Speaking for Scotland: a virtual Webcaster becomes the voice of Scottish government.

In 1999, the year Scotland's Parliament met for the first time in three centuries, the Scottish Executive was created to run the country's day-to-day operations. The new government body--technically Scotland's "devolved" government--handles issues such as education, transport, law, and health (tile UK Parliament in Westminster, London, still oversees defense and foreign affairs).

A Web site helped the newly formed Scottish Executive share information on domestic issues, but the government also sought some more cutting edge way to communicate. Taking inspiration from the well-known virtual newscaster Ananova, the Scottish Executive decided to create a digital spokesperson who would provide both a friendly, accessible interface and a progressive image that would reflect its pro-technology attitude.

That real time animated spokesperson, Seonaid (pronounced SHOW-na), premiered on Scotland's Junior Executive site (www.scotland.gov.uk/pages/news/junior). Says William Paul, the Scottish Executive's editor of Executive News Online, "It was decided to do a youth site, which wasn't there before, with the idea being that young people are notoriously apathetic about government. We could have had just a straightforward list of stories, but we decided to do something a wee bit more exciting and have a virtual character read the news rather than try and get the kids to read it."

Shaping Seonaid

The Scottish Executive asked Glasgow based Digital Animations Group (DAG), creator of Ananova, to develop a character who would appeal to the children of Scotland. "We built a personality profile," says Mike Antliff, CEO of Digital Animations Group, "that included a young but experienced individual who was well-educated, independent, and outgoing."

"She's female," says Paul, "because the research shows that for reasons best known to themselves, children tend to trust female broadcasters more than they do males. She's also got a bit of a Celtic look to her." Although Seonaid is an acronym for Scottish Executive Online News and information Distributor, it is also a familiar Gaelic name, he notes.

Like Ananova (see "Animated Anchors," pg. 27, June 2000), Seonaid was developed with a mix of commercial and proprietary technologies. Once artists at DAG had created her personality profile and developed an idea of how she should look, they modeled Seonaid in NewTek's LightWave. Her animation libraries are derived from LightWave, and also from Softimage XSI. For example, "We created the dynamic animation libraries in XSI," says Antliff, "and took them, through our own pipeline tool, DA: Hugo, into our core engine." DAG's own text-driven animation editor, DAT:T2, creates content for Seonaid.