Flash Video: Where’s the Remote?
CNET News.com has reported on Flash 8’s beefed up video capabilities, touting it as a serious contender to the world of video streaming on the web. But for me, there is some serious work that needs to be done on Flash.
I like watching videos through Flash. The Flash plugin seems to hog far less memory than Windows Media, Quicktime or Realplayer. It’s generally less obtrusive; the only big spinning logos before the video starts playing as that of the author or studio (if there are even any), again in contrast to the big three players mentioned.
CNET plays this factor up:
In several demonstrations of Flash video in recent months, Macromedia has mocked the experience that some Web surfers go through when trying to access RealNetworks or Windows Media video clips. In the demonstration, the people trying to access the video are confronted with dialogue boxes prompting the download of large players. Then they have to choose bandwidth speeds and other options.
Flash video, by contrast, is “playerless.” That means video clips play embedded in the Web page, and Flash developers can design their own interfaces and determine their own buffers and other technical settings.
The last paragraph really sets Flash up as a double-edged sword. It has low visibility as a plugin, but the lack of interface (which could easily be as unobtrusive as the plugin) is a real problem. I cannot believe Flash has been out for so long with its woefully inadequate movie controls.
I can rewind and play, but there is no pause functionality or any semblence to the controls that come with the likes of Windows Media Player, Quicktime, Real and even your domestic DVD and VCR players. Unless the developer has included a set of controls, if you missed something in a Flash movie, chances are you have to start all over again. I’ve lost count of the amount of times I had to start Homestar Runner clips from the beginning on my lunch break after being interrupted by my boss - my desire for a simple ‘pause’ button disappearing into oblivion. Breeze presentations, a new product for webcasting incorporating Flash technology, has these controls embedded into the Flash movie. Better, but still, how hard is it to give the Flash player a stock-standard set of movie controls?
The CNET quote creates another problem: designer’s creating their own interfaces. This is bad news for users, who will now have to contend with a multitude of differing interfaces, all with minor variations, icons and nuances.
How long before Macromedia puts a simple movie control in with the Flash player? Maybe I’m missing something. Maybe it’s to do with potential inteference with timelining and action scripting. A fair point, but surely including a default control interface could at least be an optional feature when creating movies? Macromedia has code on its site for creating these controls, but it still baffles me as to why these aren’t a default feature bundled with the player as opposed to each SWF.
Jakob Nielsen touched on some of the issues raised here in his in his infamous 2000 rant “Flash: 99% Bad”. Macromedia later hired him as a consultant to improve Flash usability; so they must be aware of this problem.
Please someone tell me the incredibly obvious reason there aren’t bundled timeline controls in Flash - because I can’t understand its absence.
Found your site via Port80 and thought I’d have a read on what you’ve got here about Flash and its video capabilites…
Flash does actually have a Media Component with a default set of player controls like the ones you are after… but the catch - you need to have Flash MX 2004 Professional to “build” it… the basic version doesn’t come with it.
To show you the basic default Media Component in action you can see it here:
— Laith Brookes @ August 26th, 2005, 2:17 pmhttp://www.spiritofthewest.com.au/photogallery.html - there’s a couple of videos I did while working at PerthWeb.
Interesting Laith, thanks for passing that on. The video controls are still fairly primitive though - and a bit weird to use - but at least it’s there, even if it is only in the pro version.
— James @ August 29th, 2005, 11:56 amThe video controls on PRO 8, albeit primitive, are skinnable and hence customisable and extendable;
Now the question is should onus be laid on the designer / programmer to create movie player controls or should there be a standard?
— Dafin @ May 19th, 2006, 5:25 amDefinitely a standard — the more differing interfaces there are on the likes of YouTube, Google Video etc., the worse things are likely to get. Sure, you should be able to develop your own interface, but it’s really important to provide a usable and standard set of controls for anyone to use — so conventions can be developed, and hopefully followed.
— James @ June 11th, 2006, 7:45 am