Projects Around Town: I’ve been involved in lots of fun projects so far this year!
| I’ve been working with ADP—sorry to all you people on salary,
I can’t change your paycheck. Actually, I’m working on an Authorware
CBT for customers of an ADP Dealer Services product. This
project wins two awards: one for the project with the greatest SME (Subject
Matter Expert) involvement and one for the most realistic approach to deadlines.
Creative Multimedia is getting into more "service" type stuff… and I got to help on a really fun project. It was for a one-time presentation, it had lots of great graphics/audio/and video… and it was done in about 1 week! Fun and fast—no chance to get bored. Elvis & Bonaparte had me help assemble the most creatively funny material I’ve ever worked on. They wrote an informative and humorous script, songs, and created an animated character that was synched to the well directed voice of none-other than Dan Castellaneta —the voice of Homer Simpson!The royalty checks keep rolling in! Garth’s KidsCulture—a title published by Pierian, but produced by Garth Upshaw in a style that defines the term "virtual corporation". He single-handedly cranked out this title in Authorware—with the help of more than 25 diverse writers, artists, actors, and programmers! |
Intel’s User-Centered Design Lab has me working on many "top
secret" Director demos, with a high concentration on "easy localization"
(the process of converting a project into a local language and culture).
One project was converted into 17 different languages (with ease), and
another is being distributed to 1 million users! —the most people I’ve
ever touched!
CKS Partners has a client that’s going from flip-charts to a high impact computer based presentation. They have challenged me to create my most complex Director program to date. Both CKS and their client have put sophistication and impact at the top of the list of priorities, resulting in a truly uncompromising project. The Multnomah County Health Department is taking their first stab at Computer Based Training and I’m having fun helping. The goal is simply efficiency and effectiveness—not "cool" features, a neat interface, or incorporating some new technology. Though this project is just starting, it wins the most practical award. Another 20 disciples have graduated from my Authorware classes at PSU this year. I just love to see these kids grow up (okay, they’re not "kids"). But do keep an eye out for the young people coming out of my multimedia class at The Northwest Academy! |
Software Reviews:
| Director 6
This is an awesome new release! The greatest improvement by far is not even mentioned by Macromedia—performance of high-color Windows projectors (MMX especially). Incredible… it flies. The score is nicely redesigned –new zoom features, variable speed scrolling, sprite information all over the place, and no cells—these are all great, but they’re mainly production enhancements. Features that stand out include: key-frame and path animation; lingo to tap into cue points in sound files (produced in Sound Edit) —no more cutting up audio files for synchronization; and "behaviors"—a new way to write object scripts without the messy details of birthing and disposing, plus they allow parameters to be intuitively set at production time. All in all, I can’t complain (which may be a first). Debabelizer Pro (Windows 95 & NT)What an interface improvement! It’s fast, it’s powerful, it’s easy to figure out. Drag & Drop everything. Although it was released with a few too many bugs, the patches have arrived and it’s solid. Mac Debabers are waiting until year’s end for the same interface. |
Authorware 4
Although there are fewer new features in the new Authorware, their significance may be greater. The interface, menus, and quick keys more closely match Director now (and other Macromedia products I suppose)—makes sense for consistency and I like it, but they could have gone further (e.g. used the same syntax for lists as Director does), and plus it may accelerate carpal tunnel syndrome. The biggest new feature is the incredible support for importing media and linking media. You name the file format and Authorware supports it—including Photoshop (no changing layers within Authorware) and Shockwave Audio. The path to external media can be dynamic, plus it doesn’t have to just be a location on your disk… it can be an URL! (Not only "c:\folder\" but "http://somewhere.com/folder/" also works.) More Xtra support too: Director Sprite Xtras and ActiveX, most notably. Binary file format means you don’t have to have different source (or packaged) files for Mac and Windows.Download the "Keiko Cam Monitor" from my web page for an idea of what can be done. |
What’s Hot: Localization
In addition to the normal thing—Authorware and Director consulting,
prototyping, model building, and training… I’ve seen some trends in what
people want. In this edition, I’ll discuss the need for easy localization.Although
it was essential for just a couple of my projects this year—the concept
of easy localization is hot! Generally, if you want your project
to be converted to another language you need translators and production
folks. The costs can approach the original costs of production.
If you plan for such translation, you can work smart from the beginning
to develop a strategy that makes the conversion easy. For instance,
keep language-specific media external. Also, since English is not
the most wordy language, the issue of limited screen space is doubly-bad
when you convert, say, to German. The lessons learned in such projects
can often be applied to English-only projects too. Think of updating
content. So even if the issue seems out in the future—you can benefit
by being aware now. For more information about this topic come to
my presentation at the Macromedia Users’ Conference in October.
| Tech Tips: Perfect Registration
In Director, create all your graphics as full screen… even if you just need a highlight for a button—have the artist export the full screen. Then, after you import the graphic, trim the excess (by drawing solid white boxes from the outside in… until you’ve cut off what you don’t need), then if you drag the graphic from the cast to the score (not the stage) it will be perfectly registered! Be careful that you don’t ever change the registration point in the paint window (at least in version 6 you can "undo" that mistake). If your graphics are not importing at full screen—you may have white around the edges and Director is "shrinking" down to the non-white. In this case write a Debabelizer script or a Photoshop "action" to put off-white dots in the corners. In Authorware there’s an old trick to prevent accidental miss-placement of graphics (by the Author). The trick is to set the display icon to un-movable. (Just highlight the icon, menu data>calculations and type "movable=false". Or in v4, menu modify>icon>calculation.) This only prevents Authors from messing it up while it’s running. A more permanent fix is to set the display’s initial position to an "area" which is as tiny as a point. (Menu attributes>effects click "in area", click the display, click "end", click the display. Or in v4, menu modify>icon>properties, "layout" tab, drop down "in area", click the display, click "end", click the display.) Amazingly, if you change the contents of the display and the image size doesn’t change, the placement is perfect no matter where you paste the new contents! |
Coming up:
June 30—"Beta" release of "Camp Authorware" classroom-in-a-workbook—my new book. July 15—Dean McCrea of Planet Productions leads a round-table discussion with Portland authoring gurus (and me) for a meeting of the Software Association of Oregon.September Authoring SIG—(September 10 or 17)(email: bsmith@hotpepper.com for info.)
October 10—I’ll present the paper "Worldwide Lingo" at the Macromedia
International Users’ Conference.(www.macromedia.com/macromedia/events/ucon97/)
|
The Phillip Newsletter:
The Phillip Newsletter is published twice a year by Phillip Kerman.
Phillip Kerman is an Independent Contract Multimedia Developer assisting
local and international production companies.
Concentrating on:
—rapid prototyping
—building adaptable templates for large projects
—establishing in-house production departments
—defining intuitive interfaces
Authorized Value Added Reseller of Equilibrium’s Debabelizer, Adobe
After Effects, and MetaTools Plugins.
Subscribe:
Subscriptions are available for the asking. Also, if you’d prefer an email
version tell me.
Last update: 25 September 1998