Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with flash

Compact, HD camcorder with manual control options?

bondcliff — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 11:11:16 -0800

I’m looking to buy a compact, flash-based, HD-capable camcorder with the ability to shut off automatic controls such as white balance and auto-focus. In addition to the usual stuff one does with a camcorder I’d also like to use it for stop-motion, time-lapse, and some other projects where I’ll need to shut off white balance and possibly auto-focus.

Something like the Flip or the Kodak Zi8 would be ideal but I don’t see that they have the ability to shut off these automatic features. If I have to go for a more traditional shaped camera, that’s fine. I’d like it to be somewhat small and inexpensive. Preferably under $500.00.

It needs to be able to do at least 720p HD widescreen. Good quality, good frame-rate, etc.

I’d prefer flash based but if a hard-drive based camera is my only option I’ll go with it. Tape is right out.

In a pinch, a regular point-and-shoot camera will do as long as the video quality is decent and I can shut the automatic stuff off.

If what I want does not exist, please let me know that too.

Need recommendation on FLASH program

hellodonna — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 08:42:23 -0800

I am looking for a program that will easily allow me to create a Flash banner. All I want is to create a banner that has about 4 images fading in and out and some animated text over top. I should think this would be super easy but I am trying to find a software program to do it and I am coming up with either stuff that's way too complex or software that can't do it. Do you know of any program that would help me? (It doesn't need to be free, I can spend up to 100 USD on it).

What off-camera remote flash cable should I buy?

ejfox — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 16:02:56 -0800

I want to use any old flash I find (I have an old pentax flash from one of my film cameras) on a remote cable to my Nikon D100. I want to be able to hold the flash with one hand and shoot with the other during live music shows. Please, help me find the cable I'm looking for. I've been searching for an "off-camera remote flash cable" on Amazon. A lot of it implies it is for specific cameras and flashes. I have a Nikon D100. I'd like to use the remote cable I'm buying for the old flashes I have now, but maybe a Nikon speedlight down the road.

I think this might be what I'm looking for: http://www.amazon.com/Adorama-Off-Camera-Digital-Cameras-Capability/dp/B0028DEOI6/ref=sr_1_68?ie=UTF8&s=photo&qid=1260316362&sr=1-68

Would this do the things I am looking for? Is there a better, cheaper option for what I want to do (hold the flash in my hand while moving around in front of a band)?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Help me find or build a cool viewer for image sequences.

fake — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 11:06:18 -0800

Jeffry Friedl has this awesome image viewer that steps through a sequence of pre-loaded JPGs as you move the mouse across them. I would like to find a similar viewer, but using Flash. I have sequences of images of varying length -- some time-lapse, some video, some other stuff for an upcoming project. The fun thing to do with these images is scroll through them.

What I'd like to find is a generic and Free/Open Source flash viewer app that displays these images sequentially as the mouse moves horizontally across the display window. The user should be able to move the sequence "forward" and "backward" just by flicking the mouse around.

Ideally, the app would load the images externally, perhaps from a list in a text file. That way, the image list could be easily updated and the app would not have to be compiled from Flash every time.

Finally, it would also be cool if the viewer app had a "play" button so one could just "play" the sequence.

I know that there must be apps that are at least close to this for the ObjectVR and Panorama communities, but searching Google is not yielding anything helpful. In a worst case, I will write my own application, but I'd rather just use something pre-made or contribute to something Open Source.

What's the online equivalent of a dozen Playmobil dudes?

nebulawindphone — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:02:03 -0800

I'm looking for the online equivalent of a dollhouse, or Lego or Playmobil people — a Flash/Java/whatever app that lets the user dress up a bunch of characters with different clothes/props/features/whatever and arrange them in a scene. I know I've seen stuff like this on websites for kids. The catch is, we need this for a psycholinguistics experiment we're running, which means we need to be able to run the app on our own server and record the user's actions (with consent, of course). Does something like this exist? Right now, we're running the experiment in person.

It goes like this: The subject gets a pile of Playmobil dudes with different outfits and hats and hairdos and props that can be swapped in and out. They read a short description (f'rinstance, "Six pirates are standing in a circle. There are two pirates with swords. A few girls are looking at the pirates.") and then are asked to arrange the toys to match it, and we take a picture of whatever they come up with. The hypothesis has to do with how the wording of the description affects the scene they set up.

It doesn't have to be pirates and girls. It doesn't even have to be people. They don't need pirate hats or swords or whatever. We just need two or three kinds of $X, with two or three interchangeable $Y's that can go on each $X, and the ability to line up the $X's in different ways.

None of us are fast or slick enough as programmers to make it worth writing our Flash game (or whatever) that works like this. But if there is an existing one, even if we have to do some tweaking and tinkering to get it to do what we want, that would be very good news — it's much easier to recruit subjects if they can participate from home, for starters.

Suggestions?

Converting PowerPoint to video or flash (again)

The Dutchman — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 19:04:04 -0800

Converting PowerPoint to video or flash (again) I know this question was just asked, and two years ago but none of the answers suit my needs. I have a PowerPoint presentation with animation that I need to convert into really good, smooth video or flash with all animation in-tact. Camtasia was choppy. Camstudio went kinda crazy when anything moved. Slideshare kills all the animation and blacks out some images. iSpring keeps the animation but seems to briefly show through layered graphics, which ruins the more complex effects I've created, plus it distorts graphs and some bullets. SlideBoom has the same layered graphics problem as iSpring.

To give you an idea of the quality I need, this is a portfolio of my PowerPoint design work that I want to embed on my website and/or send to potential clients in hopes that it will make them want to hire me.

Any ideas?

What's the deal with Flash video on OSX? I can't click the play button!

Glum — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 14:12:28 -0800

Why do Youtube (and other flash videos) become unresponsive on my Mac when they are embedded in other sites? [iMac and MacBook Pro, Snow Leopard (and previous OS), Firefox & Safari]

Often, when I come across an embedded YouTube clip (and sometimes videos from other services like Vimeo) on my RSS feed or in a website I am visiting I am unable to click on it successfully. Trying to access the controls (play, pause etc) becomes almost impossible. I have found that if I right click to pull up the Flash menu, but then deselect it, I do then get one chance to click on the Flash object (with it going white in the process).

These objects almost always work perectly if I click through to watch them in their original location.

My browsers have been doing this for several versions, over the last two versions of the OS and the last three versions of Flash, on both my Macs. I have the most recent versions of all software.

I've read that Flash is very unreliable on OSX - with memory leaks etc. - but this doesn't seem to be that (although, of course, I don't actually know what it is).

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Help download this flash video

corpse — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 13:13:49 -0800

I'd like to save the video from this article and convert it to a avi or something windows can play. I've tried several utilities, but can't seem to get it. Any ideas?

Choppy Video Viewing

JABof72 — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 08:53:35 -0800

Vimeo viewing, and download both choppy. These videos were posted on Metafilter last month, and they're stunning. Home movies re-done in HD with a nice sound track. Looking at the San Francisco one, I get to the point where people are getting onto the cable car, the video, and sound gets choppy. I tried downloading with both Flashgot, and Download Helper, and get the same results. Extremely frustrating. Btw, I'm pulling 8.5 mb/s if that helps.

What to do with forgotten flash drives?

Anonymous — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:04:00 -0800

For those of you who work in computer labs, what is your policy for dealing with flash drives that have been forgotten by a student? I'm a teacher at a small college in the computer department. Three or four flash drives are forgotten by someone in our computer labs every week. The lab supervisor puts these drives on a plate near his desk, which is accessible to anyone walking by. I do know of at least one case where a drive was found, and the next day, it was gone (and it wasn't picked up by the owner).

Shouldn't these drives be treated with the same care as someone's wallet or purse? Could we be liable if someone is a victim of identity theft because their drive was easily taken from the lost-and-found? If we look at the contents of a drive in an effort to figure out who it belongs to, what happens if a student blames us for anything from deleting their homework file to stealing their passwords?

There is no campus-wide policy on this, as far as I know. The lab supervisor is really a good guy in general (and has been there forever and is well-loved), but I don't think he really gets how valuable these drives can be to someone who has all their work (and possibly passwords and other sensitive information) saved on it. Or how valuable they can be to someone who wants easy access to that kind of information.

So, what do you do in your lab? Do you lock drives up? Do you plug the drive in and look through the contents in order to figure who the owner is? Do you make an effort to contact the owner? Is there a sane policy or procedure we could put in place that doesn't cause too much extra work for the lab staff and also protects the drives and ourselves?

Apologies for the length and anonymity, but I don't have tenure yet, so I'd like to not associate my name with potential conflicts with long-time beloved employees. If you want to email me directly, use forgetfulstudents@gmail.com.

Why does Flash suck so bad on the Mac?

mpls2 — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 07:58:18 -0800

Why does Flash suck so bad on the Mac? Are there any Mefites with an inside scoop (or informed opinions) about why Flash (e.g., YouTube videos) chews up so much CPU time on Macs?

It's literally (much) more efficient for me to watch a YouTube video in Windows 7 under Parallels than in Safari.

I know there are other clever ways to get around the problem, but I'm really curious why this problem persists. Perhaps this explains why Steve won't let in on the iPhone??

Thanks!

YouTube doesn't work, except when it does.

mikoroshi — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 23:20:16 -0800

Why isn't YouTube working? For the past few months YouTube just doesn't work on our desktop.

Latest version of Flash is installed on latest version of Firefox, java is so tuned on it's making obscene suggestions to other scripts. I've tried turning NoScript and AdBlock off, no dice.

The most bizarre thing is, every 12th or 15th time we boot up, YouTube works....until the computer gets turned off again.

Anyone have any suggestions? I'm at a loss.

Trying to flash a W595 Sony Ericsson (A2) based Phone but can't get it working

complience — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 03:25:21 -0800

Trying to flash a W595 Sony Ericsson (A2) based Phone but can't get it working I want to flash the preinstalled firmware on my Sony Ericsson Phone because it has some branding I don't want and some restrictions on apps I want to install (google maps)

I've tried various tools to try and achieve this:
Aerix
SeTool
D-Ultimate unlocker

I can connect to the device via usb, selecting mass storage mode, while holding down buttons 2 + 5

But all of them give me the same error regarding the boot method selected, I'm not sure if I need to start the phone in a different way to get the correct BOOT sector or if i need different software.

13:52:48 Initializing...
! 13:52:48 1. Please see the documentation first (the tab 'Info' or attached .pdf file)
! 13:52:48 2. Choose the phone model
! 13:52:48 3. Select the desired options
! 13:52:48 4. Please connect the phone either via USB while holding 2-5…
! 13:52:48 - or via a serial cable and double-click on it in the device list
13:52:56 Selected phone: W910
13:52:56 Connecting via SEMC USB Flash Device (USB2)…
13:52:56 Device driver version: 2.2.0.0
13:52:56 Device driver date: 9-18-2008
13:52:56 Connecting to the baseband CPU...
13:52:56 Entering baseband CPU service mode...
13:52:57 Detected chipset: DB3150 R2A
13:52:57 Boot mode: EROM
13:52:57 EROM version: 1200-4341 SEMCBOOT R6A013
E 13:52:57 Error: 0x889C690F
E 13:52:57 Unsupported boot mode
! 13:52:57 Please boot via ROM
E 13:52:57 Failed!

Does this game genre even have a name?

The Winsome Parker Lewis — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 13:18:17 -0800

What are some great computer games for people who enjoy non-linear privateering, combat, and risky missions? I've loved the Escape Velocity games for years. I recently got into Frontier (previously) and enjoyed it a lot, but it was way too short and easy. I'd like to try Transcendence (previously) but I'm on a Mac, and I'd like to try SAIS (previously) but I can't get it to run under Snow Leopard. Finally, I just discovered Skyrates (previously) and it's fun but so very slow.

All that build-up is to ask: What other Macintosh or Flash games are like these? Specifically I'm looking for games that feature trading, fighting, upgrades and customization, and a big world to explore. I especially love games that let you choose to be good or evil (or neutral) and to become a hero, villain, or impossibly wealthy merchant. Even better if there are a bunch of different factions to choose from besides "good" and "evil," with shades of moral ambiguity. If the game is free that's also a big plus. Any suggestions?

I want to click it and forget it for a while

Team of Scientists — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 19:19:11 -0800

I'm looking for games that progress in real time, similar to Farmville on Facebook. They can be browser-based or on XBox 360.

I used to play Ogame at ogame.org, in which you mine for resources that you need to build a starfleet in order to go raid other planets. The really impressive ships would take days at a time to complete. The problem with Ogame (besides the stupid name) was the level of attention it required lest some hardcore player raid your fleet when you least expect it. So basically I'd like something a little more casual, like Farmville, which I find kind of addicting (today I made a block M out of maize and blueberries).

If you don't know exactly what I mean, I'm looking for other games that sort of do their work while the player is not present. For example, in Farmville, you plant your crops, and, say, 8 real life hours later, they have grown and can be harvested. Do you know any games that use a similar mechanic?

Need money now thankyou.

drjimmy11 — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 15:50:15 -0800

What are some good tech-centric temp agencies in L.A.? Hi! Yet another in my long series of job-trauma questions.

I'm currently between jobs- I'm a web/software developer, specializing in flex/AS3 but with years and years of doing html/js/ajax/php type stuff too. I have a pretty strong resume, I like to think, going back about 10 years.

I'm currently getting contacted by a lot of recruiters and going on a lot of interviews, but it's a very drawn-out process. Basically I need a gig to bring in some money now- cutting up PSDs or whatever is fine, I'm not proud at this point. I'm curious if anyone knows any decently reputable agencies who could get me something like this soon. Specific names of agencies are appreciated, referrals to specific people are even more appreciated. (meMail me if you like).

(I'd also be interested in where I can advertise myself as a flex freelancer, but I'm more inclined towards W2 right now for a few reasons.)

Thanks!

Musical Jelly Beans - jayisgames

FusiveResonance — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 19:01:00 -0800

google-fu = poor. I am looking for a flash game involving multi coloured jelly beans which serve as triggers for different musical instruments. This game was originally linked to from http://jayisgames.com/.

The user could grab various musical instruments/contraptions onto the playing grid. The instruments were then piped together to allow jelly beans to flow through the instruments. Each time the beans went through an instrument they triggered sound.

Much Thanks.

What is the current state of Adobe Flex and what tools are commonly used?

Riemann — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 20:57:16 -0800

What is the current state of Adobe Flex and what tools are commonly used? Though most of my experience is in C# / C++, I have done a fair bit of development in Flash over the last few years. Despite the fact that the threading model is still crippled (compared to desktop technologies or even Silverlight), I have an idea for which I think Flash / Actionscript 3 might be an appropriate platform.

Right now I am considering whether to base my app off of Flex 3 framework or just code directly with AS3 / Flash.

(as an aside, I have read the answers to these questions on the Adobe website. However, years of experience working with Adobe products has made me extremely skeptical of anything they claim about their own products)

So, I have two questions:

1) What are the advantages which Flex 3 offers compared to just Flash? Are the Flex user interface controls substantially better than what is available with Flash alone?

2) What IDE and other tools are actually worth using for Flex 3 development? Is Eclipse still the IDE of choice?

Looking to up my presentation skills in NYC

kenzi23 — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:04:30 -0800

I'm looking for a job doing presentation graphics (in law firms, possibly financial firms); this is about 30% of my current job at a law firm. I'm one of very few "experts" at my firm which isn't very technologically advanced in this area, so I'm afraid that my skills won't cut it in the outside world. I need advice on how to upgrade my skills. I want to upgrade my skills so that I can show a better portfolio and talk about those skills with more confidence.

I'm pretty strong in all the Microsoft Office products and how they integrate, especially in Powerpoint and Visio. I also am quite skilled and experienced in Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign.

Since we don't really use Powerpoint to its full potential at my current job, I want to learn more advanced skills, and I feel like I need to improve my Excel skills to integrate better with Powerpoint. From the job listings I have seen, I think I should learn Flash, but what else is essential for a presentations job?

I'm in NYC so if you have any recommendations for places to get the kind of training I need, I would love to hear them.

Flash CS4 Quicktime Export leaves artifacts and looks like crud. Help!

buriednexttoyou — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 08:03:30 -0800

Flash animators: When I export my flash cartoon to quicktime, moving objects leave behind horrible artifacts. Apparently I am not the only one with this problem. If Flash's quicktime export is so crummy, how do the professionals publish their cartoons to video? I'm working with CS4 on a mac, but I've heard this is also a problem with CS3. I've also heard that you can import SWF files into After Effects and then export to video. As much as I'd like to be able to afford AE, I can't at the moment.

I know there are tons of animators working in Flash. Does this problem exist for you, and how do you deal with it?

Embedding book excerpts on your website?

danburzo — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 09:17:20 -0800

I need ideas for embedding book excerpts on my website. I'm looking for a way to embed book excerpts on my website. I've looked at Scribd and Issuu so far but I'm not wholly convinced, as their embed capabilities fall short of my expectations regarding the user experience.

Do you know any alternative service? I am also open to a solution that resides on my own server; something that takes a PDF file and displays it to the user in a HTML page (via Flash, most probably).

Crappy camcorder needed... best choice?

FauxScot — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 14:19:16 -0800

I'm doing some engineering and need to capture video of highway traffic. Preferably, I'd record on a large flash memory. I need medium resolution.... enough to tell the difference between a motorcycle and a tractor trailer. Looking for recommendations for 'good enough'. I'm designing some highway instrumentation / sensors and need to associate vehicles with data that I am collecting. Ideally, I'd have a small camera I could aim at my sensors and record video to associate with my data.

I've looked around and found the Samsung SC-MX20 , which seems OK enough, but was wondering if anyone here has a recommendation for something even less good?

This will be a daylight recording session, lasting perhaps 8 hours. I would like to externally power the camera. Buying a huge ass flash card is OK. Cost preference in the <$200 range. Needs a tripod mount hole, and ideally, there would be an on-screen time/date display. Video quality requirements are minimal.

I know there are other cheapskate geeks like me out there, and my laziness at posting this question is tribute to the extraordinary utility of askmetafiler in such matters. I am prepared to wait for up to 10 minutes for an answer! (Usually it's faster!)

Flash movie won't play completely inside frameset on IE8

wexford_arts — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 23:38:16 -0800

Flash gurus, HTML developers and XP know-it-alls: I need your help! Flash, framesets and IE8 are not getting along at all. A framed site using Flash works on my desktop, where I still have IE6 running on XP SP3, but not on my XP SP3 laptop with IE8. Whether or not I can make it work in IE8, I still need to demo this site on something that works. If I can't make this work by noon Tuesday, I'm going to have to use my restore disks to return my laptop to its original XP Pro condition so I can at least use IE6 on it. Help me figure out a way to avoid a complete restore in the short run and make this work on IE8 in the long run! A colleague (who is out of town and can't be reached) has built a Flash movie that is embedded within an HTML page. It works perfectly in IE6, which is the browser a client has used for years, but they are thinking of migrating to IE8 as long as their old content will still work there without too much tinkering.

While a lot of old Flash files we've created work well in IE8, even in framesets, my colleague's Flash file displays properly in IE8 only when its HTML shell is loaded directly in the browser. If the page is put inside a frameset (as will be required for the final form of this project) only the first few frames of the Flash play. When I right click and choose Play, those first few frames play again, but that's it.

My successful Flash files and the colleague's balky Flash file use the same Publish settings (AS2, Flash 8 player). His file uses scenes to divide content, with a stop() command and a named anchor at the beginning of each scene. This first anchor is the precise point where the movie stops politely when loaded within its shell, but where it disappears in a flash of white when viewed within a frameset.

Is the anchor the likely problem? Is this fixable, or would I have to restructure the file to avoid anchors completely? Or is there something else going on?

It's late and I'm exhausted and probably missing something important. I will welcome support, good questions, questioning of my premises, and being called a dumbass, as long as I can somehow get this working.

SDcard as primary storage?

jozxyqk — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 04:55:45 -0800

How reliable would it be to use an SD card as primary storage in a Plug computer? So, I've been tossing around the idea of getting a Sheeva Plug, to have a low-power-consumption web server, etc.

I am looking into the options for external storage.
Of course a USB hard drive is one possibility, but I don't need all that disk space for it and I would rather not take up all the extra physical space required either.

The Plug has an SDcard slot built into it.
How reliable would it be to use, say, a 16GB SDcard as the primary storage for the device, which is going to be almost constantly reading from it with occasional writing?
Is it just a terrible idea? Or could I get away with it?

This new-fangled internet thing is just too Flashy for me!

Anonymous — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 07:18:19 -0800

Firefox / Flash-filter: Currently, I'm running one of the last versions of Firefox 2.0 (2.0.0.20). I haven't upgraded to 3 yet, but I think I'm just about ready (well, YouTube is forcing me). I have a few concerns before I do... Okay, so my computer OS is old (Windows 2000), and I'm not planning on upgrading until I buy a new computer. My internet connection is a very slooow dial-up. As I said above, I use Firefox 2.0.0.20 for 75% of my internet browsing. I have the bare minimum installed on it so as not to weigh it down any more than it already is. I don't have Flash installed for Firefox, and, to be honest, I don't want it. There are very few websites I go to that use Flash for anything other than ads and other junk I don't want to see. I don't feel I'm missing out at all. I really don't want to install Flash and then install all the Flash and ad-blocking extensions. I just really don't want it on my Firefox period.

The only site I go to regularly that requires Flash is YouTube, and I go there daily using IE6 (the other 25% of my internet browsing). I never upgraded my IE, but now there's a little banner on YT threatening that they're not going to support IE6 any longer. Either I have to update to IE..8?, Google Chrome, or the latest Firefox. I really like having two separate browsers: one without Flash so that I can do my regular browsing as painlessly as possible and the other only going to YouTube, basically. So, I decided to check out Chrome, but I learned that both Chrome and IE8 only support WinXP+. Firefox 3.x is the only browser that still supports my OS.

Alright, if you're still reading, here's my question.
A) (My #1 choice) Would it be possible to have both the un-Flash-y Firefox I'm using now (2.0.0.20) (NO FLASH INSTALLED) AND the newest version of Firefox (which WOULD have Flash installed) (which I would use primarily for YouTube) on the same computer.. at the same time? If so, how (Keep in mind that I'm a MORON when it comes to technology. Please use SIMPLE, detailed explanations.)? To clarify, I want something like two icons on my desktop: one for FF2 (no Flash) and one for FF3 (with Flash) and to be able to have them running at the same time.
B) (My #2 choice.. I think) If Option A is impossible, it looks like I have to upgrade FF and install Flash. Would it be possible to have two ... profiles (is that what they're called in Firefox): one that HAS Flash and one that DOESN'T have Flash installed?? Possible or no? If so, once again, how? And how would I switch between the two? Could I have both profiles running at once, or do I have to choose (if this is even possible)? Once again, I'd want one profile that has no Flash installed and one that has it installed.
C) (My absolute LAST choice) If I really have to suck it up and install the newest Firefox as my sole browser AND I have to choose completely between having Flash and not (so basically, if I'm forced to upgrade and install Flash), what extensions are most recommended so that I have total control over what my browser displays? And I only want it to display YouTube videos on the YouTube website. I don't want to see anything else basically (Flash-wise, I mean). This is my LAST choice option, so this is what I'll do ONLY if I have absolutely no other choice.

Anyway, if you've read this entire thing, bless you and thank you in advance for your patient responses. I've made this anonymous because I have too many stupid tech questions to my name already. And I kind of think that I don't get good results because people are just like, 'sheesh, it's this idiot again!' I will pop in later today, and I will respond to comments/questions. Thanks again!