The long-in-coming second episode of Flash411 has just aired on AdobeTV. I talk about what FMS is, how to get started, show you how you can broadcast live with Flash Media Live Encoder (in *about* a minute!) and walk you through a basic 2-way videoconference application.

Here are the source files for the show, so you can follow along with the example:

–> flash411_ep2_examples.zip <–

Enjoy!

[10/9/08**NOTE: AdobeTV keeps moving videos around (grrrrr), so if the link above does not work, try a search for "Flash 411" or Larson or FMS to find the show.]

Thanks 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

Brian Chau has graciously offered up some sample apps to get you started with FMS3 (they are exercises for his upcoming class). These come set up to run on FMS3 running locally (the free Developer edition would work for this).
http://brianchau.wordpress.com/2008/02/12/flash-media-server-3-demos/

He’s got some interesting apps in there, that take you a step further than the sample apps that come bundled with FMS3:

• VOD/LIVE player (with playlist) – AS3 SWF, and an AIR app
• Video Recorder
• Multi-user Game
• Flash Lite 3 video player

Thanks, Brian!

Last fall I presented “Fun with Flash Media Server” at Flash Forward Boston. For those of you who weren’t able to make it to beantown, Lynda recorded the session and has added it to the Lynda.com library! If you’re not already a member, it’s just $25/mo. for unlimited online tutorials (on a wide range of subjects, not just Flash). If you are a member, here’s the direct link to my talk:

http://movielibrary.lynda.com/html/modPage.asp?ID=552

Enjoy!

I just had the pleasure of presenting at the Digital Media Festival, an annual festival geared toward animators, digital effects artists, and video professionals. There was a great turnout on the exhibition floor, often with standing-room only attendance for the numerous free sessions at the Adobe booth. The masterclass sessions were also well-attended; I presented full-hour sessions on Flash Media Server, Flash video basics, and a session on Flash video: beyond the basics which explored the possibilities of alpha channel compositing, metadata and cuepoints among other features.

It was truly a pleasure to be working with Adobe to present intro sessions at their booth, as well as being a part of this diverse conference. As promised, I’ve uploaded copies of my presentations for reference, as well as all of the source code for examples shown.

http://www.flashconnections.com/dmf_2007/

Thanks to everyone; I hope you found the sessions inspirational as well as informative!

Now, I’m finally off to my honeymoon for a couple of glorious weeks “down under.” Have fun, and keep Flashing!

cheers // Lisa

What can I say about FOTB08… John Davey knows how to put on a conference. It was a solid 4 days of workshops, sessions, networking, commiserating, and drinking of pints. Lots and lots of pints.

The speaker lineup was stellar. It was truly an honor to be a part of it this year. So when I say DON’T EVEN THINK about missing it next year, I mean it! It’s planned for late September, so watch http://www.flashonthebeach.com for official info soon.

Thanks to everyone who attended my session, Fun with Flash Media Server. And oh boy was it fun… especially when we all lost the internet connection when it was time to demo my app. Ah well, gotta live life on the edge, right?! So to help make up for that, I’ve left the demo app running for you to play with; just please be kind to my server.

You can also download the source files for the application. Just remember to change the NetConnection URI to your own FMS server. (If you don’t want to set up your own version of FMS, the code is also compatible with other streaming servers such as RED5 or Wowza; or you could sign up for a dev account with Influxis). The presentation itself is available for reference as well, as promised.
See you next year (or sooner, if you happen to be in Sydney… that’s where I’m headed next. Will be arriving there this Sunday for the Digital Media Festival)!

cheers

// Lisa

Whew. Just getting back from Boston and taking a breath. Wow, what a whirlwind conference!

This year’s FF was sold out, with a fantastic line-up of speakers and informative and entertaining sessions. I was honored to be a part of it, with my session, “Fun with Flash Media Server.”

As promised, here are the source files for you to play around with.

[ Fun with FMS : Source ]

Note that the connection string will have to point to your own server running the free FMS developer edition (running on your local machine), or using a third-party FMS hosting service such as Influxis. (As an helpful alternative for Mac users, you could run RED5 locally and connect to a default application file you name funwithfms, to test.)

Please post any comments or questions, and I’ll keep an eye on this space. Now go have some fun with FMS!

The brilliant minds of Flash developers are always working… More proof here, on FlashcomGuru, where xmoov has developed an improved solution for emulating streaming’s smooth seeking, for progressive download video delivery. Like the solution mentioned in our book, this is PHP-based, and allows you to skip around freely within a progressive video, even if that portion of the video file has not yet been downloaded. He’s open-sourced the code, and also offers a plug-and-play version for a small fee, (UPDATE: contact the developer for pricing) if you don’t want to get your hands dirty with PHP.

The updated source by xmoov.com is available from FlashComGuru’s site.

I’m back in NYC and recovering from my week at the Wedding and Event Videographer’s Association conference in Vegas. Whew! What an event. Jam-packed with useful sessions on everything from business tips, hands-on tech, to creative shooting techniques, and more.

It was my pleasure to have presented a couple of sessions on Flash basics for videographers. Thanks to all who attended; I hope you all learned a thing or two, and now feel confident that you can create your own video player in Flash!

As promised, here is my presentation in PDF format.

In the presentation, I demonstrated the creation of a simple video player using the pre-built components that come with Flash CS3. You can easily add a logo to this in Flash, as I demonstrated in my talk. You can then use that as a template for all of your videos you wish to play on your site. You can even customize each on from there with the name of the newlyweds, or whatever you wish!

The links to the prebuilt players (with playlists) I suggested, for quick reference, are:

Proxus Player: http://www.flvplayer.com [requires Flash authoring tool to create player]

FLVPlayerPRO: http://www.flashloaded.com [requires Flash authoring tool to create player]

JW FLV Player: http://www.jeroenwijering.com/?item=JW_FLV_Player [DOES NOT require Flash authoring tool]

And, of course, don’t forget to check out the free Flash Media Encoder, which you can use to broadcast LIVE from your events.

Flash Video: The Basics and Beyond!

Thanks to everyone who attended our session kicking off this year’s Flash in the Can festivities in Toronto. Here’s a link to grab the source files. We’ve included AS3 versions as well.

http://www.flashconnections.com/fitc07toronto/

Remember, all these examples (and much, much more…) are in our upcoming book, Flash Video for Professionals. Follow the link in our previous post to preorder on Amazon!