da da da daa daasign evaluations

NUMERO UNO  -  http://www.incredibox.fr/  -  (courtesy of jjock)

WHAT DOES IT DO ?
It allows you to drag different sounds and create youre own kinda song, you idiot.

WHAT I'M SAYING
 According to Google the great, this site was designed to promote and represent the incredible polo, an apparently droopy eyed beat boxer, not magician as expected, from France. As with pretty much every site we’ve referred to in class its FWA approved, but astoundingly that’s not where I found the little blighter (helping hand from another). It came about from a collaboration by Alan Durand, a French bloke with a portfolio including website design, flash and animation, and some fella called Romain Delambily, although he’s impossible to track down so what input he had I dunno.

The whole things made disappointingly with flash, which as my worksheet hints at is gonna have some sort of affect on its accessibility from tablets, which are slowly but surely taking over the world. The site was made in 2009, and the original iPad released in 2010, so the html5/flash war, or accessibility from iPads wouldn’t have even been considered at this point. Another hefty head butt reminder of how fast this industry changes and evolves. It should work on all android tablets, which I'm guessing now Steve Jobs has kicked the bucket will kind of race ahead, but it’ll struggle, or not at all work on iPads since they’ve shrugged off flash in favour of html5.however a quick visit to incredibox shows promises of a version 2, perhaps they’re getting on it and preparing the concept for world of the tablet. I had a quick whizz on my phone to see how it would get along with that, android HTC and it didn’t at all. It thought about it but eventually gave up.

DESIGN WISE!
A quick initial shows the user how to operate everything without an ‘about’ section, or a lot of text, leaving a smooth simplistic design. The icons are easily interpreted making it useable to folks from pretty much any country, there’s nothing complicated at all, everything’s been made as simple and minimalist as possible so most of the users attention is focused on the music of mister Malburet, generating a hype for nothing but him. I liked him enough from his quirkily odd site to give him the old MySpace search.

I reckon, despite the outstanding simplicity of the site that users are likely to return cos of:

The amount of different combinations of sound are plentiful, the user chooses they’re own outcome, (the designers making sure every option is pretty to the ears o course.)

It sounds nice, better than some of the dog muck I've got hidden away on my iTunes,

And of course there’s the feature animations every couple of minutes.

SO..
Its great, it’s a kind of modest, understated site that keeps itself to itself, lets you know nothing but the essentials leading you towards giving the fella a little search cos you’re so intrigued and happy with what you’ve interacted with so far.

The designs pretty much flawless, in my not so humble opinion anyway, and they’re all French blokes. Can’t really go wrong.

NUMERO DUO  -  http://www.allisnotlo.st/index_en.html  -  (like the arcade fire number, but abit tackier)

EH? 

Its another one of those infectious html5 Google chrome experiments, sorta like the wilderness downtown but not a jam jar as good, according to t’interweb it’s a “ participatory music video in multiple windows. Powered by HTML5. Enter a message to be danced out within the song.” – not an essay so no intention of referencing haha feck yer.

WHAT IM SAYING!

Tadaa, brought to you from OK Go, Pilobolous, a group of dancers, and o course the infamous Googul, this little number involves the playing of a video in perfect timing to Ok Go’s new track All is not lost. Ok Go are no foreigner to wildly charming videos, got feathers like Here we go again, the treadmill number, Last leaf a, a toastily cool animation and This too shall pass, the paint cannon vid-yo, in their ground breaking cap.

The site starts off by the user typing in any message they want, it chews over what you’ve opted for, and the music video begins. Its similar to the wilderness downtown, Arcade fire, in thart it fires a lot of different browser windows at you, all of which dance around your screen realigning and resizing, other than that its in its own league. The amount of bulge action is astounding, and well received by me haha, the dancing and choreography plays a huge part in the interactive video, sort of an online kaleidoscope kinda fing, in only one colour but with people through dance.

The end message can be shared or downloaded as a wall paper, it’s the only thing the user has an choice in, having said this the whole things engaging somehow. I've watched it an obscene amount, but I’m partial to a skintight leotard every now and then, might just be me. I’m confident users would return, and it not just wear off as one time novelty. It’s proven that although Ok Go’s videos don’t necessarily increase record sales they do have a huge impact on fan loyalty. Fans share re-post and re-blog the videos and interactive experiences through all kids of social networking sites, creating a huge audience and fan base for the band. Hugely beneficial outcome, as well as a shed load of fun t makes I reckon.

More music artists and bands are surfing the technology wave, artists such as Bjork with her star gazing applications, and Norah Jones 3 dreams of black interactive music video, which wouldn’t work on my computer haha.

NUMERO ER.. NUMBER 3  -  toddler lock app couresty of android  -  (not bothered what you think.its great)



WHAT IS IT?

Really? It’s a lock.. For toddlers.

MY VALUABLE THOUGHTS

Toddler lock is a free application on android, that pretty much does what it says on the tin, unlike other toddler applications tho it completely locks off the phone and operates like a screen saver; there’s no way for the child to press the wrong button and accidentally call that black sheep mother in law you’ve been avoiding cos she always sends coal instead of fivers for Christmas.

It’s by no means the best it could be, but I thought id write about it cos me, my mom and my stinky little brother love it. I reckon as some sort of side project id like to do a better version (id have a go at the design, and what can actually be done) but I still think this is a brilliant starting block.

 Touch screens fascinate people of all ages, it’s just like all the sci-fi moves said it would be, small people too. The phone lets out little chiming noises every couple of seconds and every time contact is made with the screen, there’s basic shapes in fluorescent colours, and the ability to drag and draw all over. By pulling down the bar at the top the screens erased, and you can start again – the only way to exit this mode is to touch the screen corner in the correct order, something Isaac hasn’t yet figured out.

I use it all the time, and Isaacs not yet bored of it, the ultimate test, I've had it for months, and he’s pretty clever. Win for toddler lock. It’s designed for this age so I'm guessing iPads iPhones and android numbers, although why you’d shoving all this into the face of your toddler relative I've got no clue, perhaps the only flaw in the entire concept.

I’m tired so not writing anymore.

Don’t go thinking I'm a neglectful older sister haha I’m bloody well not.