E-Publishing - Week 12

Dearest readers, today is a very sad day. It is the last E-Publishing lecture and therefore my last E-Publishing blog. Sad times. But on a much happier note.....it is 11 days til Christmas!!!!! Oh and of course I know you're wondering, it was a robin in my advent calender today.

Today's lecture was literally TERRIFYING! The Internet is dangerous, evil and unsafe was the theme of the lecture, and as I am typing I am wary as to not type by accident any "trigger" words that could trace me back to being involved in something evil (in fact could evil be considered a trigger word? oh dear....) Did you know, for example, that people now entering Iran are asked to show their facebook accounts? Scary huh! Apparently it is possible to tell now if someone is gay or straight by the contents of their news feed and their conversations with friends. Probably not such a big deal over here in the Western countries but places such as Uganda are campaigning for the death penalty for those found guilty of homosexuality. (Seriously! Click here to read more)

And as for protesting over the Internet...that's definitely out. No matter how hard you try you can never hide yourself on the web. Every computer has it's own unique IP address which can be traced straight back to you, and believe me, those groups that you join on Facebook filled with innocence and good feeling, that's being traced as well. China of course took it one step further and banned the use of Twitter!

There is definitely a vast amount of information on the Internet, but it is very easy to control what people see and read. We may see the Internet as a way of expressing ouselves, spreading awareness and giving us a voice but it is clearly not as utopian as we'd like to believe.

But let us briefly move on to a rather less scary topic, which is podcasting. It is built on the development of RSS feeds and was invented by Apple for use on the Ipod. Podcasts are mainly used for audio, to catch up on your favourite radio shows and can be easily downloaded from places such as Itunes. The BBC IPlayer is an example is a video podcast. And the good news is is that it is incredibly easy for you to create your very own podcast!! Check out Clickcaster to start podcasting now!

So that is it! E-Publishing is officially over. Well actually no its not as I still have that final project to do (you know the one I've been moidering on about for the last few entries). But as far as the lectures go, this was the last one and therefore its time for me to retire from the world of E-Publishing blogs.

So all that is left for me to say is:

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year !!!!

Nadolig Llawen a Blwyddyn Newydd Dda!!!

E-Publishing - Week 11

Ooooh so it's week eleven, also known as December 7th, also known as 18 days to Christmas and also known as the day that I got a chocolate snowflake in my advent calender. And that's right it's time for an E-Publishing overview!!!

So let's have a re-cap of what we've learnt over the weeks.

We've looked at blogging, publishing books using Lulu, interactive fiction, online news and visual novels and where everything started, what exactly is e-publishing.

So what is E-Publishing? After three....one, two, three....... E-Publishing is short for Electronic Publishing and refers to the publishing of works online, on compact disk, emailed or on an electronic reader. Simple yes? And of course E-Publishing refers to blogging, publishing books through, interactive fiction, online news and visual novels...ties in nicely. They all need a variety of technologies such as xml, sgml, html, pdf, PostScript, Internet, World Wide Web, etc etc and of course are all connected through E-Commerce....remember the publishing value chain? (and incase you've forgotten e-commerce is the buying and selling of products and services on the web or electronically). Oh and while we're hovering near the subject, now is the time when I should also bring up the term Print on Demand or P.O.D. It is a printing technology that in which new copies of a book are not printed an order has been received, obviously this technology did not come about until digital printing began as it was not considered economical before then. Smaller companies and also academic publishers rely solely on P.O.D whereas bigger companies tend to only use it in special circumstances.

P.O.D of course brings us back to Lulu. Lulu the online software that anyone can use to print their own copy of an out of copyright work. This is definitely a good example of a P.O.D company.

Basically. All forms of E-Publishing are linked by their base technology. All rely on the internet, and also formats such as .pdf and .html to make them work. Blogs also rely on RSS feed to show regular updates and to inform your followers of your latest posts, also they rely on the convention of hyperlinks (obviously as I've already used them in this blog entry alone). Anyway it is safe to say that fundamentally as their basic level all forms of E-Publishing can be linked by their reliance on technology. Whether it be in the form of the Internet and the World Wide Web or by RSS feeds and P.O.D, E-Publishing would simply not exist without today's technologies.

E-Publishing - Week 10

Visual Novels

In the lecture today we looked at graphic interactive fiction. Which basically speaking is the interactive fiction that we have been looking at over the last few weeks with added pictures and graphics. Most visual novels are programmed and are often split between passive and interactive.

The most well known example of a visual novel or a graphic interactive fiction is Inanimate Alice. Inanimate Alice follows the story of Alice, a young girl growing up in the early 21st century. There are so far, four episodes of Inanimate Alice available, although 6 more are said to be 'coming soon'. You read each story through the point of view of Alice along with her PDA and her interactive friend Brad. Through each contained episode you also have the opportunity to complete mini interactive tasks.

'Ren'Py' is a software used for creating graphic interactive fiction and visual novels. According to Ren'Py, visual novels are "computer-based stories presented using words, pictures, sounds and music." Ren'Py allows you to create visual novels easily and efficiently. Ren'Py can also be used to create Simulation Games.

In the second half of the class this week we were asked to download the Ren'Py software for free and have a go and creating a visual novel using the test images that come with the software.

The simplest way to go about starting to create a visual is to:

1. Create a background
2. Create a character
3. Create what the character can do

Example of how to imput instructions into Ren'Py

#background images

image bg 'beach' = "beach.jpg"
image bg 'cliff' = "cliff.jpg"
image bg 'park' = "park.jpg"

#declare characters

$ c = character ('cain', colour = 001100)
$ s = character ('stephen', colour = 110000)


etc.


After practicing with the software in the lecture I discovered that it was a lot easier to use and more rewarding than creating an interactive fiction. I got better results and have decided that a visual novel or graphic interactive fiction might be a better idea for my final project than the interactive fiction. So since the lecture I have downloaded the Ren'Py software onto my laptop and have started looking into ideas for my final project. I have also done a few tests on the software in order to familiarise myself with the technology. I'm happy with my choice now for the final project, I think that a visual fiction is definitely the best idea for me. It will also be interesting for the essay part into looking into the development of visual novels, how to publish them and how to market them. It seems that everything that I have learnt in the E-Publishing lectures will be coming together for the final project regardless of which route I will take.

E-Publishing - Week 9

So the lecture was cancelled this week but instead we had some individual meetings set up for later on in the week. The meetings were to discuss what we were thinking of doing for our final projects. I can't help but thinking that there is definitely an easy route through the final project in the form of publishing a book through Lulu, I'm thinking that that is a 10 minute job and then it's pretty much done. However, my interests lie in new media and gaming so I'm planning on making life a lot harder for myself and concentrating my final project on interactive fiction. (Note: I am probably going to regret this at a later stage).

For the final project we have to create the project itself (in my case the interactive fiction) and also a critical piece to go with it, examining the area and how we could market the product. My tutor suggested maybe using an existing film such as Casablanca and maybe turning that into interactive fiction. I think that it is definitely a good idea to use an environment that people are already familiar with rather than creating one from scratch. I wonder if Joss Whedon would mind if I created "Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Interactive Fiction Game".....hmmmmm.

I have used some of my free time by having another go at Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, trying to familiarise myself with the language used. Yep, I still managed to blow myself up!

E-Publishing - Week 8

Disaster!! I had an accident in reading week resulting in me tearing ligaments in my ankle. Ouch! Unfortunately this meant that I was unable to attend lecture 8 of E-Publishing. But nevermind I have found the lecture outline on Moodle and have decided to have a go at teaching myself this week.

So on the lecture plan it says that we will be looking more indepthly at interactive fiction, carrying on from Week 6. Starting with a man called Dennis G. Jerz. But who is Dennis G. Jerz? Jerz is a well known writer and scholar of interactive fiction, he is currently a professor of English and New Media Journalism at Seton Hill University in Pennsylvania. He is mostly interested in blogs, interactive fiction, web design, creating games and lecturing on games.

http://tlrg.bangor.ac.uk/moodle/mod/resource/view.php?id=1381

The link above shows the script of a talk that he did on interactive fiction. In the talk he explains about interactive fiction and his views on the subject. He feels that it is very complex and it is a technology to be 'mastered' not to just come into lightly, and feels that many experience a love/hate relationship with interactive fiction for its' complexities and it taxing the gamer's brain. I feel that it is important for anyone who is interested in gaming and interactive fiction to look more into Dennis Jerz as he has some fascinating views on the subject.

I have had a look at "The Breathing Wall" which is an interactive fiction similar to Inanimate Alice. There is a taster demo online for The Breathing Wall but you will need to order the CD in order to interact with the narrative. Stories such as these only really come to life when the reader is interacting with them, when the reader is controlling them, that is what makes them stand out as interactive fiction rather than merely fiction novels.

I'm hoping that next week's blog will have more detail than this one! This is the best I could do I'm afraid!

E-Publishing - Week 7

Week seven is the Univeristy's reading week so there was no E-Publishing lecture this week. The lack of lecture gave me some time to think about what I might want to do for my final project. After learning about Interactive Fiction last week I think that that is the route that I would like to go down for my final project as it ties in with other modules I've taken in University including ones to do with games and virtual environments and also new media. I found the lecture on Interactive Fiction last week very interesting and informative and definitely something that I would like to try doing myself.

So I decided to look more into Interactive Fiction. Interactive Fiction being a form of software, where there is typically a simulated environment and characters that are controlled by simple text commands such as "look around" or "pick up....". The whole 'game' or 'narrative' is entirely text based and is usually in the form of an adventure story. Interactive fiction was most popular during the late 1970s to the mid 1980s and is known as being the oldest form of computer gaming.

Using the software that we were shown in lecture six I decided to have another go at trying to create a virtual JP Hall (the Creative Studies building). Again the process was extremely slow and very frustrating. I can only imagine how long it must take to create an entire game. I seem to have been working on this for hours and all I've managed to do is get my character to look at a vending machine. It is fairly safe to say that if I will be creating an interactive fiction based final project I shall have to start studying the tutorial manual for the software over the next few weeks in an attempt to familiarise myself with the commands.

Ooh it's going to be a busy christmas!!!

E-Publishing - Week Six

Programmed Writing

Practical lecture in which we looked at interactive fiction and in particular 'The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy' which is a text-based game/'story' produced by Infocom.

In the first half of the lecture, we were split into pairs and were set the task of using the Hitchhiker's Guide software in order to progress in the game as far as the pub. The game itself, I found to be very interesting, and also unusual to be playing a game without pictures. As a pair we found it quite difficult to progress using text controls and commands in order to do the most simple of tasks, I also think that it would help to know the story behind the game.

In the second half of the lecture we were introduced to software called 'Inform' (free download to any computer) which would allow us to create our own text-based game. After talking us through how to use the basic controls we were set the task of creating a virtual building similar to the Creative Studies building. The process for creating a text-based game is very slow and sometimes infuriating but when you get it right it can be very rewarding.

If we want to, we can use this software to create our own text-based game for the final assignment. I feel that if I was to do this I would need a great deal of practice on the software and I would have to do a lot of reading into how to create various details. However I do feel that is a preferable project for me and I am considering doing this for my final project.