Interactive TV Production

Interactivity works for any genre – not just choose-your-own-ending drama. Linear TV is already full of multi-perspective, multi-layered, multi-timeline stories.

Connecting up sequences in non-linear ways allows you to give your viewers more personal agency to follow their interest deeper – or skip on.

It can feel a bit mind-blowing as a newcomer to this, but it doesn’t need to. There are some key secrets to crafting satisfying and resonant stories – we’re here to help!

”You have a seriously impressive piece of software that will clearly save many hours of headaches!
Writer/Director, UK/US drama series

Drama

The value of interactive drama productions is already clear. Netflix’s Emmy-winning Black Mirror movie, Bandersnatch gained audience and critical acclaim last year and Netflix have followed this up with interactive stories of all kinds : childrens, natural history, factual.

But even with Netflix’s resources, Bandersnatch producers Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones said it was “like doing a Rubix’s Cube in your brain. Everyone went a bit bananas at some point”. This is because there were no production tools for creatives used to delivering linear films. Until now.

Stornaway.io helps throughout the process of production. Letting you write, map out, script and pre-visualise your story and viewer journeys. Interactive drama should be fun to create. With Stornaway.io, it will be.

Children's

The statistics show that kids are increasingly turning to YouTube for content. And the reason might surprise you: because they feel it gives them more “control”. Even though 70% of videos are prompted by the YouTube algorithm.

Stornaway.io allows children’s content producers to truly shape their viewer journeys, engaging kids with a clickable experience they enjoy, keeping them engaged with the content they want their viewers to watch whilst giving them the feeling of exploring it for themselves.

With the new “Either/or” feature in Stornaway.io, there is also huge potential for fun educational and ethical content that lets children watch and play, while understanding the power and consequence of the choices they make.

”You’ve created a fantastically straight forwards and intuitive way to put together interactive stories. It’s a brilliant way for kids to consume natural history, and to learn.
Producer/Director, UK/US unscripted series

”We’ve come back into the office buzzing. We have been worrying about how we’d actually pull these shows off (just developing them has been a headache…) so this couldn’t have been better timed."
Head of Development, international non-scripted production company

Specialist Factual

Interactive stories have the power to help audiences see the result of choices, engage more deeply with their interests and see multiple perspectives on the same subject.

We understand the amazing craft and logistics involved in specialist non-scripted series and the volume of footage and archive in Natural History particularly. We also understand the need to control budgets and schedules while delivering the best storytelling possible.

We see three common types of projects being developed using Stornaway:

Hybrid: make interactive specials to complement your linear series.

Pure interactive: develop interactive-first stories, crafting journeys through different characters and ideas to see multiple perspectives, reveal secrets or explore complex subjects.

Reversioning: cut up existing clips, sequences and episodes into Story Islands and connect them into seamless interactive experiences and exciting viewer journeys.

Animation

Stornaway lets you put more money on screen and keeps your creative team in charge of interactive production.

With our simple drag and drop interface, we make it extremely easy for game and animation companies to explore ideas, pitch to commissioners and play test with their whole team throughout production, without coding.

Simply upload early storyboards, animatics, scenes and rough cuts to Stornaway. Add invisible hotspots over the top of your own buttons and clickable areas.

Our clean minimalist interface is designed to put your content first.

Our customers are also developing new revenue streams using existing IP, re-versioning old series and characters in delightful new ways to increase brand awareness and attract new audiences.

”Working remotely has placed a greater emphasis on innovative and interactive content, so Stornaway could provide us with great opportunities
Producer, interactive animation special for US broadcaster

”Every indie should have Stornaway licenses to develop and pitch interactive ideas to commissioners - and broadcasters should specify Stornaway as the standard for this
Commissioner, international TV network

Live/Current affairs

News and current affairs producers are using Stornaway for both live shows and pre-recorded stories.

For pre-recorded stories, let your viewers drill down into complex ideas, follow their interests and see different perspectives on a story. Help them understand the consequences of different choices and scenarios.

For live shows, craft more engaging and satisfying improvisation and interactivity with studio guests and online audiences, by visually mapping out your questions and decision points in Stornaway and connecting sections of non-linear script.

Using our storyboard, you can collaborate with your team right up to the point of broadcast, sharing high levels of understanding about possible outcomes depending on predicted scenarios.

Want to chat through an idea pre-commission?
Have a story idea but not sure how it would work interactively? Are you a commissioner looking to use Stornaway to release interactive content with existing brands?