Flash & Actionscript
Mick and Ian
Fixing things is sometimes what I need to do. The Mick and Ian site was created in bits by the Topia creative team and I put it together to make it all work into a fully functioning site.
Blainey North
Blainey North wanted a flash site which would showcase their work. It was predicted at the time of build that would be changes in the content of their site. I built the so it pulled the images from ActionScript code rather than within the timeline, which saved loads of time later on in the project and after launch.
Timesheet Widget
Topia really had trouble with keeping up with their timesheets. It was always a hassle to login to the timesheet software and enter their time logs. As a business, it needed to keep track of time and to do that it needed to make the time tracking process easier. I had been hearing about Flex technology and I already had some extensive AS3 and remoting experience so I set out on making a widget which would popup at intervals and prompt the user to enter a short message about what their up to. The widget was a huge success and the timesheet reports are million times better.
Salmon Ski Game
It’s one thing to have a competition to win a holiday to Canada, but it’s another to get a game to go with it. The game involved shooting a salmon at an angle which would ski down a slope and land in a bucket, being held by a bear (which would clearly eat the salmon, but this game had to be kid friendly). The speed and jump of the salmon is achieved by simulating a wheel rolling down a hill in a 2d physics engine. The speed the salmon is fired at will effect the height of the jump at the end. The coordinates reported by the engine are then mapped on to a 3d realm for enjoyment of the game.
Luscious International
When I first joined Topia, Luscious was supposed to be a finished website and on top of that we still needed to build a client room which they could privately interact with their clients. After finishing the website with way too many rounds of changes, I knew we needed to do the client room right. So I met with Luscious to work out exactly what they wanted from a client room and wrote a specification that we could both agree on. The specificaton was signed off and I began to work on the build, the end result was a website that was both in our minds eye and everybody was happy.
The client room features cascading permissions allowing fine grained control on what clients could do (read, upload, download, preview, mark favourites) etc from a top level folder right down to individual files.
Cockroach vs Canetoad Game
In 2008, Centrebet wanted to promote memberships surrounding the time of the state of origin. Its common to give QLD the nickname Canetoad and NSW Cockroach so we took it literally and made a football flash game. The user is given the option to choose a side and then must make it to the other end of the field picking up tokens before the 5th tackle. The game development involves the papervision 3d engine and some simple AI which will begin an attack if the player is close to an enemy player.
Zack & Miri Stick Porno Game
Village Roadshow wanted a method to promote their latest crude film to their target audience. What better way to make a porno game? The game involved the player having to repeatedly thrust the left and right keys and “blowing” in the “sweet spot” to advance to the next level. Points are awarded based on how quickly they finish each level.
Wild Animus
Rich Shapero had a book and he wanted to promote sales. The flash site was developed to showcase his creative work and he wanted to allow his customers to be creative as well. The site featured a “create your own animus” which allows users to:
- Choose a background
- Load pictures and rotate, tint and scale them
- Choose a music theme
- Submit their design and share it with friends
Eskimo Design
Taking concept to reality is somethng I can do. Studio Emotion provided a series of PDF’s describing how the site should look and how the site should animate. First the flash files were created and approved by Studio Emotion and Eskimo Design, then we took the flash and integrated with CMS Made Simple.
Con Poulos Photography
Similar to from something I do alot, Studio Emotion needed to enable content management on an interactive flash website. Gradually each section of the site was added to the CMS so Giles Tribe could manage their website themselves.
Giles Tribe
Studio Emotion presented me with an almost complete flash website, that I had to finish off. The content had to be editable and the entire portfolio section had to be written. The content management system was implemented and integrated into the website. The site features an updated showcase of their latest work and they don’t have to pay anyone to update their stuff.
Radar Communications
Radar needed a fully interactive website . Studio Emotion developed a fantastic full screen in flash. The only problem was that Radar needed to update it often, which can be a problem in flash. I implemented a content management system that inserted pictures and text into almost all areas of the site so Radar could change content – without paying someone else
Luxe Studios
Luxe had one goal for their website and that was to impress. Under the creative guidance from Carbon8, a smooth, slick and sexy flash website was made to showcase their luxurious studios
Dosh Online Shop
Dosh wanted to upgrade their online store to be more interactive. Studio Emotion produced the interactive flash and then I integrated the site to accept credit card payments online and provide basic e-commerce functionality
Ben Sherman
Similar to the Lacoste project, Ben Sherman Australia wanted a copy of their international site that they could update easily and instantly. The advantage with Lacoste was that we got the source files, Ben Sherman’s international creative agency refused to share these, which is completely understandable but it made my job hard. I had to completely copy their flash site from scratch (NOT an easy task)
Reebok
Reebok was the site that launched me onto the flash and actionscript path, especially on the remoting road. Reebok wanted a full shop catalogue inside flash including a whole range of promotions and other features. The shop catalogue got complicated with different sizes and colours and then different pictures for every combination of options. The 4mation shop could currently handle this but getting this into an interactive flash website was another story. The challenge was huge and I got the job done and you should see me now.
LMH Ceramics
This was an interesting project, LMH wanted content management but because of current business agreements they couldn’t change their hosting and their hosting didn’t have a database. I know, content management without a database it wasn’t possible? That’s until I got on the project and I developed a fully working password protected admin that read and saved to XML files.
Lacoste
Lacoste loved their site, the only problem was they had to send any updates to the site to France. The process took weeks to take effect so they decided to copy the site for just Australia so they could make their own updates and modify parts of the site to their taste. The full source files were given to us and we were to be on our way, it sounded easy! The only problem was that the site was ALOT more complicated then we thought, remoting to different servers, multiple languages, asset management you name it and to top it off the code was in French 
It took weeks to figure out what was going on and with baby steps we managed to flush out a website they could update instantly.
Injury Update
John at Injury Update was a cluey bloke and he managed to chew out some code which would keep his site updated, but when it got too complex he would pass the ball on to 4mation. Because of the “self updating” the site was looking pretty ugly and the site needed a serious refresh. 4mation got it designed and I gave the site a complete redevelopment from scratch, making sure all the content got through – and any dead links would come back to life.
Independent Reflections
Flash, flash, flash! It has to be flash! Oh, and we want to be able to update the content of the site as well. These are two features that don’t often go hand in hand, but it had to be done. I was handed the flash file from the designer (I needed to fix up a few action scripty things at this stage) and then I had to integrate it with the 4mation CMS. The end result was that we could have a flash cake and update it too!
