Almer/Blank will be at Adobe MAX this year in full-force. This is the third straight year that MAX will be held in our own Los Angeles, and the third year in a row where we will be represented on the schedule. This year, our CTO R Blank, our Chief Software Architect Hasan Otuome, and our Senior Software Architect Omar Gonzalez will be presenting.

If you will be at MAX this year, you should definitely consider checking out these sessions, two of which will be at MAX, and two of which will be at the FITC Unconference. And, of course, please share this with your friends and colleagues.

Share and enjoy!

-r

LAB: Developing Scalable Mobile Video Chat Applications

with Hasan Otuome
Tuesday, October 4, 3:00 p.m. – 4:30 p.m.
Wednesday, October 5, 11:00 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.

Learn how to create multidevice video chat applications using Adobe Flash and Adobe AIR for desktop and devices (including AIR for iOS). Explore how to use new platform features including acoustic echo cancellation features, high-quality video capture, and Adobe Flash Media Server running on Amazon Web Services. This session will teach you how to build robust applications leveraging P2P technology with unicast failover. You'll also learn how to quickly set up and deploy Flash Media Server running on Amazon Web Services and walk away with a fully functioning and deployed application.

SESSION: Delivering Best Video Experiences with Flash

with R Blank
Wednesday, October 5, 11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.

Video in Flash just keeps getting better and better. Now, with the recent releases of Adobe Flash Player, you can deliver even higher quality HD video to a much wider audience. Using the new Stage Video feature, you can deliver the best possible viewing experience, of the highest quality HD video content — while reducing processor usage by up to 85%!

Come join R Blank as he dives into the new feature of Stage Video, how it works, and how to optimize your content for Stage Video delivery. As well, Blank will cover the AS3 APIs for Stage Video, illustrating how to write your ActionScript code to utilize this new feature.

Even better, Blank will cover how to use the Open Source Media Framework (OSMF, www.osmf.org), which includes native support for Stage Video, making it incredibly easy for any user of Flash to start harnessing the amazing playback powers of Stage Video in Flash Player.

The portion on the AS3 APIs is intended for Flash ActionScript coders. The remainder of this talk is for ALL audiences, including designers, developers, and anyone who works with video in Flash. 

UNCONFERENCE: Working with AMF using PlugrMan

with Omar Gonzalez
TBD

Working with AMF libraries can sometimes be tricky and time consuming. In this session I will cover how to easily work with AMF gateways using PlugrMan to help test and debug AMF APIs as well as how to save hours of development work using PlugrMan's features.

UNCONFERENCE: Disconnecting: Lessons from a CTO Living in a Forest

with R Blank
TBD

Our use of connected technology is so pervasive, that we barely even notice it — it seems silly to even mention it these days. As chairman and former CEO of Google, Eric Schimdt says unconnected devices are "no longer interesting" — we don't even use them to tell the time of day anymore!

As inhabitants of the digital world, we all know many of the benefits that this increasingly connected world brings.

But this persistently connected existence comes at a price: most directly, this connected world alters our sense of time, which can diminish our patience and increase stress. At the same time, we become dependent on connected services, which, while yielding massive benefits, can also lead to a sensation of enslavement to your devices (and all the people on the other end of that connected screen). And, as the digital divide continues to expand, we lose sight of what it is to live without these advances, as so much of the world still does — including large chunks of the United States.

We can't actually know what affect these devices and services have on us, unless we can disconnect from them, temporarily removing them from our lives. Many see this, though, as impossible — disconnecting is not feasible, except perhaps for the occasional weekend getaway.

R Blank, co-founder and CTO of Almer/Blank, recently engaged in a project that has required disconnecting from this persistently connected world for several months. This was, of course, made all the more challenging by the fact that he serves as the senior technical officer of a high-tech production agency.

Come join R as he walks you through some of his experiences, and the lessons learned, in this process of disconnecting, and how you might be able to make use of some of these lessons to create a better sense of balance in your own life. At the same time, gain some insight into the reality and implications of the digital divide, and what this means for the future of our industry, as well as the nation.