Flash 8

Draftlight is a core supporter of Flash 8 for Web design and content delivery. Over 95% of web users have a Flash player installed, and the ability of Flash 8 to deliver complex realtime graphical filters, sound and video, 3D motion simulation, server communication and security makes it a surefire winner. Adobe have now made Flash Player 9 available for the main platforms, enabling development programmers including Draftlight to deliver content written using the new Actionscript 3.0 language and lighting-fast new AS3 virtual machine. Over the coming months we will be showcasing some of the new potential of Flash 9 on this website and others.

The problem of course is that many of those 95% have an older version of the player, and so can't see Flash 8 content to the full extent. We are confident that Flash 8 rollout is a win-win situation, and so deliberately try to push the visitors to our sites into upgrading to the new free player. Apart from being able to see the advanced content created for our clients, the new player provides automatic updates for future versions. Hundreds of millions of users are already using Flash on a daily basis, and the software is entirely safe. We hope that our visitors agree, and with all our clients' websites being converted to Flash 8, joining the fun is easy, fast and well worth it!

Our website header is created in Flash 8, using techniques only possible in the latest version. It has no stored images - everything you see is created programatically. Rendering a 3D panorama has been possible for a while, but with the introduction of the BitmapData class we can finally run the system on a normal computer at a reasonable speed! Developments for the next generation of players enhance this ability, as the driving force for Flash 9 was to make the player as fast as possible. Flash can generate stunning effects from tiny files, now the challenge is to stop it taking over all your memory!

Flash is not all about high-speed connections, massive downloads and movie trailers (though our full-screen video sites are only possible with Flash 8) - it is also about delivery to other platforms. We design sites for cellphones, PDA and handheld devices - many of these also leverage the reliability and speed of Flash Lite, which is also undergoing a dramatic upgrade in the Flash 9 IDE.