[comp.sys.amiga] Movie

langz@athena.mit.edu (Lang Zerner) (12/20/87)

Is there any program other than movie for playing movie format animations?
Even though movie is a great concept (honestly, GREAT job, Eric), I need to
find something that will play the compressed animations without the system
fragility of movie.  What I'm talking about, of course, is the Left-Amiga-N
bug.  IF you are playing an animation with movie, and then press left-Amiga-N,
you don't get "Workbench to Front" as usual.  What happens is that the
Workbench comes to the front for one frame, and then the animation frames
flicker wildly with the workbench.  The end result is usually a Guru.  Does
movie *have* to be that fragile?

I know that most users do not need to go to the workbench while they are
watching an animation, but animations are mainly used as demos.  Dealers, who
will naturally push the multitasking ability of the Amiga, can't afford to have
demos that crash or behave erratically with the rest of the system.  Maybe I
just don't understand the technical nature of the problem well enough, but
isn't there some way of playing a movie-compressed animation without ignoring
the possibility of interaction with the rest of the system?  I can't believe it
has to be a hack.

On a related note, does anyone know why sometimes, after using showanim to
play an animation, the display flickers as though it were interlaced?  I know I
posted this question once before, but I've seen it on other Amigas and I'm
dying to know what's behind it.  CATS?


Be seeing you...
--Lang Zerner      langz@athena.mit.edu    ihnp4!mit-eddie!athena.mit.edu!langz
"No one is exempt from talking nonsense; the only misfortune is to do it
 solemnly"   --Michel de Montaigne