M Studio Labs

Ant is a great little build tool which allows you to automate all sorts of things like compiling code, moving/copying files, creating .zip archives and using FTP to upload. The latest version of FDT has a library of Ant commands specific to Flash. There are a bunch of articles listed below which explain some of the other features, but I’m going to focus on FTP here.

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We recently built a Papervision site for M/MH and SirenMG. The site is used by teachers and administrators to learn about Macmillan/McGraw-Hill’s software products. Users can filter by features like phonics, writing and vocabulary. They can also zoom in on each product to see details, videos and animations.

Check it out here.

We built the home page, media player and Top 10 Flash Widget for the Paramount Pictures website. All content within the Flash modules is loaded via XHTML from a Drupal framework.

This website is an interactive book detailing a fictional history of tailgating parties. The 16 chapters correspond to weeks in the 2009-2010 NFL football season. Each week, a new chapter is unlocked. There are 3 additional chapters throughout the book, highlighting features of Toyota SUV/Trucks.

For this project, we also developed an application using Facebook Connect. Users can log in using their facebook account. Based on their friends, location, and name, we pair them with a chapter in the book such as “chicken wings” or “cheesehead”.

View it here.

The eBay Classifieds Group website was chosen as an official Honoree. Check out the Flash modules we developed here, here and here.

Eclipse is great, but sometimes the option menus are a little overwhelming. Every time I install a fresh copy of Eclipse, I pull my hair out looking for a handful of preferences. Here they are — hopefully someone will find this useful:

Change the editor font:
Preferences > General > Appearance > Colors and Fonts > Basic > Text Font

These are great fonts, btw: “proggy_fonts”

Remove the annoying vertical line in the editor window (print margin):
Preferences > General>Editors > Text Editors: “Print Margin”

Remove the line highlight in the main editor:
Preferences > General>Editors > Text Editors : “Highlight Current Line”

For Cosmopolitan Magazine, we developed a quiz which allows a user to determine her ultimate haircut and style. The results are based on the shape of the user’s face and the type of her hair. The results also offer haircut and styling tips. The client can also customize the tool to highlight hair products from a sponsor.

Check it out here.

We created a Flash front-end and content management system for Seventeen’s Prom Dress Finder. The tool allows a user to search a database of over 2000 dresses and filter by color, price range, designer and style. The user can then save her results and print them or post them directly to her Facebook wall.

Check it out here.

We recently developed a handful of Flash modules for the newly launched ECG website, designed by Sisu.

Papervision 3D home page module
ECG Timeline
Brand Map and Video Player

Here’s a little utility that allows you to batch-resize or crop images and output as JPG — along with the source code. If you’re not familiar with AIR, you just need to download AIR first before you download & install the Image Resizer:

Download Adobe AIR here

Download the AIR Image Resizer here

Download the source files here

Also a few notes that might be of interest to developers:

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