COURSE C2: INTERACTIVE MULTIMEDIA CONTENT AUTHORING & PUBLISHING COURSE SUMMARY The course "Interactive Multimedia Content Authoring & Publishing" will describe and present state of the art practices and trends in multimedia document creation and publishing, including CD-I and CD-ROM title authoring. COURSE LEVEL/DESIRED BACKGROUND Beginning. This is an introductory course intended to familiarize individuals with techniques facilitating the integration of many digital media elements into one multimedia presentation. Prior exposure to interactive computer graphics, especially WIMP systems (Window, Icon, Menu and Pointer), and digital media is helpful. COURSE DESCRIPTION (more info in upcoming postings) An emerging form of digital publication, the multimedia document, holds the promise of enormous growth for computer and consumer electronics markets. The theory and practice of using multimedia authoring tools such as MacroMind Director, Cats Meow by Tiger Media, MediaView for NeXT, and OptImage's MediaMogul for CD-I development will be discussed and demonstrated during this course. Additional topics covered: an overview of multimedia resources, project planning, the development cycle of CD-ROM and CD-I titles, human factors in authoring, the communication and transmission of multimedia documents, file formats and compression technology, platform independent multimedia authoring, prototyping and testing interactive multimedia presentations before publishing onto CD, and glimpses of future tools, techniques, and trends. The course notes will contain many resources and references pertaining to current multimedia development. COURSE LECTURERS Hank Grebe, AT&T Bell Laboratories Hank Grebe is a consultant in the User Interface Planning and Design Department at AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel, New Jersey where he provides computer technical support as well as graphic design input for Human Factors Engineers. He previously worked as a graphical user interface programmer and system administrator at NYNEX. Grebe's early work was in conventional cel animation, and later in computer animation and video post production at New York Institute of Technology's Computer Graphics Lab and Video Center. He studied fine art at Cornell University, the Boston Museum School of Fine Arts and the University of Wisconsin in Madison. He is also currently a freelance multimedia developer for a New York design firm and an interactive CD software publisher. Richard L. Phillips, Los Alamos National Laboratory Dick Phillips is a Technical Staff Member in the Computer Graphics Group, Computing and Communications Division of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. His current research interests are scientific visualization, multi-media workstations, distributed computing, window systems, and digital publication. Prior to coming to Los Alamos, he was a Professor of Electrical & Computer Engineering and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan for over 20 years. There he was instrumental in establishing a several hundred node workstation network for student and faculty use in the College of Engineering. He received a BSE in mathematics in 1956, a MSE in aerospace engineering in 1957, and a PhD in aerospace engineering in 1964, all from the University of Michigan. Phillips is a member of IEEE and ACM. Craig Rispin, OptImage (more bio info in upcoming postings) Craig Rispin is the Channel Manager at OptImage, a company with an entry level tool, the CD-I MediaMogul System, for comapanies interested in CD-I authoring. OptImage schedules 2 day training workshops on CD-I authoring, and is a Philips and Microware Partnership. Craig Moody, Tiger Media (more bio info in upcoming postings) Craig Moody is Vice President of Marketing and Sales at Tiger Media. Tiger Media markets Sun-based multimedia authoring software, as well authoring software for the FM-TOWNS PC. Tiger Media has also released as a number of their own interactive CD-ROM titles, including "The Case of the Cautious Condor", "Murder Makes Strange Deadfellows" and "How Things Work". Mike Saenz, Reactor Inc. Mike Saenz began his career in commercial illustration and the comic book industry at Warren Publishing and Marvel Comics, working on "Creepy", "Eerie", "1984", "Vampirella", and "Marvel Comics Epic Illustrated" magazines. He created the first computer generated comic book, "Shatter", in 1984 on a 128K Macintosh, assisted in the development of MacroMind's ComicWorks and GraphicWorks, and 1988 created "Iron Man Crash Graphic Novel" published by Marvel applying a personal computer-based color pre-press lithography system he co-developed, Knowledge Engineering's Lithographer. Saenz founded Reactor Inc. In 1989 and in 1990 released "Virtual Valerie, an adults-only entertainment product in the style of his earlier controversial MacPlaymate program. 1991 saw the release of Spaceship Warlock, a science fiction "Interactive Movie" adventure game on CD-ROM, and awarded Macworld Magazine's 1991 Game Hall of Fame award. In 1992, Spaceship Warlock was licensed to Sony for the forthcoming Play Station as well as the Super NES. Brad Warnick, Nautilus (more bio info in upcoming postings) COURSE SYLLABUS Hank Grebe, AT&T Bell Labs: Overview of multimedia, Multimedia issues in general Elements of multimedia, File Formats Software and Hardware Tools Dick Phillips: Multimedia Authoring on the NeXT computer using MediaView, a general multimedia digital publication system. Live demo of MediaView multimedia authoring. Craig Moody, Tiger Media: Human Factors in authoring presentation documents Platform Independent Authoring a. Front End: Designing and Authoring b. Back End: Generating for target platform. The Cats Meow multimedia authoring tool. Live demos of Sun-based multimedia authoring, and the FM-TOWNS multimedia platform. Craig Rispin, OptImage: About CD-I The CD-I Development Cycle CD-I market strategies Multimedia Authoring for CD-I Live demo of CD-I titles Mike Saenz, Reactor, Inc.: Macintosh Multimedia, Authoring using Macromind Director, The Planning and Producing of the "Spaceship Warlock" CD-ROM Demo of CD-ROM product in development, "Screaming Metal". CD-ROM business experiences Brad Warnick, Nautilus CD-ROM Production Coordination at Nautilus. COURSE OBJECTIVES The objective of this course is to provide introductory instruction on the fundamentals and methods of multimedia content authoring and the production of CD-I and CD-ROM disk titles. Attendees will be given a broad perspective of the current scope of multimedia document authoring, production and publication. Detailed demos of authoring tools by cutting edge multimedia developers will provide numerous insights into the workings of their state-of-the-art digital creations, including CD-ROM and CD-I title publishing. Course notes will contain many references and resources pertaining to planning, authoring and publishing multimedia content. COURSE PREREQUISITES This is an introductory course intended to familiarize individuals with techniques facilitating the integration of many digital media elements into one multimedia presentation. Prior exposure to interactive computer graphics, especially WIMP systems (Window, Icon, Menu and Pointer), and digital media is helpful. INTENDED AUDIENCE Artists, writers, graphic designers, animators, musicians, software engineers, software producers and those interested in how multimedia documents are created. SUGGESTED READINGS Technical Papers: Phillips, R. L., MediaView: A General Multimedia Digital Publishing System, Communications of the ACM, July, 1991. Phillips, R. L., An Interpersonal Multimedia Visualization System, Computer Graphics and Applications, May, 1991. Phillips, R. L., MediaView: An Editable Multimedia Publishing System Developed with an Object-Oriented Toolkit, Proceedings Usenix Summer Conference, June, 1991, Nashville, TN. "MultiMedia For Now And The Future", Proceedings of the Summer 1991 USENIX Conference, Nashville, TN, June 1991, USENIX Association, 1991. Periodicals: CD-ROM Professional 11 Tannery Lane Weston, CT 06883 (203) 227-8466 Digital Media: A Seybold Report 444 DeHaro Street, Suite 128 San Francisco, CA 94107 Tel: (415) 575-3775 Fax: (415) 575-3780 Nautilus (a monthly CD-ROM magazine) 7001 Discovery Boulevard Dublin, OH 43017-3299 Tel: (800) 637-3472 Fax: (614) 761-4110 Verbum P.O. Box 12564 San Diego, CA 92112 Tel: (619) 233-9977 Fax: (619) 233-9976