Flash iTunes Cover Flow Version 2 - Free and Open Source

So, people have been commenting a lot on the iTunes Cover Flow. Mostly they are good comments, but there were a few suggestions. I made one suggestion that seemed to make sense and was very easy to implement.

New Feature:

-Link based on XML for the Artist and the Album. If no link is given then the button is disabled.

-Link is placed on the actual text of the Artist and Album name.

Have fun and make it better.

Coverflow

UPDATE: NEW Flash 10 Coverflow. It is recommended that you use this new version as it will preform better.

Example:
Example

Source Files:
Download Flash Coverflow AS2 - CS3 (758772)
Download Flash Coverflow AS2 - Flash 8 (566985)

Please send me your improvements or modifications and I would be happy to put them up to help everyone else and I will attribute it to you and give you a link.
Remember this code is Open Source so please use, improve and share.
This code is under the MIT License.

Note: If the images are not showing up for you and you are pulling the images from a different server than the flash piece is being served from than you need to use a crossdomain.xml file to allow the flash piece to read from the remote server. This is a flash security feature and the only alternative to this is using a proxy page (as far as I am aware of). Read More

If you are experiencing a flickering on your images make sure to use the latest version.

Transparent PNG images are now supported.

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to post because there are a lot of nice people who will love to help.
Good luck!

-Stephen

Darius

I am trying to use some nice Transparent 24 bit PNG files of CD's for some of
my iTunes music artwork. The png files insert properly into iTunes, but the
next time I open iTunes, the files are no longer die cut and partially transparent,
instead they are on a white box background? I thought iTunes supported .png
files with transparency masks?

Any suggestions?

Stephen Weber

In order to use transparent PNGs you need to modify the code. You can find how to change it in the comments.

Darius

Can you walk a newbie like me through this procedure please. I see where you are
somehow editing the resources like we used to years ago in OS 9 or earlier, but
how are you doing this. I am using Mac Intel Tower, Running latest Leopard, not
Snow, and using latest iTunes. Will iTunes allow me to update in the future and
if it does update, will I have to go make this patch every time it updates ??

georgedelajungla

hello!

Thanks for your SUPERGREAT job and share with the rest of the world.

Everything work perfect but when I load from a main swf like: this.reference_clips.loadMovie("iTunesAlbumArt.swf");

The cover is not in the center and even don't disappear on the right....

Any help? I really appreciate....

Good lluck!

macluver

Is it possible to have the reflection fade down? I've been searching through the code for somewhere to adjust this, but haven't found anything relevant. Thanks fer da help!

CS

Where am I supposed to add the link, and how would the link script be??? In the file albuminfo or something else???

JohnnyFever

Awesome code. I have made several modifications and it's working great. However, I changed something in the code that now causes the scrollbar to jump 2 - 4 images every time I push the scrollbar arrows. So instead of the arrow jumping to the next image (album) it will jump a few. I feel like an idiot but any help on this would be much appreciated.

a guest

Fab code, thank you for sharing - have tweaked it to my liking... except that when I click on an image to bring to the centre, it quickly flips to the next image and I can't seem to find a way to change this. Is there a variable for this that I've overlooked, or do I need to add some kind of 'delay' script? (Actionscript first-timer!)

kieranbell9

Hey Stephen - great code and good work to make it open source - a very clever way to give your company global exposure!

A quick question - I cant get the .swf to work on my website. I have uploaded all files assets (images, .xml, html, swf, js) but i just get 'cannot load XML data' error message online - I am bemused (or possibly being dumb!) the movie works great locally and I have uploaded all the assets to a folder on my ftp - its as if the swf is trying to reference c: drive files, even online. Can I change this somehwere?? I have looked at the code and cant sem to pin it down - hope someone out there can help me!!

Stephen Weber

Are all the assets relative to the HTML hosting the SWF?
Check the XML path, make sure its appropriate for your file structure.
Also check out the new Flash Coverflow made in Flash 10 for better preformance.

kieranbell9

thank you sir - I will investigate further. As for checking the paths, I can see in the de-bugger that there is a reference to my c:drive, but this appears to be the location of the.fla file, besides which its ghosted out.

All the assets on my desktop have been placed in my ftp (in their own folder), so I am unsure as why is cant seem to work it out

Finally - I only have flash cs3 and it can open v10? i get an error meassage...(using a pc if thats the reason..)

Thanks for the quick reply...

Kieran

Stephen Weber

Yeah sounds like the paths need to be changed.

You need Flash CS4 for Flash 10.

Stephen Weber

Yeah sounds like the paths need to be changed.

You need Flash CS4 for Flash 10.

Hondo311

This is great!

How can we make this loop? For instance, instead of the current image moving to the left when you click the second image, how about the first image goes to the back of the line? So basically what you see is always the current image and a line of images to the left of it?

wk9876

who have the Flash iTunes Cover Flow (AS3 version)? if someone have, could you mind send it to me~~ email wk9876@yahoo.com.hk thanks~~~

Fabien

Merci! Thanks a lot! Good job!

sauce

How can i put two of this in only one page???

Tony

I dunno if it's possible. I looked at the ActionScript for atleast half an hour and was wondering.... is it possible to put more than 50 Album Covers on there?

Stephen Weber

I wouldn't recommend it. Take a look at the new version using Flash 10. It will preform a lot better and get your closer to 50. Maybe do some paging.

http://www.weberdesignlabs.com/blog/2009/12/fla...

alexdobert

How can make all the cover flow elements disappear? When I click on a button, I go to another frame of the timeline and all the art is still there. Is the an unloadMovie() script I need to add? Please help.

Mike (Fr)

Hello everybody,

I have so much latency when i try to "sort by" all the comments in way to find my answer (and i'm sure mines is on the 1362 :-) ).

I'm just wondering how i can add a link on my image/cover (the same link than i put on the title). Anyone can help me?

Best Regards.

Stephen Weber

A quick and easy way would be to put a movieclip on top of the area of the coverflow and just set the onRelease to go to the current selected link.

David

On the angled covers, any horizontal lines are kinked and distorted, and doesnt look very good. Is there a way around this?

alexdobert

Sorry to say,a and I have been searching, but I could not make the "cover" image transparent. I save it as a PNG with transparency, and it just shows a white square where it should be transparent. Please tell me what I am doing wrong.

Lengen1971

Hi,
to use PNGs with transparency in as2 version change the following lines (near line 530):
root["_bmd" + this.number] = new BitmapData(target._width, target._height);
root["_ref" + this.number] = new BitmapData(target._width, target._height);
to:
root["_bmd" + this.number] = new BitmapData(target._width, target._height,true,0x000000);
root["_ref" + this.number] = new BitmapData(target._width, target._height,true,0x000000);

w/regardw

Stephen Weber

Handling transparent PNGs is not a function in this version. You would have to add the ability to make it transparent. I would recommend checking out the new Flash 10 version: http://www.weberdesignlabs.com/blog/2009/12/fla...

alexdobert

Ahhh.... gotcha. Thank you. Unfortunately I am including it in a site that was built in AS2, so I can not use the AS3 version. Thanks again for the help.

Sebastian

Is it possible to have the XML file as a parameter instead of hardcoded in the fla/swf files ?

I'm not a hardcore AS programmer, but a few hints would be nice, if it's not a out-of-the-box feature.

abdulkaleem

If i increase the width to 940px the center image is getting left padding. how do i get rid of it?

Jeremy

I am trying to embed the flash file in PowerPoint. The problem is I have to specify the location of the flash file, and that points to the XML and image files. If I hand this off to other users, the file locations do not exist on their computers. Is there a way to package the SWF file along with the XML file and image files in one file that I can then embed in the PowerPoint, thus enabling me to save the PowerPoint as a PowerPoint show with the image slider embedded in it and no longer needing to point to all of the external files?

rojan123

I like your horizontal cover flow.But I want to create vertical cover flow in same swing

saira17

it is good but hou i ad links over the image on second click can you plz help me

jimvvc

Excellent piece of work - if I wish to increase the width of the document to 994 px how do I get the album covers to centralise?

Guest

Brilliant piece of work!

Does anyone know how I change the background colour of the reflected covers - they still fade to black yet I have changed this part: var reflectionBackgroundColour:Number = 0xFFFFFF;

UnR3aL

Hi,
I tried to put it in the center of the page: I set on "Publish setting" for HTML "Dimensions: Percent 100 x 100" and "Flash alignments: Center Center".
I set also "var centerX:Number = Stage.width / 2;".
The scrollbar is in the correct position at the center of the stage, but the covers are not at the center. The same thing happens for the Flash 10 version. What is wrong?

Avir

hi
first - great work!!! thank you very much
I have a very limited knowledge if flash, but I was wandering if it is possible, in the autoplay mode, to stop the scroll with mouseover on the cover and the text.

Help will be very much appreciate

cliff

I'm having issue displaying PNGs whereby the artwork showed have no transparency? Any help?

cliffpruitt

** Won't Display First Thumbnail Bug - Solved(?) **
Some of us that need to use the cover flow in situations where there may be only 1 or 2 thumbnails have seen that anything less than 4 thumbnails results in the first thumbnail being missing. Actually this has nothing to do with the number but rather has to do with the calculated x position of that final (frontmost) thumbnail. It's comparing that thumbnail's position against the variable:

deleteMaxDistance

which as far as I can tell does pretty much nothing. At least not enough to cause problems that I can see. So if you're still on the AS2 version (havent checked for this bug in the new AS3/FL10 version) here's your fix:

Change line 18 from:
var deleteMaxDistance:Number = Stage.width;

to:
var deleteMaxDistance:Number = 10; // 10 or any small number will work

Should work fine.

Tom

hy many thanks for this great coverflow!!!

Is there any posibility to show "Umlaute" like äÄüÜöÖ! I have tried many different ways, but whenever i filled my xml with äÄöÖüÜ no one of these letters appears in the outputfile?

I hope someone can help me :-)

easynow

You need to edit the flash file and change the font that is being used to one that has the umlautes etc.

Flash iTunes Cover Flow – Version 2