Join in the Fun!

Join in the Fun (c) ajellebean

New this month – “Join in the Fun”

This versatile, clean and modern invite postcard puts the power in the user’s hands.  Choosing from three different styles (clean and simple, modern, or traditional), the user can create something truly unique and tailor made to their specific event.

With a vast color pallette from which to choose, the user can set just the right tone for the invite.  

To make “Join in the Fun” even more engaging and fun for end users, I’ve added a randomize feature to the design that will allow them to quickly cycle through all available options.  With hundreds of possible combinations, “Join in the Fun” is sure to delight those you invite.

Join in the Fun (c) ajellebean

Join in the Fun (c) ajellebean

Join in the Fun (c) ajellebean

Birthday Boy Design Featured on HP Homepage

ajellebean's "birthday boy postcard" design featured on HP landing page

Excited to see “Birthday Boy Postcard Collection” is being featured on HP Creative Studio’s landing page.  The design, which allows users to choose from several different styles and color schemes, helps families connect around birthdays by sharing photos, video, and well-wishes, and invitations to their big event.  Available now in the Smilebox service.

Colormatic

Below are screen captures from my latest Flash-based slideshow, “Colormatic”.

The “Colormatic” design takes bitmap data information from a user’s photo and creates a unique background that always compliments the user’s photo.  The design features progressive image loading – only loading images that are immediately accessible by the user (the current image, two images forward from the current, and two images trailing the current) to enhance performance and the overall user experience.

The engine for this slideshow has been built from the ground up, utilizing ideas and concepts previously engineered for earlier designs.  Once in service, the underlying slideshow engine may be leveraged in other designs.

Colormatic - (c) ajellebean

Colormatic - (c) ajellebean

World’s Best Mom

For Mother’s Day, I decided to roll out a new greeting model.  Complete with a “randomize” feature, my “World’s Best Mom” design takes the standard greeting card metaphor to the digital realm, allowing the user to let their imagination run wild.

The recipient experience:

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The creation experience:

The front of the greeting allows the user to select from different art styles to create the look of their card.  The user can choose from several “canned” sentiments ranging from the sentimental to the classic.  They can round off the feel of their card cover by choosing a color scheme that matches their overall mood.  All of the unique card assets are designed to compliment one another to provide a wide range of personal expression.

I’ve also provided a “randomize” feature for the design that takes the various individual elements (background styles, colors, fonts, sentiments, etc) and shuffles them.  I believe this simple feature encourages users to get creative and have fun while they create something unique to share with their loved ones.

World's Best Mom (c) ajellebean

Inside the card, the user can choose to use their own photo (landscape, portrait, square orientations are accepted) or upload a unique video greeting to make the card all the more personal.  They can choose from three unique sentiments or enter their own.  To top it off, the user can choose different fonts and colors to add a polished feel. The “card stock” color is customizable as well.

World's Best Mom (c) ajellebean

The back of the design is programmed to match the cover so when the user arrives at this edit point, all they need to do is enter their name under the optional “created by” tag.  Font face and color are also customizable here.

World's Best Mom (c) ajellebean

Production Widget

Below is a screen capture of the Flash-based production widget I designed and developed. 

This widget makes various calculations based on designer input and displays them to the output panel in the form of Actionscript formatted Fuse-based tween code.  It automates one of the more repetitive tasks in the creation of square scrapbooks. 

It decreased total production time for these designs by 50%.

(c) ajellebean, all rights reserved

 

Quick Share

This is the latest design.  Based on an earlier design I created (“Photomatic”), the playback experience is slightly different.  I’ve added in some new features including dynamic grid resizing and reordering.

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New Year Postcard Collection

Design type created for quick send centering around the New Year.  Was the second best-selling design in the catalog just three days after its release.

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Photo Mosaic

This was the first design I created for Smilebox.  It makes use of Penner tween classes and is around 250 kb before the user adds their photos/video/text.  Some of the larger designs range from 1.5 mb to 5+ mb, making this design super lightweight by comparison.

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Holiday Newsletter

While what you see below may look simple, it’s quite complex.  In edit mode, the design’s code check to see if a user has edited any given page.  If they haven’t, that page is not shown during playback.  The intro is rendered in Maya, and page turning was completed using After Effects and Flash.  This was a collaboration between myself, Cassie L. Taylor, and Brian Pember…MindGrapes.

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Holiday Photo Postcard Collection

I developed this model which allows for six optional postcard themes, up to six optional user images/videos.  It dynamically creates a postmark based on the time and date the card is created, which can be fun when used in conjunction with scheduled send.

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Birthday Treat

This design was created in collaboration with an offsite designer located in Canada.  The photos rotate around the cake in a carousel.  The user can zoom in/out on each photo.  The design holds more than two dozen photos.   The user can also modify various design elements (my favorite being the disco dance floor I added in just prior to the design’s ship date) including the background/floor, number of photos, and music.

I was able to modify and reuse some existing AS2 class frameworks from another design greatly reducing development time over the long run.

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Cake and Candles

The best part of working on this design was the creation of the flickering candles.  Still one of the best selling birthday designs available in the catalog.

The flames are flat graphics with filters applied in Flash.

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Hallmark Citrus Recipe

This was one of the first designs I built for Hallmark.  Very short, sweet, and simple.  This is a simple Flash conversion of an existing print recipe card available in their Gold Crown stores.

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Halloween

This design has a funny story behind it…

The little pictures being used are an outdated design model (thumbnail/preview image).  All of the small images are dynamically linked to the larger, preview photo inside the jar.  When clicked, the small image’s information is sent to the preview.  Long story short, I spent as much time working on a print bug as I did animating and building the entire design.  Subsequently, I recommended the team discontinue the use of this particular design model.

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Halloween: AE

This is one of the first attempts at integrating After Effects video, scrapbooks, and slideshows all in one.  It was super fun to work on.  It is used successfully as a model upon which other designs have since been based.

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