Creating a character is a work of art. Many animators use Flash
to create their characters for presentation. This is due to
Flash’s ability to present the content over the web as well as
other presentation platforms. Flash also has many tools that aid
in character creation such as the use of symbols, ActionScript
and tweening.

Flash allows you to present your character creations in a
variety of media formats. The most popular medium is the
internet. This is logical because flash was originally designed
to present animations over the internet. However, flash
animations can also be distributed in self-contained files that
you can send to people via snail mail on CD or via email. Flash
animations can also be exported as QuickTime movies and put on
DVD or even broadcast on television. This saves having to
re-animate you character creations many times, in many different
programs, or going through difficult conversions.

Symbols in Flash make it easy to animate. Here’s how they work.
First go through the character creation process of planning and
drawing your character. Then make each of the parts a symbol
(like a nested composition) and animate the symbols. If you need
to change a character’s body, you can simply animate the
movement inside the symbol without affecting the position or
orientation of the symbol. This makes creating a character very
simple and keeps drawing to a minimum by reusing the work that
you have already done.

Flash is famous for its ability to tween. By telling the
computer where to start and stop the animation, Flash will do
everything in between. This saves hours upon hours for animators
because it frees them from drawing each frame and lets them
focus more on other aspects of animation, such as the story line
or the sound. This dramatically speeds up the character creation
process.

ActionScript (the Flash scripting language) provides truly
powerful animation capabilities. With ActionScript motion can be
determined dynamically. Like a ball that follows the mouse
pointer for example. In terms of character creation you could
animate your character completely through ActionScript or use a
combination of ActionScript and Tweening to accomplish the task
in dynamic ways.

Flash is the number one choice for character creation.
Animations are easily disseminated and characters and their body
parts can be reusable through the use of symbols through flash.
Finally, the process of animating is made easier through
tweening technology and ActionScript. Flash has many more
capabilities that make it great for character creation that are
not covered here. The character creation process is covered more
in detail in my article “making a cartoon baby”.
http://www.articledashboard.com/Article/Making-a-Cartoon-Baby/484
9

Facing the unknown can often be disconcerting, especially when
you want very much to find a great home-based career, like
medical transcription. “How long will it take to get
through the school?” And, “How long until I get my first
paycheck?” are common concerns asked by people considering a
career in medical transcription. Here we’ll address both these
issues.

First things first - How long will it take? On average you can
expect to get through a good medical transcription school in
about nine to twelve months. This assumes that you work on it
consistently and part-time. All together, it will take about
600-700 hours. Say you work at it three hours a day, five days a
week - that’s 15 hours a week. Divide that into 600, and you get
40 weeks — which is about nine and a half months. If you
consistently work at it just a half hour longer each day, it’ll
shave more than a month off that.

Obviously, that’s a great deal of time away from home — usually
the very thing people searching for a new career often don’t
want to leave behind. Fortunately, the best medical
transcription schools allow you to work at home at your own
pace.

So, when can I get my first check? The thing to remember is that
the more time you are willing to dedicate to your studies, the
sooner you will be able to start working from home and get that
first check! After all, that is really what it is all about,
isn’t it?

Regardless of your current situation, you should be able to get
through a quality medical transcription school working a few
hours a day, and as many days per week that you are able
dedicate to the program. A good medical transcription school
will guide you through the process systematically — step by
step. With a moderate amount of effort and dedication you will
quickly gain the confidence you need to complete the program.
So, find the best medical transcription school you can, and
launch your future career today!

You are serving great food. Your establishment is new, spotless and inviting and yet you are not getting the repeat visits that you expect. What’s up? What’s going wrong?

The answer may lie with your people skills…

Why do people come to your restaurant?
By now you should know why people frequent your restaurant…or at least you should know why they don’t.

They do not come for cheap food. It’s cheaper at home and there is certain to be cheaper restaurants than yours.

They certainly come to eat different foods that they cannot make at home but there are plenty of similar restaurants to yours.

So you will have worked out your “unique selling benefit” and you will have marketed that. They don’t come back and you have to discover what it is that is not providing the benefit that they were expecting.

Often the answer is with your people.
Customers come for the total experience. It will not matter whether the food is excellent and the coffee outstanding if the waiting staff is unfriendly and distant. Their evening will have been ruined and they will not come back again.

When you employ front-of-house employees their technical skills are not as important as their attitude.

You can teach a person the technical skills but it is almost impossible to teach them to change their attitudes. If your applicant finds it difficult to smile during her interview then she is certain to be an unsmiling distant waitress. She is not for you.

A warm and friendly applicant with little experience is by far the better prospect.

What about your own people skills?
In our consulting we quite often see managers whose dealing with patrons is excellent but with staff and others atrocious.

Never give your staff a ‘dressing down’ in front of customers. It makes customers uncomfortable at best and downright angry if they have established a rapport with the staff member.

Your attitude toward staff should be one that leads them to better service and higher morale.

Will they ever need strong criticism? They sure will…but keep it between yourselves.

http://ww.profitstrategies4business.com

About the Author

Kelvyn Peters CPA is one of the longest serving Australian Tax Agents. He registered as tax agent in 1962 and was accepted as a CPA in 1964.

He has become much sought after as an educator and speaker on small business. One organisation says that the highlight of the annual meeting is Kelvyn’s ability to present the audited statements in a humorous way.

Kelvyn is famous for his ability to rescue ailing small businesses.

http://profitstrategies4business.com

Do you work hard preparing for your presentation only to freeze up once you step in front of a large group of people? Do you feel uncomfortable talking and presenting while being watched by a large room of people? Do you feel as though your public speaking abilities are holding you back from achieving your dreams? If so you should consider taking public speaking courses. When you take public speaking courses you will be learning from public speaking professionals. Learning the best from the best is the best way to improve your public speaking abilities. With the help of a professional you will be able to overcome your fears and soars to new heights.

Good public speakers were not born with good public speaking skills. Good public speaking isn’t a trait passed from one member of a family to another. Public speaking skills are gained from learning from other public speakers. Today the best public speakers have learned their skills from the best public speakers of the past. Public speaking doesn’t change with time. A good public speaker from ten years ago would skill be a good public speaker today. Taking public speaking courses you will be taught by a professional wise public speaker with a lot of experience. As you progress through the course you will gain traits and skills used by the pros.