Actionscript Video Color Sampler Experiment
18.04.07 @ 8:46 amA while back, I came across an art project that put a translucent grid over public LCD monitors in New York. I was very attracted to the constantly changing abstract grid of colors - the whole idea was very clever and well-executed. Soon afterward, I thought it would be a fun experiment (albeit much less cool) to do the same thing in Flash with video. A few hours later, I had made a pretty cool system for sampling and averaging colors within a specified area. The final code was quite flexible - allowing for some very interesting representations. Below is the most simple form - I will be tidying up the code, converting it to AS3 and do a much more thorough writeup on it. Still, I thought it would be fun to show off the preliminary version.
The SWF below has a video to the left and its sampled grid to the right. Just press the play button and enjoy.
As I said, this is the most simple execution of this technique and (in my opinion) the least interesting. Still, I think it is the clearest example of what the sampler does. As expected, this technique is not relegated to video and can sample any bitmap, movieclip, sprite or display object that Flash has. I can think of many different applications to this technique - it really is fun to play with. I will be cleaning up the code and releasing it by next week most likely. Until then, enjoy the sample.
abstract, actionscript, art, code, color, creative, experiment, flash, motion, programming, sample, sampler, video visualization
April 18th, 2007 at 9:10 am
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VERY cool, as is your Comment Love idea.
April 18th, 2007 at 6:07 pm
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This is sweet, dude! I can’t wait for the code.
It might be fun to make a Firefox plug-in or Greasemonkey script to do this to all images and videos in the browser. Hmmmm…
April 20th, 2007 at 9:06 am
Thanks for the feedback folks - and thanks for the inspiration Jason.
April 22nd, 2007 at 2:25 pm
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I love that guys work, good idea to flash-ify it.
Would be cool if you posted up the code soon, I’ve a fancy idea for using that for a gig projection that could be fun.
May 17th, 2007 at 6:33 am
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dude, this is the best random video of all time!!!!
June 25th, 2007 at 1:51 am
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great. would ya like to send me the sourcecode?
thx
June 25th, 2007 at 9:30 am
Fabian - Surely. You can fine the source here.
April 13th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
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So cool dude. Any chance we could see the AS2 code?