Authoring mutlimedia CDs on OSX

[Anonymous]

Im sure this has been discussed before, but could not find it doing a search.

Im interested in producing CD's (the shiny coasters we put in our PCs, not construction documents, ) which show various House Types with ArchiCAD 3D views, plans, spec and the like. maybe even a QTVR or movie or two

What application would be best to use to "author" these CD's
preferably a cost effective simple application that runs on OSX.

Thanks in advance

[Anonymous]

There are several solutions to create a very professional CD-DVD on the Mac -

First, the high end solutions -meaning much programing and overhead in terms of an applications base cost.
MacroMedia - Director with FlashPro is one of the best ways to create interactive CD's that show QT QTVR and other ArchiCAD generated animations. There is also a QuickTime application that is similar to Flash and can incorporate flash clips LiveStage Pro. There is a earlier post regarding this application and a flash ArchiCAD utility. If you have the software the production cost will be at least $350 USD per minute and maybe more, but they will definitely give you the most flexibility in media, navigation and production. If you have a 5-10K Budget go for the best.

The cheap way with professional results - Basic applications needed
ArchiCAD Models - Artlantis 4.5 (with updates) animations and stills for the artsy look Piranesi. You must have i-movie, idvd etc.(free with OSX 1.2) -- 3.0 works ok or get the yet to be released (Jan '04) iLife 4.0 it includes a sound editor and upgrades iphoto- SRP $49.00 USD. Of course Photoshop or Photoshop elements 2.0 ( PSE very adequate for color correction and creating cool title slides as JPEG --free with some cameras and scanners -- Amazon $84.99 USD)

Make the animation and generate stills including plans and sections. You will need a Mac with a built in SuperDrive or a firewire CD-DVD Writer to burn you project onto media.

Drag still JPEGS project images to iPhoto, select a few non intrusive background tunes and copy to iTunes Library, If you have a digital video camera and you want to narrate the tour create some short movies for this, or you can just use imovie to record any narration.

Open iMovie import any dv clips, iphoto and itunes open in iMovie and allow you to drag and drop images and background movies. Follow the instructions with iMovie to make a movie (very intuitive, do the tutorial to learn it--45 min.)

The movie can be made as continuous with animations and still images or as separate movie clips. When it is finished export to iDVD but add chapters in iMovie.

Open iDVD and if you have not used it do the tutorial--45min.
A tip you can go back to imovie and edit your clips and once they have been exported to iDVD they will update in iDVD automatically.

This produces a chapter based DVD with Navigation buttons. You can add slides and other data to the DVD disk. All this is produced by cheap or free software in a format that can be played on computers and DVD players. It also is easy to operate for clients and others who may be less tech savvy.

So with this brief tutorial you too can create competition entries, marketing materials, client leave behinds of your projects all on the MAC OSX. Back to the good old days of MAC graphics.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for that Bruce I hadnt really thougth of using the i-apps in that way before.

I did import an animation file into imovie once but it looked terrible, I thought it was because it wasnt a DV file.

I dont have a mac with a superdrive yet, but hope to get one soon. I will definitly give this further consideration.

Thanks for the comments