Avatar Core 0.2.0

Avatar Core version 0.2.0 (beta) is now available on through svn on the project page. The API documentation has also been updated. The release notes for 0.2.0:

=== 0.2.0 (August 28, 2009) ===

There have been a number of new API changes, as well as a reworking
of how parenting is handled. The new approach allows Constrain behaviors
to work better with parenting. In addition some rendering changes have
been made that change the effects of parent transforms on their children.

- Added Viewport.resetContent()
- Added a padding parameter to Viewport.fitContent()
- Added ThumbnailArtSprite class
- Added SourceLoaderSprite class as a base class for ArtSprite and
ThumbnailArtSprite
- Renamed AvatarArt to AvatarDisplay to prevent confusion with with the
Art/ArtSprite classes
- ArtSprites no longer redraw themselves (i.e. their feature) when their
feature property is set. This was creating many more calls to draw() than
was necessary, though may require additional manual calls for updates
- Scaling a parent feature no longer scales its children; child position,
however, is still affected by scale
- Renamed Transform to Adjust to prevent confusion with flash.geom.Transform
- Instead of mirroring features with a negative scale, flipX and flipY
properties have been added to the Adjust (Transform) class
- Fixed a bug in Adjust.add and Adjust.subtract where x and y were flipped
- Renamed "update"-related API in Feature and Avatar to "redraw"
- Changed parent-related API in Feature (removed getParentFeature, added
parent, [internal]parentCount, [internal]updateParent)
- Features are no longer hidden if their parent cannot be found. They are
instead left visible and treated as though they have no parent
- Added Feature.getConcatenatedParentMatrix()
- Added Avatar.updateParentHierarchy(). This is called frequently through
other APIs but may be necessary to call to make sure the parent
hierarchy of an avatar is accurate
- Added getDefaultPropertiesInXML to IXMLWritable, helping to reduce the
inclusion of default values in generated XML
- Range class now has a steps property
- Separated Constrain.position (Rect) to Constrain.x (Range) and
Constrain.y (Range)
- Removed Rect class (was only used by Constrain before)
- Constrain uses its Ranges' steps, if provided, to apply stepping
to constrained values
- Constrain is now applied to feature adjusts (transforms) rather than
directly to art sprites to allow child adjusts to honor the
constrain
- Added Constrain.name, making it more convenient to access Constrain
behaviors in a feature
- Other minor bug fixes

Complete ReleaseNotes.txt.

The wiki pages, demos, and non-svn downloads still need to be updated. I'll try to get to those in the next couple of days.

Avatar Core 0.0.5 Beta

A new release of Avatar Core is now available. This release is 0.0.5 beta. I figured it's far enough along now to take it out of alpha and bring it into beta, though I'll have to admit that kind of identification is fairly arbitrary (just look at how long Google tools remain in beta...).



For anyone wanting to keep track of project updates, I'd suggest not following this blog but instead keeping an eye on the Avatar Core project feeds of which there are a number to keep an eye on. I'll probably only update this blog moving forward with major releases or otherwise notably important news.

Next on my things to do is work on documentation. The API has already been updated, but I want to include better descriptions and getting started information on the wiki. Currently, a lot of the content there is no longer accurate.

Avatar Core 0.0.3

Avatar Core 0.0.3 is now available from the Avatar Core Project Page. The same structure of the framework remains mostly the same, though a lot of the API has changed. A lot of this is a result from the increased focus on allowing Avatar's to be able to be self-contained, without needing a library to link to. Currently, this does introduce a problem with some features of the framework (which will have to be figured out in the next release), but I think overall it's for the best.

The live demo has also been updated (and can be downloaded, with the framework, from the downloads page).

More information about this release can be found in the release notes.

Avatar Core 0.0.2 Download Update

For anyone not wanting to mess with SVN on google code, I've added a download of the demo in the downloads page that includes the demo with the full framework source code. This will give you the necessary files to compile the sample right out of the box, or at least get you the full framework source code in one download without SVN.

FYI, the demo was created with Flash CS4. However, all source code is in external .as files, so you could easily recreate the FLA files in CS3 if you have that using the AS files as document classes for their respective FLAs. You can see a live demo here.

Keep in mind its still early, and changes may yet be made to the framework resulting in changes in functionality and/or API.

Avatar Core 0.0.2

Avatar Core 0.0.2 source code has been uploaded to the project on google code. More information on the changes can be found in the release notes. I'll try to get some more info on the wiki and a sample application in the downloads section a little later.

Custom Avatar Editor Solutions

While its great that My Avatar Editor is open source and available for anyone to download, use, and/or modify at will, the solution it provides is primarily targeted towards recreating the Mii channel editor on the Nintendo Wii. The approach to the application's design and how it works with data makes it a little difficult to repurpose the editor for other situations. Before releasing My Avatar Editor, I did my best to make it easier to change that, but in the end, it didn't make too much difference.

Realizing this, I thought it would be a good idea to create a more generalized framework for developers that could be easily manipulated to match various requirements - this especially with the recent interest the My Avatar Editor source. And last week I started doing exactly that.


So far so good.

What I have, which is very limited, can produce some simple results on the avatar definition side of things, but sadly (I think), I may have made the process more difficult than it needed to be. In a way this is good because it means more features and flexibility, but it's also not very good in the fact that if people really want to use this thing, they're going to have to be able to understand it. I can say, however, that because I was using My Avatar Editor as a model, I'm pretty sure that this new framework could be used to easily and completely recreate My Avatar Editor from scratch. And hopefully its flexible enough to be extended to do much more.

A run-down of the features and what makes it so complicated (and, really, it's not that bad, I mean I've only been working on it in my spare time for a couple of days ;) includes:

• Constraints for avatar features including position, scale, and rotation
• Control over feature arrangement, including having one feature consist of multiple visual assets that can exist both above and below other features at the same time
  
• Feature-specific color transformation groups
• Everything defined in a flexible XML format

The last bullet point I think is the most important one, and really the others revolve around that. The importance here is that anyone can completely define avatar features in XML - not just the avatar itself (though it is also defined in XML) - but the actual features that are possible for the avatar to use and what they look like. These collections of features are known as a library, and you could potentially swap out libraries with each other to completely change an avatar visually without modifying its internal definition. And because they're all managed by XML, they can be easily changed outside of the context of the actual editor/avatar viewer applications.

Ok, ok, ok. You want to see where it's at right now? I wasn't going to show anything, but since I talked so much about it, you're probably curious. Ready? Here's an avatar it can show on the screen now:



WOWEE! I know you're floored. Maybe more interesting is the XML used to define this. You can find that here. Of course keep in mind that all of this is subject to change.

The idea is to hopefully release this along side My Avatar Editor as open source under MIT. I have a lot more work to do, and my day job has me busy at the moment, but I'll continue to post updates to the project on this blog. Also, as you might have guessed, the target platform is Adobe Flash Player, though I will not be targeting Flash Player 10 specifically as I did with My Avatar Editor. I'll be making this one also Flash Player 9 compatible.

MAE Source is now live!

Its up, and hopefully it will compile ;)
http://code.google.com/p/myavatareditor/

Additional information can be found at
http://www.myavatareditor.com/download.html
and
http://www.myavatareditor.com/developers.html

My Avatar Editor SWF Files Posted

I've pretty much wrapped up the Developers page and have posted the latest My Avatar Editor SWF files in the Download section of the site. These SWF files are what you would need to put My Avatar Editor on your own personal web page should you want to use it there. Included in the developers page are APIs and samples of how you can interact with the SWF files with additional scripting, either via JavaScript or with another wrapper SWF using ActionScript.
JS Example | AS Example.

The full source files have not yet been posted. However, it's mostly a matter of me gathering the files together and writing up a README, etc. That could possibly happen as early as tonight, but more likely sometime tomorrow. I'll create a new blog post when that happens.

My Avatar Editor RC 1 + AIR Deskop Application

Release Candidate 1 for My Avatar Editor is now online (same link as before). Included is an installer for the Desktop version of the editor (built using Adobe AIR). The desktop version supports the associated file types .mae and .mii, drag and drop, and... well, really, that's about it :) Everything else the web version can also do.

Changes include, but are not limited to:

• AIR implementation updated for Flash Player 10/AIR 1.5
• Favorite Color selection now updates when a new character is loaded or randomly generated
  
• Legacy XML parser should now be fixed, allowing loading of older-style XML
• New XML format has been finalized (?)
  
• The assets loaded by the editor (the "character") can be displayed by itself (demo; similar examples were made before but required another wrapper)
  
• Remembered character data has changed to allow multiple Flash SWFs to use the same data (editor and character) so when you load the editor for the first time for RC1 it should show the default boy instead of your last character; this will only happen once and your character will be remembered from this point forward
  
• File menu button now at the end of the tabs at the bottom of the screen rather than being in the "General" tab
• Layout for the image export screen has changed
• You can now zoom in twice as much as you could before in the image export screen
  
• More code refactoring...

Check for issues, report any problems. This will likely be, or be close to, the final released version of the editor as it would appear on the main website... which I have yet to make.

Concerning the XML, I've decided to leave it alone. The idea of mapping the colors to hex codes kind of made sense for making it extensible, but the values can just as easily be checked for length or prefix to determine what they are specifically indicating (id value or actual color). Not confusing the real data any more than is necessary seems preferred.

In terms of releasing the source, I have some documentation I still want to complete before that happens, not to mention making sure there aren't any more issues to contend with. It'll be soon, though.

Down but not out

In case you've been worried, My Avatar Editor has not been forgotten. I have been slowly fixing things, reorganizing code, (removing any references to Mii or Nintendo) and getting it ready for release.

Originally there were a couple of version blockers that stalled me, i.e. waiting for Flash Player 10 to release, then waiting for AIR to support Flash Player 10. Then I just got caught up with work and other things that just kept me from coming back to MAE, but I've finally been able to work on the editor some more bringing it closer to release.

And what does release mean? It means hopefully 1) myavatareditor.com will have the editor up and running, and 2) the SWF and all its source files will be available for download by anyone who wants them. This will allow you to edit, modify, enhance, or customize the editor any way you see fit (legally, unlike my original mistake) for personal or professional use. Currently, I see the licence being MIT.