Spectra is a well designed visual display of customized newsfeeds in a 3d space and takes great advantage of Papervision3d. I’m especially impressed by how well the interface is designed for setting up your page and navigating the rotating stream of news items.
Towards the Next Generation of 3D Visualization: Airtight Interactive reviews a couple alternatives to Flash, specifically for 3D Visualization, Processing and vvvv. With links to some amazing work being done by Flight 404 and Lennyjpg.
I want you to want me is an interactive installation, presented as an interactive installation, displayed on a 56” high-resolution touch screen, hung vertically on a wall in a dark room. On screen is an interactive sky, whose weather (sunny, cloudy, rainy, snowy, etc.) can be controlled by the viewer.
Through the sky float hundreds of blue (male) and pink (female) balloons, each representing a single dating profile. The brighter balloons are younger people; the darker balloons older.
The piece has five formal movements: Who I Am, What I Want, Snippets, Matchmaker, and Breakdowns. Take a look at the beautiful screens generated by this data.
It was commissioned by New York’s Museum of Modern Art for their Design and the Elastic Mind show.
FlashDevelop 3.0.0 Beta6 has been released. This free application is a fantastic Actionscript code editor and project manager. I’ve been using it for about a year and I really enjoy it now using AS3 with all the great code hinting features.
This version adds a great new Code Generation feature, basically, Write a regular addEventListener call, move your cursor on the (missing) handler’s name and press Ctrl+Shift+1 to generate the event handler.
Yahoo Maps has released a new API using Actionscript 3. The Maps API contains a core set of widgets, markers, overlays and web services to enable you to interact with the map in every way.
All the examples are built using Flex, but I’m not sure if the Flex Library is required to publish. I’ll find out when I give it a whirl.
Screencast and additional Map API info.
Update: I just fond this great information on how to use this API in CS3, without Flex (a hack, but they say CS3 support is coming soon):
How to use the Yahoo! AS3 Maps API in Flash CS3
FFFFound! is a new image bookmarking site developed by Yugo Nakamura that continues to draw me back as it delivers a steady stream of image goodness. Currently an invite-only site to be a posting member, anyone can browse and view this interesting arrangement of images ranging from graphic design to an animated GIF from Star Wars.
So much of what I’ve seen has been beautiful snippets from collections of photography and design that give me inspiration when I’m looking for a spark in my design process. Having an account on FFFFound! (thanks Yogo), via a browser bookmarklet, you can snag any photo you see on a webpage and add it to ‘My Found’. Once on the system, other users can add the same image to their Found, doing so adds you to their favorite users list. Based on the images you tag, the site has a dynamically generated recommended page called ‘New for you!’
FFFFOUND! is a web service that not only allows the users to post and share their favorite images found on the web, but also dynamically recommends each user’s tastes and interests for an inspirational image-bookmarking experience!!
It’s worth checking out. Although one word of caution: the fact is that at times, as goes the internet, knuckleheads post images of naked women. I love this response to the nudie posts: “your sister anatomy: no, thanks”.
Once you get a good base for the images and users you’re page draws from, it’s easy to avoid such images.
Here is my Found page. Each user is only given one invite and I already gave mine away. But stay tuned as I’m sure more will be become available soon.
The DIGG API for AS3 is set up for use in Flex, not the Flash CS3 IDE (which seems to be a bad trend). Even though you can make it work without Flex, it’s not exactly straight forward. It also does not include any examples to help a developer get started. Unlike the AS2 version of the API, which includes three semi-useful examples.
In my quest to become Actionscript 3.0 / OOP proficient I put together this simple example using the DIGG API to pull the last 10 popular stories. Right now it’s only using the TextField to display and handle the events so there is no useHandCursor option unless you attach it to a Sprite or SimpleButton. But I added a rollover color and these are linked to the articles on DIGG.
Flash Content
Note: The source code includes the entire set of Flex 2 classes, as the Digg API requires it and I wasn’t sure how to strip out the unused classes. I wanted to include everything necessary to publish from the Flash IDE.
Visualizing: tracing an aesthetics of data is a great overview from the recent Visualizar workshop focused on presenting data and numbers visually. Lots of fantastic information visualization example and info.
Joshspear.com interviewed one of my all time favorite designers and huge inspiration, Joshua Davis. I first heard about Josh when he presented at Flash Forward, San Fransisco 2001. He was talking about easing equations using Flash 5 and showing off his large collection of exploratory work in Flash. He continues to create new and interesting illustrations generated from his Flash “machines”.
Here are a few quotes from the interview:
Being creative, for me, is just a way of seeing the world hyper-sensitively. It’s not something I can turn on or off or something I learned.
I have commercials clients who hire me to create systems for commercials purposes. I feel it’s harder because you need to take the rules and boundaries of the clients project and brand, try to breathe a bit of yourself into those confines, and hope you create something new and exciting that benefits your growth as a designer and helps elevate the clients brand.
I’d like for my studio and the projects we take on to attempt to innovate and not replicate — set the trend, rather than following it. A lot of time this refers to the fact that clients often aren’t thinking about innovation, they’re just looking at what’s already been done. My studio is in the business of trying new and unexpected things.
Also, check out Joshua’s Flash workshop presentation and source files
ProximityManager for AS3 is a new class released by Grant Skinner who has recently updated it from his AS2 version. This is a great resource for graphing data or creating an interface based on proximity. Looking forward to playing with this one.
Flare Visualization Toolkit is a collection of ActionScript 3 classes for building a wide variety of interactive visualizations. The Demo page shows off some very interesting interactive graphing effects, I especially like the Distortion > Fisheye XY demo. Includes an API set up for Flex and documentation with tutorial.
gotoAndLearn() has been updated to Version 2 by it’s creator Lee Brimlow. This site is a fantastic reference full of video tutorials for anyone looking to learn or improve their Flash / Actionscript / AIR skills. There are many basic tutorials for a beginner and also more advanced topics on coding with AS3 and Papervision3D. The latest video is on creating a video player from scratch using AS3. I found it to be very informative to get Lee’s opinion and instruction on the topic.
BulkLoader for AS3 is a minimal library written in Actionscript 3 (AS3) that aims to make loading and managing complex loading requirements easier and faster. BulkLoader takes a more dynamic, less architecture heavy aproach. Few imports and making heavy use of AS3’s dynamic capabilities, BulkLoader has a one-liner feel that doesn’t get your way.
Google Code: http://code.google.com/p/bulk-loader/
March of Dimes has created an interesting entry page to their Pregnancy & Newborn Heath solution center called whatareyouwondering.com.
An array of questions fills the page and an images of a baby is visible through the coloring of letters. You can type in a search term or select a topic from the drop down. Matching questions turn blue and pop out from the field of gray text. Clicking on on a question takes you to the answer page on their standard HTML website. Or you can just browse the large screen of questions for something you find questioning.
I like this solution as it’s a viral way to spread useful information and creates an interesting way to educate the user. The CPU usage is very high and seems to stall my browser when I switch tabs. Could possibly benefit from Bitmap caching.
As for the type of work I plan to feature on this blog, the visualizations done on Digg Labs is an exceptional example. These Flash based data visualizations use real-time data to build and reveal graphical elements that represent upcoming stories on Digg.
Currently there are five visualization available, some are more useful than others, while a couple I find are just beautiful and interesting to watch (some are available as screensavers).
Developed by Stamen Design:
We are also in continuous exploration mode with Digg’s data, generating internal research artifacts which provide new and useful views of the Digg community’s behavior (see “Research,” below). Our goal is to continually extend the possibilities of live data visualization, while addressing Digg’s real business needs.
These visualizations stand out to me for a few reasons, they are well designed and elegant to look at, they animations are smooth and continually build upon themselves, the data is interesting and of a fast pace that is quickly evolving.
I think an area of improvement would be the level of interactivity and customization. Currently you only have 3 options for which data feed you get and the interactivity it typically rollover effects or click to learn more about a story. I’d love to see some zooming or three dimensional navigations.
Digg has an API to allow third party developers to explore the use of their data. The possibilities with this are endless as there are so many opportunities to explore a better way to discover and explore current events (and viral web clips).
ScaleBitmap : 9-slice bitmap class is a simple (AS3) class which allows you to resize dynamically any Bitmap (just like the MovieClip.scale9Grid feature)
