Story-map: iPad companion for long form TV narratives

Abstract

Long form TV narratives present multiple continuing characters and story arcs that last over multiple episodes and even over multiple seasons. Writers increasingly take pride in creating coherent and persistent story worlds with recurring characters and references to backstory. Since viewers may join the story at different points and different levels of commitment, they need support to orient them to the fictional world, to remind them of plot threads, and to allow them to review important story sequences across episodes. Using the affordances of the digital medium we can create navigation patterns and auxiliary information streams to minimize confusion and maximize immersion in the story world. In our application, the iPad is used as a secondary screen to create a character map synchronized with the TV content, and to support navigation of story threads across episodes.