Lecture 2 Multimedia Hardware and Software

MM hardware We need to distinguish between hardware requirements for MM production, and hardware requirements for MM delivery

Producing MM MM production requires high quality, high speed equipment with massive storage Need to store, and process, vast amounts of MM data such as images, sounds, and video

Producing MM Need to be able to capture video from camera to disc, at a constant rate Need to be able to record sounds using high quality microphones in a sound studio

MM Delivery Computer hardware to be used for running MM products requires particular specifications

Multimedia Hardware Apple computers have had multimedia capabilities since 1984 (played sound)  Apple Macintosh series Multimedia PCs available since late 1980s  386 series

Apple Mac Variety of Models since 1984 eg PowerPc, Quadra, Classic Latest - iMac, G4 and G5, eMac

Apple iMac iMac is entirely suited for MM use Has high-level spec for:  Processor and memory  Storage  Graphics  Communications  Audio  Optical storage (cd/dvd / rewrite options)

Full details can be found at:

G5 Spec More advanced than iMac better processor GHz single/dual more memory 256Mb - 8Gb more hard disk space Gb see notes pages:

eMac eMac now also available MB SDRAM - 1 DIMM Keyboard/Mac OS X - U.S. English 1.25GHz PowerPC G GB Ultra ATA drive DVD-ROM/CD-RW Combo drive Mac OS X and Mac OS 9 included

PC Multimedia PC (MPC) standard introduced to allow users to decide whether a particular PC was capable of running MM applications

MPC  386sx, 2mb ram,  30 mb hard disk,  CD ROM Drive,  VGA video (16 colours),  an 8 bit audio board, speakers and/or headphones  Microsoft Windows software with Multimedia Extensions package - not powerful.

MPC  486sx 25 mhz, 4mb ram (minimum),  160 mb hard disk,  CD ROM (double speed),  VGA video (64k colours) display resolution (640x480),  a 16 bit audio audio board (digital sound, midi playback),  101 keyboard and mouse, midi, joystick, serial, parallel,  Windows 3.0, plus multi media extensions

MPC  Pentium 75 mhz, 8mb ram (minimum),  540 mb, CD ROM (quadra speed),  VGA video (64k colours) ( video enable graphics),  16 bit audio board (digital sound, wavetable, midi playback), speakers must be measured at 3 watts per channel,  video playback,  101 keyboard and mouse, joystick, serial, parallel,  windows 3.11 and DOS 6.0

PC Today Provides high-spec hardware and software capable of supporting MM applications Vastly exceeds MPC 3 requirements Distinction of ‘Multimedia PC’ no longer needed

Example specification  3.6 GHz pentium 4 processor  512 – 4Gb memory  160 Gb hard drive  cd/dvd rewrite  Windows XP  ~£1000

Peripherals for multimedia Extra Storage  external  hard discs  cd readers/writers  zip drives  dvd players/writers

Input Devices  Trackballs  Touchscreens  Graphics Tablets  Scanners  OCRD  Infrared Remotes  Voice Recognition Systems  Digital Cameras (still and video)

Output  projectors  video

Software for multimedia Multimedia application development software  eg Macromedia Authorware, Macromedia Director, Assymetrix Toolbook, Flash Graphics Creation and editing software  eg Adobe Photoshop, Paintshop Pro, Adobe Illustrator Text  Abobe Pagemaker, Adobe Framemaker, MS Word

Software Video  Adobe Premiere, Final Cut, iMovie, Cinema 3D Sound  provided with sound card, eg Soundblaster for PC and Macintosh sound software Web  Macromedia Dreamweaver, Adobe Go Live, Macromedia Flash and Macromedia Fireworks, shockwave