Wednesday, June 25th, 2008
I love robots. I especially like it when those who I consider to be nerdier than myself, tell me things they know about robots and what the latest robot technology is. Someone who fits that description recently showed me a video of a robot designed by Boston Dynamics called BigDog and it both intrigued and 
repulsed me. I was intrigued because of my aforementioned love of robots and I was repulsed because, well, I’m not sure. I’m aware of the uncanny valley hypothesis where robots which look and act almost, but not entirely, like actual humans, cause human observers to feel revulsion, but the BigDog robot is not at all human-like (the clue’s in the name really). I think my reaction was probably related to the way the BigDog moves and the fact that it has two sets of legs which go in opposite directions – very “exorcist”.
As you might imagine, I really liked the Citroen C4 Transformer advert which was on TV a few years ago. It was an excellent example of motion capture and 3D graphics put together seamlessly by Toronto Production Company, Spy Films and The Embassy VFX in Vancouver. (more…)
Tags: 3d, Advertising, big dog, interactive, June, motion capture, robots
Posted in 3D Design, Advertising | 6 Comments »
Sunday, June 15th, 2008
I was recently talking to a friend who’s a search marketing specialist and I mentioned that to get our site up and running quickly, I was considering throwing something together in Flash. His response was, “if you do that, I’ll have to kill you”.
Flash has been dividing opinion since I was learning about this new thing called Google back in ‘99. I once witnessed one of our Flash developers throwing a printer at a wall because of its so called “inconsistencies”.
That said, Flash has been providing web sites and 2D animation since 1996 and doesn’t show any signs of dissipating. Companies that consider themselves to be comprised of “creatives” often go wild with beautifully detailed animation and graphics and I have seen some truly remarkable work. So Flash has its place among the web design community, even if that’s not with my search marketing friend.
As you might imagine, something we’re particularly interested in is Flash for 3D. Until recently the only way to use Flash for 3D was to pre-render image sequences and use Flash to control them. This is often referred to as 2.5D because it looks like 3D but it’s actually 2D. Now that there are a few decent real-time 3D engines for Flash such as Papervision3d, FIVe3D, Away3D and Sandy, we can for the first time, create content in Flash that is truly 3D.
Of course there are many real-time 3D engines which have nothing to do with Flash, but the appeal with the 3D engines for Flash lies in the browser requirements and the file sizes. Real-time 3D engines for Flash provide content which can be viewed in browsers with Flash Player 8 or above installed and according to the Adobe Flash Player Version Penetration Statistics, in March 2008, 98% of users in the UK had at least Flash Player 8. The Flash based real-time 3D engines can also output relatively small files sizes considering the graphics-heavy nature of the content.
Currently, the main uses for the Flash based real-time 3D engines seem to be games and website navigation. The Neighbourhood’s website is a particularly good example of how Papervision3D can be used for site navigation and Carlos Ulloa (one of the Papervision3D development team) shows an application of the technology on his website in the form of a car which can travel into the distance as well as left and right. Another good example is the award winning LAB website which uses Mathieu Badimon’s FIVe3D. FIVe3D works slightly differently in that it’s entirely vector-based. Zeh Fernando explains more about the intricacies of FIVe3D compared to the other 3D engines on his blog.
In terms of commercial examples, I recently saw a banner ad which was almost identical to Ullosa’s car and I’m sure it won’t be long before advertisers come up with more snazzy ways to use the real-time 3D engines for Flash to attract and hold our attention.
One thing that’s certain is that the real-time 3D in Flash has a lot of potential and I’m really looking forward to seeing it develop in the coming years. All the Flash-based 3D engines I have come across so far are open source which will hopefully pave the way to experimentation and exploratory projects. I’ve encountered plenty of browser-crashing examples which seems to be a good indication we are right at the beginning of Flash 3D’s journey.
The other consideration is Flash Player which will have to develop considerably to meet the demands that 3D content brings. Adobe has outlined new features to be included in “Astro” (Flash Player 10) which will make the possibilities for delivering 3D content greater. Once there’s a Flash Player that can handle the complexities of 3D lighting and reflections, 3D Flash content could easily become as ubiquitous as Flash’s 2D content is currently.
Tags: 2.5d, 2d, 3d, adobe, away3d, carlos ulloa, five3d, flash, June, papervision3d, real-time, rendering, sandy, zeh fernando
Posted in 3D Design, Advertising, Digital Marketing, Interactive 3D | 1 Comment »
Friday, June 13th, 2008
I read an article on www.adage.com a while ago by the editor in chief of www.searchengineland.com, Danny Sullivan. He described a revolutionary change in the way Google treats video clips in search results. He said, Google video ads will not only appear in YouTube clips and on pages that carry Google AdSense units, but also in Google’s sacred search results as well.
Since I read that article, Google Adsense Video Units have been rolled out in the USA, the UK, France, Italy, Spain, Australia, Netherlands, Poland, New Zealand and Japan.
I haven’t actually come across one yet but as Adwords advertisers start to pick up on the opportunities video ads bring, I’ll be interested to see what impact this has on the way they communicate their message. Like Mr Sullivan rightly pointed out, “…AdWords advertisers have had to shoehorn their messages into a 70-character limit. Well, if a picture’s worth a 1,000 words, moving-picture ads will let advertisers blow through the haiku-like restriction.”
So perhaps, any day now, we’re going to be swamped by enquiries from companies who want their products brought to life with animation and swooshy graphics specifically for use in Google Adsense Video Units. Or perhaps there’ll be a surge in companies buying digital video cameras and cheap video editing software. One thing that’s certain is that some will be shockingly bad and some will be brilliantly slick, and we’ll enjoy them all.
Tags: Adsense, Advertising, Digital Marketing, Google, June, Units, Video, youtube
Posted in Advertising, Digital Marketing, Miscellany | No Comments »
