Hollywood GUIs: Interface designer Coleran designs computer screens for movies

January 27, 2010

Originally hosted at https://www.basicthinking.de/blog/2010/01/27/hollywood-guis-interface-designer-coleran-entwirft-computer-screens-fuer-kinostreifen/ and translated from German

“Damn it, hurry up! The bomb is about to go off!” – Tap-tap-tap – “Hurry up!” – Tap-tap-tap – “I’m trying. I… what’s the password?” These are the kinds of scenes…

Have you ever looked over James Bond's shoulder when he's sitting at the computer? Or Ethan Hunt? Or the guy from "Bourne Identity"? All of them are tough guys who stare intently at the monitor while the counter races towards zero and the bomb in the next room ticks ever louder. What I find so fascinating about this is that none of these computers are running a standard operating system. Or have any of you ever noticed that there is a "Start" button in the bottom left, a few icons scattered around the desktop ("Paintbrush", "Word") and a dialog box in the middle asking users to enter a seven-digit password in Arial font? No, that's not how it works...

Hollywood leaves nothing to chance - and especially not to the GUI designers of the software companies. For this, they recruit their own experts, such as the interface wizard Mark Coleran, who recently gave a very insightful interview to NPR . Coleran has already worked for a number of film studios and thus for some of the productions mentioned above.

His only job is to design screens that are only used in films: "They have to tell a story," says Coleran. "'I can't get into the computer!' - How do you make it clear to someone in a running film within two seconds that you can't get into the thing?" The "Game Over" lettering that runs across the screen would be a good example of this. Viewers know immediately what it is about. Coleran draws his design inspiration primarily from computer games, but software prototypes from Microsoft or experimental university programs also provide good ideas. Here are a few examples of his work:

Movie: xXx

Movie: Lara Croft

Movie: Bourne Identity

Movie: Mission Impossible 3

I hope you noticed one or two spelling mistakes in the Bourne Identity interface above - in fact, we probably didn't notice them during the film, as the screen is only shown in millisecond shots. You can find more examples on Coleran's site.

One more thing: If you've always thought that operating the computer was part of acting, you're wrong. In reality, the actors just hammer away on a dummy keyboard - Coleran and his colleagues then sit on the set and adjust the monitor image to the inputs ("pseudo-interaction"). Any designers among you? Who has had experience with something like this?