Chapter 10 Basic Software Tools Overview n Textbased

Chapter 10 -Basic Software Tools

Overview n Text-based editing tools. n Graphical tools. n Sound editing tools. n Animation, video, and digital movie tools. n Video formats. n Utilities useful for multimedia.

Text-based Editing Tools Word processors: n Are powerful applications that include spell checkers, table formatters, thesaurus, and pre-built templates for commonly used documents. n Are used for creating project letters, invoices, and storyboards. n Allow embedded multimedia elements.

Text-based Editing Tools Word processors (continued): n Microsoft Word and Word. Perfect are Word processors. n Often come bundled in an "Office Suite. "

Text-based Editing Tools Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software: n Converts bitmapped characters into electronically recognizable ASCII text. n Makes use of probability and expert system algorithms. n Is very accurate and saves time and effort.

Graphical Tools n Painting and drawing tools. n 3 -D modeling tools. n Image editing tools.

Painting and Drawing Tools n Most graphic programs use bitmapped images since they provide the greatest choice. n Include the Eyedropper tool, Autotrace tool, and antialiasing, airbrushing, blending, and masking functionalities. n Photo. Shop, Fireworks, and Painter are painting software. n Corel. Draw, Free. Hand, and Illustrator are drawing software.

Painting and Drawing Tools Features include: n An intuitive graphical user interface. n Scalable dimensions. n Multiple undo capability. n Scalable text font support. n Support for third-party special effect plug-ins. n Layering capability.

3 -D Modeling Tools Features include (continued): n Good color and palette management. n Multiple dimension windows and unlimited cameras. n Lathe and extrude features. n Ability to drag and drop primitive shapes, sculpt organic objects. n Color and texture mapping.

Image-Editing Tools n Are specialized and powerful tools for enhancing and retouching existing bitmapped images. n Features include conversion of image-data types and file formats, masking features, employment of virtual memory scheme, etc. n Support third-party plug-ins.

Sound Editing Tools n Enables the user to see music as well as hear sound. n This is done by drawing a representation of sound in fine increments. n Enable the user to create custom system beeps. n System beeps are pre-packaged sounds that indicate an error, warning or special user activity.

Animation, Video, and Digital Movie Tools n Animation is a sequence of bitmapped graphic scenes or frames, rapidly played back. n Animations can be made within some authoring systems by moving objects or sprites to simulate motion. n Moviemaking tools take advantage of Quick. Time and AVI formats to create, edit, and present digitized motion video segments.

Animation, Video, and Digital Movie Tools n Digital video editing and playback require a large amount of free disk space. n When working with digital video, it is necessary to defragment and optimize the disk before recording and playing back movie files. n It is necessary to compress movie files before delivery.

Animation, Video, and Digital Movie Tools n Compression ratio is the size of the original image divided by the size of the compressed image. n Compression can by lossy or lossless. n Lossy schemes ignore picture information the viewer may not miss. n Lossless schemes preserve the original data precisely.

Video Formats Quick. Time: n Is a software-based architecture for integrating sound, text, animation, and video on Macintosh and Windows platform. n Is an extensible system for multimedia delivery. n Can deliver 3 -D animations, virtual reality, and streaming audio-video on the Web. n The three Quick. Time elements are Movie file format, Media Abstraction Layer, and Media services.

Video Formats Quick. Time (continued): n Includes built-in support for ten different media types. n Offers a comprehensive set of services. n Allows embedded commands in HTML documents.

Video Formats Audio Video Interleaved (AVI): n Is a Microsoft-developed format for playing full-motion interleaved video and audio sequences in Windows. n Does not require specialized hardware. n Is an inextensible, open environment. n Lacks serious video editing features. n The Open. DML format was developed to make AVI more functional.

Video Formats n Quick. Time and Audio Video Interleaved (AVI) formats support special algorithms, provide a methodology for interleaving, and allow organized streaming of data from disk into memory. n Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) is a hardware format that uses laser light to store and read digital information.

Utilities Useful For Multimedia n Screen-grabber - Enables the user to move bitmapped images by placing them on the clipboard. n Format converters - Useful for projects where the source material originates on different platforms.

Summary n Word processors and OCR software used to handle text in multimedia. n Painting and drawing tools, 3 -D modeling tools, and image editing tools manipulate the graphical content of the project. n Quick. Time for Macintosh and AVI for Windows are the two most widely used video formats.