Flash

This is all of the stuff that I’ve built in Flash and/or produced as video. All videos are presented in reverse order of their production/release, so if you start at the bottom and work your way up, you can see me getting better as time goes by. (I’ve also produced some video using puppets, and you can see highlights of that here, here, here and here.)

David Cameron Met a Black Man (Music video) – May 2010
A rare video-edit project, and my two cents for the 2010 General Election (with several extra pennies thrown in by members of the public). Production details are here.

A letter to the PCC (space invaders edition) (Flash animation / music video) – January 2010
Made to promote this group submission to the (PCC) Independent Governance Review and the Editors’ Code of Practice Committee. (I know that sounds dreadfully complicated; that’s why I made a video to explain it.)

Page 3 :: Girls + Words (Flash animation / music video) – November 2009

Documents the use of topless models on Page 3 to feed right-wing propaganda to readers of The Sun. Mildly NSFW.

Andrew Gilligan in OCTOPUPPET: a short film about sock-puppets (Flash animation / music video) – April 2009
A video about Andrew Gilligan and the bad habit some people have of adopting false identities so they can fellate themselves virtually and/or attack enemies without fear of consequence.

Pull Your Pants Up (OFFSITE) (Flash animation / music video / erm…) – June 2008

You will watch this video. Alone and without supervision. Relax. Don’t struggle. Try not to fight it. You’ll only hurt yourself.

My submission to the Home Office for the public consultation on SOCPA (Flash animation hosted on YouTube) – January 2008
I’m very proud of this one. I made my case and helped to make a difference. Together, we got results. Well, a firm promise of a commitment to an eventual result, anyway. I’m pretty sure this was the first official submission to a government department hosted on YouTube or anything like YouTube, but if you know or suspect otherwise, do get in touch. My submission can be read in full here

The plight of Iraqi interpreters (Flash animation hosted on YouTube) – August 2007

A short video designed to prompt, promote or enhance weblog posts about Iraqi interpreters and similar support staff. Details of the related campaign can be found here.

Goodbye, Tony Blair (Flash animation hosted on YouTube) – June 2007
A near-epic video celebrating the departure of Tony Blair. Background can be found here and here.

C**ts Are Still Running The World: The Flash Video (2.9Mb Flash show) – October 2006
Loved the song. Hated the video. Needed to express my own personal frustration. Made this. (Includes NSFW audio.)

New Tory Labour (OFFSITE) – September 2006 – October 2006
Produced for the Liberal Democrats, with initial focus on the environment. Full background here.Please note that the following links are to archived versions on YouTube and not the original campaign videos/site, which has since been retired:

Video III – New Tory Labour Transmission #3 – Flip Flop Fandango
Video II – New Tory Labour Transmission #2 – Delivering Promises
Video I – New Tory Labour Transmission #1 – Climate Change

The Star Wars Photoshopping Project – Special Edition (1.4Mb Flash show) – February 2006

Images from The Star Wars Photoshopping Project set to music. That’s it.

Backing Blair II (OFFSITE) – October 2005 – May 2006
Our motto was ‘Labour in. Blair Out.’… with the job only half done, we still had a ways to go… so new attention-getting/issue-raising Flash videos were released after the general election in 2005 and prior to local elections in 2006 (the previous five can be seen further down):
Video X – The Roses of Success

Video IX – Dave the Chameleon
Video VIII – Don’t Vote Labour
Video VII – The World According To Leo Blair
Video VI – Not Over By A Long Shot

Uzbekistan in 20 Seconds (300Kb Flash show) – August 2004
Designed for short attention spans and created to promote Blog for Uzbekistan Day.

Star Wars: A Musical Tribute* (OFFSITE: 3.2Mb* Flash show and linkage) – June 2005

1 year, 25 days, 20 hours, 41 minutes. That’s how long it took for me to finally get around to finishing this once I’d started it. It spent a lot of time on the back-burner. [*Link updated: Video moved to YouTube]

WMD Hunt (OFFSITE: Flash Game) – April 2005
A little independent shot across the bow for the 2005 General Election. Script by moi, development by the most-excellent mushybees.

Backing Blair (OFFSITE) – February 2005 – May 2005
Five videos were created for this protest-voting campaign, also for the 2005 General Election:

Video V – Iraq in 30 Seconds
Video IV – Drawing the Line
Video III – Debate
Video II – Unbelievable
Video I – Vote Blair

The London Underground Song (OFFSITE: 800Kb Flash show) – January 2005
This excellent song by Amateur Transplants was enjoying 1,000 downloads a day as an MP3, but as a flash music video, it started drawing up to 30,000 visitors a day. It attracted a quarter of a million individual web users in a fortnight at its original location before the host had a small fit (note: it is now back at its original location). Did the record companies want to know? Did they bunnies! They can’t get it through their thick skulls that Flash music video allows punters to promote music in public instead of sharing MP3s in private.

Come Clean (Bush: The Truth) (LINK DOWN: 1.2Mb Flash show and linkage) – October 2004

This was made for Art Small’s campaign team in the final stages of the US Election in 2004. They declined to use the finished product on the official site, as they thought it “came on a little strong”…

Something Funny Happened On The Way To Abu Ghraib (500Kb Flash show and article) – September 2004
When you’ve finished watching the Flash show, please read the article.

George W. Bush: a coward and a liar (520Kb Flash show and linkfest) – August 2004

Fonts and forgeries change nothing. Everything in this Flash show is true.

Bloggerheads:: The Parting Shot (1.3 MB Flash show) – June 2004
I made this when I was feeling very defeated and vulnerable. I actually stopped blogging for about a month after releasing it. Cheers to loyal readers and that nice Mr Hutton for bringing me back online.

Labour: I See Red (1.3 MB Flash show) – April 2004

This was released after some tossers from the Tory Party came online expecting us to make their campaign material for nowt. It’s the fastest of all the Flash shows, so please don’t try and read it all at once.

JPEG Baby – A Love Song For The 21st Century (800kb Flash show)
I wrote the lyrics, Koit made the music. I blogged the MP3, but it didn’t go very far. The MP3 sat on my hard drive for year. Then I made and released this on the weekend of Eurovision 2003. It was an instant hit, received links from all over the world, and reached over 15,000 people in the first 7 days. In other words, there were more people downloading this than there were voting for the British act that year. At its peak, it was the top search result for ‘love song’. This clearly shows the marketing power of a hosted Flash music video – and it’s only a few animated lyrics.