Greetings and questions

Tutstastic

I am John from www.johnheeter.com.

I am currently prototyping a new webstie. The site will be a free repository of tutorials from around the web (similar to documentaryheaven.com) while also providing paid premium content similar to digitaltutors or 3dmotive.

I have many ideas for directions to take the site. I want to pose a few questions to my core demographic so that I can gauge where I should be focusing my efforts.

You don't have to answer all questions, general impressions of the idea is also useful to me.

1. What kind of features would you like to see from a tutorials/learning/tips n tricks type website?
   
2. As a potential paying customer, what is your opinion on subscription model vs pay per content model of a tutorial website?
   
3. As a potential content producer, what payment structure would you prefer to see? A flat rate to build a tutorial, or a lower initial rate + % profit on every tutorial sold.
   
4. What kind of features would you expect from a Flash/HTML5 video player designed for watching technical video tutorials.
   
5. What is your opinion on video vs text tutorials when trying to learn a new skill or workflow?
   
6. As a student, how much would you pay to participate in a live webinar with an industry veteran? For example, a two hour session covering the creation of a piece of concept art, participants can ask specific questions and get critiques of their own work.

The community here on Polycount and many other game art forums are the primary audience for this website, and I really want to build something that people will find valuable.

Thanks for taking the time to give me some feedback! :thumbup:

Andreas

1. What kind of features would you like to see from a tutorials/learning/tips n tricks type website?

Theres so much out there that just covers stuff already done over a million times. High poly modelling, normal map baking, etc. I wanna see cool stuff like feather systems, wing rigging, other advanced rigging techniques, game ready particle FX stuff... stuff like that.

Tutstastic

Andreas wrote: »

I wanna see cool stuff like feather systems, wing rigging, other advanced rigging techniques, game ready particle FX stuff... stuff like that.

Totally agree

googlematt

What kind of features would you like to see from a tutorials/learning/tips n tricks type website?

I definitely agree with the above about more advanced tutorials. I also think that, if you get a lot of tutorials, is an advanced way of browsing the tutorials. Where people can check off different categories such as software, ability level(beginner, advanced, etc), and so on. Also if tutorial series were organized kinda like TV shows on Netflix (but when searching it can still pick out specific "episodes"). Also it would be cool if you could "follow" certain tutorial series if they aren't finished.

As a potential paying customer, what is your opinion on subscription model vs pay per content model of a tutorial website?

I like the subscription model, but with the option to buy individually. If somebody just wants one tutorial, making them subscribe is inconvenient. As a result maybe they will return because they weren't inconvenienced by your site.

As a potential content producer, what payment structure would you prefer to see? A flat rate to build a tutorial, or a lower initial rate + % profit on every tutorial sold.

This depends on the customer payment model really. If its pay-per-tut then it would probably have to be a royalty model. If its subscription, you would probably have to do flat rate, but you could do a very small "per view" royalty under subscriptions.

What kind of features would you expect from a Flash/HTML5 video player designed for watching technical video tutorials.

Chapter/Section markers if there is a text tutorial that goes along with the video. I would like the site to keep track of what videos I have watched and if it could pick back up where somebody left off in a video.

What is your opinion on video vs text tutorials when trying to learn a new skill or workflow?

I like having both, the video with a text tutorial to follow along. Other than that its personal preference.

As a student, how much would you pay to participate in a live webinar with an industry veteran? For example, a two hour session covering the creation of a piece of concept art, participants can ask specific questions and get critiques of their own work.

Honestly no idea

Tutstastic

Thanks for the great feedback Googlematt!