thinkswedish

Mario Kart Wii wins The FWA award

asa.lundkvist@fantasy-interactive.com (Åsa Lundkvist) — Fri, 09 May 2008 11:33:00 +0200

Fi is pleased to announce, the Microsite we created for Nintendo’s “Mario Kart Wii” campaign has won The FWA award. Experience the site here and see some behind the scenes action here.

FiV

jason.borbet@fantasy-interactive.com (Jason Borbet) — Thu, 08 May 2008 14:47:00 +0200

New York, NY and Stockholm, Sweden – May 8, 2008

Branded video communication is coming of age. Fi, always looking to drive and promote the next-generation online video experience, has launched a new web-based video platform.

FiV provides clients with a rich, interactive online drag-and-drop video viewing experience branded to deliver focused content and dramatically increase user-enjoyment within the client’s digital environment. FiV is one in a series of proprietary software platforms, and represents Fi’s commitment to its new direction as a full-service digital firm.

Coinciding with their eighth anniversary, The FWA will be launching FWA Theater later this month. The FWA joins at&t and a host of other clients in using FiV to provide a seamless, interactive video portal.

Nintendo – Mario Kart Wii Microsite

mdavid.low@f-i.com (MDavid Low) — Fri, 02 May 2008 13:10:00 +0200

Fi is pleased to announce the release of the full Mario Kart Wii Microsite. This site introduces users to the latest chapter of this legendary racing series, showcasing the Nintendo characters, their new motorbikes and the Wii Wheel.

Fi

david.martin@fantasy-interactive.com (David Hugh Martin) — Thu, 01 May 2008 08:04:00 +0200

The new Fi site introduces both a new name and a company that has grown and matured dramatically since our last site launched in 2004. We enjoyed building a name for ourselves as an agency, but are proud of the firm we have become.

Bringing the voice of two offices separated by thousands of miles of ocean required multiple sources of input, and therefore was an inspiring team effort.

As always, we thank you for your interest in Fi. We are excited about how our company has grown over the past decade, and we look forward to seeing what the next ten years will bring.

Doing the Bull Dance

priscilla.gallardo@fantasy-interactive.com (Priscilla Gallardo) — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 15:03:00 +0200

Fi-NY was in for a surprise when Managing Director Justin Schantz rounded up the troops for another highly anticipated, top-secret social outing. To compliment our previous poker-nights, in-house-parties, movie-nights and comedy shows we decided to mix things up a bit and take a shot at mechanical bull riding. Fi-NY had no choice but to close-shop early and head uptown to Johnny Utah’s at Rockefeller Center in Manhattan for a night full of great food, drinks and of course – a massive mechanical bull. Our fearless leader, David, made sure no man was left behind; encouraging every single Fi’r to hop on with two objectives: beat the bull and be the last one standing. Bets were placed and laughs were had both with and at each other. When I started at Fi, I can truthfully admit I never expected to be riding a mechanical bull. Then again, I am learning team building takes many different shapes and forms – this instance being a series of bruises. I can’t wait to see what else is in store for us! Until then, any suggestions for our next outing?

Semel-Fika

erika.harrysson@fantasy-interactive.com (Erika Harrysson) — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 10:58:00 +0200

Fika is a Swedish tradition which we embrace at FI. There is no good translation for Fika because it is a phenomenon, it is about having a coffee and a “cinnamon-bun”, but more importantly it is about sitting down together for a chat and social break. Fika can come in many different forms; “Birthday-Fika”, “Wine-Fika” or just Fika. A short while ago we had “Semel-fika” at the Stockholm office, read: gorging on a bun with about 400 pounds of whipped cream and almond icing. This is a particular Fika-form which (thankfully) only happens one a year. Besides some unexpected caloric intake, we have found that some of our best ideas are born during these social coffee breaks. Several of our clients have been so impressed with Fika, they have adapted this tradition into their professional culture.

Nintendo – Wii Connect

jason.borbet@fantasy-interactive.com (Jason Borbet) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 09:38:00 +0200

Fi is pleased to announce the release of the Nintendo Wii Connect site. Wii Connect guides users through an interactive video tutorial, demonstrating how to wirelessly connect their Wii to the internet and showcasing the features available online. Experience the Wii Connect site here.

May 1st

david.martin@fantasy-interactive.com (David Hugh Martin) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 09:47:00 +0200

Fi has moved the launch day of our new site from April 23rd to May 1st.

Nintendo – Wii Fit Teaser Site

hakim@fantasy-interactive.com (Hakim Elhattab) — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 18:52:00 +0200

Nintendo’s Wii Fit teaser site has been released in anticipation of the microsite’s release next month. The Wii Fit teaser site is localized in three languages, supports deep linking and is optimized for search engines. You can experience the teaser site here.

Nintendo – Mario Kart Wii Teaser Site

jason.borbet@fantasy-interactive.com (Jason Borbet) — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 12:58:00 +0200

Nintendo has launched the Mario Kart Wii teaser site, which is localized in three languages and provides widgets compatible with your Facebook account and desktop. You can experience the teaser site here, and the full microsite will be launching later this month.

Porsche Bloodlines Goes Worldwide

fredrik.suter@fantasy-interactive.com (Fredrik Suter) — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 18:03:00 +0200

Released in early February, the North American Porsche Bloodlines campaign site received critical acclaim and went on to win an FWA award. After seeing the sites impact, Porsche decided to utilize this experience in multiple global markets. We have worked directly with Porsche to create each localization of the site. Today, the localized Porsche Bloodlines site is available for the following markets: China, Russia, Mid East and Asia Pacific. Enjoy!

New Fi Site – April 23rd

david.martin@fantasy-interactive.com (David Hugh Martin) — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 19:12:00 +0200

Many faithful Think Swedish posters have been wondering out loud, “where is the new Fi?” Well, you can consider this post the official announcement: the new Fi will be here April 23rd! As a company we are focused quality over quantity, and for us, the passion is in the details. That being the case, the working name for the new Fi is Passion. Today, Passion is undergoing our rigorous FiQ process. It is in the final stages, and you can expect to see the real Fi on April 23rd. As we transparently share with our clients, we are embarrassed with our current site. We feel it inaccurately portrays what we do, our voice and who we strive to be. Passion will reflect our true identity and show you what Fi has been doing for the past two years, including exciting new work for SAS, Nintendo, Nordstrom and Porsche. Warm up your popcorn =)

Fi at Jfokus

thomas.prommer@fantasy-interactive.com (Thomas Prommer) — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 16:54:00 +0100

Over the course of the past year, Fi has made a significant commitment to Java technology. As strong believers of open-source and non-proprietary development frameworks, we consider Java a powerful technology platform for developing highly scalable and agile backend systems as well as cutting-edge front-end clients.

With these advances in mind, Fi set out to experience Jfokus and see what is drawing the industry to this Stockholm-based event. Only in its second year, Jfokus has quickly established itself as Sweden´s most significant conference for the Java community with over 500 developers, architects and IT managers in attendance.

Visiting the Jfokus conference gave us an excellent opportunity to stay updated on the newest Java buzz and share notes about our technology decisions. We were impressed by the quality presentations delivered by such international speakers as Joe Walker from Sitepen and Raghavan N. Srinivas from Sun Microsystems. We returned to the office with lots of new knowledge and the affirmation we are on the cutting-edge with our chosen technology components for our ongoing Java projects.

Fi as a company has outgrown our reputation as a Flash, Flex and Javascript company. Today, we focus heavily on Java and open-source technologies. Internally, an Fi-development team is investigating the recently released Java-based Google Web Toolkit for developing an AJAX-based rich-client for a current client project. Additionally, the Java Server Faces technology is planned to be very soon part of Fi´s rapidly growing technology inventory.

But now to all you developers out there: With Java pushing strong into the client web development market with open frameworks such as Java Server Faces, the Google Web Toolkit or the newest JavaFX technology, we would like to ask – how much Java are you utilizing? What have your encounters been so far with the Java technology? Are any of the listed technologies already part of your personal development toolkit? If so, we would love to hear about your experiences and opinions!

Fi Inspires

asa.lundkvist@fantasy-interactive.com (Åsa Lundkvist) — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 09:37:00 +0100

Hyper Island in Stockholm, Sweden, is internationally known as one of the best schools for interactive design. We took a trip to meet the students in the Digital Media 09 program. Our goals were to share our passion for design and interactivity, present how we bring our projects to 100% Fi-Quality, to inspire and be inspired.

Our Senior Designer Anton and Senior Interactive Developer Hakim took the stage in Hyper Island’s production space, and presented some of our behind-the scenes projects and processes. The students did not disappoint, asking our presenters challenging, well thought-out questions in both design and technical arenas.

Anton shared design schemes and the steps we take to make the design implementation process smoother for our Interactive Developers. Hakim took the chance to shine by presenting a code extract from the Road Runner portal. Seeing the extensive folder structure made the audience realize how much work there is behind a portal. The “designer vs. developer battle” was very sophisticated and ended peacefully ;-)

Fi has also hosted in-house workshops at our office for other student groups. It’s always nice to take a moment away from our demanding schedule to meet potential future colleagues. We see great potential in Interactive Design schools, and we enjoy sharing our work and passion with these great talents.

Going intercontinental with SAS!

fredrik.suter@fantasy-interactive.com (Fredrik Suter) — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 16:49:00 +0100

Fi is pleased to announce the release of our second project for Scandinavian Airlines; an interactive display presenting the variety of products (Economy, Economy Extra and Business) a customer can choose when flying intercontinental flights (to Asia and America from Europe). Our focus was to create a visually appealing display of options for customers to quickly and easily interact with the SAS brand. This project will be localized for multiple languages in the near future, go check it out at flysas.com. Fi is excited about this growing relationship with a quality focused, like-minded organization.

BBC’s New Site

tove.blomgren@fantasy-interactive.com (Tove Blomgren) — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 15:43:00 +0100

Fi has an internal mailing list where we share links, discuss interactive design and keep up with the latest and greatest. Recently, the posting of the new BBC portal erupted into a passionate debate. A lot of critique concerned design and implementation, such as different line-spaces, jumping links and alignment. The main discussion however concerned the extensive customization options. Some liked the flexibility, but others felt the portal offers customization for customization’s sake, ignoring the users needs and overshadowing the content. So we ask: customization - is it great or was it great two years ago? Are we sick of choosing or is flexibility the key? Do we want to be producers or consumers? Are portals dying dinosaurs or just what we need to filter all the content out there? And of course; what do you think about the new BBC? We would love to hear your opinions!

Select a country!

fredrik.suter@fantasy-interactive.com (Fredrik Suter) — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 14:54:00 +0100

It is a pleasure to announce the release of our first mini project for SAS: the country selector. Visit flysas.com and check out the interactive map; and remember the sky is the limit!

A Tribute to Fi-Icons

krister.karlsson@fantasy-interactive.com (Krister Karlsson) — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 19:16:00 +0100

As you know, we are completely re-designing the Fi site. We have received many requests about our process, so I want to take you behind the scenes of making the pixel perfect icons of Fi-past. This is work that we are proud of and would like to share with you.

The Navigation icons made for the first version of the old Fi site reflected a more elaborate and experimental site navigation. This system was later updated with a more traditional structure for finding content. Based on the “Fi-Men” concept, we made the site fit their visual expression. All-in, 86 icons were created, one for each project and section of the site.

The animated icons were made entirely in After Effects, with animated vector masks and minimal effects to give them their look and feel. I first created them in Photoshop, later adding motion to create dynamic mouse-over movement beyond the regular glow-effect. I had to render them twice the size, and then re-render them at half the size to achieve the sharpness required.

Making these chromed icons was quite a task, but because of their size and style, they allowed a small story to be told in each, which was very inspiring and rewarding. Enjoy this tribute to our history, while preparing for the re-design of the Fi site.

Porsche Sounds

bartek.drozdz@fantasy-interactive.com (Bartek Drozdz) — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 14:01:00 +0100

Sound has played a key role in the overall experience of the Porsche Bloodlines site. The concept was developed around the unique sound of each engine in the series. This project marked Fi’s first Flash CS3/AS3 work. We wanted to push the limits of the sound features to take full advantage of Adobe’s new technology. Several sound channels are used to play multiple audio files simultaneously. The first layer is the background music, which is played throughout the site. Then there is a unique engine sound for each car in the series. Finally, there are different environment sounds like the barking dog in the Carrera scene, club sounds in the Cayman scene and forest sounds in the Boxter scene. By using the volume and pan controls with transition animations, we were able to focus on enhancing the "flying-over-the-city" experience. The background music came from external MP3 files. Some other sounds were embedded AS controlled WAV files, like the engine sounds. The helicopter sound in GT2 was controlled within the timeline to synchronize with the animation. The class SoundMixer (new in AS3) offers the possibility to capture a spectrum of sound - a feature we couldn’t resist! The equalizer in the bottom right corner of the site shows this in action, displaying bars of real sound level values. We felt this looked much better than the popular fake equalizer’s widely used in many Flash sites; rev one of the engines to see for yourself. Overall Flash CS3/AS3 offers some nice new sound features. The ability to assign a unique class name to a MovieClip works pretty well with sounds files, as it makes them easily accessible between different SWF files. The capture spectrum feature is also really nice. This project taught us sound adds a crucial layer to any project, complementing graphics and animations to provide users with the rich online experience they deserve!

Scandinavia is on the map again

asa.lundkvist@fantasy-interactive.com (Åsa Lundkvist) — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 17:58:00 +0100

Thinking Swedish, we are happy and proud to announce one of our most recent clients Scandinavian Airlines (SAS). Fi has most of its clientele on the US market, and this is a great step towards our Swedish-American mentality!

As a first step in our relationship, we are soon about to release our first mini-project for the international site flysas.com

We can’t announce this without our producer Fredrik Suter telling you the beautiful story behind it though:

“The SAS story started one morning in August 2007 with a phone call from the Manager of Media, PR and Marketing at the SAS International office in Stockholm. He had a concerned voice saying that they had been scanning the Web for SAS-related content and found a particular video with a very passionate gentleman talking in strong words about SAS.
The video called “SAS or...” is the 5th video posted in the entry Fi in Belgium on Thinkswedish.com earlier that summer, and the gentleman SAS was talking about was Fi’s CEO David Hugh Martin. Many thoughts ran through my head in that moment…

To my surprise, as he continued talking, I realized that he was not calling to say that they were bringing in the lawyers. On the contrary, they were inspired by our work and would like to meet us as soon as possible to discuss how we could help them shape and renew their digital presence.”

Stay tuned for upcoming news on the SAS projects!

Nintendo’s “Advance Wars – Days of Ruin”

ally.jo@fantasy-interactive.com (Ally Jo & Han Lee) — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 11:16:00 +0100

Fi is pleased to announce, the site we created for Nintendo’s “Advance Wars – Days of Ruin” campaign has won The FWA award. Navigate to www.advancewars.com to visit our newest creation.

Interacting with Fi’s Interactives

ryan.hefner@fantasy-interactive.com (Ryan Hefner & Christoph Helzle) — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 15:21:00 +0100

Providing the critical bridge between design and technology, Interactive Developers must elegantly merge both sides to bring an interface to life. On any given day, you can find an Interactive Developer discussing wireframes, providing design feedback, busting out hardcore coding and Flash work; all topped-off with an intense set in Rock Band after hours. Trigger happy as we are, we paparazzi stalked some Fi-NY Interactive Developer’s for a day. Here is a quick photo-tour of a day-in-the-life of a NY-Interactive Developer at Fi. Hard work and reward are what being an Interactive Developer at Fi is all about. Are you an interactive? Tell us about your day…

Wine Fika Thursdays

joseph.schmitt@fantasy-interactive.com (Joseph Schmitt) — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 10:21:00 +0100

We recently started a tradition here at the Fi New York office of wine tasting during our Fika’s on Thursdays. We have aptly named these special days Wine Fika Thursdays. Every week we have an employee-host who picks up two bottles of wine to bring in and share with the team. Everyone gathers around our dining table, the host speaks about the wine, describes its flavor, and maybe reads a little bit of history about the wine. Then, we go around the table and give everyone a taste of the wines. Afterwards, we pick which of the two wines is our favorite.

This particular Thursday one of our designers, Yaron, brought in some Israeli wines. He started off with a brief overview of his home country of Israel, complete with maps for those in the group who didn’t know where Israel was, and then moved on to the wine. The consensus was that the wine was quite dry, to which Yaron responded that it’s very hot in Israel, ;-). These are some pictures I took of the occasion to share with you guys.

Porsche Bloodlines Behind the Scenes

anton.repponen@fantasy-interactive.com (Anton Repponen) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 12:09:00 +0100

We are happy to announce that our Porsche Cayenne GTS site already won an FWA award!

As one of Fi’s Senior Designers, I will share some behind the scenes videos that I created especially for thinkswedish.com. The focus is on the retouching of the images for the site. With my PSD files open, I will go deep into the layers to show the photographs before and after. Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Porsche Bloodlines

anton.repponen@fantasy-interactive.com (Anton Repponen) — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 18:36:00 +0100

I am proud to announce that the Porsche project is finally live! Together with the advertising agency Carmichael Lynch, we have created a site for a line of Porsche cars, featuring the new Porsche Cayenne GTS.

Capturing the experience of the Porsche Bloodline, powered the concept of this site. With a combination of sound-FX, 3-d graphics and color palette we have created a mysterious environment to compliment Porsche’s seductive speedsters.

It was a challenging, fresh and exciting project for me and the Fi team, and we will be sharing various behind the scenes action here at Think Swedish! We will for example show the “before and after” retouching stages of the photographs – making the eye-candy. We will also take you on a journey of sound, one of the key components of the Porsche Cayenne GTS site, as well as showing the magic behind the 3D-world and video transitions between scenes.

Check the site out and be sure to keep checking Think Swedish for more behind the scenes Porsche action!

Imagine That

jason.borbet@fantasy-interactive.com (Jason Borbet) — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 17:50:00 +0100

It’s amazing how a cluster of pixels can confirm nine years of hard-work. David Martin’s immediate response to Imagine Publishing’s Companies we admire section was, “my work at Fi is done.”

In 1999, David carved-out Fi’s vision from the back of a Swedish internet café. From day one, Fi set out to be considered the “Pixar of interaction.” Seeing our shield next to the macintosh of Apple, desk-lamp of Pixar and moon of Dreamworks was the first visual realization of this dream.

Fi was nominated to appear in this section by the Imagine Publishing interactive department for its commitment to innovation, quality and attention to detail. As a web company, to be mentioned in the same breath with these companies is amazing. We sincerely thank the team at Imagine Publishing for this recognition.

Fi Movie Night

tove.blomgren@fantasy-interactive.com (Tove Blomgren) — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 11:48:00 +0100

Last Friday, the hyped New York monster movie Cloverfield premiered after almost a year of smart-marketing and mysterious trailers. Situated in downtown Manhattan and curious by nature, the Fi-NY office had no choice but to wrap-up early and head to Battery Park City cinema to get in on the excitement.

The team's high expectations turned into mild apprehension after reading the brutal NY Times review; citing, "the film is too dumb to offend anything except your intelligence.”

However, after 80 minutes of mild motion-sickness, watching Manhattan being torn to pieces received two thumbs-up for the visceral experience and thrill-factor. The limited complaints came from the Application Developers, who were upset with both the hand-cam's unrealistically long battery life and the magical cell phone coverage in the NYC Subway.

Now, in all fairness, the Stockholm office is keeping their fingers crossed for a Downtown-Stockholm-Monster-Rampage flick; with Stureplans "The Mushroom" being cut-off and hurled across Östermalm.

Until then, tell us what you thought of Cloverfield…

Fi - 2008

(David Engzell) — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 18:15:00 +0100

It all came to me during a friend’s dinner party. People were chatting, mingling and having a good time; when someone came up to me and asked what company I work for.

“Fantasy Interactive,” I said.

“Fi?” she replied.

I suddenly realized this conversation isn’t the first one I’ve had where someone corrected me about the name of the company I work for. After this conversation, I gave it some thought and realized we aren’t Fantasy Interactive anymore; we have matured, we are really “Fi”.

My first project was to re-design our identity. Throughout the years, our symbol has become well known within the interactive/design industry. Today, the Fi-shield is the stand-alone symbol, and the letters “Fi” no longer have a capital “I”.

To give you a sneak preview of our new site, it contains many of the same elements as before - except it looks like someone stepped on it, flattened it to the ground, unpolished the gloss, killed the toy-figures, vacuumed the whole area and cleaned-up after itself.

The new Fi-site will have lots of video with different clips of the projects in action, with employee commentary. This new site will reflect the new Fi; the work is first with the enjoyment of making it being a close second! I will give you updates all along the way.

Flash vs. HTML - Round One

asa.lundkvist@fantasy-interactive.com (Åsa Lundkvist) — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 17:30:00 +0100

From the very first pixel, Fi have been cutting edge in Flash development. Today, we are growing and maturing with the industry; therefore being labeled a Flash agency is too restricting. Our true focus as an interactive firm is: design, usability and pushing the limits of user-experience to redefine what it means to be “online.”

Fi tackles every project with unparalleled passion. To reach our full potential, we consume a spectrum of technologies to reach the perfect solution. Since Flash often goes hand-in-hand with HTML/CSS/JavaScript/AJAX, we are rapidly growing in these areas and would like to get in touch with the best talent out there. Have you experienced development from hand-coding to completion in these and new, emerging technologies?

Can you use Flash or HTML for any scenario? What are some of the limitations and possibilities that you see?

HTML pages are superior for text, and Flash is the go-to technology for video. But are there any situations a harmony of Flash and HTML/CSS/JavaScript/AJAX will push the boundaries?

Tell us what you think! And if you’re our next HTML guru, check out the job opening here!

Producers unite! It’s time to debate...

asa.lundkvist@fantasy-interactive.com (Åsa Lundkvist) — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 09:20:00 +0100

Our entry covering a day in the life of Stephen, one of FI's Executive Producers, spawned some intriguing comments.

“Is a producer a human being or a machine?”

“A good producer is like a great conductor, who can make every part of the orchestra perform in sync. You have to love the abuse, smile through it and reap the benefits when everything turns out right.”

We realize it is impossible to capture the role of a Producer with a few images and some text, but now we have the discussion rolling and we’d like you to take part!

What’s the Producer role like in your company? Is it similar or totally different? What drives a Producer? What makes a Producer’s job fantastic? What keeps a Producer awake at night?

Let the discussion continue...