Details

Client: WOW Sight and Sound
URL: http://www.wowwicked.com.au/

Launched: 14 July 2007
Agency: Cru Digital
Project: Flash Retail Superstore Website

Recognition:

• Interactive Media Awards (Outstanding Achievement)

Major Features:

• General Extensive Content
• DVD Catalogue
• Catalogue Viewer
• Bookmarking via Right Click
• Opening in a New Window via Right Click

The Story:

I don’t know how Garth did it, but he managed to pull out a decent design using 3 primary colours. At the clients request we made the sight very “happening” (to match their tagline - “If it’s not happening at WOW - It’s not happening”) by using their voice-overs, store video footage, bear animations and a high level of interactivity. The toughest part was coming up with a sequence and strategy for it to load as needed, and preload when the bandwidth pipeline was free.

Personally from a project perspective I feel we’ve met the target objective, but from a user’s point of view, I have a different opinion. Unfortunately WOW’s marketing approach is concrete, and our simplified suggestions just didn’t fit.

All in all, i’m somewhat happy with the final outcome. Some of those hurdles can be very hard to jump - oh well - moving on to another event now - long jump ;).

Technology Analysis:

• Flash w/ Actionscript 2
• PHP w/ MySQL CMS
• XML
• Javascript

The Team:

• Specifications - Ben Stokes & Rani Nugraha
• Designer - Garth Sykes
• Animator - Karel Van Cromvoirt
• Photographer - Damien Bredberg
• Backend Developer - Steven Miles
• Flash Developer - Neil Nand

Screenshots

Details

Client: Sono Restaurant
URL: http://www.sonorestaurant.com.au/

Launched: 12 June 2007
Agency: Cru Digital
Project: 2 Flash Restaurant Websites

Recognition:

• W3 Bronze
• Horizon Interactive Awards (Silver)
• Interactive Media Awards (Outstanding Achievement)
• Webby Award Honoree (2008, Website, Restaurant)

Major Features:

• 2 Websites using the one Content Management System (CMS) for shared content and media.
• Designed and developed to be handle all browser sizes.

The Story:

This has to be one of my favourite projects. Usually I get over my projects after a week of the completion. The reason why this one stands out in the pack is because of its principles behind it. It is a great example of maximising web technologies.

With the budget provided for 2 average websites, we devised a plan to use one CMS and spend the time on a single high-end website. The single Flash website was treated like an engine - all the menus and content was fed through the CMS. The CMS was treated like the fuel. Whatever fuel was fed through to the engine producted the final outcome: one being the Brisbane City website and the other was the Portside Wharf version. All the mechanics and layouts were identical.

If further stores were to open all that’d be required are new photos, new content and a new background.

Technology Analysis:

• Flash w/ Actionscript 2
• PHP w/ MySQL CMS
• XML
• Javascript

The Team:

• Specifications - Ben Stokes & Damien Bredberg
• Designer - Garth Sykes
• Photographers - Damien Bredberg & Dean West
• Backend Developer - Steven Miles
• Copywriting - Lisa Bianchi
• Flash Developer - Neil Nand

Screenshots

Details

Client: Berg and West
URL: http://www.bergandwest.com.au/
Backlink: http://bergandwest.crudigital.com.au/

Launched: 4 May 2007
Agency: Cru Digital
Project: Photography Website

Recognition

• W3 Silver
• Horizon Interactive Awards (Gold)
• Interactive Media Awards (Outstanding Achievement)
• Coolhomepages.com (Site of the Week - 22 August 2007)

Major Features:

• Unique navigation system

The Story:

It was all about the images. We needed to come up with a method of easily displaying the photography of the 2 photographers, Damien Bredberg and Dean West. The key was to use Flash 9’s full-screen capabilities and devising a fluent, yet comprehensive navigation system separating and categorising both photographer’s works.

Technology Analysis:

• Flash w/ Actionscript 2
• PHP w/ MySQL CMS
• XML
• Javascript

The Team:

• Specifications - Damien Bredberg
• Designer - Garth Sykes
• Photographers - Damien Bredberg & Dean West
• Backend Developer - Steven Miles
• Flash Developer - Neil Nand

Screenshots

http://neilnand.com.thehostingroom.com.au/

Details

Client: Limbo Auctions
URL: http://www.playlimbo.com.au/

Launched: 1 March 2007
Agency: Cru Digital
Project: Flash Reverse Auction Website

Recognition:

• Horizon Interactive Awards (Bronze)
• Interactive Media Awards (Best in Class)
• Channel 9’s ACA (Reverse Auctions Story)

Major Features:

• Real time bidding - with random “Instant Wins”
• Various bidding methods
• Registration & Login
• Real time bid & credit history
• Live & past auctions with paganation

The Story:

All the dynamic content to this website is delivered through web services, which was new to me. Till now, I was used to using XML and LoadVars methods. After experiencing how web services works, I’m keen to use it again. Its a bit easier and faster making the requests and the same as playing with XML with the response. From a back-end and front-end development perspective, it allowed working parallel faster and more efficient.

Technology Analysis:

• Flash w/ Actionscript 2
• ASP.NET
• XML via Web Services
• Javascript

The Team:

• Specifications - Ben Stokes
• Designer - Tim Jenson
• Backend Developer - Shon Siemonek
• Flash Developer - Neil Nand

Screenshots

Details

Client: 2 Chillies
URL: http://www.2chillies.com.au/

Launched: 8 February 2007
Agency: Cru Digital
Project: Fashion Label Website

Major Features:

• Has a full retail catalogue system, with search and multilevel cataloging
• An international retailer search and an Australia-only postcode search
• Polaroid image gallery
• Deeplinking to a primary level.

The Story

My first retail catalogue! Looking back at this, I’m still satisfied with how it turned out. A lot of thinking went into how I’m going to technically map out the catalogue. I implemented load orders, so the first items would show first, and then carry on loading the consecutive items. Eg: http://www.2chillies.com.au/#1=1=1=-1

At this point of time, I wasn’t confident in taking total control of the feel and flow of the site. Olivia helped me get the ball rolling on this.

This project did cut into my weekend a little bit, but it wasn’t all bad. It was actually my favourite part. Friends were staying down the coast, so on the Sunday when I got the final part complete, I popped down to the Gold Coast. Monday morning, I woke up, went for a dip in the beach, had some brekky with the boys, rocked up to the 2 chillies head office (also on the Gold Coast) still covered in sand on my beach attire, to run through the website, a bit of CMS training and the thumbs up. Then headed back to the studio. I’m sure those casual days are now gone, but at least I can still share the stories of what the early years of Cru were like.

Technology Analysis:

• Flash w/ Actionscript 2
• PHP w/ MySQL CMS
• XML
• Javascript

The Team:

• Specifications - Ben Stokes
• Designer - Olivia Bossy & Chris Cotton
• Photographer - Damien Bredberg & Dean West
• Backend Developer - Steven Miles
• Flash Developer - Neil Nand

Screenshots

Details

Client: Live In
URL: http://www.livein.net.au/

Launched: 17 November 2006
Agency: Cru Digital
Project: Flash Real Estate Website

Major Features:

• Client is able to manage property
• Property manager facilitates a dynamic floorplan, 3D virtual tour, image gallery based on position on the floorplan, plus more!
• Links are able to access specific content (deeplink/bookmarking)
• Users are able to register, rate property, etc.

The Story:

This was my first major full flash website, and as flashers could imagine with the specifications required, this was very painful - but a gaint leap in my skills. Working alongside a sharp PHP & Javascript developer, Steven Miles, we were able to create a bookmarking & history system to dynamic content, similar to how a standard dynamic HTML website would function. One of the other tricky bits was integrating the 3D Quicktime movie, for the virtual tour to the Flash environment with data being fed through the content management system. The dynamic content wasn’t too hard, but getting the Quicktime to flow with Flash was a bit of a pain. Our end result was to have the Quicktime movie sitting on a layer ontop of the flash, with data communication and fluency being handled by javascript.

To see the Quicktime integration in action, go to: http://www.livein.net.au/#show=10=0=0

Click on the spinning eye on the floorplan on the left to activate.

Even though parts got tough. This was a really enjoyable project. We had complete control of the creatives, and with that responsibility we were able to give the website life and character. We did this by creating the “Live In family”. Dean was out in the studio building the scene for photoshoots, and Lisa came up with the scripture and tone for the characters.

Technology Analysis:

• Flash w/ Actionscript 2
• PHP w/ MySQL CMS
• XML
• Javascript
• Quicktime

The Team:

• Specifications - Ben Stokes
• Designer - Olivia Bossy
• Photographer - Dean West
• Backend Developer - Steven Miles
• Copywriting - Lisa Bianchi
• Flash Developer - Neil Nand

Screenshots