MyFlashPortal's status (updated)

Been a lack of updates for few weeks, because I'm pretty exhausted from my fulltime job's project. But I promise i'll update and share with you guys as often when i get myself back on track with some time. Can't even have time to develop any experimental work for quite a while as well.

Don't worry, i promise and i will always will, keep the passion burning for flash, and if you would like to have a look at the latest project i worked on, it's at http://www.creativemediaaward.com.my
A lot of massive debugging and tweaking needed to be done

Salutes,
ManMeng

updates : yeap, i'm back to bring you guys with the juices I've been overflowed with those creative sites recently. hi world.

Diversify Yourself = Limitless

Isabelle de Vooght
A very good portfolio site (content wise), seeing how this designer successfully conveying message of a car brand's selling point, combining both seemlessly non related object together. Who says you can't do that? That mini site won herself quite few recognition.


ConceptM
Just when I stumbled across this site, i went like, "ah...ok, the simplest idea that people say it might not work, might turn out to be the best idea". And this sparks another reason saying how limitless what kind of outcome Flash can do to you. A newspaper, as a company's site. Who say you can't do that? It's the matter of you want to do or don't want to.


Pardus - Massively Multiplayer Online Browser Game
Let's see, how things evolved nowadays, where prefernce are moving towards browser based application, which installation are void, except that you need to have a fast connection, and a hassle free browser, like Firefox, and a latest plugin from Flash. If you fancy a Shoot & Loot action, head on to The Land of the Dead.


Wayne Kerr Music
This is another site which sparks a good marriage between textures, music, vector graphics and some neat navigation. Though this site has came way back then, and looks dated, but the idea isn't, you might think to grab some inspiration off from different section and make it new all over again, and yes, this site gives a 'narrative-style' of presenting information, the left site and the right side are divided equally, and visually, it's beautiful. :D


Dstrict
Remember a site back in 2004 that appeared for Samsung, and broke the tradition of defining interactivity? And created a 'OH MY GOD' on everyone's mind? Yes, this is the portfolio site for the company that developed that site, DSTRICT, based in Korea, even on this site itself, the navigation and 'interactive experience' are clearly redefined, and how 'exploring navigation' should be. A+ Class Quality & Revolutionary


Pixel::Blog
A blog dedicated towards some rich media application development, another hangout by the Flash Developers discussing on what's hot and not on the scene, plus you'll find at lot of interesting post targetting towards technology, browsers and operating system, good to know you'll learn something extra to optimize your Flash projects.


Crew 11
Latest graduating list of students from HyperIsland, namely crew11, and ready for internship for a period of 6 month (if i remember correctly), which turned out to moving towards a different art direction this time, compared what is usually done, previously, (look Crew9) which suggests a bright and clear look of the graduates, which this time, they decided to move towards a darker theme. This of course, created a lot of conversation between designers, and the reaction and outcome turned out to be very positive and satisfying. Having a web based project as big as this is certainly not an easy task, especially when dealing with more than 5 person involved. (You'll certainly know if you managed any campaign before), deadlines, and commitments, everything. I'd salute and bow to these dudes out there. And of course, HyperIsland is one of my dream land to step on.


SamBakZa
SamBakZa, a very unusual name, but it's already very infamous among Flash animators, especially if you visit NewGrounds frequently for your daily flicks on Flash Animations, you'll see the top 10 having 2 animation did by these 3 talented dude from Korea, titled "There She Is". Of course, what makes them stands out so much from the rest, let's say, Ninjai? Is because the planning and execution would makes your jaw drops upon watching it(the animation). Camera Angles, music and sound effect synching, and well, virtually, you'll have to see for yourself. And this really makes everyone wondering, afterall, is it all about the $$$ or passion? Kudos to them.


TychoMusic
If you'd need a break and in search for a different direction and a retro look, head over to this site, and note the styling done on the site's header, a video, yes.


Swatch
Are you ready for some spring'ing action? Inspired by the latest sets of watches for Spring (note the season). You'll see how bouncy the site would be for you.


Spring By Dannon
*BOING* Those dudes from Juxt Interactive has done it again! I can't stress enough how much I enjoy most of their latest web projects, since NesteaIce, which nominated as the finalist for the Best Sound Category for Flash Forward this year. And also, the not very long ago, Just For the F Of It are also granted the Best Site of the day by TheFwa, man, this guys just really know how to keep the user busy with the brand while keeping the site loading. Pure fun. And clever.


Struck Design
Design, randomness, textures, and design, there's where you can talk about going inside the site.

http://www.oneclub.org/oneshow/osi.php
Probably one of the most enlighting quote that I've saw throughout this year, "If you aren't doing interactive, you'd better get out of the business." Something really that great about this site, is THAT IT IS THAT BIG. And it's almost like the Emmy or Grammies for Interactive Design. Just look at the Gold winners, you'll be amazed on how something that is so unconventional works commercially. And you'll of course, find yourself looking at a vast variety of creative works.

Describe Fun & Refreshing =/= Commercialism?

It has been a major great debate around decades for designers from our country, the beloved Malaysia. Money or Passion? How much is the blame to be put? On the designers or client? Or pointing finger is useful anymore? Or the responsibility comes back to designer to always hold on to the passion and convince the client that new ideas/execution will work on branding and sells their product better? I'd think it's worth for us to think how to make us to grow better? faster? or how? and what?


Shiroganeya
This sites, will show you, ZEN. The fusion of good transition, cleverly used sound effects and awesome compositions. Now, it's not about how well you throw you graphics to move vertically or horizontally anymore, look and see for yourself to believe. The elements are so well blend that you'll really feel that you are sucked inside into the environment itself, it has been a while since I seen any site with that kind of ambience. Developed by 7779, it's really worth for you to look into this designer's transformation from his old work to the recent work, it's just utterly amazing, and you can explain it with words. And yes, his photography work, see to believe. One word, speechless.


McDonald's Videogame
Have you ever wonder you can stand on Ronald McDonald's big red shoe and manage the ever big corporation on your hand? This site, is not related to the company as well, more like a tribute to it, and I'd salute to the effort placed in making this site/game workable and, of course, addictive. Seeing it as a game is not enough, because of the depth and thought placed inside, you'll really see the value beyond entertainment, and it really benefits young kids to learn how they see McDonald from the other way round, how the meat are produced, the bread and so on. Come, introduce it to your friend and start selling burgers! Credits : Linkshard


AbsolutKravitz
Seeing how the brand, Absolut, evolved from just a beverage to an icon, is really revolutionary, featuring Lenny Kravitz, this collaboration creates a track composed by Kravitz himself, with a few remixes, you'll be able to see how Flash Videos (FLV) can be cleverly manipulated inside Flash to create a higher level of experience to convince and make the entire surfing experience more richer. Transitions that are connecting different artists, and as well, to keep things in place, instead of asking the user to wait for the loading on the next section, this site cleverly place the loading on the lower priority on the lower right side so that the user still can navigate and continue to explore on the other section.


The Fan
Imagine having a satellite tv channel on your mouse click, it's a allrounded website providing you all tv stations with a few mousewheel-ing on your finger. The idea's cool, but how far it can go, as far user experience is concerned. A cool idea to reorganize the data together in a circular roulette format. Very XML-driven site.


Sesam Katapult
Let's talk about some wicked game, and this foreign site, though with language as the barrier and I have no idea on what the games means, but it does somehow reminds me of the old 'Rocket Knight Adventure' from Genesis/Megadrive back in the console day. And of course, this game is addictive as usual, you get a good angle, and *poof* off you go up the sky, and you get higher by jumping on those purplish-pinkish clouds. Created by the dudes from Agens. Credits : Linkshard


The Streaking Game
A great way to create revenue, but to have a great balance in both fun and commercialism. You are a character, running and flashing at different venue, creating 'Eyes' for people to look at you. Avoid getting caught and reach the destination to get your score recorded. Might sound retarded at first, but soon you'll get hooked on the entire site, sound effect and music is great. Thumbs up.

Reading A Day Keeps The Doctor Away

TriWorks
Talk about awesome realistic 3D Design and with latest integration of the Flash player's capability, this site brings you depth in Flash site design. Although at many view that the 'Blur' effect might be underlooked or overused in the wrong way, it can really serve a lot of purpose in bringing the navigation message clearer. What's so unique? Look at the scalability of the site for different screen resolution, it's being properly utilized, and as well the motion of the navigation, the feedback that it gave to the user whenever you roll the mouse on any of the buttons. Lot's of little detail, but big impact. And you know what's going on

Flash Player for PSP
Good news and rejoice! Here's a portion of the article...
"...supports Flash 7 action script. Not everything mind you but a good portion of it..."
It's much more than you can celebrate :). For those who have no idea about what's going on that link, there has been a big debate and competition in hacking their PSP to run Flash inside of it. Homebrewed program of course.

http://bcdef.org/
A good resource centre to start with experimental Flash works. Remember all of the previous posts regarding application made with the integration with Flickr API? An interesting developmend you can follow for Flappr on this site.

Metah's Flash & Web Technology Blog
Another good resources centre to look into the technical aspect of Flash. You might even find neat tips on indexing your Flash site on major search engines. Might not sound too practical at times, but it's worth trying. And of course, besides looking at various Flash-tech related news, you'll find yourself enlightened by articles related web accesibility issues.


OkaySamurai
Remember the ever interesting storytelling-narrative Flash site?OkayDave.com? I can't stress enough if you haven't visit that site before, do it NOW! It's not only rich in the navigation experience, flow and hierarchy. But look, the content is so nicely blended with the design. Man, I can't seem to not love this site. OkaySamurai are actually a blog created by the designer to keep in touch with his family on his life's updates and works. But what attracts the attention and makes this blog is different is that the Flash header has been beautifully used to gel it's content and concept together. And yes, lots of interactivy to explore inside.


The Elements And Site
The Honda Element's site for the fellows in the States. Not sure if we'll able to see this car being imported to here. An intersting site to start with, which would entertain you for a short 'RPG' game. And this really draws a fine line between a very 'WOW' website and a 'oh...ok' effect type of site. The concept and direction are pretty interesting to start with, but it is really sad to see that the execution and outcome could have been better, and it might the deadline or other causes that stops them from doing better. It's really cool though. Try it. Nice. Of course, at certain time, you'll see that you never get the joke they trying to potray.


Mouse's Mouse?!
It's a bit off topic, but blame me for my reading sensation habit, i bound to found this courtesy of my friend reading it off some tech site. And passed me on this. I'd really wonder if we really could be productive with this. Who knows.

Money vs. Deadline vs. Pride vs. Dupe?

There has been a massive uproar on a recent incident happened regarding duplicate of concept found on both of the site in between a famous site developed by Mr.Yugo Nakamura and his team and a local site developed by a local Malaysia company.


The Original Site
Of course this debate much has pretty much done a lot damage to the company and the local design industry justifying how us as sneaky Flash thief. It's really sad. But of course, instead of seeing everyone and being one that is bitchin' about What and How's bad the thing is, why not take up the courage and learn from the mistake?

I'm really tired to see the ugly side of the commercial world. Which a lot of the competitor of the company took up this advantage to bring down and defame the company. Sad case, it shows so much how Malaysian design company would do to survive and keep themself at the top.

But look, as a responsible designer at the first place, if it's all about money you're doing inside this industry, and I can gladly say, please get the hell your arse out of this industry and work in the pirated CD printing service, or sell Keow Teow goreng, yes please. At a point, we're looking at how we can 'make people happy with our work'. But if it's all 'only' about chasing deadline and finish the project because the sake of client ask us to finish it without them knowing why they ask you do the project at all. Worry not, soon, this country, beloved Malaysia, will R.I.P. and left no more responsible good designer, but all, just lame machine that copies work from other, and like photostate machine? It's not all about money, really.

I see a dying passion, why not we all work towards and fix it? Instead of only bitchin' about it? Why? It's okay we are weak, but the worst part would be we don't want to acknowledge that we are weak and improve from it.

Play a part, be yourself, be responsible. Learn from how other great one striving to build a better design community in this very 'corrupted' industry. I support THINK, DOXOB, Digital Malaya.

Timeline power

SAAB AeroX
Site navigation powered by a main timeline, this site's ambience is just awesome, captured the essense of how this car want to potray, mysteriously powerful, and to feature a car this way, an all 360 round view of the car can impress your client on how they can sell the features to the consumer. What I can really say is, be daring, and you might never know, that if you convince your client that this kind of idea will sell, just make sure that it will sell even more! Reminds me of the revolutionary Eminem's website navigation that won them various awards.

[Tutorial : Advance] Flexible Magic Button

Have you ever stucked in a situation where you need to duplicate tons of button where it looks the same but only varies on the text? Let's say in a survey or trivia game, or probably a website which expands to a lot of different section. And you're in confusion and clogged with bunch of unnecessary repeated and hassling steps. Here's the help that might bring you out of the dark world. Welcome.

Difficulty : Basic / Advance
Topic : Flexible Magic Button
Download : [ Flexible Magic Button ]



Starting Up
A canvas that measures up 200 px X 200 px would be sufficient for this tutorial.

And we'll create a new Symbol which we'll name it btn_template.

Yes, we'll have nothing but only this movie clip inside our library. Amazing isn't it?

Inside the movie clip (using it to act as a button)

Moving on, we'll have a very simple looking movieclip which will act as a button. Three layers.

• Actions - nothing complicated here, only stop(); will be placed here.
  
• txtbox - A dynamic textbox will be placed here, which where the magic comes from.
  
• design - Only functions visually, and doesn't affect your button.

We'll prepare as planned, one simple rectangular and dynamic textbox.

See? Nothing's complicated. Unless if you decide to implement advance interaction here.

Next, we'll proceed with giving this dynamic textbox a name, for this case, we'll name it txtName

Some tweaking which is up to your preference to make the Dynamic text appear. For this case, it's more appropriate to center the text and unselect the "Selectable" option on the Properties panel.

We're done setting up the movieclip. We'll go back to the main scene.

The Finishing
Remember the golden rule in doing any project, REMEMBER TO SAVE! :)

The Stage's empty now right? Drag one instance from the Library to the stage, and name it btn1

Be patience, we'll about to see some magic soon, and on the actions layer, write the script as shown on the screenshot. And we'll test the movie and see if it's working.

You can choose the option Test Movie or by using Ctrl+Enter (CMD+Enter for Mac user)

THE MAGIC! yes, the word appeared. And what's next, no, we're not done yet.

As usual, we'll use the super-power of function make everything here easy. If you notice correctly, you'll find the similarity with the Rollover Smooth Button scripts. Yes, the share the same format but in this tutorial, you can dynamically change the content inside the button, using dot syntax.

Using Functions to simplify everything

On the functions' layer, we'll have this. Because instead of repeating the same Rollover and Rollout code all over again and making everything looks crowded on the actions layer, we'll simplify and only call rOver() and rOut() only.

*Note *
You might ask if it would make a difference if you place the functions and actions layer different, let's say for this case, note the function layer are placed above actions layer? And on the actions layer i placed a stop() on the bottom of the actions layer? In this case, if I place the actions layer on top of function layer, you might notice that the magic won't work, not even the Rollover/Rollout effect, this is because you stopped the movie before Flash reads the function layer. So, it does takes some planning if you want to separate layer. But not a big problem though, just a reminder.

Possibilities

Yes, you might ask, can i reuse the button and name it differently? Yes you can! That is where the magic comes from. And if you're interested to expand the idea and how far this interaction could go, I'd say, your creativity is the limit, and you can learn more on how to integrate different thing, and I'd have the tutorial ready in case you want to refer, and YES, you can combine all of it!

• Rollover Smooth Button (Transitions when rollover a button)
• Adding Sound to your button (Creating the wow-effect)
  

Here's the FLA file, have fun Flashin'
Download : [ Flexible Magic Button ]

What does it take to be really good?

Z4 by Joshua Davis
So, this is when and where you will stand when you are really good at what you are. And people believes and stands behind on your philosophy and way of doing things. This is what Joshua Davis are, right now. A very special project initiated by BMW, he was approached by BMW to create a series of print work to show the representational icon of the Z4, and I'd strongly suggest you look into 'The making of' section, and the video will stunned you, by the way how he worked things out, and clears people perception on 'code is ugly'. This is what he is, and what he does.


MMO Pong
Remember the classic pong game? Where 2 player are bouncing one ball across a plain? Ever imagined that you will be playing with hundred of other internet user at one time? What would it be like?


One by One Design
Let's talk about transition and giving your user unexpected interactive experience, you'll find yourself navigating through the information, the unusual and conventional way. Eg. you need to drag instead of scrolling for information. Back to transition, this site is unique by it's own way, cool texture loaded as you go across different section. Worth checking them out if you're looking for a classic theme in get yourself inspired.


Strato Cucine
Developed by the dudes from Group94, you can never take your eye off this site for a second. Talk about being innovative and to keep usability in mind. And see here, as commented by other user, if the site moves slightly slower than what it is now, the interest and impact wouldn't be so great as from what you are experiencing now. Thing's and transitions are moving fast to keep interest alive, but at a decent speed. I'd say it all comes back to user testing sometimes to see if a certain effect make or breaks your site. Interesting navigation and intro movie. Unusual.

Harness The Continuity Power

ZoomQuilt
I can't say how and what I can do to put this into word, and it's such a crazy idea to plan the transition that it sticks together. What you'll experience, as what the domain name suggest, you'll zoom through a series of beautifully crafted illustrations, as if you felt that it's infinite. Bravo. But it would be utterly awesome if anyone crafted thier website this way and make every single section interact-able.

Inspiration Juices

FindR
A very slick application that gained it's place on the FlashForwardConference's Finalist on the application category. What really suprises me that this stands out from the normal Flickr Flash application is that it's one of the most usable one yet. But of course it's very personal on how a person perceive usability. But on a general view, it's one that gives you for what you want to find. And of course, to develop an application like this doesn't really need you to take a rocket science test. Just the matter of patience and will to learn. Recently, I've been looking up to connecting Flash with XML from a remote server, well, and it does seem to be moving towards a positive direction. If you like to find more of this kind of application, and if you wonder why Flickr are so popular among developers, is because Flickr, themself, are very supportive in having their Flickr API accessible to people to create new innovations. And of course, having Flickr to provide such tool is not enough to start off with, you'll have no idea where to kickstart at, visit KevinLuck's blog and you'll find that he actually developed FlashR that would really help you to make stuff that similar like Findr.


Super Mario Bros' Super Synth
To certain designer that might it too seriously when finding source of inspiration. But somehow, I bound to find this very interesting piece of Flash that might appear to be redundant to a lot of people. But I'd find it is interesting and i praise the person's effort in putting it up. You might not know that by looking at it, you might find it to be your next project's biggest inspiration. A lot of more crazy, funky stuff can be found from ODK. But isn't everything that sounds and looks original came from an existing idea, but with a twist?


MoNiChengSi
Being a creative studio on it's own. This site bears it's light not on the actionscripting, but it's portfolio. I was amazed to know that this person designed the cover for one famous Chinese Pop Singer, Faye Wong. And the work displayed within the site are very diversed. Good inspiration juice.


NooFlat
Recently, I've read an interesting book about Math Creativity in Flash, i'd recommend anyone that want's to advance in A/S to read it. And then I bound to found this kewl writer that was writing about Iteration (Some kind of movement that being scripted by you, and it runs by itself continously).A simple but Math-packed site. You'll find various experimentation on ActionScript possibility. Check out the place where he worked at, Relevare.

What's the meaning of being unconventional?

OkayDave
As unconventional as it gets, this site uses a lot of collage and montage of papers and sketches. I know this has been done thousand or millions of time. But do pay close attention to the transitions in between. Clever usage of Flash Video and After Effects.


FlashForwardConference
Standing at the point which it's almost like the Grammies for the Flash, which held annually. The finalists this time proved to be extremely vibrant and dynamic with their Flashes. Worth checking them out if you're curious to know how Flash has developed up to this level. It's utterly amazing. Of course, you'll find it much or less like an award ceremony similar to TheFWA.com. But with an addition that this event gathers all of the very infamous and expert Flash developer at this very one place and share their thoughts and a lot of workshops. I wish I could go, but the air tickets are out of my way that I can afford it.


Katamari Damacy's Flash Game
Talk about addiction, this ever famous PS2 game has landed on the web, with Flash! A lot people labelled this game as a stupid one, but it's fun and addictive. Besides from rolling what's ahead you, collecting it, you may find it's pointless. But wait until you try it. *tips* try clicking on the hidden triangle and explore a hidden playmode.


NRG.be
The guys behind Ultrashock. It's the portfolio site, which you'll able to notice the smooth transition between different shape.


SukiLand
Talk about being cute and have cool attitude. This site will suprise you with the illustrator's unique style of humour. Worth checking it out. Nice transition applied as well.


Bersama-Sama
Alright, i know this might sound way off topic from Flash, but I'm really proud of these guy. Featured at TheFWA.com. Recently which they held their animation showcase at one of the local colleges in Malaysia, has seem to won few of the rapport from the big players. And to have themselves featured in FWA, is not an easy task, really great effort placed inside that project. Worth checking them out. Bersama-sama are in Bahasa Malaysia language which means "Together".


Raku-Gaki
A pretty unconventional design, like how the menus are placed, pretty experimental to a certain extend. Nevertheless it's interesting, and has interesting 'transition' that you should check out. Besides that, this site utilizes a lot of 'mouse position' interaction, whenever you moves it around, there are some picture that reacts to it. Cool.



Design Your Ride
Another seemingly unrelated article/paragraph about Flash, but MyFlashPortal supports this. Join it, you may never know you'll shine on it.