Designing Video-Based Interactive Instructions

Static Diagrams

Static, step-by-step instructions are composed of one or more figures, which can be either illustra- tions, images, or software screenshots, often with text descriptions. One popular format is to list steps in a document with a sequence of numbered steps. For examples, Figure 2.2a shows a software application tutorial and Figure 2.4 presents a DIY How-To. Images are carefully chosen, often being edited, resized, and annotated from a large set of photos that are taken during demonstrations [208]. In some domains, tutorials are composed of figures without text annotations. Tasks of these domains focus on operating physical components–to illustrate their orientations, positions, and sequences. Furniture assembly instructions made by IKEA² present successful examples. Another common form is to present a series of actions in one combined diagram with a clear layout and step labels, which is often seen in product instructions [153].


² http://www.ikea.com/ms/en US/customer-service/about-our-products/assembly-instructions/

Figure 2.4: A 5-step static tutorial for a DIY task presented as a web document. Each step includes image(s) and text descriptions. Tutorial by David Hodson [108], licensed under CC BY 3.0.

Video Editing Techniques

Visual annotation techniques are often used in video tutorials (see Table 2.2), such as placing motion arrows next to an action and highlighting with icons or text. These visual enhancements appear before or when an action begins in a video (sometimes with a fade-in effect), and move away while or after an action ends.
In addition to enhancing a shot with annotations, conventional video editing techniques are often seen. A close-up is useful to zoom in a shot to demonstrate a detailed view. Figure 2.5a shows one example that the video switches from an overview (to provide context of the position), to a detailed view (to show how exactly the action should be performed), back to an overview (to walk to the other side), and again to a detailed view. Static tutorials can present several steps in a document that learners can quickly skim to get an overview. Since video tutorials present instructions continuously, it is important to help viewers keep track of important steps. Title scenes are one common technique for providing a distinct change for a new section (see Figure 2.5b).
When presenting instructions, operation time is an important factor to guide learners through a

Technique Example

Table 2.2: Annotation techniques for static tutorials (listed in Table 2.1) are often used in instruc- tional videos, such as arrows and highlights to show product operations¹.

¹ “How to use Loola 3 stroller” by Maxi-Cosi, https://youtu.be/p6MzLXeWBJw, licensed under CC BY 2.0

t=3:30-3:31
t=3:31-3:35 t=3:35-37
t=3:37-3:39

Figure 2.5: Conventional video editing techniques are often seen in video tutorials, such as showing a sequence of overview and detailed shots (a) and a title scene to introduce a new section, which can include animation or movement as a preview (b). Images are obtained from the same video shown in Table 2.2.

task in order to provide awareness of how much time one should allocate. In a concise video tutorial, time is often manipulated by two ways: 1) applying a fast-forward or slowdown effect to a shot, or 2) jumping (a “cut”) between two consecutive shots, often with a visual transition effect, such as fades, dissolves, or wipes. These techniques are commonly used to condense long or repetitive actions in raw footage. The latter is especially common when partial footage is removed, such as mistakes or long breaks [208]. When these effects are applied, it is important to clearly convey the time manipulation to a viewer. Subtitles, text annotation, or narration can provide such indication, e.g., “5 minutes later” or “x10” (which means 10 times faster than the original playback speed).

Online video tutorials are commonly found to be 2-10 minutes long [50]. Our formative study with 6 YouTube authors showed that this strategy provides enough information for viewers to understand the demonstration, but at the same time keep the video lively and interesting. This editing goal is applied to online videos when viewers tend to have shorter attention spans [77, 183], not for conventional industrial video production.
As videos contain a series of steps and details, common video players, however, only support a timeline for navigation. Viewers can jump to a certain point of a video with the timeline, or adjust the playback speed, but the mapping between time and steps is missing. It can also be difficult to glance through the video and reason about the complexity in each step. To fill in the gap between a video and a list of steps or topics, some tutorial authors choose to provide additional text descriptions listing the index to the video. Figure 2.6 shows an example from a YouTube video. A list of 12 items and their starting time (e.g., “Assemble (0:04)”) in the video are included in the video description, which is placed below the video player. The YouTube web interface automatically adds hyperlinks to the timestamps shown as blue links. By following these links, viewers can skip to a specific topic.

Figure 2.6: Video index to a video tutorial¹ helps viewers navigate between topics.

¹ Mountain Buggy, Urban Jungle ™ Stroller Instructions, https://youtu.be/QwCtdpDmYu8

4.