One of the big things everyone was talking about while I was at Flashforward last week was Making Things. Based in San Francisco, they make devices that interface with the outside world. You can add all sorts of sensors and then use that input to interface with the computer, both input and output. The cool thing is they’ve developed a version that works with Flash - so now you’re not just tied to keyboard and mouse. Make no mistake this thing is going to be big. Craig Swann, Sam Wan and Brandon Hall have already started playing with this stuff. I’m really excited about it because it means I can start to explore physical computing in a much easier than when I built my Snow Globe Memories experiment.
Making Things
Comments
well the way the Flash one works is an XML server that runs on the local machine. Apparently a windows version is on it’s way too.
Bren / 12/03/2004I’ve had a reply back and unfortunately theres no Director support yet which is a big draw back.
They have however just released the Flash components:
http://www.makingthings.com/pr.....nt_set.htm
This *was* cool. Branden, Sam and Craig have already re-written the Flash components so that they’re more flexible/useful! This has huge potential for installation type art (and applications…)
Have you played with EtherPeg yet Bren?
Pete Barr-Watson / 15/03/2004That’s great that something like this is finally released with Flash compatibility.
I’ve been wanting to play around with the EZ I/O board (has 10 analog and 10 digital inputs/outputs). It’s Director only right now but has been around for a long time. Here’s a little article on it. http://www.director-online.com.....php?id=292
Don’t think there’s much in terms of Flash support, but I’m pretty intrigued at getting some Shockwave 3D experiments going with human interaction.
James Acres / 16/03/2004There’s a new Teleo Flash class library released by makingthings, written in Actionscript 2.0
Bren / 29/05/2004
That certainly looks very interesting. I couldn’t see any information about a Director Xtra, so I have emailed them. It’ll be interesting to see how you get on with this so let me know.
pixelsumo / 12/03/2004