Interactive Television
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- Sim2
Hi,
I'm working on an interactive TV interface at the moment. Can anyone point me to some visual examples of interface work done in the US or UK? I'm really looking for 'best practice' usability and functionality, as this thing is still relatively unexplored here in Australia.
I've used DVD and games interfaces as a basis for my thinking so far, but would love to get a look at what people are doing elsewhere.
Thanks.
- sexypixel0
i did some stuff for channel 9 a while back, we got some good material from a few companies in europe. i can mail some to you if you like, big filessizes tho
- Sim20
thanks sexypixel. had a look at your 9 stuff on your site, it's nice!
Unfortunately i wont get the luxury of developing in flash, the application is mozilla browser based, and only runs the flash 3 plugin...
I don't subscribe to digital TV at home, so would be interested to know if your app is browser based too.
- sexypixel0
the one on my site is two years old, we did a more current one for them also. It runs through a visual basics program that feeds xml to generator to flash, i just did the design so my overall knowledge of the back end isnt too hot. Its on channell 99 of a digital tv anywhere in Oz.
Your using flash 3?? Its amazing that something as advanced as interactive television is restricted to a flash 3 plugin?? Sounds like they want the customer to download the flash content before veiwing and that the digital tv is mozila based, no?
- ********0
I doubt that link helps you at all, but I know that that company is doing some very interesting things with interfaces, and is experimenting with some new technologies. Hope you get something out of it.
- sexypixel0
also the channell nine server converts the flash feed to video before it gets beemed out so theres no client side application needed.
- Julius0
www.twowwaytv.com.au have a selection of games for itv in Australia also.
- sexypixel0
also, that thing we created isnt interactive, it's basically just like the scroller on channel 13 of the foxtel box,
with regards to designing for tv, the best advice i can give you is to keep font sizes above 18pt, and always tone back your vivid colors. ie: if your using white type on a dark background, have your type set at 80%-90% opacity.Your lucky to be working on this as digital tv is the way forward and you are getting a head start.
enjoy it!
- Julius0
sorry,
www.twowaytv.com.aubugger.
- Sim20
Thanks guys - all helpful.
It does seem strange, but according to our client, Macromedia charges a small fortune, to distribute anything above the Flash 3 plugin pre-installed on their set top boxes. (or at least to much for them to spend).
So basically we're working to somthing similar to Netscape 4 specifications.
It's constraining, but an 'interesting' challenge.
- Sim20
One of the things i am also realising, is the how much of a role the hardware (ie. keypad and remote) play in the considerations for the interface.
It seems that best practice so far it to 'toggle' through simple menus, however the hardware we have here only allows for 'mouse-like' movement, which to me seems frustrating especially when sitting on a couch 5 meters away from the TV trying to click a button...
hmmmmm... (grumble)
- sexypixel0
ya, most of the navigation i came across it the same as using the tab key in windows where it selects the next button in the order the clicked arrow goes. mouse movement would be a pain in the ass.
Also defining the selected button can look really shitty and cliuncky on your pc monitor, but will look better on a tv.
- Julius0
Which platform are you designig for? Open TV is allowing for some advancements, but you've got to be bleassed with a good coder to really harness the full potential though. I'd be interested to know if it was Liberate or Open TV..
- Sim20
Not really sure julius, as far as i know it's a custom set top that our client has build, linux based - running this 'psuedo' mozilla browser as it's main app interface. Basically the browser supports most of HTML 4.0 and CSS.
It doesn't seem to 'conform' officially to anything...
- blend30
Hi!
I've been working on interactive television for the last three years. We mainly use MHP and run our own xml-presentation engine software on top of it. Haven't really seen anything mindblowing graphics wise out there. Here are some lame screenshots:
http://www.itvt.com/gallery.html…
Thing that you need to remember is cross-platform scalability. XHTML/XML has worked out to be a working solution for us.
- Sim20
thanks blend3, that's a realy good resource...
i agree, as yet, i haven't seen much that's mind blowing either, but i guess that's left up to the 'TV' part...
- blend30
I also had a better site in mind. Can't find it in my favourites though. Maybe it was on the http://www.dvb.org site or http://www.mhp.org/.
You might want to check out this doctor's thesis: