The Premier Authoring Tool for Multimedia Productions
The award-winning multimedia authoring tool from Macromedia¬, Director¿ 4.0 for the Macintosh¿ gives you the power to communicate more effectively with the impact of animation, sound, QuickTime¬ movies and interactivity. Use Director to produce dynamic, interactive presentations, entertainment and educational CD-ROM titles, information kiosks, technical visualizations, simulations and videotape productions. Director lets you combine text, graphics, animation, sound and digital and analog video from different sources, including other Macintosh applications, videodisc and CD-ROM players, videotape players, and special effects cards.
With Director you have complete, precise control ╨ over time ╨ of virtually every element in your multimedia productions. Use the integrated Cast, Paint and Score windows to create and sequence animations, graphics and text, and synchronize them with sound and video.
Director's main components, Cast, Paint, Score, Lingo and Player offer the utmost in flexibility.
Cast
The Cast window serves as your multimedia database of text, graphics, animation, digital video, and sound.
Paint
Use the Paint window to create and edit graphics and add animation effects with a full complement of
24-bit tools.
Score
The Score lets you easily animate and synchronize cast members, and precisely control transitions, two sound channels, custom palettes, inks and tempo.
Lingo
Lingo¬, an easy-to-use, HyperTalk¬-like scripting language, provides flexibility to add extensive interactivity to your multimedia documents via buttons and scripts and to control audio and video devices, such as CD-ROM, video disc players and frame-controllable videotape recorders.
Cross-platform interactive playback
Productions created with Director can be distributed as stand-alone applications with the Director Player for Macintosh (included) and the Director Player for Windows¬
(available separately). Both support full interactivity. Distribution is royalty-free to a worldwide audience of over 12 million Macintosh and Windows users.
Features in Director 4.0
Media import and Cast
Ñ Import sound, graphics and QuickTime movies from nearly any source
Ñ Link to external Cast members (sound, bitmaps, and QuickTime)
Ñ Virtual Cast options for larger movie support in reduced RAM
Ñ Drop shadows for text
Animation
Ñ Full-featured 24-bit paint and animation tools
Ñ Visual timeline for precise sequencing and synchronizing of all media elements
Ñ 24 channels with inks for imaging sprites in foreground channels over those in background channels╩
Ñ Over 50 transitions and palette effects for visual impact
Ñ 4-bit and 8-bit VGA palettes for cross-platform productions
Ñ Wait For Sound Done and Wait for QuickTime Done tempo control to improve playback of sound and QuickTime on slower computers
Sound
Ñ Two sound channels in Score window for mixing voice-over with music
Ñ Automatic playing of sound while next movie is loading
Ñ Incorporate digitized waveform, CD-Audio and MIDI sound sources
QuickTime
Ñ Add QuickTime movies to your interactive Director productions, and play back different movies on Director╒s stage at the same time.
Ñ Cut, copy, and paste QuickTime movie data. Easily identify new clips by copying a range of frames and pasting it into a new cast position.
Ñ Save Director movies as QuickTime movies with flexible QuickTime Export options that let you easily export any Director movie with sound at any size or resolution.
Ñ Now includes a QuickTime window that lets you Play QuickTime movies that are in the Cast window.
Ñ The Import command now imports QuickTime movie files which reside in the Cast window just like any other cast member.
Ñ For better compatibility with other QuickTime applications, a new 120 x 160-pixel Stage size has been added to the Preferences dialog box.
Ñ The Get Info command in the Cast menu has been enhanced to manage QuickTime cast members.
Lingo Scripting
Ñ Chunky text manipulation for evaluating expressions and text files
Ñ Control external devices, such as CD-Audio, laser disc players, videotape recorders, video cards
Ñ Cast loading management for optimizing playback on low memory machines
Ñ Scripts can be attached to individual cast members, frames and specific sprites in Score
Ñ Discrete scripting control of virtually all Score features
Ñ Supports XObjects, XCMD╒s and XFCN╒s for extensions of Director╒s capabilities
Score
Ñ The Shuffle command in the Score menu lets you change the foreground and background priority of your cast members on the stage
File Formats
Imports: AIFF, SND, SoundEdit¬, GLUE, MacPaint, PICS, PICT, Scrapbook, Director Movie, QuickTime¬ Movie
Exports: PICT, Scrapbook, PICS, QuickTime Movie
System requirements
Supports Apple¿ Macintosh Plus and later, PowerBooks and all color-capable Macintosh computers. Hard disk required. Requires System 6.0.7 or System 7 or greater. QuickTime extension included for QuickTime support. 2Mb RAM required for B&W. 4Mb required for color. 8Mb+ recommended.
