A good Flash intro?

December 12, 2000 2:09 PM

A good Flash intro? Other than what the company is about, i was impressed with the Flash intro, especially the music which goes with it.
posted by Zool (23 comments total)

They have a firm grasp of the motion tween. Indeed, it's astonishing work.
posted by aladfar at 2:41 PM on December 12, 2000

How is this different from the other 7 million Flash intros that serve no prupose?
posted by owillis at 2:52 PM on December 12, 2000

It has C-64 sounds in it, whereas the other 7 million don't.
posted by kindall at 2:56 PM on December 12, 2000

I wasn't that impressed. Here's a site that's truly mastered Flash. Be sure to crank up the volume!
posted by Sal Amander at 2:59 PM on December 12, 2000

Yes, I appreciated how it drew my attention away from the page content that people go there for and toward the special effects and useless catch phrases.
posted by fleener at 3:00 PM on December 12, 2000

Not to plug a site, but I've always liked my friend's site. It's for Team Gates, they compete in SPL (Sound Pressure Level) at stereo competitions worldwide. The animation on the splash goes well with the music. Make sure to check out the animation on the CONTACT page as well.
posted by 120degrees at 3:09 PM on December 12, 2000

I have not yet seen a flash intro (or splash page, for that matter) that was at all useful to users of a site that was selling, promoting, or giving away goods, services, or potential goods or services, including information (save those marketing individual designers or small artsy groups of them well-ensconced in their niche market).

Barring the requirement that the intro not distract the user/viewer from the *point* of the site, the lion's share of spflash also suffers from basic amateur multimedia (is that still a word?) mistakes (e.g., transitions too slow, leading the user by the nose through slowly developing phrases or even single words, an assumption of profundity, yadda). Gabocorp used to be an exception since their service *is* (or was) making kewl flash stuff. Since then the seem to have become stuck in boo land.

Shortest and most to the point, if still needless: Yipes.
posted by jplummer at 3:44 PM on December 12, 2000

The rudiments of Flash: generic techno music, geometric shapes, transparency fades, motion tweening, zooms, swooshy noises. Admiring this is like admiring the fact that someone successfully used <H1> in HTML.

Nosepilot still reigns.
posted by rodii at 3:44 PM on December 12, 2000

Nothing new here.
posted by tiaka at 3:46 PM on December 12, 2000

Cannot resist, Balthaser is still my favorite. Take especially a look at the flash intro for Balthaser studios...
posted by noom at 4:03 PM on December 12, 2000

I'm thinking of calling the next intro I do a "tribute" and then making it twice as long as normal.
posted by leo at 6:18 PM on December 12, 2000

1) Does anyone actually like the generic techno in Flash movies, or does everyone think everyone else likes it?

2) I'm not anti-Flash, I just don't know why I have to sit and watch it. Why can't I push it?
posted by argybarg at 6:32 PM on December 12, 2000

This is rapidly becoming a list of the worst uses of Flash ever. Balthaser is particularly awful.
posted by waxpancake at 6:42 PM on December 12, 2000

While normal sites have a Skip Intro button (the smart ones do anyway) this website immediately displayed the menu on the left, which is even better then the Skip button and lets you access information faster then usual. Did everyone miss this?
posted by thirdball at 6:47 PM on December 12, 2000

my favourite has always been skipintro.com.

Other than that, there really aren't many good Flash intros...especially for corporate sites.
posted by mkn at 7:18 PM on December 12, 2000

There are plenty of good Flash intros, some of which have been named above in this thread. mkn, I assume what you meant to say was, "There aren't any Flash intros that I think are good intros."

You guys need to spend more time around "normal people" - I showed some of these to three or four people, all of whom thought they were interesting and eye-catching. But wait, why would I want to have advertising that was interesting and eye-catching when we would all obviously rather sit around and debate whether links should be blue forever and ever because Mosaic worked that way once twelve thousand years ago?
posted by m.polo at 7:49 PM on December 12, 2000

This is true - 'normal' people who have no idea what flash is, are blown away by the most simple of motion tweens. This is particularly vexing to designers who are asked the following:

"Can you make me something like this? My nephew came across this great site - Balthassar or something like that. You've got to see it, it'll blow you away!! Can you do it?"

To which we respond:

"Um, yeah, but why do you want your site to look like a scene from Clockwork Orange?"

We are usually greeted with blank stares.

"You know, where the guy is strapped into a chair and forced to watch unpleasant images on a big movie screen until he's deemed fit for society?"

"..."

"Stanley Kubrick . . . Clockwork Orange?"

"I'm sorry, I've not seen that film."

Sigh . . .

"Yeah, we can do it - leave a pile of cash with the receptionist on your way out."

And thus, the beautiful cycle of Flash continues.
posted by aladfar at 8:16 PM on December 12, 2000

Flash by Macromedia. A company that doesn't know their customers, doesn't know what they want or why, doesn't even know what to do next. So when's the IPO?

Flash is making 20 year old FX cool because any yahoo can do it.

Having the best flash site on the web is like winning a pumpkin carving contest. It's going to look old and rotten in a few weeks and most people in the known universe could care less about the whole thing.

The less proprietary aps on the internet the better. It's time for someone to write a java alternative.
posted by john at 1:48 AM on December 13, 2000

No, it's like getting peeved about TV ads because they're ads.

John--you are the man. I love the pumpkin-carving analogy.
posted by rodii at 5:43 AM on December 13, 2000

I like the pumpkin-carving analogy for flash intros, but nosepilot, months later is still not only entertaining but marvellous. I love seeing it linked every few months, because I have a good excuse to revisit it.

Mind you, nosepilot is certainly a completely different usage of flash than corporate advertising.

As for the generic techno, I've actually kept the EYE4U window open for about half an hour now. I like generic techno when I'm working, it helps drown out the hoarde of noise the non-techs in my office seem to make every morning, but doesn't require any actual attention of mine to be wasted on it. :-)
posted by cCranium at 6:02 AM on December 13, 2000

I was thinking about nosepilot when I made the TV ads / short films analogy, actually, which may clarify the point I was trying to make - that it's not worth berating generic flash intros for not being art, because they weren't meant to be art in the first place.

Generic intros are annoying, though - unless you derive amusement from them by picking holes in them. But I don't think that means that there's no possibility for good or exciting work in flash (maybe even, shock horror, on corporate sites).
posted by Caffa at 8:18 AM on December 13, 2000

better than neuticals
posted by ethylene at 12:35 PM on December 14, 2000