Photo Factory for Windows 2.1/PCD9999.BIN/pfactory/readme.1st

Text File | 1994-06-06 | 10KB | 219 lines

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ABOUT
PHOTO FACTORY FOR WINDOWS(TM)
 VERSION 2.1 CD-ROM
6/3/94 RELEASE


This document includes the latest updates and instructions for
installing and using your version of Photo Factory For Windows.
We want to help you get the most out of this product.

INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS:

We have added the option to install 3 Demo slideshows and The
Multimedia Store's MIDI Gallery Volume I.  We hope you will
install these options since they are useful in learning about how
you can create slideshows using Photo Factory.  In addition, the
MIDI Gallery includes 50 original songs in both long and short
versions (100 files total) of excellent original music for your
enjoyment and use.

TO INSTALL PHOTO FACTORY:

1. Run Microsoft Windows and open the PROGRAM MANAGER;
2. Insert the PHOTO FACTORY CD in to your CD-ROM drive
    (probably the D:drive);
3. From the Program Manager, select FILE then RUN;
4. Enter the appropriate drive letter, followed by
    :\pfactory\setup.exe (i.e. d:\pfactory\setup.exe)
5. Enter the desired destination drive when prompted, along with
   the desired location for storing the program files. By default,
   Photo Factory will install in c:\pfactory.
6. Select the desired option to install. You may rerun SETUP to
   install options later if desired.

SMARTDRIVE WITH DOS 6.2 OR WINDOWS FOR
WORKGROUPS 3.11:

The latest version of Microsoft's SmartDrive allows caching of
your CD ROM drive.  There is a problem with this feature and
the Kodak Photo CD format.  The complete thumbnail file may
not load when you select the OPEN CONTACT SHEET command in
Photo Factory.  To fix this problem, you must disable the
SmartDrive CD ROM caching feature. To do this, add the command
switch /U to the SmartDrive command line in the CONFIG.SYS or
AUTOEXEC.BAT file.

RUNNING THE SLIDESHOW DEMOS:

1.  Demo Slideshows:

    If a Slideshow which contains sound is run on a system with
    no Sound Drivers installed, a Message Box will be displayed
    to inform the user that no Sound Device was detected. After
    this message is displayed, all sound will be disabled.

    You can disable this message, and all sound, by UNCHECKING the
    SOUND ENABLED CHECKBOX in the SET PHOTO CD
    DEFAULTS Dialog box. This Dialog is accessed from the File Menu.

2.  Memory, Display Resolutions & Slideshows:

    There are 2 versions of the Demo slideshows, 640-Gif and
    800-Jpg.  The 640-Gif show uses smaller 256 color Gif images,
    the 800-Jpg slideshow uses larger 24 bit (16 million) JPEG
    color images.  The 800-Jpg slideshow was designed to run in
    systems with high color displays, adequate memory (8 MB RAM
    minimum), and fast processors (486 DX33 minimum).  The 640-Gif
    slideshow was designed to run in most Windows 3.1 systems
    having a 256 color display driver.

    Photo Factory will automatically scale and dither a slideshow
    to look OK on just about any system, (256 colors minimum),
    but the system may not have the resources to run, or it may
    be very slow if the memory and processor cannot handle the
    full size image (the image is first loaded into memory, then
    it is rescaled and dithered).  The rescaling and dithering
    takes extra time.  The resizing required to rescale will
    distort text or straight lines embedded in the image.  Fonts
    added to the slide by Photo Factory's slideshow editor will
    rescale with little loss of quality.

THE MULTIMEDIA STORE(TM)'S MIDI GALLERY VOLUME I
AND THE BEST OF PHOTO GALLERY VOLUMES I AND II:

As an extra bonus with this release of Photo Factory, we have
included our first volume of MIDI song files and 50 of the best
images from our Photo Gallery Volumes I and II.

The MIDI Gallery contains 50 original songs in long and short
versions (100 files in all) for your royalty-free enjoyment and
use.  This collection was composed and produced by San Antonio
artist Kurt Otto. You may use these songs for personal or
commercial use but you may not resell them as music or MIDI files.
The copyrights to these songs belong to Kurt Otto.  If you have
any questions about your rights to use this music, or want custom
songs written, contact us for more information.

The 50 original Photo CD images from our Photo Gallery Volumes I
and II are also royalty-free as long as they are not sold as image
files. To contact The Multimedia Store:

    Call:[phone]
             [phone]
        Fax: [phone] or write to us at
    The Multimedia Store
    5347 Dietrich Road
    San Antonio, TX 78219-2997


CONSOLIDATE APPLICATION NOTE:

Consolidate is a powerful Photo Factory function.  It is used to
move all files used in a slideshow into a single directory.  You
can choose to leave the Photo CD images in Photo CD format on CD
ROM, or convert the Photo CD images to another format for storage
on your hard disk.  If the Convert Images command is checked, all
images will be converted from their original format to the new
format selected in the output format selection box.  This is
useful to compress your images to a size which may be stored on
floppy disk for export.

In a typical slideshow application, the slideshow will first be
created using 24 bit images from Photo CD, .Bmp, .Dib, or .Tif
file formats.  The slideshow may be run and tested, images may
be resized, filtered, and color corrected, and sounds may be
selected from different directory paths.  When the slideshow is
finished it can be consolidated to a single  directory leaving
the images in their original formats, or converting them to
another format.

It is recommended that you create a slideshow in 800 x 600 24
bit color by using standard sized Photo CD images, then
convert all images to .Jpg.  This works well if your system
is capable of running the slideshow in high color (15, 16 or
24 bit Windows display driver).  If the slideshow is to run on
a 256 color system, then consolidate images to the .Gif file
format with the .Pcd load option set to 256 color.  Any other
original images (other that .Pcd) should be converted to the
256 Fixed color palette before consolidating images to the
.Gif format. To force an existing 256 color image to use
Photo Factory's Fixed Palette, convert the image to RGB using
the Color Control/Color Depth Menu. Then Select the RGB to 8 Bit
/Fixed Palette option. This will produce a Dithered image, but by
forcing all images to use the same palette, you will avoid the
palette shift problems when switching between different 256 color
images.

In the slideshow Options command box, note the "Scale Objects
To Fit Screen" and "Hide Mouse During Play" options.  If you
check the Scale Objects box before the slideshow is saved, or
consolidated, it will cause the slideshow player to resize the
images and text layout to look as it did when originally
created with the slideshow editor.  If you create your slideshow
in 800 x 600 and then play it in 640 x 480, the image layout
and text will be resized to fit in the smaller screen display
area.  This scaling can take extra time during playback.  A
significant amount of time is required to dither a 24 bit image
to 256 display if your slideshow images are in 24 bit format
(i.e. .Jpg, .Pcd, and other 24 bit image file formats).  If you
know a slideshow is to be played in 256 color, save the images
as 256 color file formats.  It is best to use the standard pallet
for all images, this eliminates distracting pallet shifts between
slides when run on a 256 color system.

DIAMOND SPEEDSTAR NOTE:

When using Photo Factory For Windows Ver. 2.1 with the Diamond
Speedstar Pro accelerator card, a General Error message may
appear when trying to drag and drop high color images into the
Slideshow Script window.  This occurs due to an error in the
Diamond Speedstar video drivers dated approximately July, 1993.
Updated drivers are currently available from Diamond.  As of this
writing, the most recent beta drivers which have corrected the
problem are V1.08.02 dated 1/6/94.

OTHER GRAPHIC CARDS:

The problem described above may show up with other graphic cards
manufactured by various companies.  Make sure you have the latest
Windows display drivers installed.  Call the manufacturer for your
display card to check for driver updates.


DR. POPEYE X MULTIMEDIA SLIDE SHOW:

Included on this CD release is an artistic example of Photo
Factory's capabilities.  The slide show is located in the KURTOTTO
sub-directory of PFACTORY (on the CD) in Photo Factory export format.
During Photo Factory installation, a Player icon is installed to
run this slide show from CD.  This show runs best in 640X480 High
Color windows display mode.  All images are 256 color or less.
It may be run in 256 color mode but palette change flashes will
be noticed between some slides.  This slide show can be imported
to run on your system's hard disk by running SETUP.EXE, located in
the KURTOTTO sub-directory. It requires 34MB of hard disk
space to import.

This slideshow is (C)1994 Kurt Otto.  No commercial use or resale
is allowed.  Media from the Psychotron(TM) Interactive Movie,
(C)1994 The Multimedia Store (TM), is used under license.
If commercial use is desired, contact The Multimedia Store.

Anyone interested in producing a CD for commercial, personal,
business or artistic purposes with the Photo Factory's Slideshow
Player should contact The Multimedia Store for assistance
and updates.


BE SURE TO REGISTER YOUR SOFTWARE SO WE MAY NOTIFY YOU OF NEW
RELEASES AND UPDATES AS THEY ARE AVAILABLE.

TO CONTACT THE MULTIMEDIA STORE:

    Call:[phone]
             [phone]
        Fax: [phone] or write to us at
    THE MULTIMEDIA STORE
    5347 DIETRICH ROAD
    SAN ANTONIO, TX 78219-2997