Conveying data that spans more than 2 dimensions is classically difficult. In fact, successful representations like the map of Napoleon’s march from CJ Minard are celebrated. I saw this Flash thing from the New York Times representing box office returns from Hollywood films and I was really impressed how nice a job it did showing some disparate things in a cohesive way. Worth taking a look at if you think about this kind of stuff.

The last part is my favorite part of course!

via Aral Balkan

What I like about these new web-based media tools isn’t just that they make it easier for normal people to do media editing, but they really show the power of Flash/Flex in a mind-blowing way.

After spending a bunch of time searching the flex and paypal sites, I was getting really discouraged.

Finally, I came up with this hack:

I use the ExternalInterface to “shell out” to javascript where I create the form that paypal needs dynamically in Javascript and then submit it (also dynamically). It works, but it really seems like a hack to me.

Is there a better way to do this?

wow, this is a great resource

Finally, this article on advertainment (also from NYT) reminded me how the driving force financially behind most creative businesses is the advertising agency. This is a bit of a tougher market to get into for individuals, but little studios can get attention for themselves, starting small, and get into this business eventually.

Then again, why do work for hire if you don’t have to?

Scale Nine: Articles, Samples and How-Tos

Designing Flex2 Skins

Ted on Flex: Component Resources

Both of these pieces are doing something similar. They are using motion graphics and typeography to help illustrate and enliven spoken word material. I think that the Master Plan piece is better visually (which is admittedly much easier at 3:15 instead of 36:00. However, the content of Lawrence Lessig’s piece is far more effective if only because he is much more experienced at speaking and he is much more knowledgeable about his topic. It definitely shows how substance can beat out style, but it also shows how compelling voices and messages are really the most important part of a informational, educational or political piece.

The Lawrence Lessig film is below:

This is cute. Not insanely featured, but a nice proof of concept for Flex. Maybe ’cause I write image processing code for a living, these things are really interesting to me. This would be a great Apollo shareware app. I also like that they are in Seattle. Maybe the local startup market is improving.

Cromm Cruac is a portfolio site with some really nice Flash work, the interface is a bit challenging, but really rich.

Hoss Gifford doesn’t want Flash authors to use their own scrollbars while there exist just fine ones in the browser. I agree with him to the extent that if you are doing a text-heavy html-like site doing a non-standard scrollbar is dumb. Then again, if you are doing a site like that, why do it in Flash anyway?

If you haven’t checked out the swfObject before, you should. It is very useful for all your embedding needs.

Finally, Daniel Tietze tell you how to make your own uTube.