Producing Interactive Television

Interactive Television Production is essential reading for all broadcasting and new media professionals - whether in production, marketing, technology, business or management. It will also be of interest to media students and anyone looking to get an insight into the future of television production. It provides a practical, step-by-step guide to the processes and issues involved in taking an interactive television idea through to being an operational service - based on the knowledge and experience of leading interactive television producers. This book can be used as a quick-and-easy reference guide, with each chapter containing a 'Chapter in 30 seconds' summary for easy reference, or read from cover to cover. Using accessible language, the author provides detailed descriptions of iTV software technologies (OpenTV, MHEG-5, TV Navigator), delivery technologies (cable, satellite and terrestrial) and production tools. There are also entire chapters devoted to key issues like the commercial side of iTV and the latest work on usability and design. The accompanying web site www.InteractiveTelevisionProduction.com contains useful links designed to help with common iTV questions and issues. There are also entertaining quizzes for each chapter that let you test your knowledge of the concepts introduced in the book.

The concept of Interactive Television (ITV) is not an easy one to pin down. It has taken many forms, spurned good and not-so good connotations, and has confused the public and experts alike. Producing Interactive Television aims to unravel the confusion by taking an in-depth look into how the merging of digital and Internet Technologies is changing the way people receive, watch and react to TV, and the way TV producers plan and develop productions. For easy understanding and clarity of the topic of ITV and its content development process, the book is divided into three parts. Part One offers the necessary background information on ITV's origins and future. Part Two is a start-to-finish guide to the enhanced TV development process, including hands-on lessons for the prototyping and HTML implementation of ITV interface designs. In Part Three, TV producers and ITV developers share their real-world ITV projects, providing insightful advice on the pitfalls and successes of ITV content creation and the overall industry.

"This forward-looking book focuses on interactive television (ITV), and illustrates how it is changing the face of TV broadcasting. The book provides professionals with important technical, strategic, and creative expertise to help in the development of ITV systems and with the assessment of their future business potential. Interactive TV Technology and Markets explains how bandwidth limitations associated with analog TV signals are eliminated as cable, satellite, and terrestrial TV network operators switch to digital bandwidth."--Jacket.

Gain a thorough understanding of the nuanced and multidimensional role producers play in television and emerging media today to harness the creative, technical, interpersonal, and financial skills essential for success in this vibrant and challenging field. Producing for TV and New Media, Fourth edition is your guide to avoiding the obstacles and pitfalls commonly encountered by new and aspiring producers. This fourth edition has been updated to include: "Focus on Emerging Media" sections that highlight emerging media, web video, mobile format media and streaming media Sample production forms and contracts Review questions accompanying each interview and chapter Interviews with industry professionals that offer practical insight into cutting-edge developments in television and emerging media production Fresh analysis of emerging media technologies and streaming media markets Written especially for new and aspiring producers with an insight that simply cannot be found in any other book, this new edition of a text used by professors and professionals alike is an indispensable resource for anyone looking to find success as a television or emerging media producer.

Television sports production is difficult, and producing a remote sports event is arguably the most complicated to orchestrate. Many factors can adversely affect your production, including weather, lighting, and natural sound. A successful production is dependent on extensive planning, from budgets, technology and location to the intricacies of the sport itself. With so much at stake, why not learn from the experts? Learn television sports production from the ISB, producers of the Olympics, who rely on the very same guide to train their own production staff. "Television Sports Production" walks you through the planning, set-up, directing, announcing, and editing involved with producing an event. Detailed descriptions of mobile units/OB vans, cameras, audio equipment and lighting requirements enable you to produce live or taped coverage of sporting events like an expert. You'll learn about the special considerations involved with producing various types of sports--from camera placement in figure skating to where to put the microphone during a tennis match. Whether producing a local high school football game, the Super Bowl, or something as complex as the Olympics, this book will give you an inside look at how a remote production operates and the role of each participant.

The first-ever, fact-filled introduction to the brave new world of interactive TV: what it is, its services, and the across-the-board impact on television, cable, and computer industries. It covers the basic standards. Offers state-of-the-art coverage of interactive TV business models, the hype and reality of media convergence, TV datacasting, PC-based receivers and other smart appliances, case histories, and more.

Technology is meant to make life easier and to raise its quality. Our interaction with technology should be designed according to human needs instead of us being required to adapt to technology. Even so, technology may change quickly and people and their habits change slowly. With the aim of supporting user acceptance of iTV, the focus of this book is on the usability of iTV applications. A method for developing interaction design patterns especially for new technologies is presented for the first time. The main characteristics covered in this new approach are: systematic identification of recurrent design problems; usability as a quality criterion for design solutions; integration of designers into the pattern development process including identification of designers' needs, and iterative evaluation and optimisation of patterns to encourage designers to accept and use them; usability testing to identify proven design solutions and their trade-offs; presentation of specific design guidelines.

Television is the dominant mass medium of the current era. Its lifeblood in whatever form it takes is content - the programs it broadcasts to the public. This book is an insider's view of the business of production of TV programs, for university-level courses and for those in the industry wanting to upgrade their skills. It is the story of the TV producer, and the leadership of creative people, the management of resources of production (including funding) and the guiding of the production process. Covering all genres of television - drama and comedy, documentary and current affairs, infotainment and reality TV - it goes step-by-step through the journey from program idea to program delivery and beyond.