The update to my original Adobe Press book on video and Flash is finally available in bookstores! The new edition has a different title too: Video with Adobe Flash CS4 Professional Studio Techniques. I’ve updated this book to cover the Flash CS4 IDE, as well as adding important updates that weren’t released when the last edition went to print:

• AVC/H.264 encoding tips, including coverage of CABAC, B-frames, and Main/High profiles
• Discussion of my new Web Video Bitrate Starter application, which helps you get started with the right video and audio bitrate for your preferred video dimensions, frame rate, video codec, and audio codec.
• Updates to chapters covering real-time streaming (via RTMP) and Flash Media Server (FMS) 3.5 dynamic streaming

I also created a video encoding tutorial covering Flash-compatible output for DesignProVideo.com. If you’d rather learn by watching step-by-step how to create high quality video, or you want to augment the coverage of my book with more hands-on examples, then you’ll like this video training. But don’t take my word on it–just read this review on the forums at DesignProVideo.

Gotta get back to a client job–it’s a pretty sweet AIR app. More details when the product has been launched this summer.

Share This

While I’ve helped other people create HTML-based emails, I haven’t had to do it for myself. After a lot of tests on various email clients, I finally released my first newsletter to about 6500 e-mail addresses, collected from my registration database at FlashSupport.com, old mailing lists I use to run, and LinkedIn.com. You can view the mailing online. I used poMMo to manage the announcement mailing list. So far, it’s been a great tool with excellent administration features, including subscription management.

Fill out the subscription form if you’d like to receive future announcements.

Share This

Snow and I recorded over _6 hours_ of Flash CS4 training for the designprovideo.com site! Check the main page for the series here:

http://www.designprovideo.com/tutorial/flashcs4101

There are free downloads available as well. The NED Player that the video series uses is pretty nice too. Check it out! Here’s the table of contents:

Chapter 1: Part 1
Section 1: Interface Fundamentals
01. Introduction
02. Start Page
03. Preferences
04. Document Properties
05. File, Edit, View Menus, and Using Rulers
06. Using Snapping and Window Overview
07. Document Window: Stage, Pasteboard, and View Settings
08. Panels and Workspace Layouts
09. Customizing Workspace Layouts
10. The Timeline: Working with Layers
11. The Timeline: Working with Frames
12. Properties Panel
13. Tools Panel

Section 2: Introduction to Publishing and Managing Flash Movies
14. Section Overview
15. Quick Publish HTML and Flash Movie
16. Accessing the Publish Settings
17. Flash Settings: Player and Script Version
18. Flash Settings: Global Image and Sound Quality
19. Flash Settings: Global SWF Settings
20. HTML Settings: Template Options for Full Screen Mode
21. HTML Settings: Detect Flash Version
22. HTML Settings: Dimensions
23. Working with Test Movie
24. Using the Play Command
25. The Bandwidth Profiler: Frame-by-Frame and Streaming Graphs
26. The Bandwidth Profiler: Simulate Download
27. Employing Adobe’s Flash Player Detection Script
28. Downloading SWFObject 2.x from Google Code
29. Reviewing the files included with SWFObject
30. Copying files for SWFObject implementation
31. Modifying the sample HTML file to use your own Flash SWF file
32. Setting up Folders for Flash Production
33. Setting Folders in Publish Settings
34. Using the Project Panel to Organize and Publish Flash Content

Section 3: Drawing in Flash
35. The Shape Tools
36. The Rectangle Tool and Object Drawing Mode
37. The Oval, Rectangle Primitive and Oval Primitive Tools
38. The PolyStar Tool
39. Shape Tool Settings Box
40. The Pencil Tool
41. The Brush Tool
42. Using a Tablet with the Brush Tool
43. The Line Tool
44. How Lines Interact
45. The Pen Tool
46. Drawing Preferences
47. Line Properties
48. Smoothing Options
49. Selection Tools: Selection, Subselection & Lasso
50. The Spray Brush and Grouping
51. The Spray Brush Settings
52. The Deco Tool

Section 4: Modifying Graphics
53. Color and Alpha
54. The Color Panel
55. The Ink Bottle and Paint Bucket Tools
56. The Swatches Panel
57. The Transform Panel
58. The Free Transform Tool
59. Gradients and The Gradients Transform Tool
60. Changing Gradient Styles
61. Using the Adjust Color Filter
62. Using the Drop Shadow Filter

Section 5: Working with Text
63. Overview of Text Section
64. Selecting the Text Tool and Creating a Text Box
65. Resetting the Autosize Control of a Text Box
66. Customizing Font Face and Color
67. Changing Font Size
68. Setting Text Alignment
69. Controlling Anti-Aliasing Options for Text
70. Linking Text to a Website URL
71. Linking Text to an Email Address
72. The Difference Between Embedded and Device Fonts
73. A Note About Text Field Types: Static, Dynamic, and Input Text

Section 6: Importing Artwork
74. Importing Illustrator Files to the Stage
75. Import to Stage Options
76. Working with Imported Layers and Objects From an Illustrator File
77. How Imported Objects Appear in the Library
78. Importing Photoshop Files to the Stage
79. Working with Imported Layers and Objects from Photoshop
80. Importer Preferences
81. Bitmap Properties
82. Using Bitmap Fills
83. Tracing Bitmaps

Section 7: Symbols, Instances, and the Library
84. Working with Libraries
85. Working with Multiple Libraries
86. Common Libraries
87. Managing Assets in the Library
88. Graphic Symbols
89. Movie Clips
90. Button Symbols
91. Creating Symbols
92. Swapping Symbols

Chapter 2: Part 2
Section 8: Timeline Animation
93. Animating Content Frame-By-Frame
94. Using the Onion Skinning View Modes
95. Animating a Single Object with Frame-By-Frame Animation
96. Creating a Shape Tween
97. Using Shape Hints with a Shape Tween
98. Editing Multiple Frames

Section 9: Object-Based Motion Tweens
99. Creating Object-Based Tweens
100. Working with Motion Paths
101. Editing Tween Spans and Property Keyframes
102. Viewing Keyframes by Type
103. Changing the Target Object
104. Using Motion Presets
105. Easing
106. The Motion Editor
107. Editing Eases with the Motion Editor
108. Tweening Raw Shapes

Section 10: 3D and IK Tools
109. 3D Rotation
110. 3D Translation
111. 3D Motion Presets
112. Vanishing Point and Perspective Angle
113. Inverse Kinematics: Bone Tool on a Shape
114. Inverse Kinematics: Bone Tool with Symbol Instances

Section 11: Adding Sound
115. Section Overview
116. Overview of Sound File Formats: WAV, AIF, and MP3
117. Importing a Sound File
118. Auditioning an Imported Sound File
119. Using an Event Sound with a Keyframe
120. Using a Stream Sound on a Keyframe
121. Using a Stream Sound as Sync Sound with Animation
122. Using an Event Sound in a Button Symbol
123. Stopping Sound Playback with a Button Symbol
124. Stopping All Sounds with ActionScript 2.0
125. Stopping All Sounds with ActionScript 3.0
126. Opening the Adobe Soundbooth CS4 Samples Library and Adding Sounds
127. Adding Fade In/Fade Out Effects to Sound
128. Controlling Global Sound Quality and Compression in Publish Settings
129. Controlling Individual Sound Quality and Compression in the Library

Section 12: Working with Flash Video
130. Section Overview
131. Overview of Video File Formats
132. A Cautionary Note About Video Codecs
133. Overview of Flash Player 10 Video Codecs
134. Adding a Source Video File to the Queue in Adobe Media Encoder CS4
135. Selecting an Encoding Preset in Adobe Media Encoder CS4
136. Editing a Preset in Adobe Media Encoder CS4
137. Renaming and Compressing a Clip in Adobe Media Encoder CS4
138. Previewing a Flash Compatible Video File in Adobe Media Player
139. Importing a Flash Compatible Video File with Flash CS4 Video Import Wizard
140. Testing the Created Assets from the Video Import Wizard
141. Placing the FLVPlayback Component on the Stage
142. Assigning a Flash Compatible Video File to the FLVPlayback Component
143. Setting the Skin Options for the FLVPlayback Component
144. Adding a Full Screen-Enabled Skin to the FLVPlayback Component
145. Removing a Skin to Prep for Your Own Custom Controls
146. Building Your Own Playback Controls for the FLVPlayback Component
147. Publishing a Flash Video Experience

Section 13: Introduction to ActionScript and Components
148. Section Overview
149. Overview of ActionScript: Comparing ActionScript 2.0 and 3.0
150. Changing the ActionScript Version of a Flash Document
151. Using a Stop Action on a Timeline (AS2/AS3)
152. Placing and Naming a Button Instance
153. Playing a Timeline with a Button Instance in AS2
154. Playing a Timeline with a Button Instance in AS3
155. Enabling a Button-Click to Open a New Web Page in ActionScript 1.0/2.0
156. Enabling a Button-Click to Open a New Web Page in ActionScript 3.0
157. Making an Invisible Button
158. Building a Clickable Web Banner with ActionScript 1.0/2.0
159. Introduction to Components (ActionScript 2.0 vs. 3.0)
160. Adding a Scrollbar to a Text Field in ActionScript 3.0
161. Loading an External Image file with the UILoader Component in ActionScript 3.0
162. Skinning ActionScript 3.0 Components
163. Wrap-Up

Share This

Michael Hurwicz wrote a well-balanced review of my Adobe Flash CS3 Professional Video Studio Techniques book on CreativeCOW.net. Check it out!

http://chartjunk.karmanaut.com/taxplans/

Oops, I copied and pasted the wrong URL! That’s the difference between Obama and McCain’s tax plans. I meant this link:

http://library.creativecow.net/articles/hurwicz_michael/flash_cs3.php

Share This

Michael Hurwicz wrote a well-balanced review of my Adobe Flash CS3 Professional Video Studio Techniques book on CreativeCOW.net. Check it out!

http://chartjunk.karmanaut.com/taxplans/

Oops, I copied and pasted the wrong URL! That’s the difference between Obama and McCain’s tax plans. I meant this link:

http://library.creativecow.net/articles/hurwicz_michael/flash_cs3.php

Share This

My editor at Peachpit sent me the URL to a recent review covering my Adobe Flash CS3 Professional Video Studio Techniques book. AFAIK, this is an honest review–I haven’t met or talked to the reviewer, T. Michael Testi, but he seems to review quite a few books on photography and video.

Share This

I was asked by Sorenson to provide my quick tips for Sorenson Squeeze 4.5 for their November newsletter, and I just found the newsletter in my inbox! You can view the newsletter online to forward to a friend. Two out of five tips were included in this month’s newsletter, with the remaining three to be posted in the December newsletter:

1. DO determine a proper bitrate (or data rate) for your Flash Video content. Squeeze includes several presets for Flash Video to get your started. If you need a wide range of data rates for your deployment, encode several FLV files by applying multiple presets to the same source file.
2. DON’T be tempted to change the image quality setting in your compression preset(s), especially if you will be deploying your Flash Video with a streaming service provider such as Akamai, Limelight, or a Flash Media Server hosting company like Influxis.com. The image quality setting will override the bitrate value you’ve specified for the preset, or alter the frame rate if you elect to drop frames to maintain image quality. Neither of these outcomes is desirable.

Share This

If you purchased my new Flash Video book online as a PDF (or if you’ve lost or damaged your original DVD-ROM), you can download the > 7 GB of files from my Amazon.com S3 account. Because I have to pay for this hosting based on a per-GB fee, please e-mail me directly to get the URLs to the content. I will likely send you a “word challenge” where you have to tell me the [insert random number here] word on page [insert random book page here] to verify your ownership.

In the near future, I’ll have an online request form setup that randomly generates the word challenge and submits the data to me via email. (Check back!)

Share This

If you’re looking for some source video files to practice video encoding, you can check out the links to various clips from archive.org that I included in my new Flash Video book. I love browsing archive.org for documentaries created in the 1940s through 60s.

Share This

In my new Adobe Press book, Adobe Flash CS3 Professional Video Studio Techniques, I provide an Excel spreadsheet (.xls file) to help readers compute video and audio bitrates for Flash Video (FLV) files. I finally had enough spare time to build a Flash version (.swf file) that runs in Flash Player 9.0.45 or higher.

I’ve also built Windows and Mac projector versions of the FLV Bitrate Calculator. Enjoy!

UPDATE:

You can find an updated AIR application version of the bitrate calculator, featuring improved calculations for AVC/H.264, here:

http://www.flashsupport.com/resources

Share This