User Guide

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 7
User Guide
Chapter 2: Exploring Atmosphere
Environments
Before we turn our attention to learning how to create interactive environments in Atmosphere, let’s learn how to
use the Atmosphere Player. The Player is a free plug-in that allows people to view and interact with Atmosphere
environments embedded in web pages and PDF documents.
Using the Atmosphere Player
When you installed Atmosphere, the Player was installed automatically. If you need help with Atmosphere
installation, please see Appendix A, “Installing and Confi guring Atmosphere.” Once installed, Atmosphere
environments will be loaded in the Player automatically when you navigate to a web page or open a PDF document
that contains an Atmosphere .aer fi le. If the Player isn’t installed, a dialog box will appear asking if you wish to install
it.
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The Atmosphere Player features support for hardware acceleration. If the Player detects a supported video card, it will
enable hardware acceleration automatically.
This animated spinning globe icon and a progress bar will appear as the Atmosphere environment is loading.
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When the spinning globe icon disappears, the geometry for the environment has completed loading and will be
displayed. Textures and multimedia fi les will continue to download.
Opening Local Atmosphere Files
In addition to Atmosphere environments that are posted online, you can also open environments that are saved
locally. To open a local environment, right-click in the Player window and select File > Open from the pop-up menu.
This will open a fi le dialog box where you can select an Atmosphere environment to open.
The Player can only open and view AER fi les, not ATMO fi les.