Producing Flash video screencasts on a Mac
It’s been years since producing my last screencast and I still can’t believe how difficult it is to produce a screencast on a Mac and publish in Flash (FLV) format.
Vara Software’s Screenflow is an incredibly well-designed screencasting tool. Unfortunately it only supports Quicktime export, which just doesn’t have the install-base Flash does—if it did YouTube would have happened ages ago.
Vara’s support recommended I try VisualHub which works beautifully. And for the embedded player we’re using Flowplayer. My original plan was to embed h.264 video in Flowplayer, but that codec is only available in the very very latest version of the Flash plugin.
Here are the Idée screencasts:
What’s happening with Mail.app?
It’s things like this that make me pine for Eudora.
Apple’s email client has two ways to tell you that there is mail activity, but no way to tell you who, what, and how many. Maybe I was dreaming but pretty much most email clients I have used in the past tell you:
- Message traffic count (i.e. Incoming message 3/5)
- From email address
- Name and size of attachment
They also have a cancel button for cancelling outgoing mail. While there is a button for this in Mail.app, I’ve never seen it work.
Am I missing something?
Facebook bigger than God, Jesus
A recent search on Google Trends reveals that to the Googlers among us, Facebook is now bigger than Jesus, and even God himself.
The Father and Son powerhouse of biblical fame were surpassed by the social utility just before Christmas 2006. While Jesus appears to be more than capable to “take on his old man” in search volume, God the father continues to maintain a commanding lead in media coverage over both Jesus and Facebook.
Delicious Dish #1
Deep in the conditional-pass wasteland known as Chinatown East is a gem of a restaurant called Hanoi 3 Seasons. If I was ever pressed to name an all-time favourite dish, this would probably be it.
If you’re familiar with Vietnamese food, you’ll probably know the vermicelli noodle dish called Bún. The easiest way for me to describe the dish is to call it a fish Bún. Lots of fresh herbs, even dill… The photo perhaps describes it better.
The menu is comprised of dishes selected by super-friendly owner Hai Luke from his homeland of north Vietnam.
Let’s do Lunch 2.0
Every Wednesday my company buys lunch (usually from Thai food from Salad King or rotis from Gandhi Cuisine). A week Friday they are buying you lunch! If you often find yourself at the intersection of technology and business and eat food, drop into the Idéeplex for good food and conversation. Idée is hosting Canada’s first Lunch 2.0, and this young blogger designed and open-sourced the vector watermelon you see before you. Please come and RSVP too.
Google Talking in the iChat Theatre
Ever wanted to play some video remotely for a friend over chat, but think .Mac is Apple’s worst invention since Phil Schiller’s mullet? Well you can if you’re a Mac user with Leopard and have a Google Mail account!
Simply enter your Google account info into iChat Preferences, invite your similarly-configured friend to video chat, and you’re off.
The first time I tried it, I showed a friend travelling overseas the intro to the season premiere of LOST he had missed.
View enlarged. If that ain’t glee, I don’t know what is.
It also works with things less exciting than season premieres like images, and PDF files, etc. I have not gotten it to work with screen sharing yet, although video and audio chat has worked since at least Tiger.
TIP: If you had a .Mac account back when Apple promised, sorry strongly implied, that e-mail would be for life, it may still work in iChat. Mine does. If yours does, you’ll be able to do a few things you can’t do with your Gtalk account like File Transfers.
I cut the mustard at Idée!
Whew! I can finally breathe a large sigh of relief. I passed my three month probationary period at Idée!
I met Leila and Paul at the first BarCamp in 2005 when they demoed their image identification software. Few companies in Toronto have so clearly found their calling. Their mission to propel the image business forward drops more jaws every month. Last September I took on some freelance design work with their wunderteam. Shortly thereafter I was offered a full time position as Senior Designer.
In the first few months alone we have gotten a ton of things done. New names and brands for Idée’s two products PixID and Piximilar. A site redesign. Interface design for the labs. A new blog. Print materials. And top secret projects which, if revealed early, would ultimately result in your death.
It’s an amazing environment where everyday everyone gets gently nudged into outdoing themselves. The results are surprising and incredibly rewarding. If you’d like to join us, we (me + Idée) are hiring!
DIY TTC Surface Route Timetable
If you’d like to make a Cologne-style TTC surface route timetable for the stops you care about and happen to be an iWork-owning Mac user, I have attached a template created in Pages.app:
- Download ttc-timetable.zip (96 KB)
How did I get the data? On my Mac, I copied the text from their web schedule, and then used a text editor to process the text into rows. The rest was done with a whole lot of copying and pasting.
TIP: You can select columns of text in TextEdit by holding down the option key. It will bring up a crosshair and allow you to select squares of text. This technique was applied liberally during the creation of the timetable.
Wi-Fi hi-fi Chronicles
I have been obsessing about the the latest and greatest digital music hardware and software possibilities for a while. Here’s a condensed version of my findings.
What’s the best sound system for playing MP3s?
I have heard these in person, and can confidently claim that for both iPods, computer playback or any audio really, you won’t find a bigger bang for your buck than the AudioEngine A5 speakers. Designed by a team of former Apple, Gibson and Alesis audio experts, the A5 speakers have all the qualities of a great bookshelf speaker, but have an amplifier built right into them. Maybe Steve with throw out his iPod Hi-fi and get a pair of these.
Though the team originally set out to create speakers for sound mixing professionals, they quickly realized that with tuning, and extras like a USB port to keep MP3 players charged, their speakers would be the best system available. It’s an interesting story and the reviews are piling up.
If you’re in Toronto, Audio Oasis on Queen East has them for $389 (which is $60 less than Computer Systems Centre).
Should I be using the iPod headphone jack to send audio to the speakers?
Not really. Technically, the headphone jack is intended for headphones, not sending sound to a stereo. To get the best sound you would need a line-level signal, which is less powerful than a headphone signal. Apple sells docks for the iPod that provide a line-level signal, but even though they claim to be universal, they don’t work out-of-the-box with every iPod out there.
A more compact, compatible and economical solution is the SendStation Line Out USB. With one of these, you can keep your A5’s happy with a line-level signal, and your iPod charged via USB.
Can I play my iTunes on a sound system in another room?
Yes, and using the Multiple Speaker option in iTunes, you can even play the same music in multiple rooms. Probably the most affordable option is Apple’s AirPort Express. It’s been around a few years now and is for sale second-hand often for as low as $40. It works natively with iTunes and there’s software available called Airfoil that lets you send sound from any running application on your Mac. A nice design feature of the A5 speaker is that the AirPort express cradles right onto the back of one of the speakers, and also plug in for power.
Does the AirPort Express provide hi-fi grade sound?
Good question. Yes, and no. The device has it’s own built in digital-to-analog converter (DAC) which is rumored to be okay, but not great. Luckily you can even get a digital signal out of it which Stereophile magazine says allows it to assume a respectable role in a true high-end audio system. All you need is a TOSLINK cable and mini-adapter. Pretty smart.
Once you do, and only if you really want to get fancy, take a look at Hong Kong exceptionally well thought-out iBasso D1.
This incredible little device which can optionally be powered by battery can serve a variety of functions.
Inputs:
- Digital optical (TOSLINK from AirPort Express, DVD player or maybe even your computer)
- USB (from your computer)
- Digital coax (from an older DVD or CD player)
- Analog minijack (like from the iPod)
Outputs:
- Headphone (big ones that an iPod is too weak to handle)
- Analog minijack (a stereo, or powered speakers)
So you can take a digital signal from basically any source and and play it through headphones too big for the iPod, or go right into speakers like the A5s. You can even use it along with the iPods line out to drive stubborn headphones too.
Can I use my iPhone/iPod Touch to play music from my Mac upstairs on the A5 speakers downstairs?
Yes, thanks to one of the coolest pieces of shareware for sale today, Remote Buddy. It runs on your Mac and makes it browseable on the web, specifically designed for Safari on the iPhone/iPod Touch.
I have been a Remote Buddy user for some time, while I don’t yet have an iPhone (oligopoly anyone?) I have been using it to power the normally useless white remote that comes bundled with Macs. It actually makes the little clicker quite handy. The iPhone functionality was just thrown into it, although I think they should have created a separate product line.
Do MP3s sound good enough?
Definitely not for a system like this. 
Music is Here, if here is Latvia
I made my first music purchase on Zunior. It was Sandro Perri’s excellent album Tiny Mirrors. Experience went smoothly and I highly recommend it.
I have a tenuous familial connection to banjo maestro Jayme Stone and desperately needed a digital version of his latest album The Utmost after having heard some tracks online. Zunior does not carry this album so I looked elsewhere.
Loosely connected to indie music store CD Baby, I came across a Latvian site called Music is Here. The site lacks a solid design, Paypal and contact information and that almost kept me away from making the purchase. I’m glad I was not deterred. It’s a great album and downloaded nicely in FLAC format, although they provide downloads in more formats than I can list. I have converted it to Apple Lossless and it’s taking up a sizeable chunk of my 4B Nano.
UPDATE: As expected a $10.63 charge for the album appeared on my credit card statement.
Ryan Feeley is the senior designer at Toronto-based