The Complete Dancing Baby Screensaver Copyright (c)1998 Atomic Media. All rights reserved. Published by NCDS. HELP FILE ========= QUICK REFERENCE =============== For Tech Support and Ordering Information visit: www.babycdrom.com CONTENTS ======== 1. Introduction 2. Using This Program 3. Adding/Removing New Animations 4. Adding MIDI songs from the Collection on the CD 5. History of the Dancing Baby 6. Troubleshooting FAQ 7. Ordering Information 8. Legal Info 1. INTRODUCTION Congratulations! You are now the proud owner of the Complete Dancing Baby Screensaver! This program is the only screensaver CD-ROM that is acknowledged by Kinetix, the creators of the Dancing Baby. With over 150 different animations, 1700 full length MIDI songs, and the ability to play .WAV files and even CD audio, you have the best and most versatile program of it's kind. You can even add your own animations and sounds/music! This means, you can download a new baby animation from the Internet and easily integrate it into the program making it totally expandable! 2. USING THE PROGRAM Using this program is easy and fun. It works just like other screensavers but also has a few more options. Here is a quick look at how to use it. (This assumes you have already installed the program. If you have not done so, follow the instructions on the inside cover of the CD booklet.) To setup your Screensaver do the following. 1. Click "Start", then "Settings", then "Control Panel". When the control panel opens, double-click on "Display". When the "Display Properties" window pops up, click on the "Screen Savers" tab. 2. Pull down the Screen Saver menu and choose "Complete Dancing Baby" from the list of screensavers. 3. Now you can click on the "Settings Button" to bring up the Dancing Baby Screensaver settings screen. When the screen pops up, you will see that the different parts of the screen are numbered. You can think of these numbers as steps to follow when setting up your screensaver. Here is an explanation of these numbered parts. 1. Choose a Baby Video-- this is where you pick the dancing baby animation that you want to see. You will see a file window that shows the hard drive & folder the program is looking in, and a list of the video files in that folder. The program defaults to the install folder (where you installed the Dancing Baby Screen- Saver) and unless you are an advanced user, you should not worry about changing this. Instead, just scroll through the list of videos you see to the right and pick the one you want. 2. Choose Sound/Music-- this is where you pick the music/sound that will play with your screensaver. This works exactly like section 1 in allowing you to make your selection. The only difference is that the file window shows only music/sound files. The Dancing Baby Screensaver will play midi songs (.MID), and wave files (.WAV). Below both sections 1 & 2 are two checkboxes that say "Play Random Video" and "Play Random Audio". If either of these are checked, the screensaver will play all of the video and music files it finds and rotate through them. This is a cool way to see all of the videos and music! Try it and see what it does. 3. Performance Settings--- These two checkboxes are self explanatory. Special note about using the Password option. This is the only place you can set the password option. There is a "password protected" checkbox in the Display Properties window, but it does not function. Also, a slight bug was found at the last minute. When you are changing your password, you must CLICK on the "OK" button with the mouse; pressing ENTER will not work properly. 4. Audio Settings--- You can only select ONE of these different audio settings at any given time. If you select "Play Wav/Midi File" the screensaver will of course play whatever wav/midi file you selected in section 2. If you choose "Play Audio Track of Video", the screensaver will play whatever audio that has been recorded with the video file (not all video files have audio). If you choose "Play CD Audio Tracks", the screensaver will play a music CD if there is one in the CD-ROM drive (you probaby don't ALWAYS leave one in your CD-ROM drive). Choosing "No Audio" makes a silent screensaver. 5. The bottom buttons are: APPLY, which will of course save your settings and exit. CANCEL, will exit the settings screen without saving any changes to the settings, and HELP will display this file. 3. ADDING/REMOVING NEW ANIMATIONS & MUSIC/AUDIO Adding new animations couldn't be easier. All you need to do is copy the new animation (typically an .AVI video file) into the install folder. Unless you changed the install folder during the program's setup, it will be "c:\dancing baby screensaver". Any video file (.AVI), midi song (.MID file), or .WAV file the program finds in this folder, will be displayed when you choose to change the Settings of the screensaver. So where do you get all of these new animations? There are lots of animations on the CD itself in the "\animations" folder, the "\more animations" folder and the "\more animations 2" folder. Also, be sure and visit www.babycdrom.com for more! Where do you get more MIDI songs and .WAV files? There are over 1700 MIDI songs included on the CD-ROM, they are organized in a web page. This web page is on the CD itself, the benefit of using this method is in the fact that it lets you "browse" the MIDI song collection easily and quickly. To browse the MIDI collection, you must have a web browser installed, either Netscape Navigator/Communicator or Microsoft Internet Explorer. See Section 4. for more info on copying the MIDI songs from the web page to work with your screensaver. Also, keep in mind that you can also REMOVE any animations and audio that you don't want. All you have to do is delete the corresponding .AVI/.MID/.WAV file from the install folder. 4. ADDING MIDI SONGS FROM THE MIDI COLLECTION ON THE CD There are two ways to browse the Midi Song Collection. If you have Autoplay enabled, a few seconds after you insert the Dancing Baby Screensaver CD into your CD-ROM drive, the menu will appear. You can now click on the "Browse Midi Collection" button. From here your browser will start, and display the midi song collection. -- If you do not have Autoplay enabled, you will have to start the menu manually, do this by clicking START, then "Run" then type "D:MENU.EXE" (where D: is the letter of your CD-ROM drive). Once you are able to view the web page that has the Midi Collection, you can just browse throught the songs. To hear a song, just click on the song's title. If you decide you like a song and want to add it to your screensaver, just RIGHT-CLICK on the song title, then from the pop-up menu choose "Save As" or "Save Link As". Locate the install folder ("c:\dancing baby screensaver" unless you changed it) and click SAVE. The next time you go to change your screensaver settings, your song will appear among the choices. 5. HISTORY OF THE DANCING BABY In an excerpt from a Jan. 16 1998 Press Release from Kinetix, we learn where the dancing baby came from: Dancing Baby was created with Character Studio to illustrate to animators that it's easy to produce 3D characters who have real personality and charisma," said Jim Guerard, general manager of Kinetix. "We're delighted to see that so many people on the Internet are finding it fun and easy to personalize this memorable animated character." Originally named Baby Cha-Cha, Dancing Baby was sent to customers in 1997 as an example of the advanced 3D character animation that can be created using Character Studio. Since then, graphics enthusiasts around the world have used the Internet to share the 3D model with others who develop their own versions of Dancing Baby. Although no official count exists, today there are more than a dozen different versions of Dancing Baby available via the Internet, including Kickboxing Baby, Rasta Baby, Retro Baby, Psycho Baby and Techno Baby. One Web site even featured a contest to determine the song best suited to accompany Dancing Baby. You can get more info by visiting our official website: www.babycdrom.com and following links. Or visit, Kinetix at www.ktx.com. You can even download the dancing baby model from Viewpoint at http://www.viewpoint.com/cgi-bin/ktx.pl?ktx for use in your 3D animation programs. 6. TROUBLESHOOTING Q: The display blank! I can't view any of the baby video clips! A: There is a problem with your digital video driver. Every Win95/98 system should have that installed and functioning properly, but for some reason yours may not be. To remedy this, visit www.microsoft.com and download the latest version of "Active Movie". After you install this, you should have the latest drivers and everything will work properly. The latest version (at the time of publishing) of Active Movie has been included on this CD for your convenience. It is located in the "Support" folder on the CD..... but it is still a good idea to check the Microsoft website to see if you have the very latest version. Q:When I try and play some of the video/animation files I get a "VIDS:CVID Decompressor missing" message. A:Try this: Install the Windows 95 Video compressor. Click on START, SETTINGS, CONTROL PANEL. Double-click on ADD/REMOVE PROGRAMS, then select the WINDOWS SETUP tab. Click once on the MULTIMEDIA option, then click the DETAILS button. Scroll down the list of components, and click on VIDEO COMPRESSION. The box to the left of VIDEO COMPRESSION should now have a checkmark in it. Click on OK, then OK at the WINDOWS SETUP window. Q:The graphics and colors look wierd. What's up? A:You display is set to 256 colors. The baby was lovingly rendered in millions of colors as was the screensaver interface. This program was designed to run ONLY in high color or better, but to make sure everyone was able to at least see SOMETHING, it allows you to run it in 256 colors. It makes me cringe to see it in that mode, so do both of us a favor and change your display, you're missing a lot. To change to the proper display mode the program requires (as specified on the back of the CD) do the following in Windows 95: 1. RIGHT-CLICK on the desktop, then choose PROPERTIES. 2. Choose the SETTINGS tab. 3. Pull-down the COLOR PALETTE menu and select 16-bit/High Color or 24-bit/True Color. (anything above 256 colors) 4. You may have to restart your computer after this change. Q:Do I have to leave the Dancing Baby Screensaver CD-ROM in the drive for it to work? A:No. You only need the Dancing Baby CD to install the program(s). Not to use them. Q:How do I play the .MOV animations in the "More Animations" folder on the CD? A:Those animations require you have Quicktime installed. For your convenience, Quicktime 3.0 has been included in the "\support" folder on the CD. Install that, and you will be able to play all .MOV files. Q:The "password protected" checkbox in the Display Properties window doesn't work. A:This does not work intentionally. To use a password with this screensaver, you must change it in the Settings menu. Q:When I am changing a password I keep getting a window that says "The values for the new password and retype new password do not match!" A:This is a bug in the program. It is caused by hitting ENTER instead of clicking on the OK button with the mouse. Just click on the OK button and it will work properly. Q:The program installs fine, but when I go into Display Properties and choose Settings, I get an error that says "Problem loading or registering file" or something like that. A:This may occur on some systems. To solve this, there is a small "patch" located in the "Support\Problem Patch" folder on the CD. Run the "SETUP.EXE" program in this folder, and this should replace the files necessary to make the program work. Q:Is this a real baby? A:umm.... no. Q:How do I order more copies? A:visit www.babycdrom.com Q:Do you have other Dancing Baby products? A:YES! We also make the "Dancing Baby CD Player" which is a really cool CD! You can make the baby dance to ANY music CD! Check out the website www.babycdrom.com for a preview! Q:What if I am still having problems getting the Dancing Baby CD Player to work? A:visit www.babycdrom.com and click on the Tech Support Link 7. ORDERING INFO To order another Complete Dancing Baby Screensaver for a friend or to order another one of our products you may contact us via email at: orders@babycdrom.com or visit our web site at www.babycdrom.com Dealer inquiries welcome. 8. LEGALESE The Complete Dancing Baby Screensaver is Published by NCDS, Developed by Atomic Media Software and is Copyright (c)1998 Atomic Media Software. The "Dancing Baby" character was created by Unreal Pictures, Inc. for Kinetix, a division of Autodesk, Inc. and is a registered copyright of Unreal Pictures, Inc./Autodesk, Inc. Used with Permission. Windows 95/98/NT and Active Movie are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corp. ATOMIC MEDIA DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, WHETHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, WITH RESPECT TO THE SOFTWARE, THE PRINTED MATERIALS AND THE ATOMIC MEDIA IMAGES. ATOMIC MEDIA DOES NOT WARRANT THAT THE OPERATION OF THE SOFTWARE WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED OR ERROR FREE OR THAT THE SOFTWARE WILL MEET YOUR SPECIFIC REQUIREMENTS. ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS SUCH AS PRESENTATIONS, WHETHER ORAL OR WRITTEN, DO NOT CONSTITUTE WARRANTIES BY ATOMIC MEDIA AND SHOULD NOT BE RELIED UPON. NEITHER ATOMIC MEDIA, NCDS, NOR ANY OF ATOMIC MEDIA'S OR NCDS' RESPECTIVE OFFICERS, EMPLOYEES, DIRECTORS, AGENTS, LICENSEES, SUBLICENSEES, SUCCESSORS OR ASSIGNS SHALL BE LIABLE FOR LOSS OF DATA, LOSS OF PROFITS, LOST SAVINGS, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, INDIRECT, PUNITIVE OR OTHER SIMILAR DAMAGES ARISING FROM BREACH OF WARRANTY, BREACH OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE, STRICT PRODUCT LIABILITY, OR OTHER LEGAL THEORY EVEN IF ATOMIC MEDIA, NCDS OR THEIR RESPECTIVE AGENT(S) HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES OR EVEN IF SUCH DAMAGES ARE FORESEEABLE, OR LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM BY ANY OTHER PARTY.