Joseph Labrecque will be speaking at FITC Unconference at Adobe MAX about existing UX paradigms for Android, iOS, and QNX, the importance of adhering to user expectations through these constructs, and circumstances when deviation may be appropriate. Joseph took the time to answer a few of our questions so FITC fans and followers could get to know him a little better leading up to the event. Meet Joseph Labrecque…

What are you passionate about?
Whatever I’m currently working on at a given time. I tend to get very focused… for good or bad, and while this allows me to work hard and fast on the project at hand, it is problematic for other things going on around me! For instance, there always seems to be a point towards the end of any project where I feel this overwhelming urgency to complete it, although no real urgency exists aside from my own perspective… it’s a bit ridiculous. A major goal of mine for the coming year is to try and become more balanced in these areas. I don’t think this means less passion for my work but a more manageable sense of need, overall.

In a more terrestrial sense, I’m very passionate about the Flash Platform and the community around it! Such a great group of people doing just awesome stuff with great tools – it’s really incredible. The fact that so many of these individuals branch out into other platforms and technologies (sometimes to augment their Flash skills and at other times to simply learn something new and different) just shows what a diverse and accepting group of people are involved in it all on some level. I’m inspired every day by those I surround myself with and they certainly feed my passion for Flash and the wider set of technologies being used today. We live in amazing times and should never lose sight of that!

What personal projects are you working on?
I normally have a couple of projects I’m working on at any one time outside of my day job. Some are more personal than others but they are all beyond the span of my regular duties. As such, I find the acquisition of effective time management techniques to be an increasingly difficult aspiration.

For the past year, I’ve been doing a lot of writing and video tutorials. In June, my first book, Flash Development for Android Cookbook, was published by Packt. It contains over 90 recipes for getting started in mobile application development with Flash, Flex, and AIR and most of the examples are done in pure AS3 – making them applicable to integrate into really any IDE or framework. I also have two eBooks currently nearing completion for O’Reilly: What’s New in Flash Player 11 and What’s New in AIR 3. These should provide solid quickstarts for those getting up to speed with the new runtimes with comprehensive explanations and code examples. I’m just finishing them up now and they’ll be in the publisher’s hands by Adobe MAX.

I also have a title out for Peachpit/Adobe Press which was co-authored with Peter Elst. It’s a set of video tutorials on DVD with a small book called Mobile Development with Adobe Flash Professional CS5.5 and Flash Builder 4.5: Learn by Video. We worked with video2brain to organize this publication and I’ve been recording a number of other video-based courses for them which are available online.  In fact, Peter and I will be participating in a book signing at Adobe MAX at the Community Pavilion Bookstore: Wednesday at 10:00. Join us!

For the past decade, I’ve also been working under the recording name An Early Morning Letter, Displaced – producing collections of experimental darkambient music released through my digital media production unit and tech consultancy: Fractured Vision Media, LLC. With all the writing and recording, I haven’t had any time for new compositions over the past year, which is a sadness for me. Last year I also organized and produced a community compilation CD with fellow developers and artists called Emergent Collective One.  I had planned a follow up compilation for this year but it just isn’t going to happen. I’m hoping that the coming year will allow a little more flexibility in these areas.

What tools are you working with now?
I mostly work in Flash Builder 4.5 for my Flash work, though I do use Flash Professional now and again to build out some SWCs for a project or bang out some demos. I would emphasize though that I touch upon the entire Adobe Creative Suite for all sorts of projects… I require just about all of the tools in there! While Flash is my focus- I have to be able to jump around to many different languages, platforms, and media depending upon the project at hand.

For my audio work- I’m most comfortable using Sonar X1 Producer along with a number of other software packages including Native Instruments Komplete. Both are solid packages with a ton of workflow options- endless possibilities and creative potential.

Where do you get your news?
I get most of my news from Twitter. Follow the right people and the news you care about comes straight to you! If I had to choose one particular new source though, it would be Brian Rinaldi’s weekly rundown of Cool Stuff with the Flash Platform, available at remotesynthesis.com - always just really informative and inspiring stuff.

If you could have superhuman powers what would they be?
Invulnerability with physical immortality being a de-facto part of the overall package.

Connect with Joseph Labrecque online:
[Twitter] @JosephLabrecque [blog] inflagrantedelicto.memoryspiral.com [Web] josephlabrecque.com

For more information on FITC Unconference at Adobe MAX visit www.fitc.ca/max