[hawken]

One of the problems we have, is that when clients look at accessible websites we make here, they complain that the text looks shit in their browser. This is the inevitable internet explorer or firefox on the PC. It's especially bad for Japanese text, which only comes in two fonts for the PC. SIFR doesn't work with Japanese.

Currently we (eat, the company I work for) are working on a new "client impressing" website for ourselves, but also something that is respected by our peers. Although the main audience really is our clients or potential clients.

The site doesn't need to be dynamically update-able, or necessarily something that is to-the-nuts accessible. Flash renders text nicely across all browsers, can be selectable, and with some clever coding the same content can be visible to the 4% of users without flash. As I say, there will be minimal updates.

I guess one of the things to remember is that our clients and web browsing people in general have no idea what flash is, all they know is that some websites are boring or shit, and other websites are fun and fancy (often the flash websites) - which we cringe at - but are none the less popular.

Some good flash agency sites:
LESS RAIN
WCRS
Agency Republic - Four times Digital Agency of the Year
Dave - Creative Business Consultancy - Brand Consultants

Some good html agency sites:
________________kleber________________
RINZEN
Hi-ReS! London (yeah totally blows on accessibility though)

Good hybrid sites:
POKE
Outside Line. Digital Communications
glue London :: Most Respected Agency 4 years running :: Home

So, your vote is welcomed, and you may even influence the outcome.

Please post links to Agency sites that you think reflect your viewpoint.

cheers

[Shiro]

I personally prefer flash. The downside though is that it may be thought that your agency only does, or only can do flash, which could detract customers looking for an HTML site.

If you want to use other fonts, then how about SIFR? I've never used it, but its supposed to work well. I don't know if it works with Japanese though.

[hawken]

SIFR doesn't work with Japanese (the site needs to be bi-lingual), doesn't work well with more than a few words so not really good for replacing sentences.

[d*d]

Originally Posted by haku

I personally prefer flash. The downside though is that it may be thought that your agency only does, or only can do flash, which could detract customers looking for an HTML site.

I think most clients will not be as aware of all the differences between a flash site an HTML site, they will simply see a 'website'.

I would consider using flash for the type of site you are considering, if you end up getting more flash work leads than html would that be a good thing for eat?

[hawken]

yeah it's certainly a consideration as you guys say, we did have a chat about here. I'm not certain what the demand would be after doing this but lets just say we are happy making websites fullstop, so ne bother as to the medium.

[Limbo]

The clever designer uses Flash sparingly but to good effect.

The clever client knows the downsides to flash and benefits of text content.

The clever website uses both.

[weldo]

thank you master

[Limbo]

Paint the fence.

[nini]

A hybrid is the best choice.

HTML/large fonts/white space to promote your accessibility and a flash header (or other) to wow your clients. The best of both worlds.

In regards to the Japanese font not looking good on the Eat site. It doesnt look half as good as the english version. I think you're just going to have compromise and add more images. AQ did a good job of it.

[weldo]

Originally Posted by Limbo

Paint the fence.

chuck my babys hat

[hawken]

Originally Posted by nini

A hybrid is the best choice.

HTML/large fonts/white space to promote your accessibility and a flash header (or other) to wow your clients. The best of both worlds.

In regards to the Japanese font not looking good on the Eat site. It doesnt look half as good as the english version. I think you're just going to have compromise and add more images. AQ did a good job of it.

you talking about aqworks? They used to have a nice site, the new one is pretty gash compared. Their Japanese font is the same looks just as bad as it does on eat unfortunately. I do bring it up with them sometimes They wrote some good articles about Japanese text on the web.

[d*d]

Originally Posted by Limbo

The clever designer uses Flash sparingly but to good effect.

The clever client knows the downsides to flash and benefits of text content.

The clever website uses both.

he who chases two rabbits catches neither

[natenation]

I personally agree that a balance of both flash and html are the best. If you are looking for flashing functionality I would look into Spry, AJAX, something like that to make your page a little more interesting. As far as a business is concerned I believe that good content and awesome samples will take you further than any flash movie.

Nate Johnson
Comics - Illustration - Web Design

[freelancr]

Flash is great when used wisely, as I have seen some really good all flash sites, but for heavy content sites I would avoid it. For a portfolio for a design agency, it would be an ideal way to show off. All depends what you want the site to do.

For example, the BBC news site, or a forum, would suck if made in flash. But I think smaller sites like Top Buzz makes wouldn't be anywhere near as good if he used XHTML instead of flash.

Even though I am a developer, and dislike flash sites, I think for a portfolio it is hard to argue that using flash would be bad.

[nini]

you talking about aqworks?

yeh. I like the little touches on that site, I think it would appeal to the Japanese sense. maybe it's just me I like the hand drawn style.

SIFR doesn't work with Japanese

You mean the SIFR wordpress plugin doesnt work?

You have to click the [embed] button next to the anti-aliasing option on the font property pannel. Now you can even have sifr for Japanese websites

I am sure you have researched though... did you mail the developers ? Might be a nice opportunity to pinoneer

[Limbo]

Originally Posted by d*d

he who chases two rabbits catches neither

Kill two birds with one stone, I say.

Fucking pigeons

[pgo]

As we all know, Flash is only useful for places where HTML/CSS/JS won't cut it.

So, you might consider doing some hybrid thing. If you built an all Flash site, don't you think you'll get the kind of clients who want all Flash sites?

I guess it comes down to which kind of clients you want to attact. Those who care about accessibility, platform agnosticism, etc. Or those who are mesmerized by shiny, moving objects.

[hawken]

Originally Posted by nini

You mean the SIFR wordpress plugin doesnt work?

You have to click the [embed] button next to the anti-aliasing option on the font property pannel. Now you can even have sifr for Japanese websites

I am sure you have researched though... did you mail the developers ? Might be a nice opportunity to pinoneer

the problem is the font size, most Japanese fonts are over 4 mb. If you don't mind waiting for 4mb per SIFR on the page, then sure, it works!

[pgo]

Might be slow, but fuck me those fonts are smooooooth.

[doffy]

Originally Posted by hawken

the problem is the font size, most Japanese fonts are over 4 mb. If you don't mind waiting for 4mb per SIFR on the page, then sure, it works!

How about making a 'troubleshoot; fonts don't work?' box somewhere on there, maybe in png, just to make sure they'll see it.

Then offer up the sifr 4mb embed edition as a parallel thing, just in case the lightweight pages won't work for them.