f9

Flash isn’t something you often see in use on a blog (aside from the WP-Cumulus tag cloud plugin). The majority of our animations and other effects tend to be done with JavaScript.

When Trenty Fox of Flashmint.com got in touch with me a few days offering to give away some of their products in a competition (Which we are doing at the end of this post!), my initial reaction was that Flash wasn’t a big thing for bloggers though.

What changed my mind was when I rolled over the Christmas logo on their site (Not going to tell you what happens, just go try it out, it’s cool!). It’s a small touch, but it made a big difference for me.

With this post, I’m going to fire out some other ideas for how using Flash in small doses could add to your blog. Let me know what you think, or where you use it!

Ideas for Flash In a Blog

The images here all link to the files on Flash Mint, just click to see them.

A Countdown Timer

f1

Do you blog about upcoming releases? Whether it’s a new movie or Apple’s next tech conference, an animated countdown is a useful addition to your post, easy to add, and something other bloggers in your niche probably don’t have.

That said, do turn off any ticking sound effects…

Your Own Video Player

f2

Video sharing sites like YouTube and Vimeo are great, but if you’d prefer not to have their branding on your videos, you can use your own video player instead.

Headline Tickers

f3

An animated ticker can be a great way of scrolling through your headlines in a small space. You could even pull in an external RSS feed of news updates for your niche.

The screenshot above shows 3 different variations of tickers, but there are hundreds out there. There’s bound to be one to match your design!

Podcast Audio Players

f4

Again, there are a lot of mp3 playing scripts out there. They can range from very minimal with only the essential controls, to full-featured players like the one pictured above.

Advanced Photo Galleries

f5

Flash can be used to make some incredible photo gallery viewers. The one above is animated in 3D and looks extremely sleek. It’s a great way of showing off a large set of photos.

Novelty Navigation

f6

The links in the screenshot above function exactly like the Mac Dock. The icons enlarge as you mouse over them, making it a very cool way to scroll across (They also have tooltips that open up to give a full description).

Your primary navigation isn’t something you want to risk this on, but it could work well for a portfolio of your work.

Image Panning

f8

Image panning is a trick often used in clothes shopping sites to let you view a product in detail, without sending you a massive image which fills your whole screen. You just drag the cursor over the picture to scroll around the different parts.

For bloggers, the use is the exact same as for those shopping sites. Let your readers see full quality images easily, even if they’re on small monitors.

Competition – Win Flash Files!

f7

Flashmint.com have kindly offered to giveaway files of your choosing to 3 winners here.

Let’s try to make this useful for each other. To join in the competition, just check out their site and leave a comment here with a link to whatever your favorite file is.

In a week’s time, I’ll pick out the 3 best finds and the winners get to keep them! (Only stipulation is that the max value per file is $100). Also, you’re welcome to choose any of their full Flash templates, or even WordPress templates!

Hopefully we’ll end up with a list of ideas for great Flash usage!

So what are you waiting for? Let’s go find some great scripts! Or is Flash just for for you? I’d love to hear your thoughts on Flash vs. JavaScript in the comments!

Enjoy this post? You should follow me on Twitter!