Flash Interactivity for CS4

Here is the tutorial we went through in class.

There are more tutorials using AS2 in CS4 here.

Go through and find ones that might be useful to you.

Remember, if you have any problems - don't wait until the next class to ask about answers, but follow these steps straight away:

1. Read the comments beneath the tutorial - someone else might have had the same question answered here.

2. Think about what the problem is - does it involve a button, scene, script, animation?

3. Search your problem using accurate Flash AS2 language.


Also - i see lots of the class is playing and developing games. As i have mentioned - be careful not to bite off more than you can chew. Make sure you can create an interactive animation first. If you can make a game as well - great. Also remember to be experimental with your game aesthetics - particularly if you are getting the code from somewhere else.
Check out these games.

Character Development

It's best not to start your character off with a name or a physical description, but instead give them a reason for being: a problem, a situation, a need, a compulsion. This is where the worlds you have created come in handy.

Ask yourself: “what’s their motivation? What does my character want more than anything else in the world?"

What to they most desire? Love? Acceptance? Chocolate? Peace? War? Friends?

Also consider the opposite. What will they do anything to avoid?

What scares them to death? Humiliation? disfigurement? beetles? pain? illness? poverty? parents ?

Usually, in the course of a story, protagonists will confront the thing they fear the most and overcome it in order to win the thing they desires the most.

In order to make your character and their story interesting, people will need to care about them - even if they are evil. Make sure you empathise with your character. Care about them and other people will too.

Now, once you have explored your character, think about what they look like and try and draw them based on the mental image you have created. It doesn’t need to be a masterpiece by any means. And remember that most popular cinema and TV characters are assembled from simple shapes: circles, rectangles, triangles, etc.

Make sure your characters appearance reflects their personality. Typically, physical traits like large eyes make characters appear cuter and friendlier, where as mean characters often have smaller eyes, and are usually large or disproportionate.

For more on creating characters - try here

Hugh's top 10 Games

For sheer adrenalin and reflexes I would rate:

(1) Galaga

(2) Time Crisis

(3) Tekken

For atmospheric spaces that i enjoyed spending endless hours in:

(4) Halflife

(5) Quake

(6) Myst

(7) Grand Theft Auto

For an addictive but educational mix of planning, strategy and history:

(8) Age of Empires

For abstracted spatial interaction:

(9) Tetris

(10) Katamari

Some sample blogs to look at

To get you started here are a couple of interesting blogs to look at...

Keri Smith - illustrator and creator of amazing books

Wooster Collective - longstanding international archive of street art

Design is Kinky - Sydney based design studio and founders of semi-permanent

Week 1 ::: screening

ok, so we took a quick look at:

[1] Tekkon Kinkreet: Taiyo Matsumoto
[2] Transformers: The Movie: Hasbro / Michael Bay
[3] Laputa: Castle in the Sky: Hayao Miyazaki
[4] Neon Genesis Evangelion: giant robots and existential angst
[5] Interstella 5555: Daft Punk / Leiji Matsumoto
[6] Toy Story: Pixar
[7] Ge Ge Ge Kitaro: live action take on old Japanese cartoon character
[8] Animatrix: did not show it but sure everyone is familiar with the Matrix Trilogy...

Troy's top ten game worlds

Chosen only from worlds in which I have spent significant amounts of time in at stage in my life...

[1] Sonic the Hedgehog (Sega MD) *
[2] Super Mario World (SNES) *
[3] World of Warcraft (MacOS)
[4] Little Big Planet (PS3)
[5] Spore (MacOS)
[6] Rez (PS2) *
[7] Tomb Raider (PSone) *
[8] Half-Life 2 (PC) *
[9] Ultima IV (Apple //c) *
[10] Quake II (PC) *

... inspiration and reference for project 1 !!!

MMDA1302 ::: First Year Studio ~ [S T A R T !!!]

ok, an occasional blog for MMDA1302 over the second half of 2010...
watch this space :::
and welcome!