Flash? Pros & Cons

KevinBE · #1 08-26-2003, 05:09 PM

I am rebuilding my Web site with a completely new theme. I have an 15 day eval of Swish 2.1, which creates flash movies and effects. What are the pros and cons of this type of web site elements? Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

One of my ideas for this include the before and after shots changing on their own instead of a mouse-over action. I have the mouse-over elements are in place and working. I have a few days left on the eval and can't make up my mind. I am going to leave the examples gallery in the site but I am adding some new elements to keep the browsers attention, especially on the home page.

Thanks in advance.

roger_ele · #2 08-26-2003, 11:30 PM

Kevin

My 2 cents. For a demonstration of software or an on-line tutorial brochure that I have clicked the button to start, in effect saying 'OK, give it to me' it is great. Most sites that load with flash give you a way to opt out and skip the intro. which makes them fine. But I find unrequested flash or animation to be an annoying distraction, when I am trying to read something the last thing I need is movement on the screen to distract me (it doesn't help that most of my surfing is late at night when tired).

Maybe there are other ways of useing flash that are more subtle that I am not aware of ...

Roger

BigAl · #3 08-27-2003, 12:44 AM

I hate flash with a passion - especially on sites which won't let you in unless you look at the swf (read download the player). Lots of folks still use dial-up...

There was a discussion around this topic last year.

BigAl · #4 08-27-2003, 12:54 AM

The thread I mentioned.

jeaniesa · #5 08-27-2003, 08:54 AM

Kevin,

I have one flash animation on my homepage - a restoration fading from before to after. It is subtle and not distracting (so I've been told) because I hate things flashing while I'm trying to read. The content (text) is separate from the flash, so people don't have to have flash to view my site. I've gotten a lot of compliments on it actually.

In my gallery, I chose to do side-by-side before/afters. And links to detail areas if appropriate. The reason for this was thinking about the way I like to view things. The problem I have with rollovers is when the image has been cropped and/or rotated, then it's not really an apples to apples comparison and the rollover drives me crazy. You could of course show the "before" version after the crop, but then it doesn't fully show what you did to the photo.

Personally, I like to have control over when I see what. An automatic fade in/out with Flash doesn't allow me to do that and drives me crazy. So, I chose the side-by-side design for my gallery.

HTH,
Jeanie

KevinBE · #6 08-27-2003, 11:19 AM

Thanks Roger, BigAl, & Jeanie. You all bring up good valid points. I was trying to think of good reasons to do it and realized that I might not reach my intended audience going that route. I'm glad I didn't buy the program now. I will continue to work on the "mouse-overs". I have an optional link to click beside the mouse-over pictures to allow the side-by-side static picture if the visitor has problems with the mouse-over. I guess I should have realized that the logic behind that would tend to tell me that the flash movie might be even more problematic for my visitors.

Thanks guys you've given me a lot of food for thought. My plans are to keep the examples galleries and scatter small samples throughout the site to illlustrate the proceedure while I describe it.

I've got a long way to go before I finish this one.