Adobe Systems has announced the latest update for Adobe Flash Player 9 software, code-named Moviestar, which includes H.264 standard video support — the same standard deployed in Blu-ray and HD-DVD video players — and High Efficiency AAC (HE-AAC) audio support, as well as hardware accelerated, multicore enhanced full-screen video playback. These advancements will enable the delivery of HDTV quality video and premium audio content through the Adobe Flash Player and pave the way to expand rich media Flash experiences on the desktop and H.264-ready consumer devices. The latest update for Adobe Flash Player 9 is available in a beta version for immediate download from Adobe Labs at labs.adobe.com.
With H.264 encoding already available in Adobe Premiere Pro and Adobe After Effects software, H.264 playback is now enabled in Adobe Flash Player, which will be supported by the Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) system and applications developed with Adobe AIR software, including Adobe Media Player. Adobe AIR is a cross-operating system application that enables developers to use their existing skills to build and deploy rich Internet applications to the desktop.
Adobe Flash Player content reaches more than 98 percent of Internet-enabled desktops, as well as a wide range of devices. Content developers can reduce the cost of encoding and preparing data for distribution with H.264 and HE-AAC support in Adobe Flash Player, because these standards are already integrated into their existing authoring workflows. In addition, Adobe is working with an ecosystem of video encoding partners to expand rich media Flash experiences that already support these standards.
The final release is expected to be available via update in the fall. Demonstrations of Adobe Flash Media Server and Adobe Flash Media Encoder supporting the new codecs will be held during IBC2007 at the RAI Exhibition Center in Amsterdam, Sept. 7-11 (Stand 7.721), and again at the Adobe MAX conference in Chicago, which begins Sept. 30.
For more information, visit www.adobe.com.
