How We Do It

ForgeFX's dedication to developing quality software for our clients has allowed us to focus on the three main components of what it takes to create great products. Having a time tested process, imaginative creative, and solid technology skills guarantees that our projects stay on track, are compelling visually, and work seamlessly regardless of the end-user's machine.

Every project that we work on gets treated with the same care regardless of how large or how small. Our project managers, artists, and programmers work together to ensure that key details are figured out in the architecture and requirements phases of the project to guarantee project success.

We commit requirements to writing, use a systematic procedure to manage scope, conduct reviews of all requirements and designs, develop a comprehensive testing plan, and create an implementation plan that defines the order in which the software's functional components will be developed.

Our Process

When clients and vendors aren't in the same facility, tight communication is critical and more important than ever. The ForgeFX Extranet and Wiki are central to our collaborative process. We use them to manage and track just about every aspect of our projects. Our extranet contains detailed project schedules, databases for tracking project tasks and milestones, and a host of other online utilities that allow us to work in a highly efficient manner. Our Wiki provides a collaborative development environment allowing all team members to actively participate in the project

With these tools in our arsenal, ForgeFX tackles all projects from an experienced position which assures that the development of a quality product is delivered on time and within the allotted budget.

We split every project into four phases: discovery, design, implementation, and testing. The discovery phase involves researching and documenting the requirements and gaining an understanding of the core business problem which the project addresses. The design phase involves the creation of our project plan—from both a technical and creative perspective. During the implementation phase, we are building out the project, sticking to our plan as much as possible while adapting to the realities of what the project requires as it evolves. These four phases tend to coexist and overlap each other to some extent which allows for changes to made without jeopardizing the project's timeline. At the conclusion of the implementation phase our projects enter a rigorous testing phase to ensure that end users don't have any problems. This is also the point at which the product gets run up the flag poll to make sure it meets the requirements laid out in the discovery phase.

Our Creative

The creativity that goes into all of our projects is often the first impression users get of our work. Typically this is portrayed through the art work and graphics used in the project but the creative ideas and implementation techniques are also very important. Much of our work is real-time 3D so the tools and techniques that we use to create our models, textures, and animations are critical to our projects.

3D Studio Max is the industry standard 3D tool and is at the center of all of the 3D content that we create. Creative Director, David Vaillancourt, and his team of artists have been developing 3D Studio Max content for more than 10 years to develop a wide variety of projects for both online and offline platforms. With our focus on interactive 3D, and especially interactive 3D for the web, we have become masters of tools like 3D Studio Max and Maya in order to produce high quality work that is both visually appealing but also able to embrace the limitations of delivering online content to a wide audience.

In addition to our expertise using 3D packages, the ForgeFX creative staffers are also masters of the common industry standard tools used for creating 2D artwork. Photoshop, Illustrator, Fireworks, and Freehand are tools we use every day to create everything from complex textures for 3D models to Flash-based vector graphics to commercial art for web sites and CD/DVDs.

Our Technology

ForgeFX primarily develops desktop PC-based client applications targeting the Microsoft Windows XP, Microsoft Windows Vista, and recently Microsoft Windows 7 operating systems. We leverage a range of technologies from both Adobe and Microsoft to reliably and rapidly develop applications. From Adobe, our workhorse is Adobe Director, which can deliver solid interactive 3D simulations for both desktop PCs and in the browser. From Microsoft, we leverage the Microsoft .NET Framework, Microsoft Visual Studio, Microsoft SQL Server, and Microsoft ASP.NET. Most recently, Microsoft's XNA 3D graphics platform has taken a more and more prominent role in developing and delivering the very latest in computer graphics visuals and realism for our clients.

As applications become more and more complex, reliability testing becomes more important, and more challenging. One of our key tools to manage this challenge is the testing framework provided by Microsoft Visual Studio 2008. The testing framework allows for the development and automatic execution of dozens of applications self-check that can be set to run automatically as development proceeds. This new infrastructure around automated testing, supplementing traditional manual testing, allows development to move more quickly, and reliably, than ever before.

Getting Started

When looking for a developer for your software project you can't make a better choice than hiring ForgeFX. If you have a project you would like to discuss with us please contact us at your earliest convenience.