In Star Trek, whenever you had to be interacting with one of the display screens, was there a specific kind of sequence or any direction regarding how you tapped the screen or did you just wing it and pretend to press buttons at random?
Back in those days, I think I was the only one of all of us who had specific controls and patterns for specific tasks, and it was VERY important to me to keep those things consistent.
These days, most of the screens you see actors interact with are semi-interactive. Usually, they run a flash animation that will change when you click a key, tap the screen, or click the mouse. Some of the more complicated touchscreen ones have hotspots that do different things. So for an actor working with those screens today, the order of operations is very important, because they affect what happens on the screen. For us, it was backlit plexiglass with the occasional blinking light.
But you know what’s cool? The LCARS interface that you see all over the Enterprise D from 30 years ago *clearly* influenced the screens you see on all your favorite science fiction shows, and I love that.
