Ollie Tristram

REFRESH PAGE TO STOP THE MUSIC

As this project was to be completed using Adobe Flash my first thoughts were, “uh, oh!” I have never used Flash before in my life and my first impressions of it weren’t very good. I’m not a coder in any way, it’s like learning a new language, so I had a feeling I would struggle compared to the other narrative projects. Reassuringly though, Jools had produced a template for us to use and said that the project was not about being technical and clever on Flash, but to come up with a good narrative theme. Usually I like to be different and try new things in a project, but because ActionScript 3.0 is way over my head I figured using Jools’ template was the easiest and most stress-free route.

With a set of ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ buttons for each frame I had to come up with an idea that would take the user from frame to frame answering questions with a yes or no answer. Again, I could have experimented with this and created different answers and produced more buttons but I just didn’t want to go there. Instead of creating something rather boring and generic, I decided to go for making something humorous as if it could make people laugh, it would make up for how simple it is.

An ‘Insanity Test’ it is then.

After seeing previous html-based insanity tests in the past, in which questions are asked to find out if the participant is insane or not, I had an idea of how ridiculous and pointless the results really were so I could go for random questions when making it. Therefore one of the main reasons someone would want to play my test is a comedy factor, and everyone likes to have a laugh...

I began by creating rectangle boxes in the ‘frames’ layer of Jools’ template and used fill gradients to make them more jazzy. My intention whilst ‘decorating’ the frames was to make everything bright and colourful which has the connotations of being crazy or eccentric. I included many pictures found on Google to represent the questions in the frame. This gives the user more to look at than just the text.
To keep the user’s attention I also used sound. I created a short music clip at 180bpm, again to give an impression of being wild or mad, which loops throughout the project until the last frame. I had a lot of problems with the music because I originally wanted one clip to loop over the first frame only, and a second clip to loop over the remaining frames. But I couldn’t find anyone fluent enough in Flash (even Jools) that could help me. Still, I’m satisfied with the outcome. Also, I found free wav files on the internet to play when a frame starts coinciding with the image and text on screen. For example, the word ‘headshot’ is heard when the gun-related question is seen.

My project has a replayability factor because you can answer the Yes or No questions in a different order every time thus enabling you to see new frames and answer different questions. In addition, the route you take will also give you a different sound event at the end, so an element of surprise is also included within the project.

If I was to start the project from scratch I probably wouldn’t have changed anything at all, I would now just be prepared that in Flash things don’t always go the way you want them to.