#Using FLC'S with VB 3.0
10 messages in this thread
Jonas,
Long time no talk. How's things?
I am now venturing into Visual Basic 3.0 and trying to incorporate some FLC's
in the design of the program. I have read several chapters on multimedia and it
seems fairly simple until it comes to calling an animation from another program
such as 3D Studio (FLC\FLI).
If you have the Knowledge or the connections to give me some good reference
material on this subject, much would be apprciated.
Thank you much…
Paul J.
Hi Paul,
<< VB 3.0 >>
Brian Rudolph[ADESK] has been supporting the Animation Support Libraries V2
that is available for ~$25 from Autodesk 1-800-879-4233. There are also a few
older files (1992) in the libs when you search on VB. Also, there is the
WINPLA.exe file in the Utilities section containing all of the DLL's and such
that you need in your windows environment. The $25 gives you docs, docs and
lots of flic creation/playing/graphic card utilities…
I'd suggest downloading winpla.exe, order the ASL V2 and then start a dialog
with Brian…
jonas[adesk]
Paul,
Yes, Jonas is correct. If you ask some specific questions I will be glad to
help.
-Brian
Hello Brian,
I am in the process of trying to create self installing presentation programs
with VB that include FLC files.
I am also going to set up a database (Inventory/Parts Identification)on
PowerBuilder 3.0. It will consist of still and animated graphics generated from
3DS.
I should be able to do this correct?
Will this ASL V2 give the documentation that will take out (some) guess work
and lighten the load?
Thank you much…
Paul J.
Brian…
I have a few questions on the aaplay.dll for Windows…
1) Is there a license fee to use this in a commercial app?
2) Is it possible to disable the copyright message if such a fee is required?
3) Why does calling aaOpen() from C cause the copyright message, but using the
vbplay.vbx in VB doesn't?
4) It seems to do an excellent job, and has so far prevented me from converting
our existing DOS custom flic code to Windows. Do you believe that this
player is pushing the maximum performance under Windows?
5) One additional feature I was thinking of would be on the fly pixel doubling
of flics. What do you think the performance differences would be between
reading a 320×200 flic and pixel doubling in realtime to produce a somewhat
pixelated 640×400 flic, vs. pre-doubling the flic before hand so that it is
a
real 640×400 flic (but pixelated, not rerendered with additional
gradiants).
What do you think?
Thanks…
<<1) Is there a license fee to use this in a commercial app?>>
You will need at the minimum a licence agreement. Whether there is a fee or not
is determined on a case by case basis. Call 415-332-2344 and ask for Gail
Bennet in the Multimedia Legal department. She handles those issues.
<<2) Is it possible to disable the copyright message if such a fee is
required?>>
Not with the version you have. There is another copy of the .DLL which you can
licence from Autodesk that does not have the splash screen. Again, talk to Gail
Bennet.
<<3) Why does calling aaOpen() from C cause the copyright message, but using
the vbplay.vbx in VB doesn't?>>
When you use the .VBX file, you don't get the display message. I don't know why
they wrote it that way, they just did.
<<4) It seems to do an excellent job, and has so far prevented me from
converting
our existing DOS custom flic code to Windows. Do you believe that this
player is pushing the maximum performance under Windows?>>
The player is not, but the FLC format is. Many problems arise because FLC files
were not written with Windows in mind. There are several paette issues/problems
that can arise.
<<One additional feature I was thinking of would be on the fly pixel doubling
of flics. >>
I think on the fly would be slower performance. But either way, doubling the
Flic is not going to get you a 640×480 flic. it is going to get you a 320×200
flic with very large pixels. It will still look jaggy, as if it wasa 320×200
flic played full screen rather than in a little window. Do you see the
distinction between a true 640×480 flic and a 320×200 flic that has been
converted to 640×480?
-Brian
>I think on the fly would be slower performance. But either way, doubling the
Flic is >not going to get you a 640×480 flic. it is going to get you a 320×200
flic with very >large pixels. It will still look jaggy, as if it wasa 320×200
flic played full screen >rather than in a little window. Do you see the
distinction between a true 640×480 >flic and a 320×200 flic that has been
converted to 640×480?
Yes… actually that is what I want… a 320×200 with pixels 4 x the size of
normal.
I understand it will be jaggy, my question is whether a true 640×480 flic where
each
pixel is replicated as a 2×2 square would play back faster than a 320 x 200
pixel
whose pixels are doubled (in x and y) on the fly during playback…
Speaking of palette issues… If all the flics that my app uses only use the
center
236 colors of the windows palette, and we run the app in 256 color mode, will
we still encounter palette problems? Should we embed the windows system
palette in the first 10 and last 10 palette entries in the flic itself? Are
there a set of guidelines somewhere that we can follow to produce optimum
results?
Thanks again…
<<I understand it will be jaggy, my question is whether a true 640×480 flic
where each
pixel is replicated as a 2×2 square would play back faster than a 320 x 200
pixel
whose pixels are doubled (in x and y) on the fly during playback…>>
One of the main determinating factors in playback speed is how many pixels
change between each screen. It sounds like there would be less pixels changing
in a doubled 320×200 flic than in a "true" 640×480, so my thought is that it
would play faster. Of course this also depends on how much delta (change) is
between frames, the computer hardware, and being able to load the flic into
memory.
<<. If all the flics that my app uses only use the center
236 colors of the windows palette, and we run the app in 256 color mode, will
we still encounter palette problems?>>
You problems will be very minimized. The only other thing you can do to help
avoid problems is to have a common palette for all animations.
-Brian
Brain,
Since my last e-mail I have read VBPLAY.TXT and loaded VBPLAY.VBX to my .MAK
project and I still need a sample of some the syntax in action.
After double-clicking the custom control icon I receive the syntax
Sub Animation1_AnimFrame (user as long)
End Sub
Sample syntax that I could insert in the middle, to get the idea, would be vary
helpful.
I'm reading, hopfully I'm on the right track.
Thank you much…
Paul J.
Paul,
What you need is the Animation Support Libraries, without a doubt! This
developers kit includes C and Visual Basic Programmers reference manuals for
the Windows Player, Fliclb and File Format manuals, Code examples and other
support files, POCO and POE reference manuals, and more. You can order this kit
directly from Autodesk by calling 800-964-6432. The kit costs about $25.
-Brian