The Blob

Now, it's 1 month I work with flash CS4 demo at home. What's the verdict? I can tell you, I'm not going to buy this upgrade right now.

I liked:
- new organisation of interface (much space for the working "canvas")... but it's not enough (see further)
- search in library
- seems faster, more reactive for little projects
- Thank god, now it can browse font family (can find the Din Medium Italic for example and not just the "Din" as before).
- Of course the 3D rotations, moves, etc.
- Pixel Blender: a new world of distortion, incredible effects, transitions,...

I hated:
- the memory usage (with my macbook pro and 2gb it become quickly unusable), so slower for big projects
- the poor update of interface for development. Flex builder or flashDevelop is 10 times ahead.
- the motion tween interface. After 1 month, I still can't use it. I think there is a big potential in term of animations. You could be really precise and make eases as you want but actually you can't... the interface is just a crap. It take 90% of your screen if you want to animate everything you want and so you can't see the result:

So at the end you are just frustrated you are not able to exploit 100% of the possibilities just because of this stupid interface. And yeah, another great thing: you can't make the value of your "ease" more than 100% or less than 0%. So you can't make a bounce effect at the exact position you want (just try to do it, you'll see what I mean). Just take a look at the video on adobe TV http://tv.adobe.com/#vi+f1590v1014 it seems even the adobe guy is not comfortable with the motion interface.
- I still hate the sticky effect of the interface. When you move windows it accidentally stick to another window or to the border of your screen... For a mac user it's really a pain, especially if you use a tablet.
- Fonts still have different render if dynamic or static (line spacing). Still have problem when exporting on PC, some fonts move a little (I don't have this problem with photoshop, illustrator, indesign).
- Your projects can quickly become a mess. The interface was made for simple projects or simple animations. But now you have incredible powers (3D, new motion tools, pixel effects) so you can make huge projects, huge animations but then everything become confuse and you lose a lot of time finding everything, moving a keyframe, changing a tween, etc. I think flash should now turn to interface like Nuke or Shake. Because of all its 3D capabilities. It's time to grow up Flash!

My conclusion
If I use flash CS4, after 1 or 2 hours I'm just frustrated to have so much great tools in such inadequate interface. So I'll just use flash as I'm doing now; trying to make as much as possible in photoshop, illustrator or flex builder and use the less possible flash IDE. In fact I just use it to compile and quickly integrate graphic stuff.

Maybe one day Flash is going to get a good interface?

Labels: CS4, flash, test

posted by Blobinabottle  # 10:45 1 Comments

Mr.doob | Omega Code Visualiser

Mr Doob just released a visual equalizer for Omega Code. I'm not a fan of music, but a fan of Mr Doob's work and again it's a piece of art.

Labels: equalizer, flash, Mr Doob, music

posted by Blobinabottle  # 10:05 0 Comments

Finally, I found how to render a shadow with alpha in Cinema 4D (maxon) thanks to the shadowcatcher plugin.

It's especially useful when you need to import an object an its shadow into flash as a png 24bits.

Here is the step by step tutorial and the link to the plugin:
http://www.grafxflow.co.uk/

posted by Blobinabottle  # 08:54 0 Comments

I don't know if you already discovered the windowshop website from Amazon. It's still in beta but it's already pretty good. In fact that's what I think it's missing in websites nowadays, a good way to "explore" things. And here, I think we have a start of answer.

link: http://www.windowshop.com/

Labels: flash, website

posted by Blobinabottle  # 15:07 0 Comments

Peter Flynn showed Flash Calalyst at Max 2008. It's promising. I think it can be really helpful for lot of projects. It enable us to test our idea. You can see things moving, interacting quickly and easily.

Just watch the video to learn more:

Labels: adobe, catalyst, flash, wireframe

posted by Blobinabottle  # 09:11 0 Comments

Turn around 3D pixel to show the right image. Simple. Easy. Funny

link: http://www.bobblebrook.com/games/coign-of-vantage

Labels: 3D, flash, game

posted by Blobinabottle  # 15:17 0 Comments

Check out this test of 3D animated character in away 3D. You can also play with lights setting. Sounds really good!

link: http://perso.numericable.fr/chamaslot/away_tom4.php

http://perso.numericable.fr/chamaslot/onkba.php

Labels: 3D, away3D, flash

posted by Blobinabottle  # 16:33 4 Comments

link: http://www.dieselfueled.com/2008/12/2008-the-year-in-photographs/

posted by Blobinabottle  # 16:03 0 Comments

Nice little website for a bank targeting teenagers. Smooth little animations everywhere but I talk about this website mainly because of the excellent idea of loader. Simple concept but efficient enough (but I think too "cliché").
link: http://www.essaeubanco.com.br

Labels: loader, website

posted by Blobinabottle  # 14:51 0 Comments