Flash is a very functional technology to enhance any web design and to add helpful components to any website. When used wisely and accurately, Flash gives you an opportunity to improve your website without much time and effort. There may be lots of Flash elements that can be divided into groups. 1. Flash effects and animation
All these numerous Flash buttons, menus, headers and other mini-Flash elements and snippets grab the attention of the visitors of your website, encourage them to see the very part of your website you want to highlight. The only problem issue is to avoid excess usage of Flash so that not to annoy the visitors. The best tools are:
- IncrediFlash XTreme - help to create Flash animation quickly and easily without requirements of rich experience in Flash.
- Mix-FX - great tool for simple creation of Flash animations and buttons on the fly.
- Amara Software - has the software solutions which can be used to create animation for a wide variety of Flash effects and animation snapshots for the web.
2. Flash picture galleries
Flash galleries are widely used in web design. They allow the user to watch a series of images without necessity to open other web pages. The current tools of Flash galleries give a possibility to improve the set of regular images with text, sound, animation effects and the navigation buttons. Many tools are dynamic and use XML format to load images.
- Origramy Gallery - small yet functional and attractive tool to show pictures on the website. It has 2D and 3D solutions with high level of customization of the interface and XML support.
- dfGallery - easily customizable tool with full-screen mode, RSS support and liquid layout with multiple language support.
3. Flash audio and video players
Nowadays the Internet becomes faster and more accessible. Users are becoming increasingly sophisticated. More and more people don't want to see only plain static images. That is why the Flash video becomes more popular among users. Flash helps you to embed video and audio on the website using the special Flash players for the website:
- Flowplayer is an Open Source video web Flash media player supporting progressive downloading and true streaming.
- Wimpy streaming media tools - easily display and control the flow of sound and video.
- Fun SoundPlayer Maker - completely skinnable Flash sound player for radio or mp3 streaming.
4. Flash graphs and charts
There is no need to say that data visualization plays a very important role in information perception. It is much easier for us to understand charts and graphs than the columns of flat figures. Today graphs and charts support lots of features from dynamic update to interactivity.
- AmCharts - Flash tool for building charts which can export data to Excel, dynamically generate data file with PHP, NET, ASP or any other programming language. The charts also have a possibility to export the chart as an image and add animation effects.
- FlyCharts - is flexible tool which can quickly and easily create good-looking charts. It doesn't have to be preinstalled, it works with any scripting language and in any browser.
- Origramy - flash graph component for making diagrams and graphs. It has the multilingual interface, Javascript support and several export formats.
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