Psyked*

it’s easy once you know how.

Vector Magic

Posted by James - 12/11/07 at 12:11:08 am

Vector Magic was recently introduced to me by Spreadshirt.  Essentially, it’s an online vector tracing tool, kinda like those bundled with packages like the Adobe suite or other design programs.  It relies on Flex, although I can’t quite figure out whether it’s Flex or the Vector Magic servers that are doing the heavy lifting - probably a bit of both.  I’m quite interested in this though, and their claims about the awesomeness of their service vs. others are certainly impressive.

Interface-wise it’s functional, pretty standard flex interfaces, which actually inspires confidence that the back-end programming must be pretty hot.  Sofar I’ve only tested this with simple and unimportant images, but it’s real strength is going to be in Vectorisation of things like corporate logos - I just haven’t given this a test yet.  But I’d certainly say that it’s worth a visit.

Fast and fresh loading graphics with ajaxload.info

Posted by James - 21/10/07 at 02:10:29 pm

Here’s a neat little site - ajaxload.  There’s nothing better than letting your user know when they’re waiting for something, and although a simple animation can’t tell them the exact progress, or how much longer they’ll have to wait - it’s often the thought that counts.  Your preloader / loading animation is that little extra bit of finessé for your creations.

And ajaxload has a lovely little generator to knock some graphics up for you, in a variety of formats and completely customizable colours.

Website screenshots made easy.

Posted by James - 05/06/07 at 01:06:50 pm

Really easy, in fact. www.websitescreenshots.com has a downloadable program by Nathan Moinvaziri which is simply awesome. It ties into Internet Explorer, and uses it to capture a full or part screenshot of any website. It has all the native features your own Internet Explorer has, so Flash and Javascript and the like, all the features you need (cropping, resizing, resampling) and even full-page view. It’s also free. (but without command line abilities) I found it while searching for some sort of wordpress plugin to replace my reliance on the Snapshots rollovers. Oh, I know such a plugin could exist, but it doesn’t. Even so, getting screenshots on the web is now as easy as Open WebShot > Enter URL > Capture > Upload > Send to Editor > Publish.

Foxmarks

Posted by James - 02/03/07 at 05:03:02 pm

Foxmarks is a add-on for firefox, which syncronizes your bookmarks between computers. Soo, if you have your home computer and a work computer, for example, you can sync the bookmarks up automatically. Cool huh?

Well, where it could really come in useful would be in an office where everyone might want to have a common library of useful links in their web-browser. Anyone can add everything to a central sync server and bobs your uncle!

Head on over to http://www.foxmarks.com/ for more info.