Down Goes iPhone

I’ve dropped my phone a handful of times in the past without effect, but I went to the well one too many times…

So far falls have destroyed my first mac (macbook pro fell out of an unzipped case when I was dropping my dad at the airport) and first iphone (snuck out of my jacket pocket as I was getting out of the car). Definitely one of my favorite devices and its still working despite the damaged screen…do I dare buy a plastic 3G replacement?

Software So Good You Can Feel It Through Your Eyes

I’m deeply appreciative when I use software that continually simplifies complex tasks. Lightroom is one such application and deserves huge props for much of its user experience. This software gets me. I feel like I’m communing with it on a much deeper, but more natural level. When I use it the visual feedback provides so much context that I can literally feel my way around, as if I’m holding something physical in my hand. Here’s a short example:

That’s pretty powerful stuff. Now if only I could get the same experience when using a development IDE–I’m talking to you Eclipse; you big, nasty brute with a face only a mother nerd could love.

Wow – Interactive Video Manipulation

Holy sh*tola, I want all of this all of this stuff…yesterday:

Interactive Video Object Manipulation from Dan Goldman on Vimeo.

Here’s the link to a bit more background + some academic papers the team behind these techniques has assembled.

http://www.adobe.com/technology/graphics/video_visualization_and_interaction.html

I see quite a few applications for screen video. For instance it would be great to associate a callout bubble with a window, or see a path that the mouse or a window followed, or reposition windows by intelligently looking forward and backward in the video–lot’s to chew on.

F4V Does Not Support Cue Points

Despite appearances…

F4V files (otherwise known as MPEG4-AVC / h.264 + a special Flash only file extension) DO NOT SUPPORT CUE POINTS. Unfortunately, no good tooling support for timed text tracks replaces them.

F4V is Retarded

Why F4V is the wrong decision:

• Destroys one of the great promises of MPEG4-AVC / h.264–interoperability.
• No single file deployment (closely tied to interoperability). I certainly imagine a world where a single piece of media can be posted on the web, downloaded and played back through Flash Player, iPhone / iPod, QuickTime, Apple TV, etc. Gone should be the days of providing different files for different browsers, plugins or mobile devices.
• Effectively reduces the usefulness the existing MPEG4-AVC / h.264 ecosystem. The MPEG4 spec urges .mp4 be used as the file extension and many vendors just refuse to work with something that has a different file extension.
• You lose out on much of the existing intelligent rss enclosure handling. Blogging platforms and plugins will recognize the .mp4 extension and auto-generate enclosures (very useful for delivering to feed readers and mobile devices).
• F4V just muddles the codec picture even more. Take a look at any of the encoder dialogs in CS4 and you’ll see a confusing slew of options (flv, f4v, h.264, h.264 blu-ray, etc.). Hell, I even heard an instructor in one of the MAX hands on sessions, urge students to steer clear of h.264 encodings since that was just HD / blu-ray stuff. He actually was pushing flv (pretty bizarre for an AfterEffects class).

I’m not trying to be a jerk, there are definite reasons Adobe may have chosen to use F4V:

• Apple did it (M4V). Yep, Apple screwed the pooch as well.
• It’s easy to associate file extensions with default application handlers (i.e. AMP is the default media player for *.flv and *.f4v files).
• Allows for a unique mime-type (Flash Player gets associated with a specific file type on servers).
• OS file choosers allow filtering by extension.
• F4V clearly establishes a file as compatible with the parts of the MPEG4 spec supported by Flash Player. This has the obvious advantage of visual associations / assumptions and might assist descriptions in documentation and marketing.

I guess I feel like there should be some sort of primary directive: “thou shalt not damage interoperability.” Any time you’re thinking of messing with the spec it should be examined through this lens. As valid as some of the reasoning for using F4V is, it fails, IMHO, when compared to the primary directive.