Last night I put the finishing touches to the first level of my Macromedia Director game Jail Break.

Jail Break is far from a masterpiece, but what it is, is a 2D interactive game that has stayed true to it’s original design and concept throughout, using all of the Lingo script techniques I have learned over the past several weeks and some others I have explored and come up with myself, to finally arrive at a working artefact which I am satisfied with and which meets all the targets set by my tutor for this module of work.

The goal in Jail Break is a simple one - escape - but to do this you have to use both of the main characters selecting between the two of them at will to get past the threats to the escape (spotlights, guards and their dogs, soap (don’t ask), CCTV cameras and electric fences). You are also faced with situations in which each of the two characters will need to use their unique ability to aid the escape attempt, for example Melvin is very strong and can bend fences or dig tunnels but he has no idea how to hack switches or computers, Larry is the opposite specialising in technology while being weak of body.

When the character arrives at a certain coloured switch on the compound floor they have to hit the switch in order to use their ability and move the escape attempt onwards, above is a shot of Larry hitting his red corresponding switch and hacking it to green earning 50 points on the score in the bottom right hand corner, he also turns one of the three small red switches at the bottom green, he must turn all red switches to green, including the CCTV switch to turn off the cameras; once he does this task then he opens the gate in the bottom left corner and the ‘portal’ to Level Two becomes active, Melvin on the other hand has to hit blue switches which require strength, once he hits his blue switch he bends the fence in order for the two inmates to progress to red switches two and three. Hitting any of the above named obstacles will result in GAME OVER.

Well one level down - one to go!

Below is a video capture (though not of the best quality) to document how the game works -

Any comments on this project would be great!

Filed under: University by Joel Reed
No Comments »

Today I filmed my last couple of video shots for my Streaming Media project at the University of Wolverhampton, but it wasn’t quite as easy I thought it would be.

My project brief is simple, ‘create a 30-45 second advert which will document and promote the Digital Media division at the University’, this is to be filmed in anyway that I see fit, making use of totally unique sound effects and music.

I decided as I have mentioned in previous posts to focus on the theme of ‘time’ and how this relates to a typical day in the life of a student. To tie in with my advert’s subject matter I came up with the tag-line ‘Your time in life is precious - spend it wisely’ or at least something along those lines!

The aim of this advert is for it to be streamed live through a web page, which I have had to design and build, the most important aspect of this web page is that we relate it’s content to what we have shot for the video, in my case with time I chose to place my video in a watch on a man’s wrist which when you click on it, it begins playing, I have coupled this with a shot of busy Wolverhampton rush-hour traffic in almost a blur in the background (below), however I am going to build on this idea and add in a bus pulling away from the man, as in my storyboard he misses the bus after a cheeky pint at the pub. I will have my video’s tag-line on one of the bus’ advert boards, the website back button will appear on a road sign or ad board.

But getting this relationship between the shot for the website and the shot in the video was extremely difficult, despite being a relatively simple task. With a few clicks of Adobe Photoshop I had the basis of my website but to film the shot in which the watch on the wrist was in the same existence as the bus pulling away took a lot more effort.

I had my tripod in the middle of a busy Wolverhampton street near a bus stop, with my Sony DSR-PD170P PAL DVCAM 3CCD Digital Camcorder (above), borrowed from the University stores, resting on top of the tripod and a huge bunch of dark clouds threatening rain at any second, I knew I had only a few precious minutes for a bus to pull in, start filming the shot, avoiding getting any members on the public in the shot (I would need to ask their permission to appear in the advert) and get my arm, wrist and watch in the correct position to film a shot which would later resemble my website - phewww.

After four attempts I think I managed to pull off the shot (just about), however I haven’t uploaded the DV tape footage yet so we will have to see but I managed to film all the shots I put in my storyboard so if the lightning, focus of the shots is ok then I should be ready to edit it quickly together ready for streaming in around three weeks time.

For this shoot I have had my camera everywhere, set up in the bath to film a mirror shot, stuffed in to the back of my car for a journey shot so hopefully all the effort will be worth it when it gets posted here in around a month and a half.

Filed under: General, University, Video by Joel Reed
No Comments »

I downloaded the new Call of Duty 5 World At War Multiplayer BETA from XBOX 360’s Online Marketplace last night and I was seriously impressed with what I saw.

Out Friday 14, this first-person shooter video game developed by Treyarch and published by Activision for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360, Nintendo DS, and PlayStation 2, is the fifth installment in the main Call of Duty series. The game is set in the Pacific theater and Eastern front of World War II.

The story focuses on the final battles of World War II in the Pacific and Eastern Europe involving the United States, the Empire of Japan, the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany.

Below is a video from my current favourite map “Roundhouse” - roll on Friday 14th and look out for a headshot from gamertag ‘JoelReed’ coming your way.

Filed under: General by Joel Reed
No Comments »

With the half way mark of my first Year Three semester at the University of Wolverhampton just a fortnight away, I have finalised most of my projects and have began to create some visuals in order to give myself a guide to work with.

For my Interaction Development, I have created a pre-teenage Road Safety game, called ‘Up Your Street’; I have created a functionality specification, a flowchart, drawn some scamps and presented them via a pitch board last Monday.

A scamp showing the game’s main street.

For Streaming Media I have had to come up with a 30 second video advertising my course at the University of Wolverhampton, this video will be available to watch in around 9 weeks time, I have also been given the task of creating a single webpage to host this video in, I have decided to go with the subject of ‘a day in the life of a student’ and I have added a time theme to the piece, so I have come up with the following scamp, which combines both web and video in the subject of time.

As you can see the image will become a XHTML page, with a script which when you click inside the watch it will play my streaming Quicktime movie.

My game I am creating in Macromedia Director is also coming along nicely, ‘Jail Break’ will like my video project be available in 9 weeks times.

These projects, ideas and interfaces are all copyrighted - all rights reserved - any comments on these projects would be fantastic!

Filed under: General, University by Joel Reed
No Comments »

Two days ago I found out that my website - Reed-Design - had been short-listed for an award by a respected web design community forum.

The Web Design Forum, which I frequent on a regular basis, has a large number of respected and knowledgeable members in the area of web and it runs a monthly ‘Members Website of the Month’ feature. As I opened the Month’s nominations for October, I found out that I had made the 9-strong short-list for the title.

It is the first award I have been nominated for so it means a lot to be in contention, however I have some strong competition, with two other fellow nominees who I believe have some seriously great websites - I will let you know how I get on.

Also in complete unrelated random news I have for the past month started to learn how to cook properly, after watching chef Jamie Oliver’s ‘Ministry of Food’ I have mastered about 5 or 6 dishes already and my latest effort was a Lasagna, which turned out really well, much better than putting in a ready meal.

The lasagna in its finished state before going in the oven.

The lasagna’s layers.

The lasagna in its finished state just out the oven.

Filed under: Cooking, General, Web Design by Joel Reed
1 Comment »

Last week I started back at the University of Wolverhampton for my third year at the Institution and my second studying towards my BA Interactive Media degree.

I have four new exciting modules which I will be studying until Christmas in around two months time. These modules are Interaction Development - DM2109 (module code), Scripting Interaction - DM2107, Narrative Forms - AD2207 and Streaming Media - DM2111 respectively.

In Interaction Development, I have been set the task to research the topic of Teenage Road Safety, come up with an idea for an interactive piece based around this subject matter, write up a functionality specification, a flowchart, draw some scamps of my idea and present them via a pitch board. Then I will set about creating this interactive artefact to a prototype stage before testing it.

For Scripting Interaction I am going to make a fully working and Lingo scripted game, which I am going to build in Macromedia Director MX 2004, based around a game engine conceived by my tutor Faramarz Amiri (www.mymodules.co.uk).

I aim to build upon the coding in the basic game template to create a fully functional and engaging ‘video game’, I have been asked to come up with an idea for the game, which can be for any age-range and design backdrops, characters, dialogue and even music for the piece.

Faramarz’s game uses chickens aiming to dodge electric fences to make it to the safety of the pasture, if they touch the fence they fry and are sent to the kitchen; my idea is for a game called ‘Jail Break’ in which there will be a group of three inmates who have to escape from prison, they have spent 5 months tunnelling and now they are by the prison walls they will come across different obstacles in their path to freedom, the spotlight from the four turrets, guards walking about, electric fences, barbed wire, guard dogs on patrol, each inmate has a certain skill which the player will need to make use of to get through the fence and make it home.

In Narrative Forms I have been asked to develop an idea for an interactive Narrative story, providing storyboarding, prototyping and an animatic, this will be presented to my tutor, running alongside this I am to write a 1500 word essay based on ‘Genre Analysis’ and this will be the genre of my idea and how it is related.

For Streaming Media I am to come up with a 30-45 second video piece, advertising the Digital Media section of the University of Wolverhampton, I can convey any area of Digital media that I want and in any way, I have to make sure that this piece can be streamed via a single web page that I also have to design and make and this back-drop, to be made in Adobe Photoshop should be related to the matter within my video.

I am hoping to focus on the actual students for this piece and the subject of time will play a part in it also.

I have also been approached to do a website for a couple who want to rent out their Cyprus villa home to tourists during the holiday seasons, this work has been provisionally pencilled in for late December.

Also check out my portfolio, I have posted a video hosted over YouTube of my Director work which I have been struggling to stream over the website.

Filed under: General by Joel Reed
No Comments »

Yesterday I managed to complete a breakthrough regarding the progression and development of my personal portfolio - this time finally mastering the art of name severs and their effects on domain names.

For a long while I have been in the situation where my personal website has been hosted on a separate server [Byehost] to the one which I purchased my domain name from [LCN].

So for people to view the very latest version of Reed-Design I have had to rely on a very poor frame-based forwarding system to re-direct my LCN domain reed-design.co.uk to my Byethost server, which contains the website I want you guys to see.

Not a good system!!! - Why? - Because the frame-based re-direct XHTML coding provided by LCN was of a poor standard causing my website’s programming code to show up on the W3C Validator as invalid, meaning that the dreaded red error bar appeared when anybody looked up my website. This was causing me total frustration because I knew that behind this error-riddled re-direct and masking was perfectly ‘clean and green’ XHTML programming throughout my website.

Not only this but I was forced to use a URL Mask from LCN to stop my very long server url provided by Byethost showing up in the user’s browser address bar when people accessed my website. In short I had had enough and just wanted my domain which I had purchased to start working for me, showing up in the address bar and showing alongside it the web page names I had mapped out in my ht docs - e.g. reed-design.co.uk/pagename.htm .

So I went to Byethost’s community forum in search of a solution and I am glad to report they sorted me out in everyway I needed. I wrote a post asking for help with this particular problem and I was given it in double time.

Firstly I was instructed by ‘KatieKitty’ to go to LCN and update my name server information from LCN to Byethost and she provided me with the relevant addresses that I needed and after 24 hours of waiting, sure enough when I typed in my .co.uk domain my Byethost website appeared and most importantly after the / was the names of my web pages and files.

Problem solved? Well nearly, I still had a problem with my Blog’s files and posts not appearing after reed-design.co.uk/ so again I went to the Byethost community forum where ‘Josh(ua/y)’ explained I needed to update my url from within my Wordpress (which powers the blog) Settings - job done and might I add that if you are looking for a free or premium web host with good support of PHP, MYSQL and great customer service look no further than Byethost.

I also learned about sub-domains which I am seriously pleased about because I am quite likely to use this in the future at Uni, particularly in year 3 when I do a final project - I can now potentially have www.yearthreeproject.reed-design.co.uk.

I also added a Fav Icon on to the website which you should hopefully be able to see in your browser’s address bar, this was done in Photoshop and if you save my website to your favourites, it should sit in your Bookmarks alongside my url!!

Filed under: General by Joel Reed
4 Comments »

The eagerly anticipated Season 3 of the hit US TV show Heroes is set to air in the UK on September 25, 2008, BBC2, just three days after its American premiere and I cannot wait.

Heroes, created by writer Tim Kring, which premiered on America’s NBC network on September 25, 2006 is a collection of inter-woven stories of ordinary individuals like you or I who discover that they have superhuman abilities and the show also explores how these people adapt to the changes these abilities bring, and their roles in preventing catastrophes and saving humanity.

Some abilities which have appeared in the show include a Politician who can secretly fly, a high-school cheerleader who can re-generate from any wound she encounters, a New York artist who can paint the future, a Japanese office worker who can teleport through time and space, an LAPD cop who can read people’s thoughts and many more.

The second season left the viewer on a multiple layer of cliff-hangers, including flying Nathan Petrelli being shot by a mystery gunman, has he survived?, Nikki Sanders (who has super-strength) being caught in an inferno rescuing Monica (who can manipulate any action she witnesses), is she alive? and the show’s villain Sylar finally gaining back his powers (radiation manipulation, ice manipulation, telekinesis, paint the future, enhanced hearing, liquification and enhanced memory, all stolen from the victims he kills by chopping open their heads and extracting the power) after losing them throughout season two, will he become a force again?, with season three entitled ‘Villains’ it looks to be that way or is there others with worse intentions and powers than Sylar.

Below is one of the best previews of season three taken from YouTube it does have a couple of minor spoilers but play away and roll on the 25th - Enjoy!!

Filed under: General, Television by Joel Reed
No Comments »

Last night I dipped back in to some good old website designing, this time helping out a University friend with his Japanese Animation Club project.

My friend Robin from University is an active member in the institution’s Anime (Japanese Animation) club, running club nights on a regular basis, which is attended by many students. He came up with the club’s branding and logo and the colour scheme he wanted to use.

Robin decided he wanted to use Wordpress for its ease of use and the fact that it is much quicker to update data and information than the conventionall ’static’ website coupled with an FTP. Robin came up with his initial design (right) and then asked a couple of people to look at his design and come up with anything we might do differently, what we might decide to keep the same, what we liked, what we didn’t like.

So looking for any excuse to mess about on Photoshop I decided to look at Robin’s website idea in more detail and come up with some ideas to try and help him out.

I really kept the essence of what Robin had done himself anyway, I merely decided to firstly set out the information he already had in a slightly different fashion taking advantage of a two div column system; the main news would be near the top on the left hand side of the website’s page along with the welcome message to give users an idea of what the website entailed. I also thought it would be a good idea to have the latest reviews written by registered club members about the very latest Anime films or comic books that they had seen, or read, or discussed in group.

On the right hand side of the page I thought the other two important things to add would be the latest club events, making use of Wordpress’ calendar function, this would give potential or registered club members the chance to see what functions, outings or trips were coming up over the coming weeks or months. I also placed a small amount of contact information underneath the latest events section; this was merely a footnote so anybody quickly looking for a telephone number or email address could get it without trawling throughout the website looking for it.

Another significant change I added was moving the navigation from the left hand side of the page to underneath the Image Header, I felt this not only freed up some space, but embedded beneath Robin’s cool Logo just felt right and I also added an RSS feed alongside it for anybody to tap in to the club’s latest news.

To view my design ideas in full click here to go to my Portfolio.

Filed under: University, Web Design by Joel Reed
No Comments »

On Saturday evening at 8:34pm I launched a newly modified version of Reed-Design.

After spending far too many hours working at my summer job in Telford, Shropshire, I finally managed to squeeze in some time to get back in front of the computer, load up Adobe Dreamweaver and get firmly stuck in to some web design.

Concentrating on my existing portfolio I have added the latest batch of my work which was completed for Semester Two during my First Year of my BA Interactive Media course at The University of Wolverhampton. There are three new pieces of work which I have added to my portfolio library and these include an interactive flash piece based on the nursery rhyme ‘As I Was Going To St Ives’, a general design concept I came up with for an interface to teach pre-school children the letters of the Alphabet called ABC3 and a sound compilation piece based on an extract of an interview I conducted with a stranger on the subject of ‘What’s It Like To Be A…..’.

I also incorporated my Wordpress Blog to my website for the very first time, using a theme I designed to match the surface of my existing portfolio, I have also swapped servers from my website’s previous home at Freeola and I have also spent a lot of time on the look throughout the website, mainly on the sidebars and quality of images throughout the website’s pages.

There are still a few issues that need ironing out, notably the contact page is still a work in progress with a contact form scheduled to be added very soon, there is a minor problem with the ‘hover’ feature on some of the links on my pages and most importantly my Search Engine listing has been modified with the url being changed from www.reed-design.co.uk to my previous Freeola address which now means that anybody who searches for me on any of the dozens of search engines available will get directed to the wrong version of my website but I have contacted the modifier of my website listing in the Dmoz Directory and hopefully this will be changed back to my .co.uk domain.

So what do you think to my website?, leave a comment on this post and tell me what you think!

Filed under: Web Design by Joel Reed
No Comments »