Van, I don't think this has been posted before. Check it out.
techweb.com
August 01, 1997, Issue: 808
Section: WinLab Reviews
Macromedia Director 6 -- Macromedia Still in the
Director's Chair
By Lynn Ginsburg
Thanks to the Web, there's a surge of popular interest in creating original
multimedia content, including animation, graphics, sound and video.
Macromedia is sitting pretty with two of the most popular applications for
adding multimedia to Web sites: Director for multimedia authoring and
Shockwave for multimedia playback. With Director 6, Macromedia makes
its authoring program more accessible to those who want to create Shocked
multimedia, which is delivered from Web sites more quickly than
non-Shocked files. The program's enhanced usability and powerful new
features earn it a spot on our Winlist of recommended products, replacing
version 5.
The beta version we tested incorporated several new features that make
learning to use the program just a bit easier. While novices probably won't be
creating Hollywood-style productions overnight, they will appreciate the
many tasks-such as creating multistate buttons and applying behaviors to
objects-they can perform with Director without writing a line of code.
Experienced Director users will also welcome new support for power
features, such as streaming Shockwave files.
Since Macromedia was one of the companies responsible for launching the
Web multimedia revolution, it's appropriate that the latest release of Director
shows the greatest innovation with its new Web tie-ins. Streaming
Shockwave is a straightforward but crucial new feature. It allows Web site
visitors with a Shockwave plug-in to start playing Director movies before the
entire file downloads. Although a huge Director file won't play immediately,
streaming Shockwave does play files faster. In our testing, we still
experienced a lag before the file started playing; nevertheless, the movie
started twice as fast as it did without streaming Shockwave.
You can also play Java applets in Director 6 files, which is important, since
incompatibility between the two platforms was a major inconvenience for
developers working with both.
One of the biggest changes Macromedia has made to Director's core
functionality is the new and improved Score (the workspace in which you
combine various multimedia elements). Director's implementation of Sprites
(individual multimedia elements) in the Score is now object-oriented, making
it much easier to edit, manipulate and assign attributes to entire Sprites rather
than tediously editing Sprites channel by channel. (Channels store different
kinds of information within the Score, such as sounds, palettes, transitions,
scripts and Sprites.) The new Score also significantly improves navigation
with its support of zooming and simultaneous multiple Score windows. In
addition, the Score now supports up to 120 Sprite channels, more than
double that of the previous version.
Director novices and veterans alike should appreciate the new Button
Wizard, which automates the creation of multistate buttons (buttons that
visually indicate if they've been pushed) without using Lingo, Director's
scripting language.
Script-phobes will also like the new Behavior Inspector, which serves as a
library for common Sprite behaviors organized into the categories of Actions
and Events. Examples of Sprite Behaviors include controlling when and for
how long a sound is played, changing to a customized palette, changing the
Sprite's location and going to a Web page. You can create your own
Behaviors and add them to the Inspector or apply any of the more than 30
prescripted Behaviors that come with the program.
In the previous version of Director, you had to script a Behavior; with the
latest release, you can drag the Behavior onto the Sprite or apply it via the
Behavior Inspector in the same way you might apply a stylesheet. You'll love
this feature if you hate writing Lingo; even Lingo pros will find this approach a
much easier way to manage scripts.
Although Director has improved usability significantly, newcomers to the
program won't be churning out sophisticated Director movies without first
putting in some serious study time. While you should anticipate a learning
curve, you'll find that, once mastered, Director 6 is now more than ever the
most powerful and practical tool for creating original multimedia content on
the PC.
--Quick View--
Macromedia Director 6
Bottom Line: Remains the premier multimedia authoring software, with
improved usability and innovative Web functionality
Price: $999; upgrade, $399
Platforms: 95, NT
Pros: Powerful Shockwave and Java compatibility; sophisticated toolset
Cons: Steep learning curve
Strongest Rival: Macromedia Director 5
Macromedia, 800-326-2128, 415-252-2000. Winfo #651
Copyright r 1997 CMP Media Inc. |
