Multimedia Design I is a class in the Digital Art program in the Department of Art. The class focuses on design issues, alternate forms of interactivity, computational aesthetics and getting the power of computer programming into the hands of artists.
Monday, November 17, 2008
old(PROBLEMS & SOLUTIONS)
Below make comments about problems you encountered with your projects and your working solutions.
The main problem i had with my project was all the text i wanted to get across. I had a lot to say and very little space and dealing with people that have a short attention span. During critique a lot of valid points came across and i thought of all of them while trying to solve my problem. I Decided to leave the parent section fairly the same but changed the font so it was a little more inviting. In the teen section i did a little more of a drastic change. I figured that teens have a shorter attention span, especially when reading so i added cartoons with speaking bubbles to make it a little more interesting while reading. I think it was pretty affective but im sure there is still a lot i can do it improve it.
One of the difficulties I had was creating a timeline and script that allowed me to navigate backwards through the book while while allowing for the dissolve outs and the page turn. I thought I would have to write a code that played the timeline backwards to navigate to the previous page. What I did instead achieved the same effect.
For the first page, for example, I have a movie clip that plays has the text fade in and out all in the same clip. There is a stop in the middle. On the buttons to turn the pages I declare a variable (called "direct:) which is initialized to 0. By clicking to go to the next page, that variable is assigned to 1. By clicking to go to the previous page, it is assigned to 0. Regardless of which button is clicked, the text movie clip plays and fades out. When it reaches the last frame, there is a new action script key frame which pays attention to whether or not the variable "direct" is 1 or 0. If it is 1, it calls for the page to turn from right to left, and vice versa if direct = 0. The forwards and backwards page turns are also separate entities in the same movie clip.
I feel like I'm not clearly describing what I achieved, but here is the code on the stop when the text dissolves in:
You can see it in action by looking at the artd378_p1.fla file at http://www.uoregon.edu/~pfinney/378/media/ and looking in the library for movie clips Ch2-5.
stop(); moreone.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, playmoreone); //change playmoreone to playmoretwo, playmorethree, playmorefour and so on as well as the instance name for each playmore btn each time its used at different points in the timeline function playmoreone(Evt:MouseEvent):void { play(); }
in other words: Also, each time I used the playmore_btn I needed a new instance name for it. Since there are 14 bubbles with txt I had to name the playmore btn instance 14 times AND have, on an above frame, AS of the above code also changed 14 times to match the playmore_btn instances.
...lining the frame of this code up with the end of each popup bubble was very time consuming. In my case, timing was everything: giving the viewer enough time to read the bubbletxt before the playmore_btn appeared.
preloader and fullscreen were a challenge as well.
My biggest problem revolved around the actual flash interface. Nothing in my project was terribly complicated when it came to actionscript. Lots of windows, and buttons. However, I kept putting things in the wrong places. For example, I would get lost, and end up with movie clips within movie clips within movie clips. I learned, though, that those still work.
The other problem that I had was content. I could research my own, but because of my excitement in making something that could possibly turn into a larger project, I showed it to my employers. They wanted to see -their- proper content.
---Never, ever, if you want to get something done in a hurry, put it under any jurisdiction of a bureaucracy!!----
4 comments:
The main problem i had with my project was all the text i wanted to get across. I had a lot to say and very little space and dealing with people that have a short attention span. During critique a lot of valid points came across and i thought of all of them while trying to solve my problem. I Decided to leave the parent section fairly the same but changed the font so it was a little more inviting. In the teen section i did a little more of a drastic change. I figured that teens have a shorter attention span, especially when reading so i added cartoons with speaking bubbles to make it a little more interesting while reading. I think it was pretty affective but im sure there is still a lot i can do it improve it.
One of the difficulties I had was creating a timeline and script that allowed me to navigate backwards through the book while while allowing for the dissolve outs and the page turn. I thought I would have to write a code that played the timeline backwards to navigate to the previous page. What I did instead achieved the same effect.
For the first page, for example, I have a movie clip that plays has the text fade in and out all in the same clip. There is a stop in the middle. On the buttons to turn the pages I declare a variable (called "direct:) which is initialized to 0. By clicking to go to the next page, that variable is assigned to 1. By clicking to go to the previous page, it is assigned to 0. Regardless of which button is clicked, the text movie clip plays and fades out. When it reaches the last frame, there is a new action script key frame which pays attention to whether or not the variable "direct" is 1 or 0. If it is 1, it calls for the page to turn from right to left, and vice versa if direct = 0. The forwards and backwards page turns are also separate entities in the same movie clip.
I feel like I'm not clearly describing what I achieved, but here is the code on the stop when the text dissolves in:
this.next_btn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, forward);
var direct = 0;
function forward(evt:MouseEvent):void {
this.play();
direct = 1;
}
this.back_btn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, backward);
function backward(evt:MouseEvent):void {
this.play();
direct = 0;
}
And here is the script that gets called after the text fades out:
if(direct == 1) {
MovieClip(parent).nextFrame();
MovieClip(this.parent.parent).book_mc.gotoAndPlay(2);
}else if(direct == 0) {
MovieClip(parent).prevFrame();
MovieClip(this.parent.parent).book_mc.gotoAndPlay(16);
}
---------------------------------------------
You can see it in action by looking at the artd378_p1.fla file at http://www.uoregon.edu/~pfinney/378/media/ and looking in the library for movie clips Ch2-5.
my whole project was based off this code:
stop();
moreone.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, playmoreone);
//change playmoreone to playmoretwo, playmorethree, playmorefour and so on as well as the instance name for each playmore btn each time its used at different points in the timeline
function playmoreone(Evt:MouseEvent):void
{
play();
}
in other words:
Also, each time I used the playmore_btn I needed a new instance name for it. Since there are 14 bubbles with txt I had to name the playmore btn instance 14 times AND have, on an above frame, AS of the above code also changed 14 times to match the playmore_btn instances.
...lining the frame of this code up with the end of each popup bubble was very time consuming. In my case, timing was everything: giving the viewer enough time to read the bubbletxt before the playmore_btn appeared.
preloader and fullscreen were a challenge as well.
My biggest problem revolved around the actual flash interface. Nothing in my project was terribly complicated when it came to actionscript. Lots of windows, and buttons. However, I kept putting things in the wrong places. For example, I would get lost, and end up with movie clips within movie clips within movie clips. I learned, though, that those still work.
The other problem that I had was content. I could research my own, but because of my excitement in making something that could possibly turn into a larger project, I showed it to my employers. They wanted to see -their- proper content.
---Never, ever, if you want to get something done in a hurry, put it under any jurisdiction of a bureaucracy!!----
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