week 4 - interactive

This week we had a guest speaker Dr.Chris Hales, whose specialism was interactive films. Some of his films where really interesting, in particular the interactive painting, which needed the audience to encourage a man across the painting by shouting, in order to keep the landscape level.

The first successful internative film was made in 1967 and consisted of two alternative endings, with a inserted clip from the director himself, talking tot eh audience about what choice they should make. The clip was filmed in the past tense and was made to look like it was interacting. Cards were used as a form of voting, which is was simple and inexpensive.


Chris showed us one of the first films that was totally interactive, which was called "kinoautomat". The film was based on the audience voting to see what happens next. The film used several projectors, each synchronised together, so that it they could have each alternative ready on demand. This was very clever for its day and a major improvement on early versions.

This interaction with film links strongly with one of my choices, which is sky plus. In the same way it works by having the audience control how the story should move by either pausing, rewinding or fast forwarding.