The QuickTime VR team has released a beta version of the QuickTime
VR XTRA for Macromedia Director 5.0 or
greater. You can get it at the QuickTime
VR Developer Tools page. The XTRA is a little easier to use than the
XCMD that had to be used previously, but a good deal of Lingo scripting
is still required.
There's a demo version of ObjectDancer 1.0 on Paceworks'
software page; see Little QuickTime
Page, 1/21/97 for more info about ObjectDancer.
Astarte has
a new beta (1.0b4) of their MPEG Exporter (AME), which lets you export
any QuickTime file as MPEG using MoviePlayer.
Also, there is an Apple press
release about the release of the QuickTime MPEG extension. There is
also a note about some minor problems with the installation of the MPEG
extension on the MacFixIt
page; do a Find for "MPEG".
On the video conferencing front, Apple has a new beta of the QuickTime
TV client software for watching web broadcasts; get more info and download
it at the QTTV
Client page. Connectix has released a new beta of their QuickTime
Conferencing-based VideoPhone
2.0 software; it'll expire on Monday, February 24th, 1997.
Adobe has two plug-ins for MP (multiprocessor) Macs that speed
some operations in Premiere and AfterEffects. The Premiere MP Plug-in
1.0.1 is in Adobe's premiere/mac/4.x/plugins
directory; you want the premp files. The After Effects version is in
their aftereffects/mac/3.x/
directory; get adobemp files.
Apple last week released the final 1.0 version of the QuickTime MPEG
extension for the MacOS, which lets QuickTime play back MPEG movies. This
release (available at
the Apple software page) also includes a new version of MoviePlayer
2.5.1 and its plug-ins (Authoring Extras and Goodies); the only difference
in MoviePlayer we knowof is the ability to make an MPEG movie play back
at a higher quality (by removing blacklining); read the ReadMe.
There's an update to the Apple Video Software (the software that
comes with AV Macs and includes the Apple Video Player); this
version (1.5.1) is newer than what comes with System 7.6. Get the Video
Software at an Apple
ftp site (look for Video_SW_Install)
System 7.6 (to be released this week) includes QuickTime 2.5. The
SoundManager is now built into the system itself rather than being
a separate extension. (One less file to keep track of!). Apple's got lots
of info about 7.6,
if you're interested.
There is a new beta version of the PNG importer from Sam Bushell.
PNG (Portable Network Graphics; pronounced "ping") is a new graphics
format to replace GIF; Read about it and get it at Bushell's
PNG page. (We mentioned it on 12/9/96,
too.)
Also to follow up on a few things: Paceworks has
shipped Object Dancer 1.0 (see Little
QT page 11/11/96 and a review
we wrote for NetProfessional). The Xclaim VR card (which we mentioned
8/12/96) is available for about
$300; MacFixIt is tracking some problems
with the XClaim VR software.
The new and exciting stuff at Macworld last week was mostly QuickTime
VR-related:
Apple showed off QuickTime VR 2.0, which should be out by the end
of the month. The most significant aspect of 2.0 is that it now has an API
(Application Programming Interface) which allows programmers to program
QuickTime VR into their applications more easily, which means we should
be seeing many more applications this year that produce QTVR files
or have unique control of QTVR playback. In addition, QuickTime VR 2.0
will also be a system extension that will let most programs that view
QuickTime movies view QuickTime VR scenes.
There are also various other additions to QTVR. QTVR movies will have a
"control strip" interface for panning, zooming and hot
spot identification. Object movies can now have hot spots, and the
user can zoom in on objects. Panoramas can contain 3D objects, animation
or other QuickTime movies, as well as directional sound. Panoramas and
objects can now be linked in a single file--an authoring tool is no
longer needed to view an entire scenes of linked panoramas and objects.
Budget conscious producers will be happy to hear that the price of the QTVR
Authoring Tools Suite has been reduced by $100, and that less
memory is required for stitching. For more information about these and
other features, read Apple's
press release on QuickTime VR 2.0.
Along with the QTVR 2.0 announcement, Apple also announced
agreements with other VR-related companies. Be Here has a really cool
(and expensive) camera lens system which lets you take one picture
for an entire VR panorama. Check out BeHere's
web site for more info. eVox Productions, a QuickTime VR service bureau,
has a CD-ROM called ClipVR, which is basically VR clip art, with
a tool for compositing panoramic images using various terrains, skies, and
objects from the CD. eVox's web site
has info about pricing and availability. And OLiVR, a high-end desktop virtual
reality company, whose products previously competed with QuickTime VR, also
announced that their patented compression and streaming technologies
will be availabe to QuickTime VR 2.0; there will be a cost to developers
but not to users. Read more at OLiVR's web
site.
There's a new beta-release of the Software MPEG extension version
1.0f1 at Apple's QuickTime
beta software page. (More info at 12/9/96
Little QuickTime Page.) This beta expires on Feburary 1st. Ted Landau's
MacFixIt page has a report about
some minor potential problems (see the Friday January 3rd listing).
Astarte has a beta of their Astarte
MPEG Exporter (AME). This little (under 260k) system extension
allows you to use the Export menu option in MoviePlayer to create an
MPEG-1 movie from a standard QuickTime movie. There are some limitations;
read the Readme. (Warning: exporting as MPEG can take a long time, and you
won't always get great results, particularly with a highly compressed original
QuickTime movie.)
On December 9, we mentioned that
VideoCD chapter lists could be displayed on the standard controller.
(A chapter list is a pop-up menu that can be used to jump to specific points
in a movie.) Now, you can create chapter lists for your own movies. Chapter List Maker is
a tool which will let you take any existing QuickTime movie with a sound
and/or video track plus a text track and build a chapter list. It runs
only on a PowerPC Mac. There is no documention for the software; however,
this week's How-To covers how to use it.
Bravado and Targa users: If you haven't checked in a few months,
there are some relatively new versions of the software you need to use any
of Truevision's video cards, available from Truevision's
ftp site.
There's also a new version (1.1) of the Avid Cinema software and
it's at an Apple
ftp site.
Terran's web site, which
already has lots of useful info about QuickTime, has been updated with the
addition of a tutorial
on making QuickTime movies.
Finally, we've decided to make some changes to the Little QuickTime Page. First, we're going to move our publication date from Monday to Tuesday (because many things happen on Mondays, plus we want some of our weekend time back). Also, we're going to do the how-to's every other week. Thanks for reading our page and comments are always welcome.
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