This column was first published in the MUGOO Newsletter
in January 2001.
Cut! Cut! Let's look more closely at that frame! Does the image of
Floppy the dog wagging his tail capture 
the true
meaning of a dog? Is his howl full and throaty? What can be done?
Don't touch that mouse, it's My Performa at the Movies. It's
time to edit and play with the movies recorded with my camera in hand
and then some....
The movies created and saved are QuickTime movies, either in Movie
player format or QuickMovie format. There are several software
applications with varying degrees of functionality ranging from
recording, editing, and playback to only extracting sound tracks. Below
is the software installed on my Performa that I can use to manipulate
the images and sound (I want to say film, but that is not the right
medium).
Software Installed on My Performa
|
Quick Movie 2.5.1
|
Movie Player
|
Avid Video Shop
|
Simple Text 1.4
|
Claris Works 5.0
|
QuickTime Player 3 and 4
|
Apple Video Player
|
|
Recording
|
X
|
|
X
|
|
|
|
|
|
Editing
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
|
|
|
|
|
Playback
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
|
X
|
The above video software was bundled either as part of a software
package (Movie Player II came with a Mac Advocate CD), as part of a
hardware package (Quick Movie came with the QuickCam; Avid Video Shop
and the Apple Video Software came with the Apple TV/Video Tuner Card).
Note that two applications that we normally think of as text
applications, like ClarisWorks and SimpleText, are actually multimedia
applications that can playback QuickTime movies.
Last, but not least, are the light versions, free versions of
QuickTime Player 3.0 and 4.0 that have a third of the capability of the
free QuickTime 2.5 Player. The above software allows for manipulation
of video and audio tracks; there is software out there such as Movie
2Snd that captures only sound tracks from QuickTime moves
For low-end (that is 68K) Mac users such as myself, the common
thread of the above software is that it is works on a 68K Mac and is OS
8.1 compatible. Another common denominator is that is is either free or
can be obtained for historically low dollars when purchasing
hardware.
Optimal performance for running the software on a 68K, though, can
only be gained by using a Mac with an FPU installed such as a Quadra 630 or a Quadra 840av with maximum RAM
installed, like 36 MB, running at least at 33 MHz. The bottom line is
that for low dollars you can satisfy an itch to create movies on your
Mac by spending low dollars.
Next time: Virtual Cutting Room
