Fri, Mar 7, 2025
Create an Interactive Documentary with PandaSuite
Welcome to the world of interactive documentaries! 🎬
An interactive documentary is an innovative storytelling format that combines text, video, audio, and interactivity to create an immersive, multimedia experience. Whether you’re a journalist, filmmaker, or part of a cultural institution, this format allows you to explore a subject in-depth while actively engaging your audience.
That being said, creating a web documentary might seem complex: technical constraints, lack of skills, limited budget… 😅 But here’s the good news: with PandaSuite, you can easily create an interactive documentary without coding! This tool offers total creative freedom and adapts to all budgets.
Before diving into the tool, let’s go step by step to build an engaging and effective project, from the initial idea to integrating multimedia content into PandaSuite, structuring your narrative, and publishing online.
Ready? Let’s turn your idea into a captivating interactive experience! 🚀
What is an Interactive Documentary?
An interactive documentary is a next-generation storytelling format, designed for the web and user interaction.
Unlike traditional documentaries, interactive documentaries rely on non-linear, interactive storytelling. They can include text, images, videos, audio, and interactive elements to captivate audiences and offer an immersive experience.
🎯 What makes a great interactive documentary?
- Interactive storytelling that engages the audience
- A non-linear experience where users explore at their own pace
- A mix of various media formats: text, video, audio, infographics
Interactive documentaries are especially popular in journalism and education, as they offer a new way to share information and tell stories. They empower the audience to choose their own path through the content.
Notable Interactive Documentaries
- Prison Valley – An immersive dive into the prison town of Cañon City, USA.
- Alma, a Child of Violence – The testimony of a former gang member in Guatemala.
- Fort McMoney – An interactive game documentary about Canada’s oil industry.
💡 Good to know: Many older interactive documentaries were created using Flash, a now obsolete technology. With PandaSuite, your project will be built in HTML5, ensuring compatibility across all browsers and devices.
Why Choose PandaSuite for Your Interactive Documentary?
Several tools specialize in creating interactive documentaries, such as Klynt and Racontr. So why choose PandaSuite?
What makes PandaSuite different?
- A simple and intuitive WYSIWYG editor
- Total creative freedom, with no pre-designed templates
- Many interactive features (pop-ups, scrolling, quizzes, drag & drop, etc.)
- Regular software updates
- A premium model with affordable pricing
- A support team ready to assist you
- Various export formats (web or native applications)
📝 Full transparency: This article is published on PandaSuite’s blog, so we’re a little biased 😅. But the incredible projects made by our users are what motivated us to share this guide!
Among the projects created with PandaSuite: the University of Ottawa’s interactive documentary “Les infirmières de la folie”, Anthony Liefooghe (Canasucre Production) for the transmedia project “Teufel”, and Sophie Taboni & Nicolas Catherin for their award-winning interactive travel story “Ici tout va bien”.
“PandaSuite quickly became my go-to tool. The components are intuitive and offer virtually no creative or functional limitations. It’s also the most enjoyable, stimulating, and seriously fun design interface I’ve ever used.”
Step 1: Designing Your Story & Structuring Your Narrative
Before anything else, your interactive documentary needs a compelling story. Simply adding interactive buttons to a video isn’t enough – the experience must be seamless and engaging.
Ask Yourself These Questions Before You Start:
- What’s the core message of your documentary?
- How much freedom do you want to give your audience?
- How will you structure your sequences to keep users engaged?
Three Common Narrative Structures:
- Branching – Users follow a path based on choices
- Exploratory – Users navigate freely through an interactive space
- Personalized – Content adapts based on user choices
N’hésitez pas à utiliser un outil pour cartographier votre narration avant de commencer.
Step 2: Building Your Interactive Documentary with PandaSuite
With PandaSuite Studio, creating an interactive documentary is as simple as playing with LEGO blocks. 🧩
How does it work?
- Download PandaSuite Studio, available for Windows, Linux, and MacOS.
- Start a new project and choose the screen dimensions.
Responsive design management ensures that your layout adapts seamlessly to different screen sizes. You can add a new layout at any time during the creation process. However, this may require adjustments to ensure your content displays correctly in the new format.
- Add your media: images, videos, audio files, PDFs, and more. To upload content, simply click on the Files icon in the top menu of the PandaSuite Studio interface.
- Create your screens: Choose whether to split your content into individual screens or combine multiple elements into a single screen. Each screen can contain interactive elements such as buttons, links, interactive zones, slideshows, and more.
• Define interactions: buttons, transitions, menus
• Test and adjust: ensure smooth navigation and user experience
Useful resources to get started:
To help you get started, download this free template:
Interactive Documentary Template
Step 3: Publishing and Sharing Your Interactive Documentary
You have several options for publishing your project:
- On the Web – Accessible from any device via a simple URL.
- As a mobile app for iOS & Android – Export a native app and publish it on app stores.
Track engagement by connecting an analytics tool to your interactive documentary.
Conclusion
Interactive documentaries are a powerful, immersive way to tell stories. And with PandaSuite, you can focus on creativity without worrying about technical constraints.
💡 Now it’s your turn to give it a try! Try PandaSuite for free and start creating your own interactive documentary. We can't wait to see your projects! 🚀
