Adobe Animate

Adobe Animate

A screenshot of Adobe Flash Professional (now Adobe Animate) running on Windows
Original author(s) FutureWave Software
Macromedia
Developer(s) Adobe Systems
Stable release CC 2016 / February 8, 2016 (2016-02-08)
Written in C++
Operating system Windows, OS X
Platform x86
Available in English
Type Multimedia
License Trialware
Website adobe.com/products/animate.html

Adobe Animate (formerly Adobe Flash Professional) is a multimedia authoring and computer animation program developed by Adobe Systems.[1]

Animate is mostly used to design vector graphics and animation, and publish the same for television programs, online video, websites, web applications, rich internet applications, and video games. The program also offers support for raster graphics, rich text, audio and video embedding, and ActionScript scripting. Animations may be published for HTML5, WebGL, Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) animation and spritesheets, and legacy Flash Player (SWF) and Adobe AIR formats.[2]

It was first released in 1996 as FutureSplash Animator, and then renamed Macromedia Flash upon its acquisition by Macromedia. It was created to serve as the main authoring environment for the Adobe Flash platform, vector-based software for creating animated and interactive content. It was renamed Adobe Animate in 2016 to better reflect its market position then, since over a third of all content created in Animate uses HTML5.[3][2][4]

History

Adobe Flash Professional was the successor of a software product known as FutureSplash Animator, a vector graphics and vector animations program released in May 1996. FutureSplash Animator was developed by FutureWave Software, a small software company whose first product, SmartSketch, was a vector-based drawing program for pen-based computers. With the implosion of the pen-oriented operated systems, it was ported to Microsoft Windows as well as Apple Inc.'s Mac OS. In 1995, the company decided to add animation abilities to their product and to create a vector-based animation platform for World Wide Web; hence FutureSplash Animator was created. (At that time, the only way to deploy such animations on the web was through the use of Java.) The FutureSplash animation technology was used on several notable websites such as MSN, The Simpsons website and Disney Daily Blast of The Walt Disney Company.[5][6]

In December 1996, Macromedia bought FutureWave and so re-branded and released FutureSplash Animator as Macromedia Flash, a brand that continued for 8 major versions. Adobe Systems acquired Macromedia in 2005, and re-branded the product Adobe Flash Professional to distinguish from the player, Adobe Flash Player. It was included as part of the Creative Suite of products from CS3 to CS6, until Adobe phased out the Creative Suite lineup in favor of Creative Cloud (CC).

On December 1, 2015, Adobe announced that the program would be re-named Adobe Animate on its next major update. The move comes as part of an effort to disassociate the program from Adobe Flash Player, acknowledging its increased use for authoring HTML5 and video content, and an effort to begin discouraging the use of Flash Player in favor of web standards-based solutions.[7] The first version under the new name was released February 8, 2016.[1]

Versions

Release Year Icon Description
FutureSplash Animator 1996 Initial version of Flash with basic editing tools and a timeline
Macromedia Flash 1 1996
A re-branded version of the FutureSplash Animator
Macromedia Flash 2 1997
Released with Flash Player 2, new features included: the object library
Macromedia Flash 3 1998
Released with Flash Player 3, new features included: the movieclip element, JavaScript plug-in integration, transparency and an external stand alone player
Macromedia Flash 4 1999
Released with Flash Player 4, new features included: internal variables, an input field, advanced ActionScript, and streaming MP3
Macromedia Flash 5 2000
Released with Flash Player 5, new features included: ActionScript 1.0 (based on ECMAScript, making it very similar to JavaScript in syntax), XML support, Smartclips (the precursor to components in Flash), HTML text formatting added for dynamic text
Macromedia Flash MX (6) 2002
Released with Flash Player 6, new features included: a video codec (Sorenson Spark), Unicode, v1 UI Components, compression, ActionScript vector drawing API
Macromedia Flash MX 2004 (7) 2003
Released with Flash Player 7, new features included: Actionscript 2.0 (which enabled an object-oriented programming model for Flash, although it lacked the Script assist function of other versions, meaning Actionscript could only be typed out manually), behaviors, extensibility layer (JSAPI), alias text support, timeline effects. Macromedia Flash MX Professional 2004 included all Flash MX 2004 features, plus: Screens (forms for non-linear state-based development and slides for organizing content in a linear slide format like PowerPoint), web services integration, video import wizard, Media Playback components (which encapsulate a complete MP3 and/or FLV player in a component that may be placed in an SWF), Data components (DataSet, XMLConnector, WebServicesConnector, XUpdateResolver, etc.) and data binding APIs, the Project Panel, v2 UI components, and Transition class libraries.
Macromedia Flash 8 2005
Released with Flash Player 8, this version of the product has limited support for video and advanced graphical and animation effects. Macromedia Flash Professional 8 added features focused on expressiveness, quality, video, and mobile authoring. New features included Filters and blend modes, easing control for animation, enhanced stroke properties (caps and joins), object-based drawing mode, run-time bitmap caching, FlashType advanced anti-aliasing for text, On2 VP6 advanced video codec, support for alpha transparency in video, a stand-alone encoder and advanced video importer, cue point support in FLV files, an advanced video playback component, and an interactive mobile device emulator. Macromedia Flash Basic 8, a less feature-rich version of the Flash authoring tool targeted new users who only wanted to do basic drawing, animation, and interactivity.
Adobe Flash CS3 (9) Professional 2007
Flash CS3 is the first version of Flash released under the Adobe name. CS3 features full support for ActionScript 3.0, allows entire applications to be converted into ActionScript, adds better integration with other Adobe products such as Adobe Photoshop, and also provides better Vector drawing behavior, becoming more like Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Fireworks.
Adobe Flash CS4 (10) Professional 2008
Contains inverse kinematics (bones), basic 3D object manipulation, object-based animation, a text engine, and further expansions to ActionScript 3.0. CS4 allows the developer to create animations with many features absent in prior versions.
Adobe Flash Professional CS5 (11) 2010
Flash CS5 was released on April 12, 2010 and launched for trialling and normal buying on April 30, 2010. Flash CS5 Professional includes support for publishing iPhone applications.[8] However, on April 8, 2010 Apple changed the terms of its Developer License to effectively ban the use of the Flash-to-iPhone compiler[9] and on April 20, 2010 Adobe announced that they will be making no additional investments in targeting the iPhone and iPad in Flash CS5.[10]

Other features of Flash CS5 are a new text engine (TLF), further improvement to inverse kinematics, and the Code Snippets panel. [11]

Adobe Flash Professional CS5.5 (11.5) 2011
Flash Professional CS5.5 was released in 2011. It includes improved support for publishing iPhone applications, following Apple's revision of their iOS developer terms. Flash CS5.5 also contains several features to improve mobile app workflows across devices. Some examples are: Content scaling and stage resizing, copy and paste layers, sharing symbols across FLA files, symbol rasterization, incremental compilation, auto-save and file recovery, and integration with CS Live online services.
Adobe Flash Professional CS6 (12) 2012
Adobe Flash Professional CS6 was released in 2012. It includes support for publishing files as HTML5 and generating sprite sheets.[12]
Adobe Flash Professional CC (13) 2013
Flash Professional CC was released in June 2013 as part of Adobe's Creative Cloud rebrand. Changes include a native 64-bit scene rendering engine, minor performance improvements and bug fixes, and the removal of legacy features such as ActionScript 2 support. As part of the Creative Cloud suite, Flash CC also offers users the ability to synchronize settings or save files online.
Adobe Flash Professional CC (2014) 2014
Flash Professional CC (2014) was released on June 18, 2014. It includes new features such as variable-width strokes, SVG export, and WebGL publishing for animations, as well as an improved, redesigned Motion Editor.
Adobe Flash Professional CC (2014.1) 2014
Flash Professional CC (2014.1) was released on October 6, 2014, featuring expanded WebGL publishing abilities, freedom to create custom brushes, and the ability to import external SWFs. Also, a new software development kit (SDK) enables extensibility for custom platforms without depending on the Flash runtime, to reach more viewers.
Adobe Flash Professional CC (2015) 2015
Flash Professional CC (2015) was released on June 15, 2015, featuring Lifelike animation with the Bone tool, import H.264 videos with audio, export bitmaps as spritesheet for HTML5 Canvas, brush scaling with stage zoom, universal document type converter, improved audio workflows, improved Motion Editor, panel locking, code snippet support for WebGL, enhancements in Custom Platform Support SDK, integration of latest Flash Player (version 17.0), AIR SDK (version 17.0) and CreateJS libraries, save optimizations, auto-recovery optimizations, organize imported GIFs in library, library search by linkage name, invert selection, paste and overwrite frames and reset timeline zoom to the default level.
Adobe Animate CC (2016) 2016 Adobe Stock integration, 4K resolution video export, Creative Cloud Libraries support, TypeKit integration.[1]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Lardinois, Frederic (2016-02-09). "Adobe Launches Animate CC, Previously Known As Flash Professional". TechCrunch.
  2. 1 2 Flash is Dead, Long Live Adobe Animate CC, Benjie Moss, Dec. 1, 2015, WebDesignerDepot
  3. ↑ Shankland, Stephen (2015-12-02). "The death of Adobe's Flash is lingering, not sudden". CNet.
  4. ↑ Adobe releases Flash Professional successor Animate CC, Harrison Weber, Feb 8 2016, VentureBeat
  5. ↑ Gay, Jonathan. "The History of Flash: The Dawn of Web Animation". Adobe Systems. Retrieved 2011-11-12.
  6. ↑ "The Flash History". flashmagazine.com. Retrieved 2011-11-12.
  7. ↑ "Adobe bows to HTML5 and renames its Flash Professional app". Engadget. AOL. Retrieved 1 December 2015.
  8. ↑ "Adobe Labs — Adobe Flash Professional CS5: Applications for iPhone". Adobe. Archived from the original on 13 March 2010. Retrieved 2010-03-02.
  9. ↑ "New iPhone Developer Agreement Bans the Use of Adobe’s Flash-to-iPhone Compiler". Daring Fireball. Archived from the original on 30 April 2010. Retrieved 2010-04-22.
  10. ↑ "On Adobe, Flash CS5 and iPhone Applications". Mike Chambers. Archived from the original on 22 April 2010. Retrieved 2010-04-22.
  11. ↑ Apple Inc. modified terms & conditions for developers in the app store. Adobe is developing again for iPhone and iPad CS5
  12. ↑ "Flash Professional CS6 Features". Adobe. Retrieved 2012-09-23.

External links

Motion graphics and animation software
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