Dynamic Image Creation with Adobe AIR

We’ve put together a simple AIR application that allows you to load a SWF, select any class, and export a series of PNG or JPEG images. Potential uses for this tool range from photoshop-style batch image creation to randomized image painting ala Erik Natzke.

There’s a built in help section, but here’s a short video that outlines the basic idea:

Since I didn’t include a voiceover for this example, the basic steps involved are:

1. Export a custom class on an empty symbol.
2. Write logic to add a text field and draw a circle.
3. Publish SWF and load into the image encoder.
4. Create 20 PNG images in the “output” folder on the Desktop.

Extra notes on functionality:

1. The application attempts to pass in the current serial index to the constructor of the class you’ve chosen. This has a variety of uses, but is especially good for looking up array data, or directly populating a text field (as in the example above).
2. Even if you don’t declare a constructor parameter, the export will still run just fine. This makes it easy to see what any class will look like as an image, or to export a series of images from a Math.random-based visualization class.

The application is available for download here. If you have any questions or requests, post a comment and I’ll do my best to help out.