Tools for interactive content on fixed screen display?
Hey, not sure this is the best sub to ask but I can’t find any subs about interaction design that seem to have any active use right now.
I regularly work on design projects for a couple of long term clients that are small-medium sized museums.
They typically have a fixed screen (either touchscreen, button input or no input) installed as part of an exhibition next to an artefact of some kind and require content to run on it that offers some nice motion graphics work often coupled with an element of interactivity - even if this only involves a few options that can be selected by the user touching them to progress to the next page etc.
I’ve standardly been producing these using AfterEffects for the motion work and output to either video or html5 via BodyMovin. I then embed that motion content onto an html page and write custom html/css/JavaScript to provide any interactive elements and allow switching between pieces of content. Lastly, I run the html content I’ve created inside Chrome run in kiosk mode to hide anything that a user might press causing an unwanted interruption to the display, I.e toolbars, exit application, minimise, right mouse button, etc.
Generally speaking the process i describe above works fine for me, thought it can be a bit slow to create content for and a bit clunky sometimes in the way some things link to each other but usually it’s good enough.
However, I often find that members of staff at both museums want to get involved themselves in creating content and enquire about the software available to help them do it.
If I wound back in time to my first piece of interaction design circa 1998, I was using Macromedia Director to produce fully animated and fully interactive content using a fairly capable WYSIWYG editor and stage for tweened animation. And it offered me the ability to drop into code when I needed to achieve a custom task.
Obviously Director is long long gone and so is Flash, which was for a while my closest alternative. Flash’s modern day resting place seems to be Adobe Animate but I find it very simplistic for a lot of my needs and really doesn’t offer the interaction side of things.
So whenever I get asked about software these folks could use to create even some quite basic content for themselves I am basically stumped.
Am I just totally disconnected from things and missing out on a decent tool to serve this purpose that is currently available and actively being updated / supported?
Or is there really no suitable alternative to hand coding this stuff as I have been doing?
In general I think the main problem is that the type of content I produce for this is designed specifically for the target screen it will run on - to which I know the exact dimensions and resolution, OS and browser etc. Whereas the majority of apps out there to help with even basic web page design are intended for use on an unknown target, with infinite variability in screen size and browser etc. I suspect there are very few customers that are looking for the former but a LOT for the later.
Anyway, any advice, ideas or pointers would be appreciated!
submitted by
belowlight to
MotionDesign
[2000s] [PC/Flash] A minigame where you punch a late worker. A stress relief kind of game.
Hi everyone, I'm here to ask you all about a game I used to play in my childhood and I totally just remembered it out of the blue when reading about Flashpoint project. Being a very easily distracted person I am, it sticks to my mind and kinda bothers me.
Platform(s): PC (Flash)
Genre: Flash minigame
Estimated year of release: 2000s (I remembered playing it with another Flash game where they took a screenshot of your current desktop and change your cursor into a hammer or a flamethrower, Hangaroo, and Cat VS Dog. Flash was still owned by Macromedia)
Graphics/art style: 2D Vector
Notable characters: Your worker
Notable gameplay mechanics: The game was in static first-person view where you are the boss and you click/press keyboard keys (I'm not sure about this one) to punch your worker to oblivion (you could at least see your hands when punching him). IIRC the game would never end and there was no scoring system. You just simply close it to stop playing.
Other details: Your worker will have a myriad of excuses every time you finished punching him. One of the most memorable excuse I remembered was "I'm sorry I'm late. My only grandma, her only grandson died. Wait a minute, that's me!". The other one is "I have to take my daughter to the *insert some place here*." I could not remember the place he mentioned because my English was not that good yet. The excuses were presented through audio files spoken by the worker, and there were no subtitles IIRC.
Thanks a lot!
submitted by
SongOfStormySeas to
tipofmyjoystick
