Direct Manipulation in Videos

Written by Thomas Baekdal on May 27, 2008

Please note, the video's on this page is currently unavailable while we are moving to a new server!

A group of people from Toronto University have come up with an ingenious way to manipulate videos. Traditionally this is done using some kind of "bar", but what if you could simply drag each element right in the video itself.

This is the concept of Direct Manipulation Video, and by the looks of it, it is pretty cool. Check out the demonstration and the "how it works" videos below.

Demonstration

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How it works

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Of course usability professionals, like me, will quickly point out that this is not a perfect way to manipulate videos. The biggest problem is that you do not know what can be manipulated without having to mouse over the video in order to find a hot-spot (remember "Mystery Meat Navigation"), or watch the video from start to finish to see what moves - and thus can be manipulated.

This is however still a very important experiment. And it could be quite useful as a supplementary navigation option.

This concept has also been explored by several advertisers, which is... neat!

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(via LabConfidental and Dimp)