INTRODUCTION Interplay is the first authoring system to allow you to create multimedia productions for the CD32 and CDTV via a desk top publishing environment. It has been designed specifically for the purpose unlike most other systems which require a high powered computer with plenty of memory and a fast hard disk as the delivery platform. The requirements of Compact Disc storage and limited memory render authoring systems not designed for the task of limited use. With Interplay, creating your production is simply a case of creating blank pages, laying out the page with images and boxes, and then authoring a series of media elements termed "Media Clips" which are activated when the box or image is selected. There are many more things that you can do with Interplay, but it can be as simple as this. Interplay has been used to produce some of the most well received commercial titles to date, so what better testimonial could there be? Our design brief with Interplay was to make a non-programming authoring system which could produce applications sporting more powerful features than those available to producers spending many thousands of pounds on software engineers. WORKING PRACTICES FOR YOUR PROJECTS The most practical way to produce a title is to allocate a drive, partition or directory to your final project. This will look exactly like the finished project and only contain final versions of your media files. This is important at the end of the project when it is time to cut a disc. If you do not have your own disc cutter you will probably have to take your project hard drive to a bureax, this will be easier if you have a seperate drive with only the project data on it. NOTE: It is imperative that you save the project to the root of the drive, partition or directory allocated for the project, failing to do this will make authoring your project more cumbersome and increases the chances of missing out the project script at disc cutting time. Author your project from this drive or partition so that all media file paths are identical. Remember Interplay must be able to access media files at all times to edit and preview your project so DO NOT move files, delete files, rename files, rename directories or rename volumes or partitions after you have started authoring. The Interplay runtime player automatically replaces each file's volume pathname with CD0: ie, the CDTV/CD32 CD drive, so WORK:STUDIO/PICTURES/Face.PIC is converted to CD0:STUDIO/PICTUR ES/Face.PIC by the runtime player, this means you do not have to concern yourself with where your original files were authored from. It is also a good idea to have a separate drive or partition designated for supplementary files, these may include images for custom boxes, scripts for voiceovers and partially finished media files etc. These should not really be stored on the drive or partition designated for the final project and associated media files as it becomes almost impossible to clear the final disc of unused, and suplementary files. Use logical directory names and filenames, it will make finding your media files much easier when you come to author your project. The key words here are 'plan ahead', a well thought out structure to your storage of files can save hours, and sometimes days, at the authoring stage, also costly mistakes can be avoided. CREATING A CD The creation of compact disc titles comprises several distinct stages: PROJECT PLANNING Before commencing authoring any material with Interplay it is essential that you plan your work ahead. Here are some guidelines to help your planning: a. Maintain a separate partition or hard disk for your project. The data and its organisation on this unit will be the same as that on the compact disc. b. It is helpful to maintain a separate drawer for "scratch" material for your project, where files that are used to create the final data for your project are kept. c. Create a storyboard on paper that lists the pages, their links, and the data associated with them. This can become very complicated, so you may wish to list only the most important information. Use this storyboard to build a disk directory structure for your project. For more ideas on file management and disk directory structure refer to the Optonica CD titles supplied as part of the Interplay package, and the example project. d. Remember to backup your data! SOURCING OF MEDIA CONTENT The media files used in your project will have to be created. You will need suitable software and hardware for this purpose. Here are some suggestions: 2D paint programs. DeluxePaint IV AGA (Electronic Arts), Brilliance! (Digital Creations), TV Paint (Tecsoft). 3D graphic and animation programs. Caligari24 (Octree), Real3D (RealSoft), Imagine (Impulse). Image Processing/Morphing Art Department Professional/MorphPlus (ASDG), ImageFX/CineMorph (GVP), ImageMaster RT (Black Belt Systems), MultiFrame (batch processor for Art Department Professional/MorphPlus, MacroSystemUS), ProControl (ASDG). Video Digitising V-Lab YC (Amiga Centre Scotland), IV-24 (GVP), Rombo VIDI24. Scanners Epson GT6500/8000, Sharp JX-320/450/600. Drivers for these are supplied with or as extras to the image processing systems listed above. Sound sampling. GVP DSS+, Audio Imager. More expensive, but far superior are the direct-to-disk recording systems, in particular the SunRise AD516/Studio16 system (SunRise Industries). There are two other direct-to-disk systems, the Toccata (Amiga Centre Scotland) and WaveTools (Blittersoft). COMPILATION OF PROJECT It is essential that your project partition is correctly structured. In addition to the drawers that you will create to hold the media files for your project data, the necessary system drawers and files that enable the CDTV/CD32 to start up and operate correctly must be present. The system files are located in the corresponding drawers of your system partition. ISO PREP: The ISO PREP function on the left of the Interplay panel has been designed to remove the headache of preparing your project hard drive, partition or directory for the next stage in the process, namely the ISO build and cut of a gold disc. NOTE: ISO PREP needs only be performed once on your project, this should be done just prior to doing the ISO build (performed by a third party or yourself using the appropriate software). Under no circumstances should you do ISO PREP before this point or else fonts added to your project may not be included on your gold disc when cut. To use ISO PREP follow these steps:- 1) Select the ISO PREP button. 2) A requester will appear asking if this disc is to be CDTV compatible. Selecting YES will ensure the disc is prepared for both CDTV and CD32 booting, if NO is selected the disc will be made CD32 bootable only. NOTE: A CDTV/CD32 bootable disc will boot substantially slower than a CD32 only disc. 3) Follow the on screen instructions inserting any disks, or selecting any directory path requested. On completion your Project hard drive, partition or directory has all of the files and directories needed to make the project bootable. CREATION OF THE ISO IMAGE Creating an ISO image of your product is also known as "building a disc". Once your project is complete, an exact duplicate known as an image is made of the partition in a format that is a compact disc standard. The format is described in the ISO 9660 specification. The ISO disc build is NOT a function of Interplay and the appropriate software is usually supplied with the disc cutting hardware or this function is performed by a bureaux. Alternatively, Commodore UK can supply this software to registered deve lopers. NOTE: A CD may have up to 99 tracks. Track 1 always contains the data (i.e. the ISO image of your master partition). CDDA and MPEG Full Motion Video is placed on subsequent tracks, and must match those specified in the CDDA & MPEG FMV media clip entries of your Interplay project. CUTTING A MASTER DISC This step is also known as cutting a gold disc. Once the image has been created, it is written to a special recordable gold compact disc using a compact disc recorder. This operation may be performed by a bureaux or you can now purchase your own recorder for around 6,000. Alternatively, this service is available at Commodore UK to registered developers. NOTE: If you are having your gold disc built and cut by a bureaux you will need to take along your hard drive containing your project (remember at the beginning we said an external hard drive was best, now you know why!). A list of bureaus offering build and cut services is listed in APPENDIX A . QUALITY CHECKING AND DEBUGGING The gold disc should then be checked. If errors are found these will need to be located and corrected, a new image built, and a new gold disc cut. This build, cut, test, correct cycle may have to be performed many times before you are happy with the final project. Expect to cut at least 3 gold discs for a commercial title. Our commercial titles have ranged from 1 to 8 disc cut loops! INTERPLAY FILE REQUESTER The nature of producing multimedia titles usually means that you are dealing with many media files, sometimes thousands. Before you proceed any further, it is worthwhile spending a few moments familiarising yourself with the ubiquitous file requester, a part of Interplay of which there is no escaping. In fact, it will become the most familiar area as you start to author more and more projects. The file requester appears as an overlay panel. Each numbered function is explained below. 1) DIRECTORY AND FILE LIST This area lists the currently accessible files (in black) and directories (in white). Directories may be entered by singularly selecting them. Files may be loaded by double selecting them. On the right the file list scroll bar and buttons allow you to move through this list to locate the required file or directory. 2) DRIVE SELECTOR This area displays the currently available devices, volumes and logical assignments when viewing files via the SHOW module. When authoring media clip elements only the current project device is shown. Clicking this will put you at the root of your current project. This is not a foible of Interplay but an aid to good project management allowing you to only author from the correct area on your storage device.To view more, use the scroll bar. To select a volume and be taken to its root directory, simp ly select it. 3) CURRENT DRIVE PATH & PARENT The PARENT button on the left, when selected, will move to the parent of the current directory. The drive path entry to the right of this shows the drive path for the current directory. This may be typed manually rather than using the file list if preferred. 4) CURRENT FILENAME This area, contains the current filename. This area may be selected and a filename typed in directly if this is preferred to selecting from the file list. 5) ACCEPT Selecting the ACCEPT button selects the current filename for loading. ACCEPT is optional and the same process is achieved by simply double selecting a filename from the file list. 6) SHOW Once a filename is displayed in the filename area by single selecting it, selecting the SHOW button will allow you to preview any type of media file before selecting it for use in a media clip. 7) CANCEL Selecting this button will cancel the current load operation and return you to your previous operation. ON-LINE HELP AND TOUR OF THE MAIN PANEL ON-LINE HELP SYSTEM Interplay has an on-line help system for virtually every function. To access the help system simply move the pointer over the function on which you need assistance and press the `HELP' key on the keyboard. When Interplay is in GO mode the on-line help does not function and the `HELP' key on the keyboard simulates the CD32/CDTV controller help via the Green/ESC button launching any appropriate media clips for your project TOUR OF THE MAIN PANEL Once Interplay is up and running you will see the main panel with the introduction inset. The system has been designed using a layered approach so that you will only ever be presented with options relevant to the task in hand. This helps to keep Interplay both simple and quick to operate, with a short learning curve. You will see that the main panel has three distinct areas. Area 1 Page Information/Panel Control At the top from left to right is a row of buttons. These have the following functions: 1: QUIT BUTTON Selecting this quits Interplay. If your project is not saved up to date this will be done automatically. 2: PAGE NAME This area contains the name for the current page in your project. If the page has a title box, this is the title that will appear. 3: PAGE NUMBER This area contains the number of the current page. To move to another page number, click in this area, type in the number of the page to which you wish to move to, then press the italics key. 4: GO - RUN TIME SIMULATOR This button places Interplay into run time simulation mode, emulating how your project will run in practice. To redisplay the panel and return to the edit mode, press the space bar. NOTE: Once GO is selected use the keyboard (cursor, A, B and HELP keys) to properly emulate the controller, using the mouse keeps Interplay in partial edit mode allowing you to select invisible image boxes. 5: PANEL DOWN Selecting this button whilst holding down the left mouse button will gradually move the panel down, revealing the page beneath. 6: PANEL UP This is the reverse of the Panel Down button. 7: PROJECT SHUFFLE This button will shuffle the main panel forwards or backwards with workbench or other applications that may be running. It is equivalent to the Workbench Depth Gadget. Area 2: Navigation and Page/Project Management At the left hand side of the main panel beneath the Quit button and Page Name is a column of buttons. 1: PAGE TURN NAVIGATION BUTTONS These six buttons allow you to move forwards or backwards 1 page, 10 pages, or 100 pages at a time. 2: ADD PAGE This button inserts a new page. A requester will appear asking whether you wish to have the new page inserted before or after the current page. 3: DUPE PAGE Selecting this button creates duplicates of the current page. A requester will appear, asking you to specify the number of duplicates to be made. Enter the number in the box, then press the italics key. The new pages will be added after the current one. 4: IMPORT PAGE Selecting this button will pop up a file requester from which you may load a page from another Interplay project. This allows pages and projects that have been authored previously, perhaps by another member of the production team, to be incorporated into the current project. Any Page Goto's authored in the imported page will be lost and replaced with NO PAGE as it is impossible for Interplay to automatically resolve links which no longer exist for this project. These must then be authored to link with pages in the current project. 5: DELETE PAGE Selecting this button deletes the current page. All navigation authoring (i.e. Page Goto's) will be remapped automatically to the new position of each page. Remember that deleting pages may render the current project invalid for navigation purposes by breaking the link structure. If this is so, on exiting Interplay you will be asked if you wish to validate the project. 6: LOAD PROJECT Loads a previously saved project for further editing. 7: CLEAR PROJECT Selecting this button will clear the current project from Interplay so that you may load another. The cleared project is not deleted from your storage device so may be loaded back at any time via the load project option. 8: ISO PREP Selecting this button will prepare your project disk for the ISO build and gold disc cutting process (which are not performed by Interplay) by copying the files required to make your project bootable on CD32 and/or CDTV machines. This is quite a complicated procedure to due manually and is one of the main areas in which the novice is prone to make expensive mistakes. This option is only needed once per project and MUST be performed just prior to pressing your first gold test disc. Performing before this time will mean that your project fonts will not be installed to the project hard drive. 9: ABOUT Selecting this button will give information regarding Interplay including the release version and the name of the owner and/or the serial number. The name is security coded in when the disk is shipped, this is written to every project to allow Optonica to ensure that copyrights are not infringed by unauthorised users of Interplay, the name/serial number must be quoted whenever telephone or written support is requested. Area 3: Interplay Modules Panel This area contains the eight modules you will use to construct your projects. The options available for each module are displayed in the module inset panel directly below. From left to right these are:- 1: BOXES MODULE Selecting this button will make available the module for page layout of boxes and lists. 2: MEDIA CLIP MODULE Selecting this button will make available the module for adding media clips to boxes, list entries and pages. 3: PAGE TRANSITIONS MODULE Selecting this button will make available the module for selecting the wipe transition used when leaving the current page. There are 16 to choose from. 4: PAGE SELECTOR MODULE Selecting this button will make available the Page Selector Module. This selector lists every page in the project. There is a page search facility and page goto via `page name' point-and-click selection. 5: LAUNCH EXTERNAL PROGRAMS MODULE Selecting this button will make available the external application launch module. This enables you to launch other production tools such as a graphics program or sound sampler from within the Interplay environment, for those last minute changes. 6: FILE VIEWER MODULE Selecting this button will display the file requester which enables you to browse through media files. Files may be viewed or listened to using the SHOW option or by double selecting them. File sizes are also displayed. 7: SCRIPT VIEWER MODULE Selecting this button displays the Script Viewer Module. This lists the information relating to each page in the current project, and is useful when checking for errors and potential run-time problems. 8: PROJECT SETUP MODULE Selecting this button will make available the module for the current project options. INTERPLAY INDEX CREATOR The indexer is a self contained program used to build an index of all the words in text files contained within a specified directory and subsequent nested directories. NOTE: The directories may contain other file types such as samples or pictures, but these are ignored. It scans the files and builds a list of all the words contained within them together with all file references. Irrelevant words such as "and", "the" or "with" can be placed in a special word filter file and excluded from the list. This file is called a SCREEN file and is always appened with .SCN. Each index created has its own screen file. When an index is created from scratch the program will load in 'default.scrn' as a starting point. When the program has created a new, or loaded an existing, index you may manipulate the contents of the index and screen files. LOADING THE INDEXER PROGRAM The indexer is normally launched from the RUN INDEXER button on the LIST panel inset that is present when adding a list page from within the BOXES module. When the indexer is launched, it opens on the workbench. CREATING AN INDEX 1. Select the CREATE INDEX button. 2. Select the directory to search through using the file requester. Remember that all subdirectories will be searched as well. Changing the pattern match entry in the file requester allows you to tailor what files will be included in the index search, ie, .DOC or .TXT. NOTE: for the indexer to work all text files should have a postfix, for example, .TXT. Do not mix postfixes such as .TXT and .DOC otherwise you will have to rename your files before the indexer can be used. 3. Select OK - the indexer will scan the directory for files matching the patern match as outlined above. Once all the files are found the indexer will build the index, this may take some time depending upon the number of files to process. On the Indexer Window there are the following buttons. SAVE INDEX:- Saves the current index and screen file (only if any changes have been made). LOAD INDEX:- Allows an existing index to be loaded given the filename (obtained from the file requester). CREATE INDEX:- Allows a new index to be created. If an index is already loaded then there is an option to abort the creation operation. To create a new index you need to specify a directory (The root of your project directory if you have text files spread throughout the project). The text files must be in the correct directories from which they have been authored. Once the index has been created the index must be given a name, again from the file requester, by typing it directly into the filename area. INCLUDE:- The include button may contain an optional patternmatch which all filenames will be compared with. SKIP TO:- To save time scrolling through the items in the index list to see if a word exists, simply type the first few letters of the word into the skip to string box, the indexer will try to find the first word which matches that typed in the closest. SELECT ALL:- Selects all the words in the index list for further operations. UN_SELECT ALL:- Un selects all the words in the index list. DELETE SELECTED:- Removes all the highlighted words in the index list. This command prompts "ARE YOU SURE" as the words cannot be restored. ALIAS WORD:- Will allow a word to be aliased, an existing alias to be altered or an alias to be removed completely. If the word is not aliased, then you will be prompted for an alias word (or phrase), otherwise a multi choice requester will enable the alias to be cleared or changed. These aliases are useful for ambiguous words or for changing numbers into words or phrases when shown in an Interplay list. VIEW FILE:- Allows you to view all the files which contain the currently highlighted word. The command will traverse down the list and allow you to view each word in turn. The View Word requester will list the names of all files in which the word appears, these can be de-selected. When you press on the VIEW button you will be shown all the selected files and the words will be highlighted. You can press the SKIP button to skip the current word or cancel the view operation altog ether. ADD TO FILTER:- Allows you to add a single word to the screen file list via a string requester. DELETE FILTER:- Deletes all selected words in the screen file list. As the words cannot be restored you will be prompted with an "ARE YOU SURE" requester. COPY TO FILTER:- Moves all the selected words from the index list to the screen file list. Any word moved to the screen file list cannot be moved back to the index list (as the file references are lost), therefore you will be prompted with an "ARE YOU SURE" requester. To select/un-select a word you need to press the left mouse button over the word in the list boxes, An unselected word will be rendered in the same colour as the indexer's window border, a selected word will have its background colour modified. The screen file list will indicate any newly added words by rendering the text in a different colour to that of unselected words. TUTORIALS Here are a few short tutorials CUSTOM PAGE DESIGNS There will be occasions when you wish a page to have a custom backdrop with buttons that have been designed in a paint program such as DeluxePaint. To create this type of page:- 1. Select the ADD PAGE button and insert a page after or before the current one as you prefer. 2. Select the BOXES module. 3. Click the delete button, then click on the title box to remove it. 4. Select the SETUP module. 5. Note that the PAGE BORDER button is selected. Click on it to deselect it. The page border is now removed. 6. Select the BOXES module. 7. Select the INVISIBLE BOX style (bottom right), IMAGE button, then ADD. 8. Draw a box that fills the screen from top left to bottom right corners. 9. A file requester appears asking you to select an image. Select the one you have created. NOTE: You should create the ILBM in low resolution extra half brite mode, and match it to the dimensions of the page (PAL 320 x 256, NTSC 320 x 200), CUSTOM 320 x YOUR PAGE HEIGHT SETTING). Interplay converts the image selected to this display mode and scales it to fit the box size. It also filters out the four base colours of the palette. 10. The ILBM is then added as a backdrop onto which other boxes can be added. NOTE: In Interplay you can highlight the background for editing purposes, though the run time player will ignore it as a selectable box. MEDIA CLIP SPOOLING The ability of Interplay to play animations and sound files directly from the CD is a feature which you will need to take advantage of. A common requirement is to spool an animation whilst playing a sound sample, commonly a voiceover. It is physically impossible for the CD laser to be in two places at once, so you will need to load one file into RAM, and the other can be spooled ("disc played"). The largest possible amount of free memory is about 1.4MByte for CD32, 0.7MByte for CDTV; you should stay as far below these figures as possible. If you have an animation that is 2MByte in size, and a sound file that is 700K, you would create the media clip as follows: 1. If you are attaching the media clip to a box, highlight the appropriate box. 2. Select the Media Clip module. 3. Select ADD to add a media clip element. 4. Choose ANIM from the primary pop-up menu. 5. Select the anim to include using the file requester. It will play back once. Note that the RAM PLAY button is not selected, so the anim will be spooled (default setting). 6. Select the first box of the media clip's secondary component. 7. Using the pop-up requester select the SAMPLE option (Loudspeaker icon). 8. With the file requester choose the sample. 9. By default this will be spooled, but this is inappropriate since it is inadvisable (until you are experienced enough to know what you can get away with!) to spool both animation and sound simultaneously. Instead, to play the sample from RAM, select the RAM PLAY option. 10. To preview the animation and sound, select the PLAY button or hit the 'A' key on the keyboard. Hit the 'B' Key to stop the media clip playing. NOTE: Remember that it is possible to add delays and synchronise samples to individual frames of the animation. RUN TIME PLAYER When you have completed your project you may wish, as a final test, to run it from the hard disk with the run time player since this is the program used on the compact disc. NOTE: Running from the hard disk may be useful but it does not test that you have everything right, for example, it cannot test trademark files such as RMTM as these only work on the CD platform. Also it does require a fairly advanced knowledge of the Amiga. If you are confident that you have correctly followed the steps outlined above for composing your CD and feel the test outlined here is going to cause you more problems than it solves then we suggest you skip this test. 1. Change the system logical assignments as necessary. For example fonts: is assigned to your workbench:fonts directory on startup. Since the fonts for your CD will be located in the fonts directory on the CD itself, to correctly simulate the CD project in operation you should reassign fonts: to this location using. assign fonts: Partition_Name:fonts This will assign fonts: to the fonts directory on device Partition_Name: - substitute Partition_Name: with the name of your partition used for your Interplay projects. You will need to reassign the following logical assignments: c: fonts: libs: l: It is a good idea to create a DOS script containing the assignment commands that can be executed as a script. This prevents you having to type each command line in turn. you should also write a script that reverses the assignments. NOTE: You may wish to run NoFastMem from your workbench to simulate the memory available on the CD32 platform, although this is not exact it is a reasonable approximation. 2. Open a Shell window and type player NOCD Project_Name then press the RETURN key. 3. Your project will now launch. 4. To exit the run time player press SHIFT + X on the keyboard. NOTE: The full command template for the player is USEAGE: Player PROJECT.int where NOCD = do NOT attempt to use the cd.device OR cdtv.device, this is for use with the test outlined above, ie, running your project from the hard drive with the run time player, your authoring machine will not have access to the cd.device or cdtv.device SLOW = ALWAYS use 150K per second transfer rates to allow testing with problematic gold disks(default is to use fastest speed possible) PATH = usually the player substitutes the first logical device name in a path with "CD0:" such that "WORK:pics/Flower.PIC" becomes "CD0:pics/Flower.PIC". You may now choose a different path substitution if required (such as "CD1:" or "HD0:Project/" )