The Secrets of Flash Video | Webvisions 2007

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Today was the first day of Webvisions 2007, May 3-4, 2007 in Portland at the Oregon Convention Center.

Exploring the Future of the Web
Join the rockstars of design, user experience and business strategy for two days of mind-melding on what’s new in the digital world. Get a glimpse into the future, along with practical information that you can apply to your Web site, company and career.

I attended a workshop presented by Robert Reinhardt.

Robert is the VP of the Multimedia Platforms Group for Schematic and an internationally regarded as an expert on multimedia application development, particularly in Macromedia Flash. Robert is the lead author of the Flash Bible series and the Flash ActionScript Bible.

The workshop covered everything I needed to know and more about Flash Video, from shooting quality video to delivering real-time streaming video. We learned key pre-production factors that affect final Flash Video output, such as camera quality, lighting, audio, green screen shooting and format choices. We had a demonstration of the basic tools for capturing and encoding video, as well as advanced encoding strategies like multiple bit rates, codec decisions and options, and SMIL.

After the lunch break we learned how to bring the video into Flash, building custom code players and how to utilize the FLVPlayback component. We also learned about the best options for deployment and the differences between progressive web video and real-time streaming video, including large scale deployment using Flash Video Streaming Service (FVSS) providers.

One of the most valuable things I have learned about is a flash support site that Robert offers.

Stay tuned for more information from Robert about Flash Video and a more detailed explanation of my notes.

I am going to give you my Flash Video notes in bullet points.

cbr and vbr encoding
Inflluxis (flash streaming server access)
lv requires 2 files a flv and a swf.
vp6 has a better compression algorithm.
You can turn smoothing on or off with actionscript
spark vs vp6
width x Height / Compression ratio = bit rate starting point
Flash will only scrub to keyframes
keyframes should be 10 x the frame rate
Sony HBR A1U Video Camera
Alfa chanel
swf object – best
ActionScript 2 and 3
A2 using bindings tab to add videos to your flash movie (this can be done without any actionscript)
Video Markers reading cue points.
Captions (captioning) MAGpie
“smil” files
ServiceCapture
Buddy extra (for director) Buddy API