I came across this today. These free icons can come in handy for future app development.

Animation, cartoons… where would I be without them today? Something about the whole concept of being able to bend reality, stretch solid objects, and put someone’s body thru tortuous contorting, yet he still bounces back within five frames resonates with my soul. Tex Avery is my hero. His was the turning point in animation history as he ushered in the ridiculousness of jaws dropping to the floor, tongue rolling out of the mouth about four feet, eyes literally jumping off the face. In one scene there is a chase between 2 characters, one makes a sharp turn, the other tries to change direction and but slides completely off of the screen movie reel. Such theories may not sound impressive these days, but everything before that was the Disney-esque ultra realitic mimic of everyday life, no bending the space-time continuum or the off the wall craziness that we have come to love and expect. So why the hell am I mentioning all of this? Cartoons have taught me timing, exaggeration, special effects. the list goes on and on. Thank God that Flash and interactive offer creative outlets that employ people like myself. The only reason I know that animations and transitions look aesthetically correct is because of teachers like Avery. Thank Tex.

This is a perfect example of how simple and effective Flash games can be. You hold the mouse down and move the cursor to shoot orbs. Why the hell are we so intrigued by such simple concepts? I could sit here for hours and play this without getting bored. If I’m having fun, I am going to pass this to all my friends to enjoy as well. Commercial and viral possibilities? HELL YEAH!!! I like the bitmap blurring effect that was added as well, its a nice touch.

VIEW CAMPAIGN LAYOUT

We worked with AMV-BBDO to produce the whole interactive side for Guinness Tipping and I must say that this presentation illustrates to the vastness of the campaign. A project can potentially be so large that a single slide cannot do it justice. We built everything that was internet related on this.

Whether you are a seasoned veteran or new to the Interactive game, you may have a home at ICG. We are especially looking for interns. You don’t need to know a whole lot about Flash, you just have to be very interested in growing in Interactive, be likable, hardworking and willing to learn alot. Either apply thru the website or reply to this post.

Personal Task Manager
This is a software that we are testing out at work to log our actual productivity. It asks you what project you are currently working on every predetermined interval. We just started using it and it seems pretty detailed and helpful. I’ll document my experience. If you want to try it out download it here:
Software download
IF you don’t have the .net 2.0 framework installed, download and install from here:
.net 2.0 framework download

View Banner

I built this banner a while back. I was able to convince the client early on to have this built in Flash 8 because that was the dawning of BitmapData in Flash. Without BitmapData there would have to be layers upon layers of MovieClips with transparent images in them which is never a good thing. I don’t even want to think about how hard this thing would be chugging the processor. Everything had to be under 40K filesize which wasn’t easy with such a graphics heavy banner. Basically all I did was overlap a bunch of images (the individual sprays) for each color as the spraycan moved across. That gave the illusion the can was spraying. When the can stopped spraying I took a snapshot (BitmapData.draw()) of the container MovieClip which housed the spray and removed all of the spray MovieClips from the stage. That kept the Flash player free and clear of having to constantly redraw all of those transparent images. It all came out pretty smooth, I was happy about that.

We are currently doing some big work for a major client. We hire some forth party vendor to do some heavy lifting for us because we are swamped with other work. I was never in any of these calls so I don’t know the whole story. Maybe the vendor has some really great reasons for dropping the ball but here’s my take on it. Apparently the vendor was talking the right talk and promising us the moon. They had a good amount of time to create several Flash sites. Time passes and we need to see progress. The vendor literally submits an FLA with an imported PSD file in it for graphics. Some minimal code which was in AS2 when in the contract we specifically stated AS3. What they submitted may have taken one of us here maybe 30 to 45 minutes to do. We now have a week to bring the project inhouse and spit out 5 sites along with all the other work we are supposed to deliver to our other clients. If you ask me who really gets scarred in this transaction it is the Digital Media team. Its crap like this that keeps us at work till 2 am instead of 10 pm.

A good rule of thumb if you are a vendor is to under promise and over deliver. That gives your client that “HOLY CRAP THESE GUYS ARE AMAZING” bang factor that compels them to keep you as a vendor, send you an ungodly amount of work, and pay you your well deserved hefty fee (within reason of course). If a vendor wants to run with the Pros, he has to train like a Pro, commit like a Pro, and deliver like a Pro. Don’t jerk your clients around especially when there are reputations to uphold and potential millions of dollars at stake. If you make a commitment and you don’t know how the hell you are going to pull off some magical whurly gig that you have never done before, work your ass off and do everything possible to figure it out. Get some consultation before you commit if necessary. Maybe we just expect everyone to put out the quality of work we do. Maybe we are part of the few that strive to do fantastic work. But Good Lord man, If you make a commitment, keep it. If you get a scope of work that you know is way over your head, consider not taking it and keep learning. After reading this if you are an Interactive Vendor or Freelancer and want to be considered to do some great work, contact me with your info and portfolio and I’ll see about hooking you up with some ICG projects. Check out my portfolio section, it is 99% ICG work.