After Effects API Zone

Passing the torch

2007-10-11T20:03:29Z

No more SDKs for me.

With the completion of the CS3 launch, I've moved full-time to my new responsibilities as Engineering Manager for (formerly) Serious Magic products (OnLocation, Ultra and Visual Communicator).

]]> Zac Lam, long-time API Engineer for Premiere Pro and the Adobe Media Encoder, will take over developer support for users of the SDK; the AE team and I will assist as necessary. Most of you know Zac already; I'm sure he'll do a wonderful job.

[Hard not to be a little melancholy, after all these years...]

My first SDK release was for After Effects 3.1, in 1998; first Windows release, and the Mac SDK still had 68k and PowerPC build configs. [sigh]

The After Effects team has treated my like family, and I'm glad to continue to work with them as Production Premium Suite-Mates™.

I've truly enjoyed working with you AE plug-in developers; the community spirit you've created is an inspiration.

Keep up the great work!

-bbb

CS3 SDKs live!

2007-07-20T22:53:58Z

Give them a try.

Such a long, long time...

2007-05-08T16:00:27Z

Sorry, folks. It's been too long since my last post.

There has been plenty of action on the AE API front, but all if it NDA'd. Now the public preview is up, and you can see for yourselves what the team has been up to.

Marvelous.

Okay, back to getting this suite out the door...

Is the opposite of locked down...locked up?

2006-11-02T17:50:54Z

Regardless of the answer to such philosophical questions, I wanted to fully endorse and support Apple's XCode 2.4.1 as a development environment for After Effects plug-ins.

Apple fixed the issues the After Effects team was having (and which were blocking me from using 2.4, and supporting you folks' usage of 2.4).

Onward and upward!

Not nearly so locked down

2006-10-20T16:06:45Z

Thanks to the efforts of the folks at Apple, it is now safe for After Effects developers to move to XCode 2.4.

Lock-down

2006-09-22T20:45:47Z

For the (completely hypothetical, you understand) next release of After Effects, we will NOT be moving to XCode 2.4, for a variety of reasons into which I will not publicly go. Suffice it to say: Known Issues™.

Stick with 2.3.

Europe again

2006-09-13T15:28:01Z

Yikes, has it really been a month?

Steve Warner (Director of Engineering for our group) and I just had a fantastic trip back to Stockholm for customer visits, and then to Amsterdam for the IBC trade show. I'm digging out of my inbox now, but I wanted to post to say "Thank You!" to the customers who spent time with us, and to the AE developers who made the IBC show worthwhile.

Sorry folks, didn't bring a camera or the family; more pictures soon!

Onward and upward

2006-08-15T18:43:02Z

For reasons which I won't elaborate, XCode 2.4.0 development of After Effects plug-ins is unsupported at this time.

Okay, chump...

2006-07-25T17:54:58Z

("Chump" is self-referential...) Kids are crazy for the blogging these days. What started as an effort to communicate items of interest to developers in a more timely fashion seems to have become something more. At least, based on the feedback I get, people seem to want it to be something more. They also seem to want discounted erectile dysfunction drugs at rock-bottom prices, and pictures of adventuresome poly-sexuals. But hey, one need at a time.

So, I'm going to start adding posts on development methodology, books and articles I've found helpful (not necessarily all code-related, but within the bounds of an corporate blog), and developer-related goings-on at Adobe. That, and pictures of my kid; can't change everything at once.

No one's posted any feedback about my quick start development guide, which could mean any number of things. I choose to hope it means you're all well into your own development processes, and don't have time to waste posting about it on some fool's blog. So, how about it; what books, articles, or general ideas help you get your Geek on? I'll start: http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/

SDK Jump-start

2006-07-12T17:20:08Z

Let me know if this helps.

Download file

Niggling issue w/new Mac SDK

2006-06-21T22:13:29Z

So, if you're developing on a MacIntel machine, and testing with AE 7.0, you'll need to add "PowerPC" to the architectures to build, in each sample project's settings.

Sorry.

Updated SDKs available

2006-06-19T16:12:13Z

Release 2 of the AE SDKs are now available:

http://partners.adobe.com/public/developer/aftereffects/devcenter.html

While there are still some rough edges, XCode 2.3 projects are provided for OS X, as are Visual Studio .NET 2005 projects on Windows.

In compliance with revenue recognition regulations, no new functionality is present in the updated SDKs.

I've received some feedback that posting irrelevant personal photos was distracting. I made sure that, in this irrelevant personal photo, I'm at least wearing an AE hat.

Know your audience

2006-05-24T20:50:33Z

It's tough to "aim" the After Effects SDK; it could be used for so many different things.

One could learn the rudiments of C or C++ based image processing, just fiddling around with the samples. One could learn about workflow automation just reading through the headers (AE_GeneralPlug.h would make most integration engineers' mouths water).

The SDK Guide could be a reference manual, a cookbook, a tutorial...

What do YOU hope to get out of the next After Effects SDK? Besides the XCode and .NET 2005 samples, I mean?

Hand-waving speculation

2006-05-09T16:02:44Z

Wouldn't an AEGP project diff tool be slick?

Back from Europe, back from NAB...

2006-04-27T20:01:25Z

Hullo!

Amsterdam and Stockholm were fabulous. Thanks to Jens, Nils & Peder for their offers of hospitality and assistance around Stockholm. I could visit Stockholm at one end of my IBC trip; let me know if you'd like to meet. I know this place that serves awesome reindeer...

___

My prediction of new SDKs containing XCode and .NET 2005 samples was overly-optimistic; the Jell-O is still setting. I'll let everyone know when they're up.

I quite enjoyed this year's NAB (my 9th); very pleasant this year. Adobe's booth looked wonderful, standing room only. The Plug-in Pavilion had traffic and the Adobe-adjacent position seemed ideal. Over the next month or so, I plan to meet with multiple Adobe VPs to discuss improvements to how we work with developers.

Your input is appreciated.

And now, the content that made me flag this with the "irrelevant" topic:

Noel:

Me, looking thoughtful (and furry):