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2010 | Book

Catalyst Interface Read chapter Read first chapter

Foundation Flash Catalyst

Authors: Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon

Publisher: Apress

Part of: Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" , Springer Professional "Technik" , Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

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About this book

This book offers an introduction to Flash Catalyst for designers with intermediate to advanced skills. It discusses where Catalyst sits within the production process and how it communicates with other programs. It covers all of the features of the Flash Catalyst workspace, teaching you how to create designs from scratch, how to build application designs and add functionality, and how to master the Catalyst/Flex workflow.

Introduces Flash Catalyst Focuses on production process Covers the interrelation between Flash Catalyst and Photoshop/Illustrator/Flex/Flash

Table of Contents

Frontmatter
Chapter 1. Catalyst Interface
Abstract
Flash Catalyst is a unique addition to the design tools created by Adobe. It allows a user-interface designer to quickly create an interactive and dynamic prototype of a site that can then be taken into Flash Builder to be completed. You can bring together visual assets created in Illustrator, Photoshop, and Fireworks and add interaction and movement to them. This gives you fine control over how the interface responds to the user’s interactions before a developer needs to get involved; it also increases the speed at which an interface can be created and tested and allows for a more iterative design process.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 2. Your First Flash Catalyst Project
Abstract
Flash Catalyst is designed to let you take assets created in Photoshop or Illustrator and convert them into an interactive prototype of the final site. It allows you, for example, to take a static image and essentially tell it to act like a button. You can then control when parts of your design are visible and how they’re made visible. Catalyst gives you a very quick way to move from static images in a graphics program to an interactive dynamic project.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 3. Wireframing in Catalyst
Abstract
Chapter 2 looked at how to use a Photoshop file to create an interactive prototype complete with animations. Another major use of Catalyst is the creation of wireframes. In the context of Flash Catalyst, wireframing is the use of simplified, low-fidelity components to quickly sketch out the site and its interaction.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 4. Animation in Catalyst
Abstract
Catalyst is very good at giving you the ability to quickly add animation to a design. This reinforces how the application ultimately responds to the user. It also allows you to finely control and define how the objects respond, rather than passing that work on to the developer.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 5. Interactions
Abstract
Creating interactions in Catalyst is surprisingly direct and intuitive. This is partially due to Catalyst’s focus has on the most common types of interactions, as opposed to trying to provide all possible options, and partially due to the intuitive design of the process. The Interactions panel responds to the type of object that is selected and guides you through the options specific to that component (although many interactions follow a similar pattern).
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 6. Organizing Artwork and Best Practices
Abstract
Because working with Catalyst involves passing files between multiple programs (Illustrator or Photoshop to Catalyst to Flash Builder) and between team members (designer to developer), keeping files organized and clear makes projects move much more smoothly. Looking at the way the files are structured is especially important as you prepare them to move from one application to the next. In this chapter, you look at some of the ways to do this.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 7. Data Lists and Design-Time Data
Abstract
Designing a site often involves using a repeated set of similar objects. This is true whether the repeated items are thumbnails in a gallery, posts in a blog, items on a product site, or dates on a calendar. Often, these repeated items are created based on external data from XML or server-side data. This is a mainstay of web design and makes for easily updatable and expandable pages. The challenge for the interaction designer at the start of a project is to create the look and behavior of the repeated items without requiring the outside data source to be created. Catalyst deals with this challenge through the use of Data Lists to repeat items and design-time data to give the impression that an outside data source exists.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 8. SWFs, Video, and Audio
Abstract
Although Catalyst has the ability to create some fairly sophisticated animated transitions, Flash’s use of the timeline, guide paths, and scripted animation make it a much more powerful and flexible animation tool. Thankfully, as part of the Flash platform, Catalyst works very efficiently with files created in Flash. This allows you to create elaborate animations that involve numerous elements in Flash and then bring them into Catalyst. This lets you not only use the advanced animation tools of Flash, but also use your existing Flash skills in your Catalyst projects.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 9. Custom Components and Library Packages
Abstract
Catalyst comes with a variety of components that cover most interaction situations. These include components such as the button and the horizontal slider, and other components that are included in the wireframe component set and were used in Chapter 3. Inevitably, you stumble onto a situation where these default components aren’t appropriate and you want to create a different sort of interaction. This is where custom/generic components come into play.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Chapter 10. Catalyst to Flex Builder
Abstract
One of the key advantages of Catalyst is that it separates the work done by interaction designers from the work done by developers. Interaction designers get to build in Catalyst using visual tools with design-time data and no coding, and developers can work from the same file in a much more code-friendly environment to connect it with a variety of data sources. This transition can often be difficult, largely due to the dramatically different ways each group works with the file.
Greg Goralski, LordAlex Leon
Backmatter
Metadata
Title
Foundation Flash Catalyst
Authors
Greg Goralski
LordAlex Leon
Copyright Year
2010
Publisher
Apress
Electronic ISBN
978-1-4302-2863-9
Print ISBN
978-1-4302-2862-2
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4302-2863-9

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