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Feb 3, 2012, 6:16 pm
In my last post I produced a normal map of the side of a British pound coin. It was an early attempt at following this normal map tutorial, and the results were passable. But on evaluating the results I also identified some fine tuning I could make to my own technique at the photograph stage to make... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Jan 27, 2012, 6:07 pm
Normal mapping is a vital part of 3D modelling and rendering these days. In some cases it take hours off your modelling time, and in others hours off your rendering time (and sometimes both).
A while ago I came across this tutorial about making normal maps from photos. I finally got round to trying ... Comment - Like
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Oct 18, 2011, 6:07 am
One way of increasing the repeat appeal of a game, particularly for 1 player games, is to include a leader board of high scores. This gives the player an additional goal of beating their previous best score, allowing them to compete with themselves, and other players, even if the game has only 1 pla... Comment - Like
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Jun 17, 2011, 6:11 pm
Quick Reference (QR) Codes are a type of Matrix Barcode capable of storing much more information than your normal stripy barcode.
Many organisations have taken to using QR codes as part of an integrated marketing campaign to store web page URLs, allowing users to capture the 'barcode' on their mobi... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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May 13, 2011, 8:17 pm
If like me you have had some frustration trying to get Premiere Elements to work with VADO HD video, without hanging on import, you may find this solution helpful.
When for a recent birthday I was the glad recipient of a new VADO HD pocket video camera, and a new sealed Premiere Elements 7, I was ex... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Apr 29, 2011, 4:47 pm
.NET magazine reports this month that Adobe has released a "Flash-to-web-standards converter" called Wallaby, that basically takes your FLA file and spits out standards compliant HTML5 with accompanying JavaScript.
I must say I was waiting for Adobe to make a move like this ever since Apple got the ... Comment - Like
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Apr 8, 2011, 7:21 pm
As soon as I realised the possibilities available with Sound Objects in Flash I realised that you could write a simple sound mixing app using ActionScript.
I started this experiment ages ago, but ran into a problem with the sound I couldn't solve straight away. 18 months later I remember it exists a... Comment - Like
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Apr 2, 2011, 5:49 am
In my last post I looked at querying the Yahoo GEO and Weather APIs from within flash in order to return an XML file containing weather and forecast information.
Last time I simply pulled out the location and the weather condition text that gave a general description of the current weather. But act... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Mar 20, 2011, 10:02 pm
I spent some of this weekend examining the potential of the Google API for finding out the weather in my area. My long term aim is to include some nod to local weather in a Flash app I am working on. While the Google API was easy to tap into (see here) it is not very well documented and apparently u... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Mar 19, 2011, 11:34 am
Some projects are just plain fun. You get an idea, you get inspiration on how it should look, you research the maths that goes behind it and crack on until it is done. The Annual Clock is one such project for me. I actually finished it as a Flash application almost a year ago, but only just got roun... Comment - Like
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Feb 3, 2011, 5:20 am
You may have come across flash menus where you drag a selector over a row of small images which slides a larger row of the same images into view. This code example is a basic solution to that problem.
Method
1. First produce all your images. You need a large version and a thumbnail version of each. ... Comment - Like
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Aug 26, 2010, 7:45 am
This is simple stuff compared to doodling apps and platform games, but no less vital if that's what the job requires. Here I give a brief intro to making Flash link to external URLs.
We can often think of Flash as creating standalone apps that talk only internally, but sometimes there is a need for ... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Aug 24, 2010, 7:17 pm
This year my students will be learning about game engines. For 3D they will most likely use the Unreal Development Kit, along with 3DS Max/Carrara 8 Pro for content creation. But that's all 3D - what about the 2D games? Well, for 2D, my platform of choice is Flash.
Problem is, that unlike the UDK, o... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
Dan's Interactive Media Pages
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Aug 20, 2010, 3:45 pm
The basic way of including sound in your Flash movies is to add them to keyframes in the timeline. And this is fine for sounds that must coincide with animated events, or simple audio feedback on button rollovers. But if you want more sophisticated control over sounds, like starting and stopping the... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Aug 19, 2010, 12:04 pm
Slider or sliding inputs for user interfaces are not new, we get them in desktop software and on the web. But this one is slightly different. Instead of sliding the handle along a bar, the handle stays still and the bar moves. This is helpful when the bar contains measurements that are too big to fi... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
Dan's Interactive Media Pages
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Aug 4, 2010, 7:38 pm
Inspired by Dragon's Den this week, when 2 guys demonstrated a fun drawing program they had made, I decided to learn some more about Flash's drawing API to make a very much simpler doodling application in Flash.
Try It
It might look complex, but the hardest bit is only 26 lines of ActionScript, in... Comment - Like
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Aug 2, 2010, 6:42 pm
Although this is more lines of code, the code is easier to follow.
The last example used trigonometry to calculate the angle of rotation and gave a realistic simulation of dragging an object in a circle. This is much more basic, and sets the rotation of the object based on a horizontal drag only.
Th... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Aug 2, 2010, 5:59 pm
In Flash I often find that some things which seem hard, are easy, and some things which ought to be easy are hard. Making things rotate when you click and drag them is, for me, one of the latter. It doesn't take much code, but figuring the code out hurt my brain.
You'd think this would be easier - y... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
Dan's Interactive Media Pages
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Aug 2, 2010, 9:43 am
When, as a young college design student, I discovered the existence of Ivan Chermayeff I felt I had found the one professional graphic designer that really understood the purpose and role of his vocation. His approach resonated with me as being honest, open and direct - and as such was a refreshing... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Mar 30, 2010, 2:13 pm
To add to my earlier posts about 3D stereoscopy, this BBC clip compares different ways of perceiving 3D that can all be used by artists and animators. Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
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Mar 16, 2010, 6:04 pm
I have probably mentioned SitePoint before, but that is because they have some really useful things for web designers.
The offering that prompted me to blog tonight was some free sample chapters from their JQuery book, and better still - 100 free JQuery codes as well.
Get it here: http://bit.ly/a0sN... Comment - Like
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Mar 15, 2010, 4:40 pm
This BBC article about some of the once big names of the Internet brought back memories for me. It is strange to think that most of my current students were only kids at the time, anything between 5 and 10 years old. They probably won't remember most of these. But for me, as one who was working in a... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
The DTLLS and GDTLLS Blog
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Nov 28, 2009, 2:49 pm
Monday's edition of the Guardian reported that Ofsted was facing a crisis in public confidence as it came 'under a series of attacks on its authority this week, with the watchdog accused of being "flawed, wasteful and failing"'. (Guardian, 2009)
The report goes on to say that:
The children's service... Comment - Like
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Nov 9, 2009, 4:09 pm
Finally here is the solution. It turns out you can use NetConnect and NetStream to make an MP3 player in Flash, but only if you encapsulate all your MP3s as FLV files. Not really very helpful since it means converting your MP3 files - it just makes more work.
And busy designers really don't want the... Comment - Like
Dan L. posted an article on
The DTLLS and GDTLLS Blog
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Nov 5, 2009, 2:55 pm
Seán posted a comment on an earlier post of mine about learning styles and linked to his views on the subject. I thought I would reply.
Here's a devastating scientific criticism of the popular but groundless VAK learning style theory, which also attempts to explain why teachers love it, despite it... Comment - Like
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