Media Forms

books and movies

What are the practical differences between books and movies as storytelling forms?

1. Customary Form
   • Books use written language as the primary form of communication.
   • Movies are a conglomerate media in that customarily use audio-linguistic-visual, music-video-imagery and music-pantomime as multimedia. Other combinations are possible but less common. They are akin to the musical concert, the musical play and the documentary as forms.
2. Character's Expression of Inner Life
   • Books customarily use linguistic expression to peer into thought through the thoughts and perceptions of characters. This can be a short cut to knowing a character in story telling. But using it that way tastefully is challenging.
   • Movies customarily limit the window into the thoughts of characters to that which may be construed from the characters dialog and choices of activity. There lies the similarity to real relationship except that the viewer is a voyeur. The viewer sees more sides than even a spouse, close friend or counselor.
3. Expressing Emotion Outside of Pure Language
   • Books require that the reader use imagination to flesh out body language and other movement from written dialog.
   • Movies facilitate the use a trained professional's body language, cadence, tone and annunciation to carry the story and produce a lasting effect in the viewer.
4. Conveyance of Setting
   
   • Books require that the reader use imagination to flesh out setting from the writer's imagery.
   • Movies make use of constructed sets, indigenous scenery and animation to convey the setting setting.
     
5. Storytelling Point of View
   • Books rely on the writer as the primary storyteller. The reader learns about the writer's and editor's point of view.
   • Movies require that storytelling is collaborative in nature. The viewer is exposed to a conglomerate perspective as it is represented through many of the people: writer, director, producer, actress and actor.

the interactive scene

Questions: In what ways can artistic expression be interactive? Which of these ways have the potential of high impact? How can media such as the DVD and the WWW support these ways? How does one limit the combinatory explosion that interactive stories? How might the storyboard be leveraged?

Partial Answers: It is left up to the creative selectivity of the writer to get all of the elements necessary to invoke the feeling of control which interactivity demands. The problem with interactive is the same problem that games have. In real life you can't just pause. How is that simulated? The interactive writer/producer can make it costly to jump out of the story, either monetarily or emotionally. Perhaps the characters build trust in the player/viewer over time and it is cut back with the logarithm of pause time.