NYVideo 2.0: Video of June Meetup
Jun 26, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: Industry NewsNYVideo 2.0 is a remarkably active and vibrant meetup group here in NYC that focuses on Video-centric startups and web companies. I unfortunately missed this month’s meeting, but luckily for me (and for you) they shot a video. This month’s star-studded list of presenters were:
1. Visible Measures - Matt Cutler, VP Marketing & Analytics
2. Hulu - Kevin McGurn, VP National Sales
3. Boxee - Avner Ronen, Co-founder & CEO
4. MediaMerx - Tejpaul Bhatia, Co-founder & CEO
5. Move Networks - Bob Bryson, SVP, Sales & BD
Steve Wolkoff - Gone too soon.
Jun 24, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: AnnouncementsSteve Wolkoff, formerly of Adobe’s Flash Media Server team, was involved in a tragic accident this past weekend. A drunk driver took his life, and critically injured his girlfriend, Cindy.
He leaves behind a legacy not only in the lives he touched with his open heart and good nature, but also in Flash Media Server, the project he fostered while at Adobe.
Steve’s memorial page on Freewheel: http://www.freewheel.tv/
Memorial page on Doubleclick: http://doubleclickalumni.org/2008/06/22/sadness-yet-again.aspx
News coverage of the accident: http://www.insidebayarea.com/sanmateocountytimes/localnews/ci_9661670 -
Flash 411 airs on Adobe TV!
Jun 19, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: Announcements, Video PodcastsI’ve been working with Adobe on a series of video podcasts about working with video in Flash — the first episode, “Video in Flash: Crash Course,” has just posted. There are lots of other useful and interesting ’shows’ there as well, so be sure to stop by AdobeTV to check them out.
In the meantime, here’s Flash 411, for your viewing pleasure!
FlashBelt 2008: “Videophobes” session resources
Jun 11, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: Resources, Tutorials & CodeThanks to everyone who attended my session today, “Custom Video Players for Videophobes”. As promised, here are the slides, source files, and links.
–> Presentation [PDF] <--
--> Source files [ZIP] <--
The pre-built video players I mentioned are:
- FLVPlayer PRO component http://www.flashloaded.com/flashcomponents/flvplayerpro/
- JW FLV Media Player http://jeroenwijering.com/?item=JW_FLV_Player
- flowplayer http://www.flowplayer.org
Be sure to check out the Adobe Developer Connection for additional tutorials and tools for Flash Video.
If you missed this year’s Flashbelt, be sure to mark your calendar for next year! This is truly the conference not to be missed… great networking, fantastic speakers, laid-back vibe. Dave, you’ve done it again! Midwest is the best 
FlashBelt Day 2: Geoff Stearns, YouTube!
Jun 10, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: InspirationGeoff is “the man” when it comes to YouTube’s embeddable player framework… he gave us some insight into the nextgen YouTube player, and shared some user-gen gems.
Some tidbits:
- Use MTASC!
- To prevent playback outside of the YouTube player, they require a token to be passed back and forth. This required them to create a ‘container SWF’ that loads in the actual player SWF to allow the Player to be cached, saving them TONS of bandwidth.
- Widescreen and standard versions supported
- Custom skin colors
- Easy to add new features, easy to enable/disable on the fly. Runtime modules (separate SWFs for each feature) are used instead of having all features built into the player. These modules are internal only, but you can use the API to add some customization. i.e. annotations (closed captioning, speech bubbles, interactive hotspots!)
- Targeting 40 different languages for player (about 19 now)
- Keyboard controls (playback, volume, etc) Can be turned off.
- Can use an AS2 wrapper to use the player in AS3 projects.
- Robust javascript API to control/receive events via the webpage. This can be used to synchronize slides/urls/etc with video, create chapter links, etc., etc.
- Uses pseudo-streaming (you can jump ahead to parts of the video that haven’t downloaded yet, even though it is progressive video.)
- onStateChange events, etc. to keep track of how users are interacting with your video.
- Maximum time between keyframes has been decreased to 2 seconds, for better seeking.
- Chromeless Player available: http://code.google.com/apis/youtube/chromeless_player_reference.html (only has YouTube watermark and loading spinner)
- JW Player integrates with the new framework, so you can embed YouTube videos into that open-source player. Slide (FaceBook widget) does the same.
- YouTube GData API gives you access to YouTube data in XML format. Allows you to build a YouTube clone, using their bandwidth (but still has the YouTube watermark, of course).
- AS3 player is in the works (chromeless player will be first)!
- 10-minute limit: Register as a developer/partner, and get around this limit. Quality/file-size limit has been increased to 1GB.
- Audience question: “Any plans for a Silverlight player?” Answer: “Aww.. c’mon… [laughter]” (translation: Um, no.)
Get help: http://groups.google.com/group/youtube-api
Get Geoff’s presentation: http://tinyurl.com/5vytgz
FlashBelt 2008: Day 1: firstborn video tips
Jun 9, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: InspirationDan Lacivita from firstborn: workflow and process of 3D/Video projects.
Dan offered some tips:
- Video looping issues; they often use PNG sequences for short loops. Just be sure to synch up your framerate (they used onEnterFrame script to control the playback speed).
- Encoding and compression. For their Lowe’s project, they decided against H.264, due to color saturation issues and player requirements. Started with On2 Flix Pro, but they were dissatisfied with the compression of high-motion clips. Ended up using Sorenson Squeeze with On2 VP6. Tip: Always use a CDN to deliver the video content, don’t let your client skimp on hosting!
- Trick for creating a dynamic mask: can use a PNG as an overlay to shade items on the Stage. Read the values in AS, and control the Z-depth according to the bitmap data/pixel values.
FlashBelt 2008: Wish you were here!
Jun 9, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: Industry NewsI’ve just arrived in Minneapolis, and taking in the first couple of sessions: First was an inspiring presentation on “emergence” with Jeremy Thorpe, and now Seb Lee-Delisle’s PaperVision3D session. Hurrah for intelligent agents, and 3-D cows!
I had to head to the airport at 4am this morning, so I’m taking a nap break, but will be back for the afternoon sessions. Will check back in with an afternoon update.
The turnout for FlashBelt this year is great, and the energy is high (as always!) If you are anywhere near Minnesota, you’ve gotta get over here!
Coming back to life…
May 16, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: AnnouncementsAs you may have noticed, I’ve been a bit scarce lately. I haven’t posted in awhile, I have yet to discuss yesterday’s big announcement about Flash Player 10, and I actually missed Flash in the Can! “What the heck happened to Lisa?!” you might be asking…
Well, I didn’t run off to Aruba… I’m expecting, and the little one has been very, very demanding already! I’m finally able to eat again, and have been able to leave my apartment for more than 10 minutes at a time, so I will be rejoining the living now. Expect more posts and updates from me, and responses to the backlog of comments and questions I’ve received. Promise. And I WILL be presenting at FlashBelt in Minneapolis in June!
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FitC Toronto 2008 is coming up…
Mar 11, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: Announcements… and you don’t want to miss it! I’m presenting a new session “Flash Video Voodoo“:
For everyone who’s ever struggled to create a full-featured video player, or to just get a darn video to play back in Flash, this session is for you. Lisa will share her collection of tips, tricks, secrets, and little-known facts about working with video in Flash; hopefully making your life a little easier — and your video projects a bit flashier!
Flash in the Can is always a vibrant, information-packed conference, and this year promises to be better than ever. (It’s also reasonably priced, which is a plus!) Here are the details… hope to see you there!
5/5/08 UPDATE
My apologies to those who were looking forward to my talk at Flash in the Can. For those of you who attended, you know I couldn’t make it this year. For more details, see the next post…
I’m now an “Adobe Community Expert!”
Mar 8, 2008 Author: lisa larson~kelley | Filed under: AnnouncementsAdobe is really making developer relations a top priority these days, so they’ve opened up a few more spots in the Adobe Community Experts program… and I’m proud to announce that I’ve been invited into the fold!
The program is made up of Adobe customers who are committed to sharing their knowledge and expertise with the community. That’s me! In the coming months, I’ll be getting even more involved in the Adobe Developer Center; publishing additional podcasts, tutorials, and whitepapers; and keeping you up-to-date here on my blog with new developments in video on the web.
Pretty much what I’ve been doing, but now with a shiny new badge on my webpage.
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