Idea Generating Exercises

Ok, so, I spoke earlier about some of the ideas I'd developed from the digital storytelling text we were all asked to read. Now we've been asked to do the excersises, which I already read through and those are what inspired me to develop those ideas. To be more specific, here are my responses to the questions:


1: What traditional ritual have you participated in that reminds you of an interactive narrative?
Pantomine- actors address audience, you address them- similar to digital tv shows that tell you to 'press the red button', to interact with the show and vote ect.
Kids puzzle books- your meant to solve puzzles on the page for the character, so it can proceed to the next page. quite mentally engaging for kids in a fiction al way- similar to computer game.

2: What game or sport have you played that could be adapted tp a form of iinteractive entertainment?
Chess- a computer game. Sounds basic, but I'm thinking of having it from the perspective of ONE piece, so you don't see the whole board, and have to work as a team with other pieces, perhaps as an online group game. would excerise the mind and induce interperson-interaction ( teamwork!)

3: What work of trad. storytelling have you read that has a narratve technique that could be aplied to digital media?
The Jane Austen Book Club (book) compares a number of characters to different Jane Austen books, telling their tales over time as the group meet, discuss and grow via flashbacks, Jane Austen quotes, and present day plot. It would make an excellent film, following the goings on of different people, and cutting it up to reveal the plot from different peoples perspectives. But altering the question to relate to Int.Media, I would say perhaps developing a DVD only bersion of a film, where you select the charcter you want to view the whole perspective of the plot from. Would be quite weak interaction though, mainly just one choice you can make, but would lead to altered perceptions of the media. wouldn't really work out though for finanical reasons. If all tv started being filmed from every angle, so many sub-plots would dvelop that it wouldn't be worth watching.

4: Describe how hyper text can deepen the characterization of a character.
Pretty obivous answer- links. Press on a name, go to a page about them. Wikipedia does it as do alot of other sites. To dwell on this a bit though, I think it is a shame that this idea of fictional characterization isn't a bit more exploited comercially. On Home and Away, if you miss an episode, you can go to the online blog of one of the characters- 'Sallys Blog' and read about the episode from her perspective (or at least used to be able to. Not certain if it still exists) This sort of idea doesn't break the fourth wall of interactivity, but I think it get's close, as the blog is being written and directed at the audience. It is a nice idea to build up a charcter online, and really give them an identity, and I think that this could be used more to generate interests in tv shows and films.

5: Can you think of any work of traditional entertainment that breaks the 4th wall? How could this be done in Int.M?

This question brings to mind a cartoon where a little boy would draw a perons or animal each epsidoe with chalk and the character would come to life and they would have an adventure. Not really breaking the 4th wall, but the idea within it is that the little boy is interacting with his drawings. Also, I am reminded of a book about a boy that has a character come out of a book, and has to convince him to go back and end the story. Think the boy then goes itno the book. These kind of magical experiences always seemed appealing to me when I was young, and I think modern interactive media is really making experiences like that seem possible, making everything in old media such as tv shows more lifelike. I'm not really answering the question here, just noting down thoughts related to the project that the questions has sparked in me. I really like the thought of making a plain book into a much more interactive object.


And finally.....
a little off subject of the text, but the idea of narrative has reminded me of a tv show I watched the other day on quantum physics, about the man who invented the theory of paralell universes and hopw they work. To recap extremely sketchily, because I'm not so sure on the specifics myself, and didn't agree with his ideas exactly, he developed a scientific idea that atoms can be in two places at once, and addressed a scientific problem about a cat in a box. If some of the atoms that form poisen react one way, the cat dies, if they react another, it lives. The spectator cannot see in the box, so it is plausible that both things happen. The cat is both dead and alive at the same time. It prompts a paralell universe. Every tiny change in the world prompts an inumerable number of them. I'm not explaining the theory too well, but that's beside the point. The whole idea of paralell universes makes me think of DVD's that offer us multiple endings, or games where we can do one thing, but know other people may be doing something else at the same time in the same game. I'm sort of typing as I'm thinking here, but I think exploring the concept of parallel universes could produce some ideas for digital narratives to use with my ideas for this project.