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#executable flic player

16 messages in this thread

#182993From: Kathleen LuAug 1, 1995 12:53 AM

Is there any program that will allow me to create an executable file in Windows which simply plays a flic with a wave file and closes the file when the flic is finished? I would like to play the flic as a 640×480 full screen animation. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Kathleen Lu

#183000From: dave aguilarAug 1, 1995 3:01 AM

>> Is there any program that will allow me to create an executable file in Windows which simply plays a flic with a wave file and closes the file when the flic is finished? I would like to play the flic as a 640×480 full screen animation. Any help would be greatly appreciated. << may i suggest GRAPHSUPP forum! lots of stuff in there, but most of the stuff i've seen has been DOS-based… course… there's always PIF. 🙂 -dave

#183021From: Kathleen LuAug 1, 1995 10:01 AM

Thanks, Dave, but all of the programs I have found thus far are of the screen saver variety. I need an simple executable to launch within another app (Director). Anyone else have any suggestions? Thanks again, Kathleen Lu

#183063From: dave aguilarAug 1, 1995 2:44 PM

>> Thanks, Dave, but all of the programs I have found thus far are of the screen saver variety. << have you checked out the Grasp and BuildSV stuff? no screen saver stuff in those, very reliable EXE creation too. -dave

#183069From: Paul BoydAug 1, 1995 3:02 PM

I use a routine that came with VISTAPRO, it is called playflc.exe. I believe they have a forum on compuserve, this allows you to sink a flc with sound and play,loop etc as long as you define it. I hope this helps you out. Thanks Paul Boyd

#183087From: dave aguilarAug 1, 1995 4:59 PM

>> I use a routine that came with VISTAPRO, it is called playflc.exe. I believe they have a forum on compuserve, this allows you to sink a flc with sound and play,loop etc as long as you define it. I hope this helps you out. << kewl. <scribble scribble> -dave

#183095From: Kathleen LuAug 1, 1995 5:55 PM

Thanks, Dave and Paul– However: BuildSV doesn't allow linked sounds. GRASP seems very interesting, but the $695 July special sticker price is a little high for what I am looking for. Playflc.exe (I found ver 3.06) also doesn't link sounds and does not create an executable file either. Oh well, my search continues… Thanks again for the suggestions, Kathleen Lu

#183167From: Paul HempstockAug 2, 1995 5:57 AM

Just use the MCI commands from Lingo. (You'll need the MCI driver for FLC files, it's probably in the library here). You might have to be clever with your palettes or you'll get a palette flash when Director yields to the MCI driver. Paul.

#183186From: Kathleen LuAug 2, 1995 9:37 AM

Paul, I've tried using the MCI commands both from Lingo and in a C executable. Besides having the palette flash problem, I also am unable to link sound to my flic using this method. Have you been able to link a sound to a flic this way? Also, regarding the palette flash, I have tried making an identity palette and remapping the flic to this palette without great success–the flash I get is still unacceptable. If you have any tricks or techniques that I am unaware of, I would be most grateful for suggestions. Thanks, Kathleen Lu

#183372From: charles jamesonAug 3, 1995 8:22 AM

Kathleen, have you considered converting the FLC to an AVI format (say with the RLE compressor if you want it to be pixel accurate). Director would be able to play it directly? Chuck Jameson Silver Tongue Software

#183391From: Kathleen LuAug 3, 1995 10:06 AM

Thanks, Chuck, but I have tried converting to AVI using all of the "recommended" compression algorithms (e.g. RLE with 0 or 999 keyframes, etc.). It works okay with flics having little movement, however, with flics which require a lot of screen updating, the conversion to AVI is totally unacceptable. Regards, Kathleen Lu

#183459From: dave aguilarAug 3, 1995 4:17 PM

>> Thanks, Chuck, but I have tried converting to AVI using all of the "recommended" compression algorithms (e.g. RLE with 0 or 999 keyframes, etc.). It works okay with flics having little movement, however, with flics which require a lot of screen updating, the conversion to AVI is totally unacceptable. << what AVI codecs have you tried, Kathleen? just curious. some work pretty well with high pixel delta. -dave

#183483From: Kathleen LuAug 3, 1995 8:06 PM

Dave: I've tried most of them–Microsoft RLE, Cinepak, Intel Indeo, Microsoft Video 1…None of them came even close to flic playback quality with high pixel delta. Do you have one in particular that you suggest trying? –Kathleen

#183527From: dave aguilarAug 4, 1995 1:01 AM

>> I've tried most of them–Microsoft RLE, Cinepak, Intel Indeo, Microsoft Video 1…None of them came even close to flic playback quality with high pixel delta. Do you have one in particular that you suggest trying? << Cinepak and Indeo seem to work well when played from RAMdisk (util/temps and movie files). -dave

#183745From: charles jamesonAug 5, 1995 10:10 PM

I agree, for FLCs with lots of frame to frame changes, using an AVI file with RLE compression isn't the ticket. It did work well for me on one project – but then the FLCs had lots of still areas. Chuck Jameson

#183536From: Paul HempstockAug 4, 1995 3:17 AM

I was about to suggest the same thing but then I went and tried it from AAS. The Microsoft RLE codec has settings for quality, key frames and data rate. Do you know what the significance of these are to run-length-encoding? The lowest quality output produces a file about 5 times as big as the equivalent FLC and much worse quality. Highest quality looks OK but is 12 times as big. I don't understand it… Paul.