The background image was constructed in Photoshop using a technique that maintained the image quality but allowed for a small file size, allowing a shorter download time. The technique employed a screen of alternating 50 per cent transparent horizontal white lines, two pixels apart, placed over a subdued montage of photographed ceramics pieces scaled to a live space' measuring 800 x 466 pixels area OPTIMIZING THE SITE To achieve a smooth screen rendering, the home page graphic was sliced into three vertical sections, taking 22, 35, and 10K up respectively. Although this still constituted a large file, each image would download progressively and simultaneously, presenting a fluid screen draw. To ensure visual content would be present on the screen immediately, low-resolution, grey scale versions of the three large graphics were created to render quickly followed by the full-colour versions overlaying them as they downloaded. The same technique was applied to all the images on the work sample pages. Buttons were made as rollovers, incorporating simple graphic symbols to indicate their function in the rollover state, with small-scale images of ceramics pieces indicating
Above: By slicing the main graphic on the home page, a relatively large-scale image could be employed to create visual presence. As well as the design considerations, an equally important aspect of the project was to ensure successful indexing for search engines. The timescale involved for this should not be underestimated, and correct Meta-tagging on the home page itself is the first step. Pointing search engines at the site can be a lengthy process.
the static state. The buttons were subsequently placed in layers on top of the main graphic, and scaled to match precisely. THE FINAL RESULT The entire home page totalled 97K, resulting in an approximate download time of 20 seconds on a 56Kbps modem. This was within the acceptable timeframe for the intended specialist audience group. The brief, to create a highly visual site with detailed graphics while at the same time maintaining a fluid rendering of pages, was achieved.
Multimedia is the broad te that encompasses any communication medium thatcombines the use ofsound, graphics, moving image, video, and animation. It generally involves some form of interactivity which distinquishes it from simple video productions. It is fast becoming integral to our daily lives, with the advent of interactive digital TV advanced mobile phones, wireless PDAs, touch-screen information kiosks, Internet-enabled pay-phones, DVD Video, and DVD-ROM. Designers are increasingly involved with the continuing growth of interactive technology The CD-ROM, once hailed as the replacement for the printed book, introduced the concept of interactive multimedia products for the mass market. Publishing houses ventured into this new medium with re-workings of existing texts, but after a brief honeymoon found little success. It PART 03. DESIGN FOR SCREEN CHAPTER TWO
became obvious that reading on screen was not the'killer application for the technology DVD has secured a much stronger market identity partly due to its focus on entertainment-- although it doesn't hurt that the disc goes in a box under the TV rather than a personal computer. Unlike CD-ROM, DVD is a truly rich medium that provides high-quality playback of video and music, with extra features such as user interaction as standard. The most widespread, but currently least interactive, form of multimedia is television graphics(advertising, trailers, title sequences, and weather charts), produced using digital technology but at present mainly delivered by analog transmission while digitalTV services catch up. The ubiquity and diversity of television gives the digital graphic designer a wide range of creative opportunities, and by its transitory nature also encourages experimentation and innovation. Design has flourished in the information screens and kiosks found in banks, airports, museums, in-store points, stations, and public spaces. Unlike their hard-copy counterparts, information kiosks can be updated easily and hold large amounts of information. Moving images and animation add to their interest and entertain the viewer. Artists have adopted multimedia as a new medium for self- expression, from on-site exhibition installations to Internet delivery The internationally acclaimed video artist BilViola has a respected'tradition of
Right: Touch-screen information kiosks, such as this example from the National Portrait Gallery in London, can offer a plentiful choice of media for the viewer. Illustrations, graphics, and video can be rendered quickly and efficiently with dedicated hardware. The constraints for the multimedia designer are far fewer in number than they are for those in web publishing. Design by Cognitive Applications, UK
167
embracing new media and technology in his work.The web artist Barminski exploits the full power of sound and animation to present his idiosyncratic view of popular culture using Macromedia's Shockwave. We exist in an environment where our senses are constantly bombarded with sounds words, and images Designers, artists. and developers are responsible for the many forms of information and entertainment that experience, b must constanty reset their we working parametes to keep abreast of new developments. Multimedia designers well be musicians, fine artists film and may video-makers, writers or editors. Graphic designers especially however, find that their visual language, together with their experience in managing words and images, provides them with an excellent basis for multimedia work.
Below: Multimedia means the designer is free to create a high- quality sensory experience using dynamic video and audio. Large high-resolution moving images such as this are impractical to transmit over the Internet, but will not tax the relatively huge data capacity of a DVD disc. Design by Tomato Interactive, UK
168
MULTIMEDIA AND WEB DESIGN-THE DIFFERENCES Much of the technology used to create multimedia projects is similar to that used to create webpages but there is one major difference. Multimedia work is not constrained by the limitations ofthe Internet.
Unlike the Internet, in which the all-important download time is reliant on the unpredictable d of modems, broadband connections spee and web servers, multimedia whether in the form of a DVD-ROM or a touch-screen museum installation is only limited by the speed the computer reads the information from the disc The advantages of this are clear. First, the viewer gets real time playing with no jerkiness in video playback or lack of responsiveness in interaction; second, far larger file sizes are permissible, enabling a greater range and quality of content. Video and audio are notoriously storage- and bandwidth hungry, but a DVD can deliver CD-quality stereo even full surround sound and better-than-TV quality video, impossible to stream over most people's Internet connections. REAL TIME PLAYING Real time' playing has to be qualified: the speed at which video can be played from a DVD-ROM or from the computer's hard drive depends on the processing power and internal architecture of the machine, factors which also affect the responsiveness of interactive elements. Toda personal computers, however, have reached a point where multimedia designers are barely limited by performance constraints. With the vast majority of systems now easily capable of playing full-screen video at 25 frames per second, choices regarding video quality and compression are more likely to be influenced by the 4.7Gb capacity of single-layer
recordable DVD media. Even this is rapidly being rendered obsolete by dual layer technology, and discs with much greater capacity are only a few years away. Nonetheless, where multimedia is to be delivered to end users' machines(rather than displayed at fixed kiosk points), it is vital to cater for the broadest audience possible. The continuing growth in computer ownership partly reflects the increased availability of low-cost consumer models which often cut corners in areas such as graphics processing. In this respect the multimedia designer faces some of the same issues as web designers. THE POINT OF DELIVERY Multimedia is often delivered over a closed network using a powerful central computer to send the work to smaller satellite machines. This is much more efficient than using the Internet, because data is transferred across a high- bandwidth local area network(LAN whether cabled or wireless-rather than meandering around the Internet. This kind of set-up can be used for"Intranet systems(web-style pages distributed only within a company), company data, training workshops, in-store information points, and similar restricted environments. Multimedia products usually offer a broader,richer, and more expanded range of outcomes than web products, which by their very nature are anchored to the more stifling constraints of the Internet. Interactive television, although barely out of its infancy and currently burdened by low screen resolution, provides a particularly exciting prospect for multimedia designers over the next few years.
169
Above: InterStitch created this title sequence for the feature documentary Daughter from Danang. In the film, a grown woman flies from America to Vietnam to reunite with her lost family and culture.
The title sequence bridges that journey with animated letterforms which blow through clouds and sky. Each letter was animated individually in Adobe After Effects and then composited with an environment of digitally created clouds and wind. Design by InterStitch, USA
170
The page The Sunday Times is probably the bulkiest ef the British Sunday newspapers, but one its rolaur supplements is only the size a CD-ROM. The Month contain interview, features, listings, reviews, and promotions. all laid cut in a style ma ching the paper's other sertions. Hyperlin
The background image was constructed in Photoshop using a technique that maintained the image quality but allowed for a small file size, allowing a shorter download time. The technique employed a screen of alternating 50 per cent transparent horizontal white lines, two pixels apart, placed over a subdued montage of photographed ceramics pieces scaled to a live space' measuring 800 x 466 pixels area OPTIMIZING THE SITE To achieve a smooth screen rendering, the home page graphic was sliced into three vertical sections, taking 22, 35, and 10K up respectively. Although this still constituted a large file, each image would download progressively and simultaneously, presenting a fluid screen draw. To ensure visual content would be present on the screen immediately, low-resolution, grey scale versions of the three large graphics were created to render quickly followed by the full-colour versions overlaying them as they downloaded. The same technique was applied to all the images on the work sample pages. Buttons were made as rollovers, incorporating simple graphic symbols to indicate their function in the rollover state, with small-scale images of ceramics pieces indicating
Above: By slicing the main graphic on the home page, a relatively large-scale image could be employed to create visual presence. As well as the design considerations, an equally important aspect of the project was to ensure successful indexing for search engines. The timescale involved for this should not be underestimated, and correct Meta-tagging on the home page itself is the first step. Pointing search engines at the site can be a lengthy process.
the static state. The buttons were subsequently placed in layers on top of the main graphic, and scaled to match precisely. THE FINAL RESULT The entire home page totalled 97K, resulting in an approximate download time of 20 seconds on a 56Kbps modem. This was within the acceptable timeframe for the intended specialist audience group. The brief, to create a highly visual site with detailed graphics while at the same time maintaining a fluid rendering of pages, was achieved.
Multimedia is the broad te that encompasses any communication medium thatcombines the use ofsound, graphics, moving image, video, and animation. It generally involves some form of interactivity which distinquishes it from simple video productions. It is fast becoming integral to our daily lives, with the advent of interactive digital TV advanced mobile phones, wireless PDAs, touch-screen information kiosks, Internet-enabled pay-phones, DVD Video, and DVD-ROM. Designers are increasingly involved with the continuing growth of interactive technology The CD-ROM, once hailed as the replacement for the printed book, introduced the concept of interactive multimedia products for the mass market. Publishing houses ventured into this new medium with re-workings of existing texts, but after a brief honeymoon found little success. It PART 03. DESIGN FOR SCREEN CHAPTER TWO
became obvious that reading on screen was not the'killer application for the technology DVD has secured a much stronger market identity partly due to its focus on entertainment-- although it doesn't hurt that the disc goes in a box under the TV rather than a personal computer. Unlike CD-ROM, DVD is a truly rich medium that provides high-quality playback of video and music, with extra features such as user interaction as standard. The most widespread, but currently least interactive, form of multimedia is television graphics(advertising, trailers, title sequences, and weather charts), produced using digital technology but at present mainly delivered by analog transmission while digitalTV services catch up. The ubiquity and diversity of television gives the digital graphic designer a wide range of creative opportunities, and by its transitory nature also encourages experimentation and innovation. Design has flourished in the information screens and kiosks found in banks, airports, museums, in-store points, stations, and public spaces. Unlike their hard-copy counterparts, information kiosks can be updated easily and hold large amounts of information. Moving images and animation add to their interest and entertain the viewer. Artists have adopted multimedia as a new medium for self- expression, from on-site exhibition installations to Internet delivery The internationally acclaimed video artist BilViola has a respected'tradition of
Right: Touch-screen information kiosks, such as this example from the National Portrait Gallery in London, can offer a plentiful choice of media for the viewer. Illustrations, graphics, and video can be rendered quickly and efficiently with dedicated hardware. The constraints for the multimedia designer are far fewer in number than they are for those in web publishing. Design by Cognitive Applications, UK
167
embracing new media and technology in his work.The web artist Barminski exploits the full power of sound and animation to present his idiosyncratic view of popular culture using Macromedia's Shockwave. We exist in an environment where our senses are constantly bombarded with sounds words, and images Designers, artists. and developers are responsible for the many forms of information and entertainment that experience, b must constanty reset their we working parametes to keep abreast of new developments. Multimedia designers well be musicians, fine artists film and may video-makers, writers or editors. Graphic designers especially however, find that their visual language, together with their experience in managing words and images, provides them with an excellent basis for multimedia work.
Below: Multimedia means the designer is free to create a high- quality sensory experience using dynamic video and audio. Large high-resolution moving images such as this are impractical to transmit over the Internet, but will not tax the relatively huge data capacity of a DVD disc. Design by Tomato Interactive, UK
168
MULTIMEDIA AND WEB DESIGN-THE DIFFERENCES Much of the technology used to create multimedia projects is similar to that used to create webpages but there is one major difference. Multimedia work is not constrained by the limitations ofthe Internet.
Unlike the Internet, in which the all-important download time is reliant on the unpredictable d of modems, broadband connections spee and web servers, multimedia whether in the form of a DVD-ROM or a touch-screen museum installation is only limited by the speed the computer reads the information from the disc The advantages of this are clear. First, the viewer gets real time playing with no jerkiness in video playback or lack of responsiveness in interaction; second, far larger file sizes are permissible, enabling a greater range and quality of content. Video and audio are notoriously storage- and bandwidth hungry, but a DVD can deliver CD-quality stereo even full surround sound and better-than-TV quality video, impossible to stream over most people's Internet connections. REAL TIME PLAYING Real time' playing has to be qualified: the speed at which video can be played from a DVD-ROM or from the computer's hard drive depends on the processing power and internal architecture of the machine, factors which also affect the responsiveness of interactive elements. Toda personal computers, however, have reached a point where multimedia designers are barely limited by performance constraints. With the vast majority of systems now easily capable of playing full-screen video at 25 frames per second, choices regarding video quality and compression are more likely to be influenced by the 4.7Gb capacity of single-layer
recordable DVD media. Even this is rapidly being rendered obsolete by dual layer technology, and discs with much greater capacity are only a few years away. Nonetheless, where multimedia is to be delivered to end users' machines(rather than displayed at fixed kiosk points), it is vital to cater for the broadest audience possible. The continuing growth in computer ownership partly reflects the increased availability of low-cost consumer models which often cut corners in areas such as graphics processing. In this respect the multimedia designer faces some of the same issues as web designers. THE POINT OF DELIVERY Multimedia is often delivered over a closed network using a powerful central computer to send the work to smaller satellite machines. This is much more efficient than using the Internet, because data is transferred across a high- bandwidth local area network(LAN whether cabled or wireless-rather than meandering around the Internet. This kind of set-up can be used for"Intranet systems(web-style pages distributed only within a company), company data, training workshops, in-store information points, and similar restricted environments. Multimedia products usually offer a broader,richer, and more expanded range of outcomes than web products, which by their very nature are anchored to the more stifling constraints of the Internet. Interactive television, although barely out of its infancy and currently burdened by low screen resolution, provides a particularly exciting prospect for multimedia designers over the next few years.
169
Above: InterStitch created this title sequence for the feature documentary Daughter from Danang. In the film, a grown woman flies from America to Vietnam to reunite with her lost family and culture.
The title sequence bridges that journey with animated letterforms which blow through clouds and sky. Each letter was animated individually in Adobe After Effects and then composited with an environment of digitally created clouds and wind. Design by InterStitch, USA
170
The page The Sunday Times is probably the bulkiest ef the British Sunday newspapers, but one its rolaur supplements is only the size a CD-ROM. The Month contain interview, features, listings, reviews, and promotions. all laid cut in a style ma ching the paper's other sertions. Hyperlin
การแปล กรุณารอสักครู่..
![](//thimg.ilovetranslation.com/pic/loading_3.gif?v=b9814dd30c1d7c59_8619)