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The Pixel Lab 2014_Adam Sigel_Understanding Narrative Techniques Across Platforms
This document discusses techniques for designing narratives across multiple platforms, known as transmedia storytelling. It begins by looking at early examples from Hitchcock films and how they engaged audiences through additional materials. It then examines three levels of audience engagement - passive, casual, and active - and how participation has increased with new technologies. Finally, it addresses how to develop the world, mythology, characters, and themes of a transmedia story (the "storyworld") as well as the importance of defining the core narrative and having a clear strategic plan.
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The Pixel Lab 2014_Adam Sigel_Understanding Narrative Techniques Across Platforms
- 1. Pixel Lab Baden-Wurttemberg,Germany7 July2014 Adam Sigel @cutbait cutbaitprods@gmail.com
- 2. Understanding Narratives Techniques AcrossPlatforms Designing Narratives A
- 3.
- 4. “It's funny. Allyou have to do is say something nobody understands and they'll do practically anything you want them to.” Transmedia is all a little bit wrong ― J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
- 5. We are allblind men with the elephant Are we still so early we don’t really know what it is?
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- 7.
- 8. Where do webegin? Technological Convergence
- 9. Convergence – What’sold is new again Additional dialogue Advertise movies Trivia about Actors Movie Star is born
- 10. Hitchcock - TheClassic Auteur Engagement Through Narrative Subjective Identification - Expand the first part of the story of “Psycho” Feelings of empathy - Anxiety, Chaos, Guilt, Suspense and Tension - Building up the moment and then the release
- 11. QuickTime™ and a decompressor areneeded to see this picture. The scene that shocked the world and ruined the shower forever.
- 12. Rules of Engagement:How Hitchcock made “Psycho” into a multiplatform experience
- 13. QuickTime™ and a JVT/AVCCoding decompressor are needed to see this picture. Rules of Engagement: How Hitchcock made “Psycho” into an multiplatform experience
- 14. Early activities -Books, Oaths Rules on how the movie would be screened. Security on hand to prevent riots. Hitchcock audio recordings played in the lobby. The first Blockbuster. Rules of Engagement: How Hitchcock made “Psycho” into a multiplatform experience
- 15. Welcome to theConvergence Telecommunication has gone from scarcity to limitless abundance. Audience interactivity morphs the passive audience into an engaged audience. Colin R. Blackman
- 16. Audience Engagement Marketing hasalways been part of the storytelling Creatives have an opportunity to explore and continue creating Guided by user behavior
- 17. Levels of Engagement ThreeLevels: Passive Casual Active Audience Engagement
- 18. Passive Engagement –The World & Genre Audience Engagement Traditional marketing with community management Assets created to promote central component. “In space no one can hear you scream.”
- 19. Casual Engagement -Minor Commitment Audience Engagement Games & Apps go beyond central storylines Interface requires some participation Parallel, mirrors, expands story of the main component
- 20. Active Engagement –Story comes to life UGC, ARG, LARP Real World & Virtual Major Release of control As participation requirement increases, number of participants decreases Audience Engagement
- 21. The Culture ofParticipation “Fans are the most active segment of the media audience, ones that refuse to simply accept what they are given, but rather insists on the right to become full participants.” Henry Jenkins, Convergence Culture
- 22. Culture of Participation “ParticipatoryCulture” by Henry Jenkins 1. Low barriers to engage • Sharing 2. Training & passing of knowledge from a mentor • Belief that contributions matter 3. Social connection with each other 1. Call to Adventure • Supernatural Aid & Threshold 2. Challenges & Help from the Mentor • Revelation & transformation 3. Atonement & Return “The Hero’s Journey” by Joseph Campbell
- 23. Merchandising (Monetization) - Marketing- Community M.M.C.
- 24. Merchandising (aka Monetization) TheBusiness Model Is it a process or a product? Each component is: Unique (Content) Complete (B-M-E) Benefit (Value)
- 25. Merchandising (aka Monetization) Disney:The King of Franchise Transmedia is working when you don’t notice it
- 26. Marketing The Brand Finding the“Trans” Madison Avenue developed many of the tricks —
- 27. Making the Brand Brandas an account Deposits and Withdraws Marketing
- 28. The Brand Account- Star Wars Marketing
- 29. Community The Social Proof Fansand Followers are the new currency
- 30. Social media platformshave unique characteristics
- 31. Social media platformscan have context collapse
- 32. ABOUT STORYWORLDS… Topos - Settings Physicaland material landscape; Social and temporal aspects; Technological Mythos - Mythology Backstory; Timeline / Chronology; Archetypes Ethos - Character, Themes, POV Morality / Codes of behavior; Ethics & Values - The Center of Good
- 33. “That a taleshall accomplish something and arrive somewhere” - Mark Twain
- 34. What is point? Ifyou want to send a message, try Western Union. Frank Capra
- 35. GET TO THECORE
- 36. The Strategy isthe road map The Core is the driver of your story GET TO THE CORE
- 37. Strategy Defined: A planof action designed to achieve a particular goal. A media plan defines the roll-out strategy. Driving platform and evolution of experience. Always remember your CORE. PLAN OF ATTACK
- 38.
Editor's Notes
- #3 HOW DID I GET HERE —
- #5 Michel & I were talking that when you are at the beginning of a new art form, often there is no language yet to describe what you are doing. It’s a clumsy and inelegant word -- but this field has a lot of awful ways to describe things -- An ARG? MMORPG... Really? The games industry is the worst culprit. user experience and Information architecture. Content Matrix… Facet Map? The tech world, make everything seem so complicated on purpose to turn around and say - hire me to solve it. RESULT: It’s also a word that isn’t used very much in Hollywood or Silicon Valley and when it is can be met with an eye roll... My problem with it is that it is confusing by it very nature… NOT HERE TO DEFINE IT — Talk about the revolution and then I will now tell you the rules… all became a bit silly Trying to understand why there is confusion and how this help us understand a bit more about it. Because it may be very clear to Bad films and TV shows are turned into Transmedia projects… It doesn’t help.
- #6 The story of the Blind men with the elephant — each one feeling a different part perceive it to be what it is… IT IS ALL ABOUT PERCEPTION — But is this dues to the fact that we are really just so early —
- #7 Hollywood is Franchise — sucking the life out comic book heros.. Or is branded content — trying to sell coffee while also making an artist statement
- #8 Arts house cool installations so you get to hang out with BOB
- #9 Some look as far back as christianity…. Some say it goes back to the 19th century and tory printing press movement -- the oral tradition of sharing stories from town to town... Greek myth through various artistic media—sculpture, architecture, drama, epic-- Driven by Technology — A convergence Tendency for different technological systems to evolve toward performing similar tasks. This is why I consider the first true transmedia to be Cinema.
- #10 -100 years ago the first cross platform Experience was created Fan Magazines for new medium extended the experience while at the same time marketed the movies. - Additional background dialogue and details not in the film… “Fan magazines gave audiences a way to experience the magic of the movies beyond the theatre. The magazines also gave producers a way to promote their stars and coming films. Shift in emphasis - first ones reproduced the stories of films, the late-teens and beyond focused on the most important audience draw — the stars. You can argue that the whole idea of a movie star was and still is a trasmedia concept…
- #11 1. a book about a series killer is altered to include an additional 30-35 minutes of another story of a woman who steals money so she can run away with her boyfriend. And we are with here the whole way as she takes the money, leaves town and goes on the road -- being questioned by a police officer, trying to not act suspeicous as she buys a car, getting cuaght in rain storm that causes her get lost and turn off the main road to a old motel. What hitch is doing here is creating intense feelings of empathy in the view -- building the anxiety, the guilt, the chaos mounting... it’s all going to hell. All the way using suspense and tension until we hardly bare it... And just when Marion decides she is going go back to Phoenix, retunr the money and bring order back to the chaos she created... This happens.
- #12 This is what I call the what the hell do I do now scene -- I have been watching this movies through these eyes and now she is dead.... The lead of the movie -- the big movie star has been killed before half the movie is over. And so I must enter the POV of the only other sane person here, the poor guy who’s mother keeps killing young woman... Noran bates.
- #13 Issues with the impact of TV - changing behavior of Movie viewers — come in the middle of the film. Everything was riding on it for him. He needed to make it work. HAD TO WATCH FROM THE BEGINNING. Hitchcock was the producer -- put everything one the line -- this would make or brake his career.
- #14 A film trailer was released to theater owners.
- #15 Preview parties, Buy all the books, oath on the set Could not enter the movie after it started, rules on how tickets were purchased. Waiting lines for ticket holders. Instructing the theater owner how to make the audience a partner – The care and handling of Psycho in how to watch the film It was almost going to end up as a tv movie
- #16 It’s all really about Engagement. NOW WE HAVE Digital convergence — separate technologies such as voice (and telephony features), data (and productivity applications), and video that now share resources and interact with each other synergistically.
- #17 Open your eyes to certain things that only you will know as creators that is unique and powerful about your work.
- #18 Marshall Mcluhan Hot and cold Media Each level tells the story – each media invites a different level of participation.
- #19 First on is Narrative Engagement - Great Story!!!!! Not what people think but it is the starting point for anything. When I pitch a story in Hollywood, the producer will often ask… What is the poster… This sets the expectations Think about how movie posters are actually helping to tell the story… What you think about being in outer space… and something horrible happens to you… and no one can you hear you scream…
- #20 Most popular and little can go a long way. Gets to the idea that interface is the story…
- #21 This is about building experiences around IP...
- #22 This goes back to my experience when I came to Hollywood in the 90s and the internet was still just an infant... Dark skies -- my first job in hollywood. Websites appeared for a TV show that I was on and I wasnted to engage the fans... I was told not to...Luckly one of the creators of the show was willing to reach out and we began doing line online sessions with fans.
- #23 What is interesting is seeing how these rules for developing a story for cross platform look in comparison to this 0=--
- #24 I have come to see The 2100? These are the three vectors for most if not all Transmedia projects —
- #25 Business model/Product – Thinking very much in terms of Product. Or at some kind of ROI… Can have a social/educational value which can stand in place of monetization or Value
- #26 Star wars, Marvel, Pixar not to mention the … DIsnery.. Now Disney Star Wars… IT is a merging of great franchise that may collapse un its own weight and become a black hole? But this is because only disney has a product development group - Disney Consumer Products??? Driven by Content
- #27 Advertising… Marketing (trans) Many of the techniques that we are using.. they processes and approach and strategies all come from advertising. Television grew out of this… So as a result I am noticing that what were once Digital Marketing Companies are now calling themselves Transmedia. My favorite: A transmedia Franchise content company.
- #28 DRIVEN BY VALUE When you create a component that isnt’ so good — it becomes a withdraw — so you don’t do everything.
- #29 The worst withdraw of a major brand and one of the best.
- #30 Socialization is Driven by story or subject For Monetization - Content is king For Community - credibility is king all about Authenticity
- #31 Each social media platform has its own personality.. it’s time and place... IT’s purpose.. You see this all the time in children’s content – an uneven
- #32 Facebook is no longer cool for a 17 year old… mom and grand mom are on your feed… Fragmentation of social media It is context collapse: an infinite number of contexts collapsing upon one another into that single moment of expression. The images, actions, and words captured at any moment can be transported to anywhere on the planet and preserved (the performer must assume) for all time. The little glass lens becomes the gateway to a blackhole sucking all of time and space – virtually all possible contexts – in upon itself.
- #33 Foundation of integrating narrative... the World. 1. pitch a story 2 pitch a character 3 pitch a world Cat nip for Academics… maybe a bit too much is made of it…
- #34 You need a story before you need a world... and what is that... What is a story... I go back to this guy... A hero of mine and a great storyteller. The first rule for writing... This was a sarcastic response to another writer of his day... but I think it is bad for all of consider. But as is the case he observed most stories accomplish nothing and arrive nowhere GAME -- SHOW THE QUOTE. e in air.
- #35 This is my WHAT IS POINT slide – which is a reference to my Russian Film professor at NYU who after screening out 3 minute projects would come out and say – what is point.. Which is a more efficient way of saying it… Who needs articles? Elegant — speaking of elegant… The clarity of children… She Knows exactly what she wants… she can express it very clearly… Be careful of being too on the nose… Don’t send a message… CLARITY OF INTENTION. Frank Capra talked about it in two ways.. One is don’t make it so obvious… But the other one is to know in yourself what your point is… you will need it. It has to be clear, it has to be simple and it has to be important enough to you to do all this to make it work. It is something that we all struggle with – One the one hand you need to be clear in your own mind --
- #36 The core is the everything... the meaning, what you are saying... Please try to hone this as it get very messy to try and find the core later... particularly when work across platforms... If your project is complicated and confusing as a film, it will not get any better when you start building it out on different platforms... But as is the case he observed most stories accomplish nothing and arrive in air.
- #37 Some say start with the audience... some say it is the story... it is both. Like they say about a film... it begins with a great script.. WIth a cross platform project it is strategy. User experience is very much about storytelling — Like story is it about the flow of information Judith made this point — UX and experience design. Very important. But as is the case he observed most stories accomplish nothing and arrive in air.
- #38 This is a war -- a battle and you need a plan of attack... Transmeida bible or COntent matirx and UX -- SET A GOAL — A great Film or Television program starts with a great script… A great transmedia project begins with a great strategy. SCRIPTS — the structure, the characters, the flow of ideas… This is how I see strategy for Multiplaform. It is the MEDIA PLAN Narrative Integration – this is how it all comes together. FIND: CENTRAL (DRIVING) component and finding the touch points that are valuable to build from. So this is both about breaking down and analyzing and then putting together Remember CORE to create a unified experience. You can have the many touch points out there but it can all seem messy and uneven.
- #39 Narrative Integration – this is how it all comes together. This is also about taking the core component and finding the touch points that are valuable to build from. So this is both about breaking down and analyzing and then putting together to create a unified experience. You can have the many touch points out there but it can all seem messy and uneven. You see this all the time in children’s content – an uneven