London Flash Platform User Group http://www.lfpug.com A user group holding monthly meetings in London to discuss the Flash Platform Tue, 06 May 2008 10:41:25 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.3 en 29th May 2008 (29/05/2008) http://www.lfpug.com/29th-may-2008-29052008/ http://www.lfpug.com/29th-may-2008-29052008/#comments Fri, 02 May 2008 10:14:24 +0000 Tink Meetings http://www.lfpug.com/29th-may-2008-29052008/ Flash CS3 Components (19:00 - 21:00) - Tink Ltd
This session will take you through the component life-cycle, bugs you might come across, how to use them in AS 3.0 projects in Flex Builder, skinning both in the Flash IDE and with code, and extending the components to add your own functionality.

Prizes for the free raffle
1 copy of Foundation ActionScript 3.0 with Flash CS3 and Flex donated by friends of ED.
6 Adobe Air Launch Posters by eboy donated by Adobe.

Sponsored by friends of ED.

When/Where
Date: 29th May 2008 (29/05/2008)
Time: 19:00 - 23:00 (doors open at 18:30)
Venue: CosmoBar, 50-54 Clerkenwell Road, EC1M 5PS (click for map)
Tube: Barbican

You need to register and sign-up if you wish to attend and be entered into the raffle. You can sign-up in the sidebar on the right of the front page or at the bottom of the post here. Please do not sign-up if you don’t plan to attend. You cannot win unless you attend the event.

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/29th-may-2008-29052008/feed/ Building 3D Websites in Flash http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-05-2008/ http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-05-2008/#comments Tue, 29 Apr 2008 22:41:54 +0000 Tink Training http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-05-2008/ Overview
This two day course will cover essential 3D Flash techniques for the Developer and/or Designer with some coding skills. Featuring the latest Papervision3D and Away3D engines, the course will focus on how best to use the API’s in any given situation, tackling basic issues that arise such as asset loading, scene arrangement, interaction, optimising for speed, effective use of 3D and how it can be integrated into traditional 2D Flash content.

Presented by Rob Bateman

****************************************************************

Schedule

Day 1:

1. Introduction
- The limitations of a software renderer
- Available frameworks
- Setting up your development environment

2. 3D Basics
- The cartesian coordinate system
- Defining the scene and the view
- Manipulating visual elements
- Texture mapping

3. Importing 3D models
- Preparing a model
- Usable formats
- Online resources

4. Mixing 2D with 3D
- Inline MovieClip rendering
- Billboards
- Animated textures

Day 2:

5. Interacting with a scene
- Mouse interaction on 3D objects
- Mouse interaction on textures

6. Optimising the view
- Distortion correcting on textures
- Triangle culling
- Corrective z-sorting

7. Lighting
- Manipulating lights
- Flat color shading
- Gouraud shading

8. Special effects
- Transforming and layering textures
- Using Flash filters on 3D objects

****************************************************************

Costs
- The cost of this 2 days training is £200 + VAT (£235).
- This includes lunch and tea/coffees throughout the day.

****************************************************************

Requirements
- All attendees will require their own laptops.
- All laptops will need to have a copy of Flash CS3 installed.
- All laptops will also need to have a copy of Flex Builder 3.0 or FDT 3.0 installed for editing ActionScript 3.0.
- All attendees will require some prior experience working with ActionScript 3.0.

****************************************************************

When/Where
Date: 28th-29th May 2008 ( 28/05/2008 - 29/05/2008 )
Time: 10:00 - 18:00 (doors open at 09:30)
Venue: CosmoBar, 50-54 Clerkenwell Road, EC1M 5PS (click for map)
Tube: Barbican

****************************************************************

Booking
- To book a place on this course please contact training AT lfpug.com.
- 11 places left (places are reserved for 15 attendees maximum).

****************************************************************

More info on our training philosophy can be found here

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-05-2008/feed/ Practical Particle Effects with Flint http://www.lfpug.com/practical-particle-effects-with-flint/ http://www.lfpug.com/practical-particle-effects-with-flint/#comments Fri, 14 Mar 2008 10:36:03 +0000 Tink Presentations http://www.lfpug.com/practical-particle-effects-with-flint/ Richard Lord

Flint is an open-source particle system written in Actionscript 3. Flint is easy to use and enables the rapid development of particle systems through the reuse of existing particle behaviours and a simple interface for adding custom behaviors.

This session will look at the code behind Flint and the techniques that lead to its versatility, ease of use and speed. It will also cover the basics of creating a number of particle effects using Flint including rain, fireworks, smoke and fire.
Flint is available at http://flashgamecode.net/flint.

Presentation: SWF.

You need Flash Player 8 to view this presentation.

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/practical-particle-effects-with-flint/feed/ Successful Flash Games http://www.lfpug.com/successful-flash-games/ http://www.lfpug.com/successful-flash-games/#comments Fri, 14 Mar 2008 10:28:21 +0000 Tink Presentations http://www.lfpug.com/successful-flash-games/ Iain Lobb

A rapid-fire exploration of the Flash games scene. If you want to create a hit Flash game, this talk will tell you what to make, how to make it, where to promote it and how to make money from it. I’ll cover platforms and devices, genre, graphical style, branding, playability, control schemes, localisation, distribution and promotion. I’ll also go into detail about technical issues, such as making your game pausable, making save-game functionality, optimising performance and creating multi-user games. I’ll also give real-world examples of why certain Flash games are successful - including games I’ve made and games I just love playing.

Presentation: SWF

Iain and Bloc:
http://www.iainlobb.com
http://www.blocmedia.com
http://www.bloclabs.com
http://www.thegameslist.com/

Games by Bloc:
http://www.zwok-game.com
http://www.stackopolis.com
http://www.thegameslist.com/playgame/157/MIND_GAMES__HEAD_SPACE
http://www.eyetoy.com/playsports/?locale=en_GB
http://turfwars.needforspeedcarbon.co.uk/
http://www.candc3battlecards.ea.com/en/

Other games I talk about:
http://www.kongregate.com/games/preecep/desktop-tower-defense-1-5
http://www.nitrome.com/games/twang/
http://www.nitrome.com/games/toxic/
http://www.bowmaster.net/
http://www.miniclip.com/games/heli-attack-3/en/
http://www.xgenstudios.com/play/stickarena

Advertising
https://www.google.com/adsense/
http://www.mochiads.com/

Other business models:
http://www.habbo.com/
http://www.runescape.com/
http://www.clubpenguin.com/

Flash games sites:
http://www.miniclip.com
http://www.kongregate.com
http://www.newgrounds.com
http://www.nitrome.com
http://digg.com/playable_web_games
http://www.thegameslist.com/
http://jayisgames.com/
http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/games/
http://www.minijuegos.com/

Flash games on devices:
http://www.adobe.com/products/flashlite/
http://www.playyoo.com/
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/08/03/05/steve_jobs_pans_flash_on_the_iphone.html
http://www.pspflashgaming.com
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/devices/articles/psp_games.html
http://www.wiiplayable.com/
http://www.lastchancemedia.com/mariotoo/

Flash games on the desktop
http://www.adobe.com/products/air/
http://www.multidmedia.com/software/zinc/
http://www.flashjester.com/?section=tricks_jugglor3

Mic control:
Chicken fight
http://www.singstargame.com/en-gb/

Webcam contro:
http://www.gskinner.com/blog/archives/2006/11/camera_interact.html
http://www.thegameslist.com/playgame/409/EYEkanoids

3D games:
http://blog.papervision3d.org/
http://www.away3d.com/
http://www.adobe.com/products/director/
http://unity3d.com - Amazing!
http://creators.xna.com/
http://blog.wired.com/games/2007/12/study-suggests.html

Game Artwork:
http://images.google.co.uk/images?q=spritesheet

Game design theory:
http://stevenpoole.net/blog/trigger-happier/

Free sprites!:
http://www.lostgarden.com/2007/05/dancs-miraculously-flexible-game.html
http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2006-08-08-n51.html
http://charas-project.net

Tweening Engines:
http://www.mosessupposes.com/Fuse/
http://blog.greensock.com/tweenfilterliteas3/

Audio
http://www.apple.com/ilife/garageband/
http://www.adobe.com/special/products/audition/loopology.html
http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/products/acidfamily.asp

Physics:
http://seraf.mediabox.fr/wow-engine/as3-3d-physics-engine-wow-engine/
http://blog.generalrelativity.org/?p=17
http://lab.polygonal.de/motor_physics/
http://www.cove.org/ape/index.htm

Multi-user:
http://www.electro-server.com/
http://www.smartfoxserver.com/
http://www.gotoandplay.it/_articles/multiplayerCentral/

Game Accessibility:
http://www.game-accessibility.com/

You need Flash Player 8 to view this presentation.

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/successful-flash-games/feed/ Thermo http://www.lfpug.com/thermo/ http://www.lfpug.com/thermo/#comments Wed, 12 Mar 2008 19:35:15 +0000 Tink Presentations http://www.lfpug.com/thermo-2/ The Thermo Team (Steven Heintz, Ethan Eismann & Rob Adams)

An introduction to Thermo followed by an open discussion on Thermo and Flex workflows.

Thermo is an upcoming Adobe product that makes it easy for designers to create rich Internet application UIs. Thermo allows designers to build on familiar workflows to visually create working applications that easily flow into production and development.

Thermo - Adobe Labs.

You need Flash Player 8 to view this presentation.

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/thermo/feed/ 27th March 2008 (27/03/2008) http://www.lfpug.com/27th-march-2008-27032008/ http://www.lfpug.com/27th-march-2008-27032008/#comments Mon, 10 Mar 2008 12:30:46 +0000 Tink Meetings http://www.lfpug.com/27th-march-2008-27032008/ Hardware Hacking for Software Scripters (19:00 - 20:00) - Matt Biddulph
With cheap open-source hardware platforms like Arduino, it’s now possible to design and build electronic devices in your own home. Even more importantly, working with hardware is starting to look more and more like scripting with software. In this session, Matt will give a tour of what can be done when you apply a background in building web applications to a box of electronic components.

Hardware Hacking with Flash and Arduino ( 20:15 - 21:15 ) - Alias Cummins
Have you ever wanted to build your own custom controller for your Flash applcation? Wired up your home of the future to a bunch of sensors and lights? Build your very own army of robotic ninjas? Now you can!
Alias will be talking about some of the possibilities of using Arduino and Flash to build your own electronic and interactive projects using cheap, commodity electronics and the neat and inexpensive arduino board. Using some simple examples, we will go through the basics of starting out with hardware sketching, and being creative with electronics and electricity.

Prizes for the free raffle
1 Arduino Beginners Kit donated by Tinker.it!.
1 copy of Essential ActionScript 3.0 donated by Adobe.

Sponsored by Tinker.it!.

When/Where
Date: 27th March 2008 (27/03/2008)
Time: 19:00 - 23:00 (doors open at 18:30)
Venue: CosmoBar, 50-54 Clerkenwell Road, EC1M 5PS (click for map)
Tube: Barbican

You need to register and sign-up if you wish to attend and be entered into the raffle. You can sign-up in the sidebar on the right of the front page or at the bottom of the post here. Please do not sign-up if you don’t plan to attend. You cannot win unless you attend the event.

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/27th-march-2008-27032008/feed/ Matt Biddulph http://www.lfpug.com/matt-biddulph/ http://www.lfpug.com/matt-biddulph/#comments Wed, 05 Mar 2008 16:47:22 +0000 Tink Speakers http://www.lfpug.com/matt-biddulph/ Matt is based in London and is a software designer and creative technologist. He’s the CTO of Dopplr, a social network for frequent travellers and used to work at the BBC, in Radio and Music Interactive, where he was leader of the software architecture team, aka Head of Plugging Things Into Other Things. We made good things.

He like open source software, open data, music and radio, mobile and wireless, Unix, distributed computing and messaging, REST, hardware hacking, PVRs, iPods, python, ruby, rails, massive media, digital photography, RDF, semi-structured content and corpus analysis, finding patterns in information, the internet, laptops, video, xhtml and css, Debian, Macs, conferences, snowboarding and all kinds of other stuff.

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/matt-biddulph/feed/ Building 3D Websites in Flash http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-04-2008/ http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-04-2008/#comments Wed, 05 Mar 2008 10:35:28 +0000 Tink Training http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-2/ Overview
This two day course will cover essential 3D Flash techniques for the Developer and/or Designer with some coding skills. Featuring the latest Papervision3D and Away3D engines, the course will focus on how best to use the API’s in any given situation, tackling basic issues that arise such as asset loading, scene arrangement, interaction, optimising for speed, effective use of 3D and how it can be integrated into traditional 2D Flash content.

Presented by Rob Bateman

****************************************************************

Schedule

Day 1:

1. Introduction
- The limitations of a software renderer
- Available frameworks
- Setting up your development environment

2. 3D Basics
- The cartesian coordinate system
- Defining the scene and the view
- Manipulating visual elements
- Texture mapping

3. Importing 3D models
- Preparing a model
- Usable formats
- Online resources

4. Mixing 2D with 3D
- Inline MovieClip rendering
- Billboards
- Animated textures

Day 2:

5. Interacting with a scene
- Mouse interaction on 3D objects
- Mouse interaction on textures

6. Optimising the view
- Distortion correcting on textures
- Triangle culling
- Corrective z-sorting

7. Lighting
- Manipulating lights
- Flat color shading
- Gouraud shading

8. Special effects
- Transforming and layering textures
- Using Flash filters on 3D objects

****************************************************************

Costs
- The cost of this 2 days training is £200 + VAT (£235).
- This includes lunch and tea/coffees throughout the day.

****************************************************************

Requirements
- All attendees will require their own laptops.
- All laptops will need to have a copy of Flash CS3 installed.
- All laptops will also need to have a copy of Flex Builder or FDT 3.0 installed for editing ActionScript 3.0.
- All attendees will require some prior experience working with ActionScript 3.0.

****************************************************************

When/Where
Date: 9th-10th April 2008 ( 09/04/2008 - 10/04/2008 )
Time: 10:00 - 18:00 (doors open at 09:30)
Venue: CosmoBar, 50-54 Clerkenwell Road, EC1M 5PS (click for map)
Tube: Barbican

****************************************************************

Booking
- To book a place on this course please contact training AT lfpug.com.
- 2 places left (places are reserved for 15 attendees maximum).

****************************************************************

More info on our training philosophy can be found here

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-04-2008/feed/ Building 3D Websites in Flash http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-03-2008/ http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-03-2008/#comments Mon, 18 Feb 2008 22:48:36 +0000 Tink Training http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash/ Overview
This two day course will cover essential 3D Flash techniques for the Developer and/or Designer with some coding skills. Featuring the latest Papervision3D and Away3D engines, the course will focus on how best to use the API’s in any given situation, tackling basic issues that arise such as asset loading, scene arrangement, interaction, optimising for speed, effective use of 3D and how it can be integrated into traditional 2D Flash content.

Presented by Rob Bateman

****************************************************************

Schedule

Day 1:

1. Introduction
- The limitations of a software renderer
- Available frameworks
- Setting up your development environment

2. 3D Basics
- The cartesian coordinate system
- Defining the scene and the view
- Manipulating visual elements
- Texture mapping

3. Importing 3D models
- Preparing a model
- Usable formats
- Online resources

4. Mixing 2D with 3D
- Inline MovieClip rendering
- Billboards
- Animated textures

Day 2:

5. Interacting with a scene
- Mouse interaction on 3D objects
- Mouse interaction on textures

6. Optimising the view
- Distortion correcting on textures
- Triangle culling
- Corrective z-sorting

7. Lighting
- Manipulating lights
- Flat color shading
- Gouraud shading

8. Special effects
- Transforming and layering textures
- Using Flash filters on 3D objects

****************************************************************

Costs
- The cost of this 2 days training is £200 + VAT (£235).
- This includes lunch and tea/coffees throughout the day.

****************************************************************

Requirements
- All attendees will require their own laptops.
- All laptops will need to have a copy of Flash CS3 installed.
- All laptops will also need to have a copy of Flex Builder or FDT 3.0 installed for editing ActionScript 3.0.
- All attendees will require some prior experience working with ActionScript 3.0.

****************************************************************

When/Where
Date: 26th-27th March 2008 ( 26/03/2008 - 27/03/2008 )
Time: 10:00 - 18:00 (doors open at 09:30)
Venue: CosmoBar, 50-54 Clerkenwell Road, EC1M 5PS (click for map)
Tube: Barbican

****************************************************************

Booking
- To book a place on this course please contact training AT lfpug.com.
- 0 places left (places are reserved for 15 attendees maximum).

This course is now fully booked but we plan to re-run it. Please contact training AT lfpug.com if you would like to be contacted as soon as we have a date organized fro a re-run.

****************************************************************

More info on our training philosophy can be found here

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/building-3d-websites-in-flash-03-2008/feed/ The 3rd Way: Handling 3D on the Web http://www.lfpug.com/the-3rd-way-handling-3d-on-the-web/ http://www.lfpug.com/the-3rd-way-handling-3d-on-the-web/#comments Sun, 17 Feb 2008 20:52:55 +0000 Tink Presentations http://www.lfpug.com/the-3rd-way-handling-3d-on-the-web/ Rob Bateman

In this session, Rob investigates how the available 3d possibilities on the web have shifted since the outbreak of open source 3d engines in Flash (Papervision3d, Away3d and Sandy), and compares the relative merits between them and other current competing 3d formats. He goes on to analyze what constitutes good use of 3d, illustrating by example how things can be done well, what happens when 3d is abused, and how the application of 3d can be approached in order to create a compelling and intuitive experience.

Presentation: SWF (source).

You need Flash Player 8 to view this presentation.

]]> http://www.lfpug.com/the-3rd-way-handling-3d-on-the-web/feed/