I found the visual essay the easiest of the 3 projects within design 2. Although I do not enjoy actionscript, I find it easy enough to work with on a basic level. The screen layout is based upon web 2.0 design using simple colour and gradients to achieve a sleek look. User interaction is meant to be as simple as possible, using the three answers provided with each question, the user must select the answer they think is correct. Actionscript is utilised to track and keep a record of the users score, based upon whether or not they those the correct answer. Each answer that is correct is a button that uses basic actionscript to add one point onto the score box at the end. If the user chooses the incorrect answer, the score will not be increased but the film will still progress to the next question using simple goto functions.
I based my quiz around film because it is a medium I enjoy very much. The questions within the quiz are based on some of my favourite films and directors. During the middle of the quiz is a video round, where the user watches an excerpt from ‘American Psycho’ and must answer a question on the video afterwards. I used actionscript to embed the video into the flash file.
I think a big element of design within the quiz is typography, the main menu and end score page are examples of typography being used to achieve a fulfilling but simple design. At the top right of the frame there is a menu button which will take the user back to the start of the quiz at any given time. At the bottom of the quiz is a link to my blog and my name, the information is not intrusive on the design and tells the user a little more about where the quiz came from.
Some of the issues I overcame with this project where mostly actionscript problems. More often than not, it was me forgetting to label buttons so they were properly tied to actionscript. I also wanted there to be sound when the user interacted with the button. Using the button timeline I learned how to add sounds to the ‘over’ and ‘hit’ areas of the button timeline, so the user felt more feedback from their choices.
Focusing once more on the layout, I intentionally used only a small amount of colour as not to overthrow the design and flood the user with a jarring interface. The background is a very basic gradient element, but with the text positioned over the top adds a sense of depth and ties the interface all together.
From this experience with flash I have determined that online environments is not the module for me. Although I feel I am competent with flash, I feel I am only really associated with it on a basic level. This is a problem for me because learning new things with actionscript was a frustrating experience and most of the coding within this project is taken from things I learnt from the term prior to this one.
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