iAd Designers and Developers Network Showcase (subgroup for showcasing work)

Lyraspace has launched a group on LinkedIn to gather together the talented designers and developers out there who are busy creating amazing, engaging content for the new iAd platform.

Anyone interested in expanding on their existing skill-set are invited to engage with the rest of the community and share their experiences and knowledge with others.

The group is for Javascript and Objective-C developers. It’s for After-Effects creatives, Flash developers looking into HTML5 and Javascript. The group will allow you to share your experiences of using the iAD JS framework and showcase your work in the ‘showcase’ sub-group.

Recruiters and agencies are invited to post job opportunities in the ‘jobs’ section and to engage with the community discussions.

The 3D shirt was modeled in Blender and rendered using the Papervision Actionscript framework. The two dimensional representation of the shirt was constructed using the new Adobe Text Layout Framework which allows text to be rendered through multiple columns. The project was the ideal candidate.

http://signthestripes.co.uk

Your average consumer will delight in using the device for the usual everyday tasks of email, surfing and watching video; especially as they relax after a hard days work with the device sat comfortably on their lap and Eastenders on in the background – but what about on the move?

Nothing can beat the iPhone for providing you with all the kit you need to be productive (or not) while out and about. Whether you’re emailing, checking your diary or posting on LinkedIn you can be sure that in Apple’s own words ‘there’s an app for that’. I personally use a lot of amazing apps on my iPhone. Whether to record notes with Evernote or read articles with Papers I am confident that I am being as productive as humanely possible whilst away from my office and my faithful MacBook Pro. As a developer and a consultant the only thing I cannot do is author code and draw wireframes in OmniGraffle while sat in the dentist chair. But will that change once the iPad is released? Well, to be honest … probably not. I can’t see myself whipping it out while running to catch a train to see if I can squeeze in another five minutes of work – but I can see myself sitting on the train working on ideas with mindnode or sketching some ideas down using the Brushes app. And it will be these kinds of tasks accomplished on the iPad that will really make it stand out from all the other iPhone based tools I use.

Some of the new applications demonstrated at the keynote included Apple’s Keynote, Pages and Numbers which collectively make up the iWork suite of tools that are already available for the Mac but have now been ported over to take full advantage of the touchscreen interface. The consideration to the user-interface and usability of these tools on the iPad is truly breathtaking and it was watching these demonstrations of desktop publishing, presentation design and number crunching that really made me stand up and take notice and then the true market for this device became apparent … Apple have created the ultimate sales and marketing tool.

If you are a media dude out to win that next big pitch then presenting your glossy presentation on this thing is really going to make you stand out from the crowd. Whether your crunching the numbers with colleagues in the local cafe or zapping your latest brochure over to an interested party via Bluetooth this is the device you want to be seen with. The iPad is purely and simply the next big business accessory … it makes the Blackberry look like a child’s toy and sporting one will be the pursuit of every media maestro in the world.

But a cool looking device means nothing without great content … and this is where I may be able to help. As a fully paid-up member of the iPhone Developer program I’ve already downloaded the latest SDK and have been studying all the latest changes that will enable me to produce apps for the new iPad and as a keen developer and designer I’m also ready to produce cutting edge web sites and Keynote presentations that take full advantage of the features of the iPad that will surely look sweet on that magnificent display.

You may want to provide your sales force with an iPad equipped with a bespoke application that allows them to enter their data on the go and send it back to headquarters whilst also recording their movements throughout the day. You’ll be provisioning them with a presentation device that tells the client you mean business. A toolkit that incorporates video and audio, connectivity and usability without any of the stress involved with rigging up projectors and connecting to dodgy wireless connections to showcase your wares.

How about sending someone a PDF of your latest brochure via Bluetooth after previewing the document to them in all its glory in glorious full-screen? What if that brochure was available from iBooks … you never know, Apple may allow businesses to host their own literature on their store as well as apps.

Maybe you’d be interested in adapting your website to include an iPad specific stylesheet so it renders within the iPad browser but looks just like an app.

If your company would like advice on how to plan ahead to take full advantage of this new opportunity then please get in touch to request a consultation. There are exciting opportunities available to us all and you might want to be ahead of the game!

iPad images courtesy of Apple.com

This version of the Flash player will be the first that is to be deployed over multiple devices including certain mobile phones, netbooks, set-top boxes and even built into some of the very latest television sets. All this is thanks to the work of Adobe and the Open Screen Project which now has Google as a partner in this initiative as their Google Android platform for mobile and the upcoming Chrome OS look set to take a big bite out of Apple and Microsoft’s monopoly in these areas.

Let’s also not forget that Nokia are also partners as well as other huge names in the industry so the flash platform is definitely about to explode out of the browser and the desktop and into living rooms and pockets … watch out for Flash exploding in your pocket though!

I am very excited about this news and am looking forward to working on some very exciting projects in the near future. I can foresee my work moving onto the small screen for Mobile platforms but also onto the huge, massive plasma-screen with widget style apps being deployed onto televisions and digital set-tops.

Some other news from Adobe was the announcement that they will also be compiling native iPhone applications from Flash CS5. This is very interesting and controversial news that has been stirring things up within the community and I will be reserving judgment on this until I have more technical information on just how Adobe hope to integrate with the iPhone hardware sensors and UI controls. You can read my thoughts on this on my blog here.

There’s also the announcement that a new Flex Mobile Framework will be released to help us develop apps for Mobile devices. I’ve already done quite a bit of research into this and things do look very promising as you can see in my blog post on this here. The new framework will allow multi-touch and gesture events which you can also read.

So, a very exciting future ahead and one I am very keen to get involved with. If you would like to keep up on all the latest news regarding interactive media on mobile devices then don’t forget to sign up for a newsletter or get in touch for a consultation on how I can help your brand move onto the small and the huge screen.

After consultation with the agency I constructed a two day schedule that included asset preparation with Photoshop and Illustrator, Flash tips and tricks, Banner production concepts and best practices, introductory Actionscript 3 and dynamic tweening with TweenLite. We finished off by building a real-world example banner which left Brett satisfied that he’d be able to take the things he’d learnt and apply them in his everyday work.

Overall the team were left satisfied that the training had been successful and worthwhile but don’t take my word for it. Here’s a testimonial from the managing director of Mind Orchard, Arran D’Aubigny:

At Mind Orchard we are always skeptical of training courses. They have always seemed way too expensive without delivering on their promises. Our employees in the past felt that what they had learnt wasn’t relevant to the work we do here and we needed something a bit more personal.

When we met Lee we felt instantly that he had the knowledge and experience necessary for mentoring Brett. He needed some training in Flash as well as an introductory course in Actionscript which he was keen to learn. We were also attracted to the practicality of having Lee conduct the training in our own offices using our own kit.

Lee was able to teach Brett everything he needed to know and I can see that he has a fresh enthusiasm for Flash and especially using Actionscript 3 which has always seemed a bit daunting to him in the past. Overall we were very impressed with the results and would definitely use him again in the future.

Welcome to my site, please take a look around … would you like a cup of tea? A biscuit perhaps? You’ll find some examples of my work in the Case Studies section and you can read about what I do in Services. Most importantly though, keep in touch! You’ll find my details in the Contact section and please bookmark/feed my blog for future reference.

I hope you’re having as much of a great time at FotB as I am (I’ve not even left yet as I write this post) and I hope our meeting has made as much of an impression on you as it has on me (I’ve not technically met anyone at the conference yet).

If we haven’t actually met then please do pop over to point at me and laugh … I’m the small, tubby chap with the stupid looking, over-sized glasses. You may have seen me stumbling off my silver Vespa looking flustered. You’ll also spot me loitering around sources of coffee and trying to steal stickers and t-shirts. Please do say hi.

I’ll continue to tweet my experiences (haven’t started) and you can follow me @leeprobert or @lyraspace depending on whether you want the techy geeky stuff or the downright rude!

Thanks for visiting my site! See you soon.

This fun project had some interesting technical challenges … in particular we wanted to create the illusion that the pencil was floating above the canvas. We originally thought we’d achieve this with Papervision 3D but I created something much simpler and lightweight in 2D with a bit of math and some clever use of shadow.

Also, some painting applications use a series of straight lines from point to point to create the drawn line effect. Others use the stamp method of printing a shape into a bitmap every frame. These techniques look fine while the user is drawing slowly but it soon breaks down when the mouse is moved fast across the screen and the line either breaks or becomes too angular. My version of the painter application creates a smooth bezier curve from points plotted in real-time. The result is a smooth, continuous line.

Try it out! Click here to launch.

The site is now finally live here.

View the emulator here