Almer/Blank Labs

Adobe has posted R Blank's talk at MAX 2009, 'Practical ActionScript 3 for Flash CS3 and CS4' to Adobe TV. You may download the slides and accompanying code files from R's blog.

I spent most of my time at Adobe MAX 2009 at the FITC Unconference. This year placed in the middle of the exhibit hall, and with a stellar lineup of speakers including Ralph Hauwert, Robert Reinhardt, Phillip Kerman, Joshua Hirsch, Grant Skinner, and Joa Ebert (among many more) -- and featuring free Influxis beer -- turnout was excellent and the vibe was really cool. I'm sure FITC will be posting some pix of the event soon, but I took a few myself and posted the album on Photobucket (what's this with monthly limits on Flickr?!?! I've posted two albums there in my life, but made the mistake of trying to post a third right after the 2nd -- lord knows that's the last time I'll be trying that one). Oh, and my talk, Hearing Pictures with The Ludi Machine went really well. Because of IP-ownership issues, I can't post the work I showed (I don't own the sound files I used), but the code wasn't the important part anyway. The 25 minutes of talking before getting to the code was the really fun part. I started out with 2 people in the audience but ended up with a full house, including at least a dozen standing by the entrance. I don't want to post the slides yet. This was a first shot at something -- using a funky platform like the Unconference to try out something new -- and it worked out well, so I want to invest more time in making this a meaningful lecture, at which point I'll start making parts of it available online as well. I've included a totally-unfulfilling snapshot of a Ludi-powered sound-board in action, translating a snapshot from the Hubble telescope into 'music': Kudos to Shawn Pucknell, Erin Kelly and FITC for running such a great event and Kudos to Adobe for giving him the platform to do it right in the belly of the beast.

Yesterday afternoon I had the privilege of addressing a crowd of over 100 at MAX. Apparently, the slides and source code that accompany the talk were not placed on the attendee extranet at MAX. So, per request of some of the attendees, I am posting the files here. (If you were one of the people who attended, thank you very much for turning out.) Included are:

• All code files (62 flas, and associated AS files)
• Slides used during presentation
• Extended slides for home reference

As you can see, the subject was 'Practical ActionScript 3', which is a one-hour version of a day-long (8-hour) curriculum I have created, and teach through the Rich Media Institute. I will be teaching the full-day version of this workshop on October 24th in Toronto and November 7th in Los Angeles. A 3-hour online version is also available through the RMI (that hasn't yet been updated for Flash Player 10, as the live workshop has). I'd also like to take this opportunity to note that I will be teaching a full-day version of my new AS3 workshop, 'Working With and Extending Events in ActionScript 3 (on October 25th in Toronto and November 8th in Los Angeles). I know 'Events' isn't often treated as it's own subject, worthy of an entire day-long course, but in my experience this is an incredibly useful subject -- events are really the key to functional fluency in AS3 and once you understand them (which really isn't *that* difficult) you can basically do anything you want in Flash. It's designed to accompany Practical AS3 (which is why I'm teaching it the immediately following day in both Toronto and LA), and I would really strongly suggest you consider enrolling. UPDATE So turns out Adobe captured the whole talk and posted it on Adobe TV. Share and enjoy!