With today, all content for SourceBinder and FlashFilterLab is has been moved to a brand new server. The old server was way too overloaded. This step is the first on the way to the SourceBinder public release. With the server transfer there might be things screwed up. If you encounter any weirdness please let us know.

The next step will be the private test of the new refactored redesigned flash-player-10-SourceBinder. This step will be due on the beginning of February.  We plan to invite some lucky people already on the waiting list for this event. Put a comment here if you would like to be there !

Till the new Binder is out, the current version of SourceBinder will be frozen. That means users (already invited) will not be able to make/save compositions and nodes.  Old compositions will be still available for viewing.

Along with the new SourceBinder release we are redesigning sourcebinder.org which will act as a community site and as the dashboard for the upcoming SourceBinder era.  The design is not final, but i will put it here, so you can have a look and make comments, suggestions on it.

Sourcebinder's new cloth

Although it could look as there would be not to much happening with SourceBinder these days, but i can ensure you: we are heavily working to get SourceBinder into public beta for February. In case you have missed it: SourceBinder will be introduced in Amsterdam on the FITC. And i can tell you we have a long long way to go. Currently the whole source code is going through a refactoring which was already quite necessary since it evolved from a prototype which we made for the Flashconference last year. But refactoring is a good opportunity to re-think the whole environment with interaction design and simplicity kept in mind. Hopefully i can make a post soon on the new killer feature which is to simplify the quite difficult task of putting together compositions.

To keep you patient while waiting to lay hands on our shiny thing i made a composition public which i made using the cool Flint particle library and of course Papervision. Flint is really just ideal to be put into sourcebinder: there are so many classes to try out which a huge variety of settings. In this composition i made a little twist on a typical particle setup: the initial particle positions are derived from a DisplayObject3D-s vertex positions.

Spacetime composition

Click on the image to open the composition in preview mode.

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Working with a software that is in development state is a quite unpleasant thing to do. The lack of documentation, features changing from day to day, bugs on every corner and such things are the common attributes of development releases. As SourceBinder of course makes no exception from that, it makes it even more astonishing to see what some users get out of it. As a matter of fact there are only few better things to do, than to watch compositions that were made with our tool. And ever since we have invited the first few alpha users, there has been one guy who always manages to draw our attention with his compositions and that not only because of his commitment and enthusiasm. So this post goes to Stevie, and his dancing spheres composition. Keep it going mate!

Oh, before i forget! The tiny black window is our new feature to enable composition creators to choose any attribute that “makes” a composition. Those published attributes automaticaly appear in this control to enable the viewer to try out the unlimited variations one can get.

Sound visualization

This composition is so fun to play with, we will definitely make a directed movie out of it as soon as we get some dancer move for us again.  This cut was done in 2005 for a little experimental movie we have done with flashfilterlab. I will publish a link to the video as soon as i find it.

usage: mouse moves the camera, scroll wheel moves the dancer front/back

Click to open composition

Dear visitor, take this long chain made out of particles and try to tie a knot on it. The first who succeeds gets a free sourcebinder invitation immediately. Screen shots can be sent by email to our address.

The vertical mouse movement drives the amplitude of a low frequency oscillator (LFO) applied to the chain. The values coming from the LFO are used as an input for a queue wich defines the particle arrays particle position.

Particle chain

Here are two creative compositions, that were made in collaboration by our very first sourcbinder alpha users. The first one uses PV3D particles and the bitmap effect layer to create a “3d-blurred” dizzy particle field. The second uses sound3d to play and transform mp3 sound in space and a sound spectrum node with a cube array to visualize the sound.

Dizzy Particles

Sound Spectrum Visualisation

Making a carpet out of a simple plane is not as difficult as it seems. Just drive the plane through a modifier node and use an image stream as the modifier source. A video or the webcam footage will be perfect. The modifier node displaces the vertices by an offset calculated from the corresponding the pixel values of the mapped source image. The best result can be achieved with a white background and a dark object. Alternately you could also use an interactive sprite and convert it to a bitmap. If you have a webcam and you are in a bright room you have to check out the second composition.

Displacement with Video

Displacement with Webcam

I was so excited about And Zupko’s work with the new Papervision effect branch, i just had to give it a try in SourceBinder. You can try the compositions and play with the setting as usual (from now on) in explore mode. If you have a webcam you should connect the MovieMaterial node to the Sphere in the first composition. You can do that either by Alt clicking the MovieMaterial node and droping the line on the Sphere node or with the output connector of the same node. SourceBinder will aply the connection automaticaly on the material input of the sphere, because of its type. Have fun!

3DFx Layer on Webcam

3DFx Layer on Cube

While we are are still preparing for a public alpha we just decided to let our nice visitors also play with some composition. So we made an explore mode for SourceBinder which in fact is the environment but with only two features enabled: binding and adjusting. Be sure to doulbe click on one of the nodes in the compositions and try to play with the atribute values and of course watch the result in realtime.

Particles in a Sphere

Simple Earth