Archive for the ‘work’ Category
After Effects experiments: Particular 02
Thursday, January 8th, 2009After Effects experiments: Particular
Tuesday, January 6th, 2009Have been messing around with the Trapcode Particular plugin in AfterEffects, here are some of the more interesting ones, mostly from various tutorials on VideoCopilot and Graymachine …
iPlayer news
Friday, December 19th, 2008So I finished working on iPlayer over the summer, but some of the last things I was working on have now been released which I think are really exciting, the first iPlayer Wii version released in October, in which the interface has been redesigned to work 10ft away with a Wiimote. If you don’t have a Wii you can see what it looks like here www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/bigscreen
Then today the big news is that the new Adobe Air-based version of the download manager has been released, it’s not based on Windows Media or using Peer-2-Peer which means no uploading costs from your ISP + IT WORKS ON MAC AND LINUX!! This is really great as it was certainly one of the big criticisms in it’s initial launch … I think it’s still got a few teething problems but it will be really exciting to see how this develops.
Another big release (which I had no involvement in) but looks really great is the children’s version of iPlayer – particularly good if you don’t want your kids watching some of the more edgy BBC Three programmes!
Fun and games at BBC Audio & Music
Sunday, December 14th, 2008So for the next few weeks I’m working at the Audio & Music Interactive department at the BBC in Regents Street, and on wednesday and thursday I was fortunate to get involved in a two electronics workshop which they run every now and again as part of radiolabs - I guess to try and come up with slightly more off the wall ideas.
It was a wicked two days, lots of people doing clever stuff with Processing, Arduino boards and various sensors - the brief was to create a device which measured how much a rock band ‘rocked’! Which ended up involving accelerometers in hats (to measure headbanging!), motion sensors under the floor etc.
Unfortunately my coding/electronics skills have become a bit non-existent since finishing uni so I tried to help out by putting stuff together on the display side of things, however it’s definitely something I’d like to try and pick up again in the new year! Anyway check out the photos on flickr or a video that I’ve put together of the day!
After Effects comp: STORIES
Friday, October 24th, 2008So on the theme of ’stories’ I was thinking about intro’s and trailer’s of films where a story is often condensed down to a short period of time. So decided to go for a bit of a ‘mashup’ re-cut trailer of an existing film - The Empire Strikes Back! (You might notice the influence from the intro to ‘Snatch’)
Anyway you can check out my film here. Also as the winner for this week I get to choose the theme for next fortnight: SCARY!
After Effects comp: SOUP
Wednesday, October 8th, 2008I have to confess I got a bit lazy with this fortnights after effects battle, so here’s my last minute entry to the theme ‘Soup’ - Nick Beese won in the end and has chosen the theme ‘Story’ for night fortnight …
After Effects comp: POWER
Friday, September 26th, 2008In the visual design department at the BBC we’re having a little on-going competition to improve our After Effects skills. The challenge is to produce a 5-10 second film on a certain theme, then do a show-and-tell to how you made it etc …
So the theme this week is ‘Power’, here’s my entry which was a modified tutorial from Video Copilot (which is a really great resource for learning motion graphic software by the way). Also well done to Andy Bird who won and now chooses the theme for two weeks time, which is gonna be … ’soup’!
Angela Buttolph
Tuesday, September 9th, 2008A little site I’ve done for my friend fashion journalist and TV presenter Angela Buttolph
iPlayer redesign nominated for an award!
Thursday, September 4th, 2008.Net magazine has nominated the new iPlayer site under the ‘Best Redesign of the Year’ category, if you have a spare 30 seconds (there’s no form to fill in) please click here to vote!
iPlayer 2 site now live!
Friday, June 27th, 2008So for the last 6 months I’ve been working on the new iPlayer site which went live yesterday evening! It’s currently in beta and will run alongside the current site until all the bugs are ironed out. I’m really pleased with the final result though, the development team have done a fantastic job building this in quite a short period of time to a really high standard. Check it out!: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayerbeta
New Podcast: Daylight Savings Mix
Saturday, April 12th, 2008Thought it was time to get the podcasts up and happening again, I think (like blogging) it’s a case of little and often, so here’s a little mix to celebrate that it’s now still sunny when you finish work - hooray!
Download file:
(Right click the link below and select “Save Target As”):
http://cdn2.libsyn.com/benhanbury/Daylight_Savings_Mix.m4a
Subscribe to podcast:
http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=207664846
New Threadless sub: Radio Evolution
Tuesday, January 15th, 2008Right, new year, time to get back into the ol’ blog posting again … the last couple of weeks have been pretty busy as I’ve been leading the design team on the next version of iPlayer, however I’d like to try and get back into the habit of doing one post per day - thought I’d kick off with a new threadless sub, this was actually an idea I started doing for work, however when it got scrapped I thought I’d develop it a bit more and see if I could get a good tee design out of it!
Please vote or comment on it here:
http://www.threadless.com/submission/147491/Radio_Evolution
BBC iPlayer - now with streaming video!
Wednesday, December 12th, 2007Although still in beta, a new version of BBC iPlayer which we’ve been working on for the last few months has been released this evening. The big changes on the previous version are that it now offers streaming flash video which will work across platforms, the sign in process has been removed so anyone in the UK can easily access it, the first step towards radio integration has been taken and the download manager has been significantly redesigned to make it simpler and easier to use.
There are still a couple of bugs, but I’m really proud of it and think the design and development team have done a really great job. So if you’re in the UK click on the link below and catch up on the last 7 days of BBC TV!
We Are All Rwandans
Friday, November 23rd, 2007A friend of mine has recently completed a short film about an incident which happened shortly after the Rwandan genocides involving a group of school children. It’s an amazing film, even more so because it was made with virtually no budget and using real Rwandan school kids as actors.
Anyway last night was the premiere at the Bafta film academy in Piccadilly, I was fortunate to have a part in the project by creating the opening titles, setting the scene for the rest of the story - it was very very cool seeing something you made in After Effects on your laptop projected onto a massive cinema screen!
I think the next step for the film is to be sent around several film festivals, if you get a chance to see it I would definately recommend it - you can find more info on the website and production blog.
Almost there …
Sunday, November 18th, 2007Have been recently trying to update and redesign my website, the bad news was that in my tussles with trying to figure out Wordpress I ended up deleting my database and all previous blog posts! 
The good news is that it’s now up and although there’s still quite a few more pages to do it seems to be getting there …
