How to hide the video progress bar?

Question

We are doing an online experiment where participants are asked to estimate the duration of a video (some coupled with sounds). Unfortunately, to activate the video, participants will always see the progress bar and the actual length of the duration. Are there any ways to automatically start the video (that is, without the participants clicking on the video)?

Thanks a lot!

Answer 1

You can remove all control elements from the video player (using the "controls" attributes in the <video> tag): HTML video Tag

After doing that, you will have to add a button and use some JavaScript on it, so that it will start the video playback.

Please note that modern browsers may allow respondents to (re-)display the control elements by right-clicking on the video element. And respondents with some technical expertise may simply ask the browser for "more information" about the video file.