User Guide

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CHAPTER 11
Using Digital Video
You can give your Macromedia Director MX 2004 movie added appeal by including digital video.
Digital video not only offers high-quality real-time image animation and sound, but also supports
new types of media such as Windows Media audio and video files and DVD content.
Director supports QuickTime video and Real Media content for Windows and Macintosh.
Director also supports Windows Media Video and Audio (WMV and WMA) for Windows only.
Audio Video Interleave files (AVI) in Windows are supported through the Windows Media Xtra.
The Windows Media Xtra extensions can also support MPEG-1 (including MP3), MPEG-4,
WAV, and RIFF.
QuickTime is a multimedia format in its own right. It offers sophisticated sound features and can
include graphics in many formats, including basic navigation of QuickTime VR2 files. For a list
of supported QuickTime formats, see the Apple Computer website at www.apple.com. To use
QuickTime, you must also obtain QuickTime 3 or later (QuickTime 6 or later is recommended)
from Apple.
Increasingly, digital media is being provided in the DVD format. The Director DVD editor lets
you link to, inspect, manipulate, and access the contents of a DVD. You can link to media on
hybrid DVD ROM/Video and regular DVD video discs. However, you cannot export Director
files in the DVD format.
Note: DVD support in Director authoring and playback has specific requirements. Please refer to the
minimum system requirements at www.macromedia.com/go/sysreqs for more information.
The Director media synchronization features let you synchronize events in a movie to precise cue
points embedded in digital video.
Video can make significant demands on a computer’s processing power, so you might need
to manage video content carefully to make sure it does not adversely affect your movie’s
performance.
Lingo or JavaScript syntax gives Director more flexibility when playing digital video and can help
overcome performance concerns. You can use it to play digital video in ways that are not possible
with the Score alone. Using Lingo or JavaScript syntax, you can do the following:
• Precisely synchronize digital video and animation
• Turn digital video on and off on demand and control individual video tracks