New Video Features of Flash 8 Examined

Macromedia’s Flash format has become a popular way to stream video over the Internet, and the latest version of Flash (version 8) includes a number of new video features, which Digital Producer looks at here. These include a new system for encoding videos and alpha channel support, where you can overlay video clips on each other within the player itself. These clips can be triggered by ActionScripts (Macromedia’s scripting language), so you could create a video where a user could click on an area of a product to watch a short video about a feature narrated by someone overlaying the product, for instance. You can read more about Flash 8 here: the product (and the player required to use the new features) are still in beta, but can be downloaded here.