The flashest web animation was rewarded last night at the Flash Film Festival, part of the Flash Forward conference happening this week in London.
Web-based audiences voted for their favourite international designers at the bleeding edge of Flash construction to win awards across ten categories.
Top of the list, and winner of best of show, was coin-op-city.com, which won the game category. The site was designed by Design Assembly, a German studio which also won the 3D section for the design of their own website.
UK studio Hi-Res!’s website for Darren Aronofsky’s new feature ‘Requiem For A Dream’ won the prize for interactive for its crashing window featuring interrupted static and pseudo-shopping site graphics. The site translates the breakdown portrayed in the film online - with deliberate malfunctioning and programmed chaos.
Florian Schmitt, creative director at Hi-Res!, said he was chuffed with winning the Flash 'cursor', saying: "It's the Macromedia equivalent of the Academy Awards.
"[Building the site] was more play than work, because we were so into the film."
While users can alter some aspects of the site, the spiral of self-destruction programmed into the site is inevitable. Asked whether he thought it merited a prize for interactivity, considering its propensity for breakdown, Schmitt laughed: "It definitely didn't belong to business!"
Megalo, the French outfit, won two prizes for their client Salomon, one for best motion graphics for Salomon Inline and the second for business for Salomon Ski. The site for Ang Lee’s phenomenal ‘Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon’ was less lucky, and although nominated in both motion graphics and sound, won neither awards.
US animators Groove Chambers won the cartoon section, Poland's MONDO Design won best sound for their BlueMondo site and Miss Maggie won best story for Italy's Fever Interactive. Best navigation went to Paris France Inc, for their M3Snowboards site, and New York-based shop Firstborn Multimedia won the design section for Madonna’s Music website.
The Flash Forward conference is running until tomorrow at the National Film Theatre in London, and boasts web animation pioneers as its guest speakers. Headlining will be Daljit Singh and Mickey Stretton of Digit, Joel Baumann of tomato interactive, and Joshua Davis, of ‘one-man reasearch and development website’ www.praystation.com.
450 delegates from over 40 different countries are attending the conference, which is debuting in London after the success of the Flash Forward conferences held in San Francisco and New York over the past year.
Links:
Best Motion Graphics: www.salomoninline.com
Best Navigation: www.m3snowboards.com
Best Design: www.madonnamusic.com
Best Sound: www.bluemondo.com
Best Game: www.coin-op-city.com
Best Interactivity: www.requiemforadream.com
Best Business: www.salomonski.com
Best 3D: www.designassembly.com
Best Story: www.missmaggie.org
Best Cartoon: www.groovechamber.com
