Considering a 3D Animation Career? Some Things You Should Know
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Joseph_Serpico]Joseph Serpico
What skills do you need to be a 3D animator? First of all, you must be able to draw. Additionally, you should be familiar with the process of creating a storyline and know a little about acting. Added skills that would help greatly would be sculpting experience and a knowledge of anatomy. Even though animators use computers to create animations, the ability to draw is one skill they absolutely must have. Due to the number of employment applications received by the big Hollywood animation studios, If you aren't fantastic at drawing, you can forget about ever getting hired by one. So where do all the animators who can draw good but not great work? Well, making films is not the only job animators can get. They also work in industrial design, architecture, interior design, on the Internet, producing media such as CD-ROMs, creating computer games, and many other fields.
Additionally, an animator position is not the only job available in the animation field. Animators are supported by storyboard artists, graphic designers, layout artists, animator's assistants, background artists, in-betweeners, and many others.
Regardless of where you work, you're probably not going to start at the top rung of the ladder. Most people who aspire to eventually work as animators start their animation career as an in-betweener. This job can help you to learn the basics of professional animation and get paid for it. The in-betweener's job is to help the animator's assistants to fill in the movement between key drawings. These in-between drawings are called transition drawings.
On the other hand, people who are more interested in the technical aspects of animation might get their start as a storyboard artist's assistant. The storyboard is the outline of the film that the animators work from, and the storyboard artist creates it from the script. An assistant usually starts their career by doing clean up and revisions, with the aim to eventually prepare portions of the storyboard with instruction and assistance from the artist.
Most likely the biggest future advances in animation will occur in 3D animation, so if you want to be on the cutting edge, that's what you want to learn. New techniques are being developed all the time, while many old ones are continually being updated to keep pace with all the technological advancements that are occuring in the field. Nary a week passes without news of some improvement in either the hardware or software used for 3D animation. If you intend to work in the field, be prepared to continually re-educate yourself. The good news is that many employers will either provide the training or foot the bill.
If you want to read more about beginning a [http://www.animationschoolguide.com/3d-animation-career.html ]3D animation career, head on over to The Animation School Guide at http://www.animationschoolguide.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Joseph_Serpico http://EzineArticles.com/?Considering-a-3D-Animation-Career?-Some-Things-You-Should-Know&id=781125
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Monday, October 22, 2007
Illusion Technologies: Animation
Considering a 3D Animation Career? Some Things You Should Know
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Joseph_Serpico]Joseph Serpico
What skills do you need to be a 3D animator? First of all, you must be able to draw. Additionally, you should be familiar with the process of creating a storyline and know a little about acting. Added skills that would help greatly would be sculpting experience and a knowledge of anatomy. Even though animators use computers to create animations, the ability to draw is one skill they absolutely must have. Due to the number of employment applications received by the big Hollywood animation studios, If you aren't fantastic at drawing, you can forget about ever getting hired by one. So where do all the animators who can draw good but not great work? Well, making films is not the only job animators can get. They also work in industrial design, architecture, interior design, on the Internet, producing media such as CD-ROMs, creating computer games, and many other fields.
Additionally, an animator position is not the only job available in the animation field. Animators are supported by storyboard artists, graphic designers, layout artists, animator's assistants, background artists, in-betweeners, and many others.
Regardless of where you work, you're probably not going to start at the top rung of the ladder. Most people who aspire to eventually work as animators start their animation career as an in-betweener. This job can help you to learn the basics of professional animation and get paid for it. The in-betweener's job is to help the animator's assistants to fill in the movement between key drawings. These in-between drawings are called transition drawings.
On the other hand, people who are more interested in the technical aspects of animation might get their start as a storyboard artist's assistant. The storyboard is the outline of the film that the animators work from, and the storyboard artist creates it from the script. An assistant usually starts their career by doing clean up and revisions, with the aim to eventually prepare portions of the storyboard with instruction and assistance from the artist.
Most likely the biggest future advances in animation will occur in 3D animation, so if you want to be on the cutting edge, that's what you want to learn. New techniques are being developed all the time, while many old ones are continually being updated to keep pace with all the technological advancements that are occuring in the field. Nary a week passes without news of some improvement in either the hardware or software used for 3D animation. If you intend to work in the field, be prepared to continually re-educate yourself. The good news is that many employers will either provide the training or foot the bill.
If you want to read more about beginning a [http://www.animationschoolguide.com/3d-animation-career.html ]3D animation career, head on over to The Animation School Guide at http://www.animationschoolguide.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Joseph_Serpico http://EzineArticles.com/?Considering-a-3D-Animation-Career?-Some-Things-You-Should-Know&id=781125
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Joseph_Serpico]Joseph Serpico
What skills do you need to be a 3D animator? First of all, you must be able to draw. Additionally, you should be familiar with the process of creating a storyline and know a little about acting. Added skills that would help greatly would be sculpting experience and a knowledge of anatomy. Even though animators use computers to create animations, the ability to draw is one skill they absolutely must have. Due to the number of employment applications received by the big Hollywood animation studios, If you aren't fantastic at drawing, you can forget about ever getting hired by one. So where do all the animators who can draw good but not great work? Well, making films is not the only job animators can get. They also work in industrial design, architecture, interior design, on the Internet, producing media such as CD-ROMs, creating computer games, and many other fields.
Additionally, an animator position is not the only job available in the animation field. Animators are supported by storyboard artists, graphic designers, layout artists, animator's assistants, background artists, in-betweeners, and many others.
Regardless of where you work, you're probably not going to start at the top rung of the ladder. Most people who aspire to eventually work as animators start their animation career as an in-betweener. This job can help you to learn the basics of professional animation and get paid for it. The in-betweener's job is to help the animator's assistants to fill in the movement between key drawings. These in-between drawings are called transition drawings.
On the other hand, people who are more interested in the technical aspects of animation might get their start as a storyboard artist's assistant. The storyboard is the outline of the film that the animators work from, and the storyboard artist creates it from the script. An assistant usually starts their career by doing clean up and revisions, with the aim to eventually prepare portions of the storyboard with instruction and assistance from the artist.
Most likely the biggest future advances in animation will occur in 3D animation, so if you want to be on the cutting edge, that's what you want to learn. New techniques are being developed all the time, while many old ones are continually being updated to keep pace with all the technological advancements that are occuring in the field. Nary a week passes without news of some improvement in either the hardware or software used for 3D animation. If you intend to work in the field, be prepared to continually re-educate yourself. The good news is that many employers will either provide the training or foot the bill.
If you want to read more about beginning a [http://www.animationschoolguide.com/3d-animation-career.html ]3D animation career, head on over to The Animation School Guide at http://www.animationschoolguide.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Joseph_Serpico http://EzineArticles.com/?Considering-a-3D-Animation-Career?-Some-Things-You-Should-Know&id=781125
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Illusion Technologies: Animation
Forensic Animation
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Sarah_Freeland]Sarah Freeland
Forensic animation is a newer legal tool used in just about every type of legal suit imaginable. In murder cases forensic animation can be used to recreate a forensic crime scene. In car accident cases this legal video tool can be used to recreate the accident and to determine who was at fault. However, while this technology is very effective, before it can be used as evidence it needs to be evaluated by the court for its admissibility.
The admissibility of forensic animation depends on several factors. First of all the court is going to look at how objective the animation is. They are going to look for significant biasing of the animated footage, which can give one side an unjust advantage. Next the court is going to look at the data used in creating the animation. The data used must be verifiable and it must be supported by witness testimony or authoritative facts. Finally, the forensic animation must be easy to understand and be relevant to the case at hand.
Forensic animation, while intriguing and helpful, is not right for every type of case. It is expensive and it takes time to generate. For most average forensic animation presentations under 3 minute, you should expect a turn around time of between 1 and 3 months. You should also expect to pay $6,000 plus for a piece of forensic animation. The actual cost that you will incur is going to depend on how long the piece needs to be, the complexity of the animation used, how soon you need the piece by and what forensic animation company you use.
The cost of forensic animation mostly goes towards the labor costs. In fact, labor is going to make up about three quarters of the total cost of your animation presentation. Some of the labor costs that your project will incur include: consulting, model generation, camera animation and actor animation. Again the actual costs that you will be charged are going to depend greatly on the complexity of the animation that needs to be generated and the company that you work with.
A [http://www.legalvideographer.info/what_is_legal_videographer.html]legal videographer is a video production specialist who is skilled at producing video evidence for legal cases. The services offered by this type of video specialist is in high demand and it pays a very generous salary. Being a [http://www.legalvideographer.info/digital_videographer.html]professional digital videographer takes more than just knowledge of how to use a digital camcorder. It takes expertise in a variety of business, creative and technical subjects. There are a lot of [http://www.legalvideographer.info/videography_tools_accessories.html]videography equipment that videographers need including: cameras, tripods, editing software, video monitors, cases, lenses and mixing devices.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sarah_Freeland http://EzineArticles.com/?Forensic-Animation&id=702656
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Sarah_Freeland]Sarah Freeland
Forensic animation is a newer legal tool used in just about every type of legal suit imaginable. In murder cases forensic animation can be used to recreate a forensic crime scene. In car accident cases this legal video tool can be used to recreate the accident and to determine who was at fault. However, while this technology is very effective, before it can be used as evidence it needs to be evaluated by the court for its admissibility.
The admissibility of forensic animation depends on several factors. First of all the court is going to look at how objective the animation is. They are going to look for significant biasing of the animated footage, which can give one side an unjust advantage. Next the court is going to look at the data used in creating the animation. The data used must be verifiable and it must be supported by witness testimony or authoritative facts. Finally, the forensic animation must be easy to understand and be relevant to the case at hand.
Forensic animation, while intriguing and helpful, is not right for every type of case. It is expensive and it takes time to generate. For most average forensic animation presentations under 3 minute, you should expect a turn around time of between 1 and 3 months. You should also expect to pay $6,000 plus for a piece of forensic animation. The actual cost that you will incur is going to depend on how long the piece needs to be, the complexity of the animation used, how soon you need the piece by and what forensic animation company you use.
The cost of forensic animation mostly goes towards the labor costs. In fact, labor is going to make up about three quarters of the total cost of your animation presentation. Some of the labor costs that your project will incur include: consulting, model generation, camera animation and actor animation. Again the actual costs that you will be charged are going to depend greatly on the complexity of the animation that needs to be generated and the company that you work with.
A [http://www.legalvideographer.info/what_is_legal_videographer.html]legal videographer is a video production specialist who is skilled at producing video evidence for legal cases. The services offered by this type of video specialist is in high demand and it pays a very generous salary. Being a [http://www.legalvideographer.info/digital_videographer.html]professional digital videographer takes more than just knowledge of how to use a digital camcorder. It takes expertise in a variety of business, creative and technical subjects. There are a lot of [http://www.legalvideographer.info/videography_tools_accessories.html]videography equipment that videographers need including: cameras, tripods, editing software, video monitors, cases, lenses and mixing devices.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sarah_Freeland http://EzineArticles.com/?Forensic-Animation&id=702656
Friday, October 19, 2007
Illusion Technologies: Animation
Branding, Concept, Communication and Focus Testing
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Rick_Vidallon]Rick Vidallon
I’ve seen it all. The good, the bad and the ugly of Web site design. And the more I analyze what’s on the Web, the sadder I get, because the Web has become open game for Web site designers with bad taste and no plan.
On the other hand, there are many talented Web designers to choose from. But talent will only take one so far.
A designer has to understand and master the essence of design: Design with purpose, Create with purpose, and Implement with purpose.
As with the world of print, TV, and radio, a designer must design with four specific goals in mind:
Branding
Good branding makes the cash register ring. Take Fox News as a case in point. Unlike CNN or MSNBC, Fox strives to be a bit more edgy and bold -- and they lead the pack. Their logo animation, bumper graphics, and over-the-shoulder graphics are bright primary colors. Even their music is a bit edgier with guitar riffs versus the subdued music tones of the other stations.
Concept
A great concept on a shoe-string budget will blow away a weak concept on a multi-million dollar budget any day. For example, how many truck or SUV commercials have you seen with guys careening through mud or snow-covered mountain passes as the words scream out “Chevy Tough” or “Ford, Built to Last.” I can’t believe executives at these car companies spend millions each year on poorly conceived advertising campaigns.
Now, see if you remember this one. A mother is about to drop her child off at school, and asks if he’d rather get dropped off at the curb instead of directly in-front of the school. The child says, “nah, that’s okay mom.” He steps down from the Hummer and strolls up to the school entrance while an older student, with his eyes glued to the Hummer, says “cool.” This is a “concept;” a very well executed concept. It strongly conveys an attitude. Even Hummer’s theme music has attitude. The branding and concept raises the Hummer’s image above the rest.
Your Web site or your client’s Web site should convey this type of branding and concept. Think outside the box. Look at other well executed designs for inspiration. Don’t look at the industry, look at the design. Just because you’re building a Web site for a golf course doesn’t mean you should only Google golf courses in your research. Look beyond. Here are some great Web site resources for creative inspiration. http://www.commarts.com
CA-
Communication Arts, the online counterpart of Communication Arts magazine. http://www.designinteract.com
Design Interact, The premier source of information and inspiration for the field of interactive media. http://www.coolhomepages.com
Cool Home Pages, Great resource for designer's block.
Communication
During my career in broadcast graphics we would churn out graphics for the evening news. Many of them were “over-the-shoulder” graphics which appeared behind the anchor as they delivered the story. The main philosophy
I constantly ingrained into my design team was:“If it doesn’t read – it doesn’t work.” In other words, if the volume of the TV is turned off, the viewer should know what the story is about without the presence of text or title.
Your Web site should project that same philosophy. Ask yourself, does it immediately communicate my message? In television your message is “one click” away from the next channel. On the World Wide Web, you’re one mouse click away from a potential customer moving on.
If you own an e-commerce site, do you expend Web real estate endlessly talking about yourself, or do you get right down to business by featuring your products?
If you own an industry or business site, do you have fancy animation with glitzy music, or does your site convey a serious professional business image?
Make sure your Web designer is communicating well with the public. Solid thinking translated into clear messages works every time.
Focus Test
Want good feedback? Want good direction? Try a grassroots focus test.
Late one evening after some finger breaking work on some all important Flash animation, the cleaning crew entered my office. I asked, “What do you guys think?” They replied, “What is it?”
I was taken back. Ouch!!! I had fallen into the old trap of not being able to see the forest for the trees. This is an all too common problem among creative types. Design work tends to be a labor of love, and you can get too close to your project without seeing the big picture.
Get feedback, it’s the breakfast of champions. Ask your team, neighbor, spouse, significant other -- ask anyone but yourself. And once you step out on the ledge, make sure you’re ready for negative feedback. Learn to embrace it and use it to develop into a better professional. Growing some thick skin will also be helpful.
To see what I mean, visit [http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/]www.webpagesthatsuck.com.
About the Author http://www.visionefx.net - Visionefx President Ricardo Vidallon has been in the creative business of advertising, cable broadcast, animation and the World Wide Web for more than two decades. His work has been featured on
the Christian Broadcasting Network, Inc., Fox News and NBC Entertainment. His career track in Web consultancy includes the global companies of Reynolds and Reynolds, CMGI Solutions, and Automark, Inc.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rick_Vidallon http://EzineArticles.com/?Branding,-Concept,-Communication-and-Focus-Testing&id=99651
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Rick_Vidallon]Rick Vidallon
I’ve seen it all. The good, the bad and the ugly of Web site design. And the more I analyze what’s on the Web, the sadder I get, because the Web has become open game for Web site designers with bad taste and no plan.
On the other hand, there are many talented Web designers to choose from. But talent will only take one so far.
A designer has to understand and master the essence of design: Design with purpose, Create with purpose, and Implement with purpose.
As with the world of print, TV, and radio, a designer must design with four specific goals in mind:
Branding
Good branding makes the cash register ring. Take Fox News as a case in point. Unlike CNN or MSNBC, Fox strives to be a bit more edgy and bold -- and they lead the pack. Their logo animation, bumper graphics, and over-the-shoulder graphics are bright primary colors. Even their music is a bit edgier with guitar riffs versus the subdued music tones of the other stations.
Concept
A great concept on a shoe-string budget will blow away a weak concept on a multi-million dollar budget any day. For example, how many truck or SUV commercials have you seen with guys careening through mud or snow-covered mountain passes as the words scream out “Chevy Tough” or “Ford, Built to Last.” I can’t believe executives at these car companies spend millions each year on poorly conceived advertising campaigns.
Now, see if you remember this one. A mother is about to drop her child off at school, and asks if he’d rather get dropped off at the curb instead of directly in-front of the school. The child says, “nah, that’s okay mom.” He steps down from the Hummer and strolls up to the school entrance while an older student, with his eyes glued to the Hummer, says “cool.” This is a “concept;” a very well executed concept. It strongly conveys an attitude. Even Hummer’s theme music has attitude. The branding and concept raises the Hummer’s image above the rest.
Your Web site or your client’s Web site should convey this type of branding and concept. Think outside the box. Look at other well executed designs for inspiration. Don’t look at the industry, look at the design. Just because you’re building a Web site for a golf course doesn’t mean you should only Google golf courses in your research. Look beyond. Here are some great Web site resources for creative inspiration. http://www.commarts.com
CA-
Communication Arts, the online counterpart of Communication Arts magazine. http://www.designinteract.com
Design Interact, The premier source of information and inspiration for the field of interactive media. http://www.coolhomepages.com
Cool Home Pages, Great resource for designer's block.
Communication
During my career in broadcast graphics we would churn out graphics for the evening news. Many of them were “over-the-shoulder” graphics which appeared behind the anchor as they delivered the story. The main philosophy
I constantly ingrained into my design team was:“If it doesn’t read – it doesn’t work.” In other words, if the volume of the TV is turned off, the viewer should know what the story is about without the presence of text or title.
Your Web site should project that same philosophy. Ask yourself, does it immediately communicate my message? In television your message is “one click” away from the next channel. On the World Wide Web, you’re one mouse click away from a potential customer moving on.
If you own an e-commerce site, do you expend Web real estate endlessly talking about yourself, or do you get right down to business by featuring your products?
If you own an industry or business site, do you have fancy animation with glitzy music, or does your site convey a serious professional business image?
Make sure your Web designer is communicating well with the public. Solid thinking translated into clear messages works every time.
Focus Test
Want good feedback? Want good direction? Try a grassroots focus test.
Late one evening after some finger breaking work on some all important Flash animation, the cleaning crew entered my office. I asked, “What do you guys think?” They replied, “What is it?”
I was taken back. Ouch!!! I had fallen into the old trap of not being able to see the forest for the trees. This is an all too common problem among creative types. Design work tends to be a labor of love, and you can get too close to your project without seeing the big picture.
Get feedback, it’s the breakfast of champions. Ask your team, neighbor, spouse, significant other -- ask anyone but yourself. And once you step out on the ledge, make sure you’re ready for negative feedback. Learn to embrace it and use it to develop into a better professional. Growing some thick skin will also be helpful.
To see what I mean, visit [http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/]www.webpagesthatsuck.com.
About the Author http://www.visionefx.net - Visionefx President Ricardo Vidallon has been in the creative business of advertising, cable broadcast, animation and the World Wide Web for more than two decades. His work has been featured on
the Christian Broadcasting Network, Inc., Fox News and NBC Entertainment. His career track in Web consultancy includes the global companies of Reynolds and Reynolds, CMGI Solutions, and Automark, Inc.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rick_Vidallon http://EzineArticles.com/?Branding,-Concept,-Communication-and-Focus-Testing&id=99651
Monday, September 17, 2007
Illusion Technologies: Animation
Upsurging Flash Animations
By
[http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Rakhee_Chowdhary]Rakhee Chowdhary
Flash animations are protruding because of their myriad
characteristics in this coeval age. Flash is splashing all
around and the timeless saying “A picture is worth a
thousand words” aptly describes how large amount of data
can be absorbed quickly, imbibe our mind.
Flash animation is created using Adobe flash animation
software and is distributed in .swf (Shockwave Flash)
format, other formats are .as (ActionScript), .flv (Flash
Video). Flash animations have nowadays become best way
to showcase overview of an enterprise. Web flash
animations are often created in series and well known by
different names; bitmaps, raster-based art, vector based
drawings, videos can be easily incorporated with these flash
animations for more clear graphics. You can find numerous
flash generator, image manipulator, menu creator on the
web. You tube,
We find Macromedia Flash is a pioneering vector
technology for designing high-end-high-impact,
low-bandwidth websites that for enticing and retention of
visitors; providing a richer, more compelling web
experience. You don’t need to install or download player,
just drag the file to your browser and it runs, these flash
animations are very attractive and interactive and help a lot
in website brand campaigning.
Adobe Flex, is the latest upsurging flash animation; it is an
IDE and SDK that supports development and deployment
of cross platform for technologies based on proprietary
Macromedia Flash platform. Flex Data Services 2 provides
Enterprise-oriented services through data synchronization,
data push, publish-subscribe and automated testing. Adobe
Flex 3 is the beta version that supports Adobe Application
Runtime and includes Creative Suite products and Flex
Builder IDE.
There is good news for SEO executives working over flash
websites!! Previously it was almost impossible to get flash
websites indexed in the search engines, but now as adobe
as incorporated Adobe SDK capable of converting .swf to
html making the site fully search engine friendly, it is helping
SEO’s to gain rankings for the same with much more ease.
Presently google has also deployed a new fix over its
algorithm via which its crawler (googlebot) is capable of
indexing partly content of flash driven websites.
[http://www.icreon.com/]Icreon offers
[http://www.icreon.com/multimedia_flashwebsite.shtml]Multimedia presentation India Interactive multimedia, flash
website design and development.
Rakhi, is a experienced SEO content writer at Icreon
Communications Pvt. Ltd.
Article Source:
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rakhee_Chowdhary
http://EzineArticles.com/?Upsurging-Flash-Animations&id=672823
By
[http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Rakhee_Chowdhary]Rakhee Chowdhary
Flash animations are protruding because of their myriad
characteristics in this coeval age. Flash is splashing all
around and the timeless saying “A picture is worth a
thousand words” aptly describes how large amount of data
can be absorbed quickly, imbibe our mind.
Flash animation is created using Adobe flash animation
software and is distributed in .swf (Shockwave Flash)
format, other formats are .as (ActionScript), .flv (Flash
Video). Flash animations have nowadays become best way
to showcase overview of an enterprise. Web flash
animations are often created in series and well known by
different names; bitmaps, raster-based art, vector based
drawings, videos can be easily incorporated with these flash
animations for more clear graphics. You can find numerous
flash generator, image manipulator, menu creator on the
web. You tube,
We find Macromedia Flash is a pioneering vector
technology for designing high-end-high-impact,
low-bandwidth websites that for enticing and retention of
visitors; providing a richer, more compelling web
experience. You don’t need to install or download player,
just drag the file to your browser and it runs, these flash
animations are very attractive and interactive and help a lot
in website brand campaigning.
Adobe Flex, is the latest upsurging flash animation; it is an
IDE and SDK that supports development and deployment
of cross platform for technologies based on proprietary
Macromedia Flash platform. Flex Data Services 2 provides
Enterprise-oriented services through data synchronization,
data push, publish-subscribe and automated testing. Adobe
Flex 3 is the beta version that supports Adobe Application
Runtime and includes Creative Suite products and Flex
Builder IDE.
There is good news for SEO executives working over flash
websites!! Previously it was almost impossible to get flash
websites indexed in the search engines, but now as adobe
as incorporated Adobe SDK capable of converting .swf to
html making the site fully search engine friendly, it is helping
SEO’s to gain rankings for the same with much more ease.
Presently google has also deployed a new fix over its
algorithm via which its crawler (googlebot) is capable of
indexing partly content of flash driven websites.
[http://www.icreon.com/]Icreon offers
[http://www.icreon.com/multimedia_flashwebsite.shtml]Multimedia presentation India Interactive multimedia, flash
website design and development.
Rakhi, is a experienced SEO content writer at Icreon
Communications Pvt. Ltd.
Article Source:
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rakhee_Chowdhary
http://EzineArticles.com/?Upsurging-Flash-Animations&id=672823
Friday, September 14, 2007
Illusion Technologies: Animation
Website Decisions IV - Animations
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Dustin_Schwerman]Dustin Schwerman
From Flash to animated gifs to javascript, there are a variety of ways to add animations to a website. Moving graphics can be a helpful addition, but should be used with a degree of care. As with all options, used properly, animations can improve the visitor’s experience and augment your message. Used improperly, however, and animations can distract, annoy, and delay the viewer.
The first rule for using animation is to make sure it doesn’t hinder the user. Having balloons float around the web page might look cool and provide a festive feel, but it also threatens to get in the way as the user tries to read your page’s content. Big flashing changing images can attract the eye, but can also distract it from the point you are trying to make.
Introductory animations are especially prone this sort of problem. Although these openings may be attention-grabbers the first time someone visits, they quickly grow boring, even annoying, after a few replays. Bypassing links can be useful for minimizing this effect, but the problems with such introductions do not end there. People are impatient; when they come to your site from the search engine, they want to be provided instantly with the information they are searching for. These sorts of introductions, thus, are excellent for sites whose primary function is to entertain. Informative sites, which may very well include sites that exist to inform about products, receive limited benefit from these additions.
You should also consider your SEO when considering animations. A web page that only contains a Flash intro has no content, which greatly limits SEO. If it is the main page to your site, the search engines will see that your main page has no keywords. Better optimized pages will rank higher, and at that point, the introduction isn’t useful at all.
This is not to say that animation is a bad thing to add to a site. However, it is a tool, one of many tools available to a skilled web designer. As with any option, using it solely for the sake of using it is never a viable option.
So how do you use animations? Ideally, you want to utilize them where they can be entertaining and attractive without drawing attention away from main content. Button links, of course, are classic places. Although these animations are subtle, they can improve the user’s experience by augmenting the appearance of interactivity. If there are circumstances where your website is loading other content, a brief animation can distract the user from the delay. A scrolling set of links can allow you to display more options in a limited amount of space. And, naturally, you can use animation to attract attention to sections of the page that you want the viewer to notice.
What it comes down to is that movement draws attention. The goal is to draw attention towards key parts of your website. Used in that manner, and animations can help direct the user to the places and pages you want them to view. If you simply animate things to see them move, you will only draw the eyes away from the more important parts of your site.
Copyright © 2007 Dustin Schwerman.
Dustin Schwerman is the primary web designer at [http://www.trulyuniqueweb.com]Truly Unique--Affordable Custom Website Design. Truly Unique specializes in impressive, custom sites designed to capture the essence of the businesses they represent, as well as creating useful web-based programs to improve and simplify some of the tasks of running a business. Their goal is to provide these services at affordable, pragmatic rates based on effort involved, rather than arbitrary costs based on number of pages or hours.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Dustin_Schwerman http://EzineArticles.com/?Website-Decisions-IV---Animations&id=704593
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Dustin_Schwerman]Dustin Schwerman
From Flash to animated gifs to javascript, there are a variety of ways to add animations to a website. Moving graphics can be a helpful addition, but should be used with a degree of care. As with all options, used properly, animations can improve the visitor’s experience and augment your message. Used improperly, however, and animations can distract, annoy, and delay the viewer.
The first rule for using animation is to make sure it doesn’t hinder the user. Having balloons float around the web page might look cool and provide a festive feel, but it also threatens to get in the way as the user tries to read your page’s content. Big flashing changing images can attract the eye, but can also distract it from the point you are trying to make.
Introductory animations are especially prone this sort of problem. Although these openings may be attention-grabbers the first time someone visits, they quickly grow boring, even annoying, after a few replays. Bypassing links can be useful for minimizing this effect, but the problems with such introductions do not end there. People are impatient; when they come to your site from the search engine, they want to be provided instantly with the information they are searching for. These sorts of introductions, thus, are excellent for sites whose primary function is to entertain. Informative sites, which may very well include sites that exist to inform about products, receive limited benefit from these additions.
You should also consider your SEO when considering animations. A web page that only contains a Flash intro has no content, which greatly limits SEO. If it is the main page to your site, the search engines will see that your main page has no keywords. Better optimized pages will rank higher, and at that point, the introduction isn’t useful at all.
This is not to say that animation is a bad thing to add to a site. However, it is a tool, one of many tools available to a skilled web designer. As with any option, using it solely for the sake of using it is never a viable option.
So how do you use animations? Ideally, you want to utilize them where they can be entertaining and attractive without drawing attention away from main content. Button links, of course, are classic places. Although these animations are subtle, they can improve the user’s experience by augmenting the appearance of interactivity. If there are circumstances where your website is loading other content, a brief animation can distract the user from the delay. A scrolling set of links can allow you to display more options in a limited amount of space. And, naturally, you can use animation to attract attention to sections of the page that you want the viewer to notice.
What it comes down to is that movement draws attention. The goal is to draw attention towards key parts of your website. Used in that manner, and animations can help direct the user to the places and pages you want them to view. If you simply animate things to see them move, you will only draw the eyes away from the more important parts of your site.
Copyright © 2007 Dustin Schwerman.
Dustin Schwerman is the primary web designer at [http://www.trulyuniqueweb.com]Truly Unique--Affordable Custom Website Design. Truly Unique specializes in impressive, custom sites designed to capture the essence of the businesses they represent, as well as creating useful web-based programs to improve and simplify some of the tasks of running a business. Their goal is to provide these services at affordable, pragmatic rates based on effort involved, rather than arbitrary costs based on number of pages or hours.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Dustin_Schwerman http://EzineArticles.com/?Website-Decisions-IV---Animations&id=704593
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Illusion Technologies: Animation
The Favicon, an Untapped Image Promotion Trick -
Animated Favicons?
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Andrei_Smith]Andrei
Smith
A favicon is that little image that most browsers display on
the address line and in the favorites (bookmarks) menu.
Tabbed browsers like Firefox and Opera extend the
functionality of favicons, adding them to their tabs. The
name was coined based on Internet Explorer (the first
browser to support it) and derives from "Favorites Icon".
Each web browser has a unique user interface, and as a
result uses the favicon in different ways. The favicon allows
a company to further promote its identity and image by
displaying a logo, a graphical message, etc. Often, the
favicon reflects the look and feel of the web site or the
organization's logo.
A traditional favicon is actually a Microsoft Windows ICO
file. An ICO file is actually a repository of bitmap like
images. They are used because in some locations a 16x16
pixel image is desired, and sometimes a 32x32 image may
be needed. Sometimes a 16 color image is desired, and
sometimes a 256 color icon is desired.
You probably already knew all of the above.
But did you know that Firefox can display animated
favicons? If you don't believe me, open Firefox and go to
my site, bsleek.com (there should be a link at the bottom of
the article). if you don't have Firefox, download it, it's a
"must have" and you will quickly fall in love with the
simplicity and convenience of tabbed browsing. Even if you
are not a designer but just a site owner, in today's
environment you absolutely must know how your site looks
in all browsers. You would think that all websites should
look the same, but as browsers become more diverse and
more sophisticated, standards are not respected and things
can get messy. For example, I just discovered that a few
pages on my site don't look as expected in the latest version
of Opera and need to be adjusted.
Ok, I hope by now you saw my animated favicon in Firefox
and came back to the article to learn more about it...
The main reason why you can see animated favicons in
Firefox is because Firefox abolished the proprietary ICO
format in favor of the ability to display any supported image
format in the favicon location, including BMP, JPG, GIF,
PNG and... animated GIFs.
So now you know the big secret, the animated favicon is
nothing but a tiny animated GIF.
Here's a very neat trick, that can actually be used to
visualize how any image looks like as a 16x16 pixel icon -
once you start designing one of those, you will realize that it
is extremely hard to produce a legible image on a 16 square
pixels canvas:
Find any page with any graphic that you are interested in.
Right click the image and chose "View Image" from the
dialog. A blank page should display with your chosen image
and surprise: you can see a miniature 16x16 copy of the
image as a favicon! Uhh... do I have to mention again that
we are doing all this in Firefox?
A hacker's mind will immediately think of how great it
would be to use this feature as a conversion tool.
Unfortunately, unlike Internet Explorer and Opera, Firefox
doesn't store FavIcons in .ico files, the icons are stored in
an encoded format directly in the bookmark file.
You can apply the same principle to animated GIFs and you
will notice that a miniature version of the animation also
plays in the address bar and on the tabs.
Perhaps one of the main reasons why you don't see that
many sites using animations is browser compatibility.
Animated favicons are not treated at all by Internet
Explorer. A static image will not be extracted from the
animation either. Instead, the default .htm icon (as defined in
Windows' filetypes) will be placed under one's Favorites -
once added, that is. The animations are not supported by
Netscape, Opera, Konqueror, Safari; at least so it seems at
the time of this writing. The Firefox family seems to be the
only friend to animations, yet as browsers evolve, broader
support for animation will probably come along (or, the
concept will die).
So, why not take advantage of this *now* and 'beat the
rush'?
Basically, this is how it's done:
1. You make a 16x16 animated GIF.
2. You upload the animated GIF to the "root" of your site,
or to any other location.
3. You hardcode in your page the location where Firefox
should look for the animation.
That's really it, "big picture" wise.
If you don't feel too creative or just don't have time and/or
patience, a reputable professional design firm (such as
Bsleek) should be able to make a nice animated favicon for
you. Another option - I don't endorse it, as your goal should
be to excel through unique content and push your own
image out there - is to find one of the many galleries online
and either download a ready made animated favicon or take
a large animated GIF and resize it and/or edit it in one of the
many available tools. There also are sites that offer online
animated favicon creation from a standard image (check out
chami.com, find "FavIcon from pics", they have a simple but
neat scrolling text feature).
If you are however a fellow do-it-yourselfer, then let's
elaborate and look at some techniques and useful tips:
As far as tools go: If you are a lucky owner of Adobe's
excellent Photoshop, then you also have a companion
application called ImageReady. Linux users have Gimp, an
incredibly powerful and free graphics application that can
easily handle animated GIF creation. What many people
don't know is that Gimp is also available for free for
Windows and the Mac. There is also GIMPShop in the
wild, which is a nifty GIMP version for the
photoshop-inclined audience (did I mention free?). There
are also many specialized GIF animation makers, some
freeware, some not.
Things to remember when designing animated favicons:
You have control over the number of times your animation
will play. Any decent animated GIF editor will ask you
whether you want your animation to play once, several
times (you specify a number) or forever. It is also important
to know that after the animation cycled the predetermined
amount of time, it will remain still on the last frame (not the
first one!), so make sure that frame contains the image you
want displayed at the end of the cycle.
If you really need to, you can set it to loop continuously.
However, out of curtsey to those paranoid about their
computer resources being eaten alive by your animation and
to those who find animated things in general terribly
annoying, I always recommend that you set up a finite
number of times your GIF will cycle through the animated
sequence. 6 sounds like a good, conservative number, 12 is
on the medium side.
By limiting the number of times your GIF plays, you might
even set a cool viral marketing effect, where visitors will just
click through your pages to see the animation start over. I
clearly remember when I first saw an animated favicon
years ago (on the first iterations of the Mozilla browser), the
animation was set up to cycle once, and I found myself
refreshing the pages over and over, and even clicking
through the site just to see it again and again. I don't care
what anyone says, people are attracted to eye candy.
So you made your animation and are very proud of it. Now
it is time to upload it to your web server. You can put it
anywhere you want, in any folder you desire. The old
school webmasters who follow Microsoft's teachings will be
very much appalled by this statement. They will tell you that
if you don't name your icon favicon.ico and if you don't put
in the very root of your site, it will not work. With Firefox
and animated favicons things are very liberal, you can name
your animation anything you want (.gif) and place it
anywhere you want. You just have to place a special tag on
every page that points to the gif.
Here is the big problem: All this works fine in Firefox, but
what about the rest of the browsers?
Well, for maximum compatibility you'll have to make a
regular favicon.ico and upload it to the root of your website
(that's where your very first index.xxx home page is, where
xxx is htm, html, php, cfm, etc..). Then we'll add the
following two lines of code to every page that you want to
pull and display the animation.
Please remember to replace the "{" and "}" brackets with
the standard HTML ones, "". I had to use the curly ones
here in order not to confuse article sites. The code has to be
placed between the {HEAD} tag and the {TITLE} tags. It
might possibly work otherwise, but your HTML code will
not be fully W3C compliant:
{LINK REL="SHORTCUT ICON"
HREF="http://www.mydomain.com/favicon.ico"}
{LINK REL="icon"
HREF="http://www.mydomain.com/favicon.gif"
TYPE="image/gif"}
Of course, replace "mydomain.com" with your own domain,
favicon.ico is a standard favicon, favicon.gif is your newly
created animated GIF. Again, it can as well be
mydomain.com/somefolder/somename.gif.
Always hardcode the location, use absolute addresses (as in
the example) and not relative ones ("../favicon.gif").
The first line of code is a standard, a-la Microsoft command
that tells the majority of browsers to load a standard
favicon.ico.
The second line of code is for Firefox only, instructing the
browser to load the animated version.
As a side note, if you forgot to add the two lines of code to
a page, that page should pick the default favicon.ico, but
only if you already loaded it via one page that had the code
in it, or if the page was bookmarked. Additionally,
sometimes, Internet Explorer will just refuse to show a
favicon...
If the above sounds strange (if it doesn't, what are you
doing reading my articles??), I talk about how to create a
favicon.ico and about some of the favicon's stranger
behaviors in my other related articles. Just Google for "The
Favicon, an untapped image promotion trick" (with quotes).
One last thing: I feel that this article will not be complete if I
don't support those folks who look at the animated favicons
the same way the world looks at the text blink "feature"
from the early nineties and would like to forever wipe it of
the face of the web.
You can disable favicons - animated or not & site icons in
Firefox. Here's how:
Open a Firefox window. Type "about:config", without the
quotes, in the address bar. Hit enter or click Go. Scroll
down slightly to "browser.chrome.favicons" and double
click it to change it to "false". This gets rid of the favicons. If
you also want to stop seeing site icons, then look right
below for "browser.chrome.site_icons", double click it to
change it to "false". Close all Firefox windows. When you
reopen Firefox, the pesky little icons should be gone.
---
Andrei co-owns [http://www.bsleek.com/promo]Bsleek - a
company that specializes in web design, hosting,
promotional items, printing, tradeshow displays, logos, CD
presentations, SEO and more. Andrei has amassed an
extensive technical knowledge and experience through his
career as the CIO for a major travel management company
and through his past careers in military research, data
acquisition and airspace engineering. He also consults for
[http:/www.trinityinvestigations.com]Trinity Investigations, a
New York based PI firm.
--- [http://www.bsleek.com/websites/]Bsleek Web Design
- If we build it, they will come.
Article Source:
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Andrei_Smith
http://EzineArticles.com/?The-Favicon,-an-Untapped-Image-Promotion-Trick---Animated-Favicons?&id=153883
Animated Favicons?
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Andrei_Smith]Andrei
Smith
A favicon is that little image that most browsers display on
the address line and in the favorites (bookmarks) menu.
Tabbed browsers like Firefox and Opera extend the
functionality of favicons, adding them to their tabs. The
name was coined based on Internet Explorer (the first
browser to support it) and derives from "Favorites Icon".
Each web browser has a unique user interface, and as a
result uses the favicon in different ways. The favicon allows
a company to further promote its identity and image by
displaying a logo, a graphical message, etc. Often, the
favicon reflects the look and feel of the web site or the
organization's logo.
A traditional favicon is actually a Microsoft Windows ICO
file. An ICO file is actually a repository of bitmap like
images. They are used because in some locations a 16x16
pixel image is desired, and sometimes a 32x32 image may
be needed. Sometimes a 16 color image is desired, and
sometimes a 256 color icon is desired.
You probably already knew all of the above.
But did you know that Firefox can display animated
favicons? If you don't believe me, open Firefox and go to
my site, bsleek.com (there should be a link at the bottom of
the article). if you don't have Firefox, download it, it's a
"must have" and you will quickly fall in love with the
simplicity and convenience of tabbed browsing. Even if you
are not a designer but just a site owner, in today's
environment you absolutely must know how your site looks
in all browsers. You would think that all websites should
look the same, but as browsers become more diverse and
more sophisticated, standards are not respected and things
can get messy. For example, I just discovered that a few
pages on my site don't look as expected in the latest version
of Opera and need to be adjusted.
Ok, I hope by now you saw my animated favicon in Firefox
and came back to the article to learn more about it...
The main reason why you can see animated favicons in
Firefox is because Firefox abolished the proprietary ICO
format in favor of the ability to display any supported image
format in the favicon location, including BMP, JPG, GIF,
PNG and... animated GIFs.
So now you know the big secret, the animated favicon is
nothing but a tiny animated GIF.
Here's a very neat trick, that can actually be used to
visualize how any image looks like as a 16x16 pixel icon -
once you start designing one of those, you will realize that it
is extremely hard to produce a legible image on a 16 square
pixels canvas:
Find any page with any graphic that you are interested in.
Right click the image and chose "View Image" from the
dialog. A blank page should display with your chosen image
and surprise: you can see a miniature 16x16 copy of the
image as a favicon! Uhh... do I have to mention again that
we are doing all this in Firefox?
A hacker's mind will immediately think of how great it
would be to use this feature as a conversion tool.
Unfortunately, unlike Internet Explorer and Opera, Firefox
doesn't store FavIcons in .ico files, the icons are stored in
an encoded format directly in the bookmark file.
You can apply the same principle to animated GIFs and you
will notice that a miniature version of the animation also
plays in the address bar and on the tabs.
Perhaps one of the main reasons why you don't see that
many sites using animations is browser compatibility.
Animated favicons are not treated at all by Internet
Explorer. A static image will not be extracted from the
animation either. Instead, the default .htm icon (as defined in
Windows' filetypes) will be placed under one's Favorites -
once added, that is. The animations are not supported by
Netscape, Opera, Konqueror, Safari; at least so it seems at
the time of this writing. The Firefox family seems to be the
only friend to animations, yet as browsers evolve, broader
support for animation will probably come along (or, the
concept will die).
So, why not take advantage of this *now* and 'beat the
rush'?
Basically, this is how it's done:
1. You make a 16x16 animated GIF.
2. You upload the animated GIF to the "root" of your site,
or to any other location.
3. You hardcode in your page the location where Firefox
should look for the animation.
That's really it, "big picture" wise.
If you don't feel too creative or just don't have time and/or
patience, a reputable professional design firm (such as
Bsleek) should be able to make a nice animated favicon for
you. Another option - I don't endorse it, as your goal should
be to excel through unique content and push your own
image out there - is to find one of the many galleries online
and either download a ready made animated favicon or take
a large animated GIF and resize it and/or edit it in one of the
many available tools. There also are sites that offer online
animated favicon creation from a standard image (check out
chami.com, find "FavIcon from pics", they have a simple but
neat scrolling text feature).
If you are however a fellow do-it-yourselfer, then let's
elaborate and look at some techniques and useful tips:
As far as tools go: If you are a lucky owner of Adobe's
excellent Photoshop, then you also have a companion
application called ImageReady. Linux users have Gimp, an
incredibly powerful and free graphics application that can
easily handle animated GIF creation. What many people
don't know is that Gimp is also available for free for
Windows and the Mac. There is also GIMPShop in the
wild, which is a nifty GIMP version for the
photoshop-inclined audience (did I mention free?). There
are also many specialized GIF animation makers, some
freeware, some not.
Things to remember when designing animated favicons:
You have control over the number of times your animation
will play. Any decent animated GIF editor will ask you
whether you want your animation to play once, several
times (you specify a number) or forever. It is also important
to know that after the animation cycled the predetermined
amount of time, it will remain still on the last frame (not the
first one!), so make sure that frame contains the image you
want displayed at the end of the cycle.
If you really need to, you can set it to loop continuously.
However, out of curtsey to those paranoid about their
computer resources being eaten alive by your animation and
to those who find animated things in general terribly
annoying, I always recommend that you set up a finite
number of times your GIF will cycle through the animated
sequence. 6 sounds like a good, conservative number, 12 is
on the medium side.
By limiting the number of times your GIF plays, you might
even set a cool viral marketing effect, where visitors will just
click through your pages to see the animation start over. I
clearly remember when I first saw an animated favicon
years ago (on the first iterations of the Mozilla browser), the
animation was set up to cycle once, and I found myself
refreshing the pages over and over, and even clicking
through the site just to see it again and again. I don't care
what anyone says, people are attracted to eye candy.
So you made your animation and are very proud of it. Now
it is time to upload it to your web server. You can put it
anywhere you want, in any folder you desire. The old
school webmasters who follow Microsoft's teachings will be
very much appalled by this statement. They will tell you that
if you don't name your icon favicon.ico and if you don't put
in the very root of your site, it will not work. With Firefox
and animated favicons things are very liberal, you can name
your animation anything you want (.gif) and place it
anywhere you want. You just have to place a special tag on
every page that points to the gif.
Here is the big problem: All this works fine in Firefox, but
what about the rest of the browsers?
Well, for maximum compatibility you'll have to make a
regular favicon.ico and upload it to the root of your website
(that's where your very first index.xxx home page is, where
xxx is htm, html, php, cfm, etc..). Then we'll add the
following two lines of code to every page that you want to
pull and display the animation.
Please remember to replace the "{" and "}" brackets with
the standard HTML ones, "". I had to use the curly ones
here in order not to confuse article sites. The code has to be
placed between the {HEAD} tag and the {TITLE} tags. It
might possibly work otherwise, but your HTML code will
not be fully W3C compliant:
{LINK REL="SHORTCUT ICON"
HREF="http://www.mydomain.com/favicon.ico"}
{LINK REL="icon"
HREF="http://www.mydomain.com/favicon.gif"
TYPE="image/gif"}
Of course, replace "mydomain.com" with your own domain,
favicon.ico is a standard favicon, favicon.gif is your newly
created animated GIF. Again, it can as well be
mydomain.com/somefolder/somename.gif.
Always hardcode the location, use absolute addresses (as in
the example) and not relative ones ("../favicon.gif").
The first line of code is a standard, a-la Microsoft command
that tells the majority of browsers to load a standard
favicon.ico.
The second line of code is for Firefox only, instructing the
browser to load the animated version.
As a side note, if you forgot to add the two lines of code to
a page, that page should pick the default favicon.ico, but
only if you already loaded it via one page that had the code
in it, or if the page was bookmarked. Additionally,
sometimes, Internet Explorer will just refuse to show a
favicon...
If the above sounds strange (if it doesn't, what are you
doing reading my articles??), I talk about how to create a
favicon.ico and about some of the favicon's stranger
behaviors in my other related articles. Just Google for "The
Favicon, an untapped image promotion trick" (with quotes).
One last thing: I feel that this article will not be complete if I
don't support those folks who look at the animated favicons
the same way the world looks at the text blink "feature"
from the early nineties and would like to forever wipe it of
the face of the web.
You can disable favicons - animated or not & site icons in
Firefox. Here's how:
Open a Firefox window. Type "about:config", without the
quotes, in the address bar. Hit enter or click Go. Scroll
down slightly to "browser.chrome.favicons" and double
click it to change it to "false". This gets rid of the favicons. If
you also want to stop seeing site icons, then look right
below for "browser.chrome.site_icons", double click it to
change it to "false". Close all Firefox windows. When you
reopen Firefox, the pesky little icons should be gone.
---
Andrei co-owns [http://www.bsleek.com/promo]Bsleek - a
company that specializes in web design, hosting,
promotional items, printing, tradeshow displays, logos, CD
presentations, SEO and more. Andrei has amassed an
extensive technical knowledge and experience through his
career as the CIO for a major travel management company
and through his past careers in military research, data
acquisition and airspace engineering. He also consults for
[http:/www.trinityinvestigations.com]Trinity Investigations, a
New York based PI firm.
--- [http://www.bsleek.com/websites/]Bsleek Web Design
- If we build it, they will come.
Article Source:
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Andrei_Smith
http://EzineArticles.com/?The-Favicon,-an-Untapped-Image-Promotion-Trick---Animated-Favicons?&id=153883
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)