Creation of a Ragdoll with Flash part 2: Constraints

It’s time to introduce another feature involved in Ragdoll creation.
In part 1 you saw Verlet integration, now it’s time to see what is a constraint.

In mathematics, a constraint is a condition that a solution to an optimization problem must satisfy. So basically a constraint is a condition that must be respected. In our ragdoll world, this condition (or those conditions) refers to a distance from a particle to another, no matter if particles are moving or not.

Let’s imagine a real world example: a steel, rigid, unbendable, unbreakable, undeformable stick. This stick has two important points, one at its beginning and one at its end. Being the stick rigid, unbreakable and so on, we can say that the distance between those two points will always be the same, no matter what happens to the stick.

This is a constraint: the condition that says that the distance between start and end points must always be the same.

This is very easy to satisfy when the points do not move: we simply place two points at a given distance and the game is done.

Real problems come when there is a reason (any reason) why points could move, and we have to find a way to move points and satisfy constraints at the same time.

The first thing we are going to do is coding a function where we pass two points (in our case two movieclips) and the distance (in pixels) between them. The function will output the points in a way that satisfies the distance. Read more

Create a Lightbox effect only with CSS – no javascript needed

You may call it Lightbox, or Greybox, or Thickbox, but it’s always the same effect.

When you are on a page, and click on a photo or trig some event, a Lightbox is an effect that fades the pagein the background to show you new content in the foreground.

I mean this effect

In the upper example, when clicking on a photo the site fades to black and shows the photo, in the lower one when clicking on “login” the site fades to white and shows the login form.

There are tons of Lightbox scripts in the web, each one with its unique features and limitations, but all require massive use of Javascript or the installation of javascript frameworks.

In some cases, there are “lightweight” versions with “only” 40KB of Javascript.

This example does not want to compete with those scripts, but if you are looking for a simple, 100% CSS, 0% javascript lightbox, this may help you.

Features of this Lightbox:

100% CSS as said
You can insert any content in it (some scripts out there only allow images) Read more

Create amazing particle effects in Flash with Partigen component

Particle effects are one of the most difficult effects to achieve in Flash. Try to imagine a realistic candle flame, or a realistic explosion, or a realistic smoke. Keyword: realistic. Even if you should manage to create such effects, I bet you would spend a lot of time.

A company called Desuade comes in our help with the most complete Flash particle generator ever.

Partigen

Partigen is a Flash component that allow the user to crate extremely realistic particle effects in Flash. Moreover, all effects are generated in real time, there isn’t anything pre-rendered, and this gives us the complete control over effects. Read more

How to get a ReviewMe review rejected

If you are a regular reader you are used to see how to make things work, this time I’ll show you how not to make things work.

Do you remember the Create a Flash image gallery using photoFlow component post?

This is what I got in the ReviewMe control panel

As I was predicting in the review, the review did not get paid, probably for allowing comments.

Anyway, Photoflow remains a good component.

It would be nice to have a comment from the guys at Flashloaded.

Managing ball vs ball collision with Flash

This is another headache post. I am sorry, but since there is a ball physics competition, I have to focus tutorials on ball physics.

This tutorial covers collisions between balls, and it works with any number of balls, and it’s based on Raman Pfaff’s Physics of an Elastic Collision.

What is an “elastic collision”?

From Wikipedia: “An elastic collision is a collision in which the total kinetic energy of the colliding bodies after collision is equal to their total kinetic energy before collision.”

In this tutorial I simply made one single object, a 15px radius circle, linked as “ball”.

Then, in the first frame, just eighty lines of actionscript: Read more

Throw a ball with a sling physics Flash tutorial: Part 2 by Kevin Ward

Only 2 days. That’s how much time Kevin Ward needed to solve and publish the solution of the problem posted in Throw a ball with a sling physics Flash tutorial.

You may know Kevin for his excellent post about a different approach to create a game like Line Rider, and now he come with the second part of the sling tutorial.

Take your honour, Kevin, you deserve it!!

This is the movie Kevin created:

And this is the actionscript, with comments in some critical parts: Read more

Got a page in the Million Dollar Wiki

When you have a blog, you want people to read it. If you want people to read it, you want people to find it. If you want people to find it, you have to promote your blog.

I am sure the quality of my posts make my readers return. Now it’s time to spread the word and get some new readers.

That’s why I bought the Tutorials keyword on the Million Dollar Wiki.

You may wonder what is the Million Dollar Wiki.

It’s a very creative project attempting to create a pay per page version of Wikipedia. You choose a keyword, buy the page and you can edit it as you want. You can place your links, sell your products, include your pay per click sponsor or whatsoever.

A page costs $100. Why did I spend $100 for a page? There are more than two reasons: Read more

Throw a ball with a sling physics Flash tutorial

August 16th update: 2nd part released by Kevin Ward

Here it comes the first tutorial about some strange ways to use ball physics in a game, as said in the rules of Jay is Games competition. We have to create something original and physics related at the same time.

We’ll learn how to throw a ball with a sling.

In order to throw a ball with a sling, you need a ball and a sling. We can define a sling as an elastic connecting two points.

So I am going to create the ball and the points in Flash in this way:

Then, in the first frame, this is the actionscript: Read more

Flash game design competition at Jay is Games!

The popular flash games reviews blog, Jay is Games, is hosting a Flash game design competition.

JiG often hosts competitions, but this one has a very interesting theme for us: ball physics. How many ball tutorials did you read on this site? Maybe it’s time to code something interesting and submit to JiG before October, 1st.

You can win up to $2,500 and a Adobe Flash CS3 Professional license.

More information at this page.

Come on and let’s get at least an honorable mention!!

And expect massive tutorials about this theme during next days…

Invited to MochiAds beta

MochiAds is the world’s first advertising network for casual games. Comprised of two facets, MochiAds enables advertisers to reach a highly sought-after demographic through engaging, virally distributed Flash games and simultaneously provides game developers an effective, non-obtrusive revenue channel to support their creative talents.

That’s how Mochi Media introduces MochiAds.

In other words, it’s a way to make money developing Flash games. The idea is simple: design a game, put their ads on it and earn money every time the game is played.

MochiAds is currently in beta and I signed up for testing it on April, 22nd. On August, 2nd, I got my invitation.

Currently I have 3 or 4 almost-ready-to-be-published games, so I think I am going to test MochiAds and share my thoughts with you.

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