This week's cooltopic:
The long awaited review of SWiSH!
Article by: The KROW   [Page 1] [Page 2] [Page 3]

“....the crowd’s on the edge of their seats with just two seconds left in the final quarter, and Billy Longshorts has the ball! Will he make it? .....He shoots.... ~~SWISH~~ ....he scores! Billy Longshorts does it again!”

Ok, maybe you’re not a sports fan. And, it’s true that being a hero doesn’t come as easily for some folks as it does for Billy Longshorts, right? Afterall, you’re a webbie, not a basketball star! Probably the closest webbies come to making the swish of the day is to a basket by the desk. This of course, comes only after Mr. Bigexec says, “your hand drawn site tree is garbage....so file it”, to which you oblige with rapid paper crinkling and zeroing in on the nearest *round* file. Hardly the thing stars are made of, eh?

So, how are webbies supposed to be the “shining star”? It’s hard enough working day to day in the redundant world of key tapping and pixel pushing, let alone trying to stay on the cutting edge of cool stuff, like ........(eeek!....say the word)......FLASH! It’s a webbie’s dilemma!

“Gone In A Flash”
You know FLASH. It’s that fantastic program that lets you create an entirely new world of web sites with interactivity, and is quickly becoming *the* thing to do on web (whether we like to admit it or not). Yep.....that’s the same Flash we all know and love which costs a pretty penny (and then some) and can take weeks (more like months and months) to learn. And yes.....that’s the same Flash which is now collecting dust on the software shelf, because the development cycle of one Flash site took so long, you lost money on the deal and ended up eating noodle-o’s for 3 months!

So, where’s Billy Longshorts when we need him? He makes being a star look so easy (and has probably never ate a bowl of noodle-o’s in his life), while the rest of us stare in disgust at that box of Flash, telling ourselves we *will* figure it out and turn profit from it!

“No Benchwarming Zone”
If you’re a sharp webbie, you’ll see that Billy’s secret to becoming a hero was here all along and it’s the key to helping you be a star in the Flash world!

Remember his ~~ SWISH~~ ? Well, what if you could have a SWISH of your own, that helped you be the hero of your Flash movie development? Better still, what if *your* SWISH had:

• A learning curve so short you could do your first movie in just minutes
• Total WYSIWYG environment
• Ability to create complex effects like explode, wave, squeeze and more, with just a click
• Mouse events with no scripting required
• Direct visual editing of vector gradients (coming in version 2!)
• In-program drawing tools
• 4-state button rollover creation
• Ability to import sound files
• Import images of your own including sprites
• Extra image compression (to help eliminate large file sizes)
• Finished movies viewable in the regular Flash player (no special player needed) and SWiSH generates the html for you
• MORE!

Bet a SWISH like that would fill a large gap in your ol’ webbie tool box, now wouldn’t it? So.....what are you waiting for? Get out there and give the “big dogs” a run for their money. Go get your own SWiSH!

Oh. Still here, huh? You’re the “hard sell” kinda folk, huh? Don’t worry. By the end of this review, you’ll be “SWiSHing” your way around the web like the rest of us (and from what’s said around town, it’s better to be a “swisher” than it is a “flasher” anyway).

Cool KROW Clue
Due to the terrible thought of eating one more bowl of noodle-o’s, it’s worth mentioning that your single-license of SWiSH is just $30! Much more *palatable* wouldn’t you say?

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