I was at a lecture from Mark Swaine the Creative Director of Squire today which proved to be an excellent and informative class.

One thing I came away with though was a feeling that I should really delve into AfterEffects a lot more. I’ve messed around with it but Mark says that he loves using Flash and AfterEffects and, although it might sound a bit stupid, that was a combination I can’t say I’ve ever thought of using before.

He showed us how they can be combined to make some truly dazzling websites and videos. Granted, these companies have big budgets and years of experience under their belts but this stuff is just awesome.

Ford Mustang Website

And the absolutely hilarious Viral Site for the Pomegranate Phone.

There is no reason not to give it more of a go seeing as there is more than enough tutorial sites to help get started such as;

• http://ae.tutsplus.com/
• http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/

If anyone has any relevant sites to share be sure to comment.

Hey all, hopefully someone can help me.

I’ve a blog for a project I’m working on and I’ve a Facebook Page for the same. I’ve no problem displaying the blog posts on the FaceBook page’s wall, it’s the next step that’s gettin’ me.

I want the fans of my FB page to be able to see the latest update on their home wall’s. It’s nothing new. Lamebook.com and Komplett.ie both do it but I don’t see how they are doing it either.

Google didn’t yield anything for me and it’s something that’d be very handy.

Thanks, Sean

Well, two actually. Firstly, I’m making a book of designers from various “isms” such as constructivism, futurism, dadaism, pictorial modernism etc.

An example of Cassandre's (Pictorial Modernism) Work

I’ve decided to make the front and back cover out of metal (much like the Futurist’s manifesto) but maybe mix it up with some other “ism” just to add some more interest.

I’ve to design the inside pages as well which will be equally important. It’ll be tough to keep a consistency between so many different styles of artistry.

Secondly, I’m making a children’s book. I’m much less certain about this at the moment as the designer book is due first and so it’s on my mind the most.

I’m interested in a tactile book and maybe something “make and do” but I really have so set myself a target age group before I can start designing and this will also limit what I can actually do.

Enough for now, I’ll post photos when it’s done.

Hey all! How are we keeping?

I’m using my new Android G1 phone to post this using an app called wpToGo which is pretty nifty.

College is mad buzy. I had a presentation yesterday that went well but I have like 6 big projects due in December. A Design magazine, a children’s book, a Flash game, a flash ‘yolkie’, a website and a 3d scene. Many a late night lies ahead!

I’ll leave you with a photo of a book that I bound and made myself in class today. It’s pretty cool if I do say so myself.

Talk to ya’ll again!

Edit//: I guess it’s not so good at uploading images. Oh well :/

We had a Group Project in college to combine a children’s toy with a keyboard and to make a game or some multimedia piece from it.It was my job to do the electronics and wiring for it and below is an account of my ordeal The progress blog can be found at httP://www.seabasshunterproject.wordpress.com

The Toy

The toy is a fishing rod game and it was my job to combine this with a small printed circuit from a keyboard. The following is the process I underwent and I was proud to achieve a working final product.

So, what was inside?

Fist thing was first, I had to have a look at what was inside and see what I could do with what was there. I opened the toy up to find:

The Modifying

Ideally, I would like to be able to fit everything needed into the space that I already had. I simply didn’t like the idea of having to have an external compartment somewhere on the toy to store the keyboard’s circuit and wiring. So I stripped out the LCD screen, it’s circuit and the wiring. This surprisingly didn’t leave as much room as I thought so I had to make even more.

This is the back plate of the screen part of the toy. I drilled and cut out the battery compartment (as seen in the first image) as it wasn’t going to be needed anymore. The new toy will be USB powered and leaving the battery compartment would have just been a waste of valuable space.

While I had the drill out, I drilled a hole at the bottom of the handle so that the USB wire would be able to run out it.

Seeing as the screen was no longer being used to display anything, I covered it in black tape just to clean it up and so it would look neater from the outside. The LCD screen itself is only about 1cm thick so I decided to leave it as it would look better than anything I could replicate.

The Initial Wiring

Now to the hard part.

The keyboard’s circuit has two sets of pins. There are 12 pins on either side and a combination of at least one from either side *may* result in a character output from the keyboard. We checked this by touching pins from either sid with the same piece of wire. This completed the circuit.

Here’s a list that we made that shows what pins corrisond with a letter or number.

( Thanks to Lillian for the lovely hand modeling )

We chose only to do letters and numbers because we didn’t want to run into any problems later when it came to programming it later.

I glued the keyboard ciruit into the LCD compartment. This would make the circuit more secure and less prone to moving as I worked on it.

I had to double check these combinations again just to make sure. After I did this I began temporarily holding down the wires with some tape. This allowed me to get a better understanding of how many wires were needed and just how small and fidly it all is.

Now to hold down these wires. There was a little aluminium stip that came with the keyboard that I could use to hold down the wires with. I covered it in tape to insulated it as to not interfere with all the other wires.

However, when I went to screw the plate down, the center would tighten, but the edges rose and no longer held down the wires. It bent so I needed something tougher…….My solution? A Spoon of course!

As strage as it sounds, it worked! Of course, I cut the actual spoon part off and used the handle part. Again, I taped it so it wouldn’t interfere with the other wires but it did the job. I then tried to glue the wires in place as best as I could just to secure them.

Finishing The Wiring

So, I needed to connect the jystick that was already there to the keyboard somehow. I used 4 micro switches which would be pushed when the joystick moved up, down, left or right respectively.

I judged where the micro switches should go by placing them where the old switched used to be underneath the joystick. I covered the ciruit with tape to insulate and I could still see where the switches should go.

And the micro switches all wired up.

I also had to connect up the 2 switches that we were going to use from the bottom half of the toy. We were going to use the reel and theline switch. This wasn’t too hard to do theoretically but the wire kept breaking so it took a fair few tries just to get it the way I wanted.

Finishing Up

Just a last few things to do and that’s it!

I then ran the USB wire out the bottom put the other half on the main body of the fishing Rod.

Here’s a shot of some of the wiring I had to endure.

I closed over the LCD compartment careful not to damage the wiring and slid this onto the Main Body of the Fishing Rod.

I then tested it one final time just to make sure it worked and thankfully it did.

It’s safe to say that I spent over 20 hours on this project, although it may come across differently in this post. The wires never worked first time so it was a matter of constantly tweaking it until it worked. I’m just thankful that this ordeal is over me

Thanks,

Sean Smyth

This is a DVD like menu from an end of year project. The Project will be made in Director and will have my Flash Animation, My Short Film, images and whatever else I can cram into the extras section.

On another note, the Toy Project that I’m currently working on is nearing completion. The Toy project is a challenge to combine a childs toy and a keyboard to creative and interesting effect. I’ve just about finished the wiring of the electronics which took  A LOT longer than originally planned. A full report on what exactly I had to do will be up over at the group’s blog www.seabasshunterproject.wordpress.com for those interested.

Toodles for now

Mr Beanie’s Desk

Originally uploaded by imLOSTirl

An illustration of a desk I did for an upcoming animation for college. What do you guys think?

For college I have to go one day without technology to show how defendant and reliant we are on technology. Simple, eh? One day without a phone, TV, computer I can do but then there is also the fact that I’m unable to use a toaster or kettle in the morning which just plain sucks.

I dunno what I’m going to do without my tea in the morning. And to top it all off, tomorrow is Pancake Tuesday so I can’t even make them without feeling badly.

Feck it, I’ll just make them on Wednesday instead defeating the whole purpose of the original meaning of Shrove Tuesday. Oh well. Farewell internetz!

Here is a cool Navigation element that is usable on a website if anyone is interested.

A good few actually!


I’ll start with Project Management. Basically, we have to take a toy, take it apart, use the buttons and what have you, and take the output of these buttons and turn them into inputs into the computer using Director. It’s fun and I’ll have a load of updates here when it actually gets going. As part of the assignment we also have to setup a dedicated blog to mark our progress so I’ll link to that when it’s up aswell.

Second is Multimedia Tools and Techniques which is basically Flash and Illustrator class. I have to create characters and make a 60 - 120 second animation on whatever theme I want. All has to be designed in Illustrator and then brought into Flash to actually animate it and make it all lovely and shiney. Again, updates when I actually start it all.


Thirdly is Digital Editing which is Final Cut class for everyone not in my course. Basically, I have to create a 30 second montage with the emphasis on the passing of time. I have to shoot the video myself and edit it as I see fit. I already have an idea for this one so it shouldn’t be too hard. *crosses fingers*


Fourthly and finally is Digital Editing again. This time it’s a 60 to 120 second video which is supposed to incorporate as many types of media as you can with original content gaining more marks than stuff nabbed of Youtube. It also has to be directly related to and have some elements of the Animation (stated above) in it. So, it has to be a prequel, equal or just be something involving it and it needs to include original recorded sound, video and animations. An example given in class was say, there is a shot of a T.V. onscreen. Our job would be to replace what is on the T.V. with  video of our own. Again, I have an idea for this one aswell so it should be cool.


It’s all go but it’s all good at the same time. I’m actually really looking forward to the rest of the semester. There are a few more minor projects thrown into the mix so I’ll post them when they are all done and dusted.

Today I completed a project that isn’t due until Friday the 20th of February. This project was to design and create a Film Production Company Logo. On our first day of this semester, our lecturer made us all come up with our own Film Production Company name. Later, the names were shared and swapped throughout the class and, in essence, everyone became someone elses client.

I was chosen to design and conceptualise a logo for someone who’s Production Company was called “TakeTwo”. Firstly, I had to come up with an idea and this was achieved my quickly sketching some basic ideas with pencil and paper. After about 20 some jumped out at me as being pretty good and then I felt that I should draw them out in greater detail just to show them in a better light.

I showed these drawings to my client and she chose here favourite one which, coincidentally, was mine too. I then drew this up on Adobe Illustrator. I did some little tweaks that I thought would improve it even more at this stage.

Logo

It was at this stage that I added the film reel cut-outs to tie it in with the Film Production Company. I also made the “PRODUCTIONS” type a little smaller than “TAKE TWO” as there was no need for it to be as prominant.

Tada! All done. I’m pretty happy with it.
However, I’m not all done there. We then had to make a Compimentary Slip, Business card and Headed Paper. All of which, can be seen below.

Business Card

Compliments Slip

Headed Paper

Any comments are greatly appreciated. Creative Critisism is also welcomed. Thanks.