Why Autoplay Medio Studio

[aharris816]

I currently develop multimedia content on cds using Macromedia Flash. While looking for better ways of developing these cds I ran into Autoplay Medio Studio, but after reading and watching the video tour, I still don't understand how AMS 4 is better. With Flash you can import videos and the content looks a lot better. I know you can import Flash movies into AMS, but why would you, unless you wanted to integrate your web site, but I just want to have a nice looking multimedia cd. I really want to use AMS, but for what I want to do is it worth it?

Thanks,
AJ

[Corey]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

Well I'm the local Flash guy and I can tell you that there are TONS AND TONS of things you can do with AMS that you can't do with Flash. Just one example, file functions. You cannot create or edit files. The list goes on and on...

The list of things which AMS can do which Flash cannot is in the hundreds and is way too big to list here but if you download the fully functioning trial and fool around with it for a few minutes you'll see exactly what I mean.

Combining Flash with AMS is easy and gives you the best of both worlds, you can add all the typical advanced functionality of any Windows software application to your Flash movies, it's awesome... Better than Flash alone and better than Shockwave. The possibilities are endless. It's really easy to use too.

P.S. You can integrate your Flash with any type of video in AMS. And content in Flash certainly does not look "a lot better" than content in AMS. It looks exactly the same in either. I'm not sure where you got such an idea... [img]/ubbthreads/images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] For example a bitmap is a bitmap, makes no difference whatsoever if you display it in AMS or Flash. AMS does beat Flash hands down when it comes to video though, video performance in AMS is much better. You can use AVIs, MPEGs, ASFs, WMVs and more without converting them and you can make them interact with all the other objects within your application, i.e. Flash movies, web browsers, other videos, windows media player, text fields, etc...

Corey Milner
Creative Director, Indigo Rose Software

[kpsmith]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

AMS is quicker and easier for one thing...

As Corey mentioned the big strength of AMS is the way it can
interact with external files, registry keys, user settings, .etc. For example flash was never really design to check for a word viewer, codec, etc and then open a file. The FlashProjector in it's self is pretty weak if you ask me.

I'd say AMS's big weakness is the lack of animation. Of course you can always import flash objects to easily overcome this.

My favorite thing about AMS is how robust and stable it is and it doesn't need any plug-ins.

[CTRL]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

Why not try Visual Basic, and get great results. Its very similar to AMS. But if you want to do it very quick, it cannot get any easier than using AMS. So put the words short you wont find any decent CD Menu Creator on the net like AMS and just like other softwares it also has some bad points. But I think people using AMS will have no problem using Visual Basic because of its similarity, except you have to learn the programming style of VB.

[kpsmith]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

No offense CTRL but I hate VB. It just has too many dependencies on VBRUN DLL's and it seems that no two windows machines have the same versions of any VB supporting files.

I used to use a little VB app to locate the .exe that was associated to a particular file extension back in AMS3 days.

I wrapped most of the file depencies into the .exe and that fixed most of the errors users got but I still had to install the latest VB runtime files on 10% of the machines in order to get it to work... Not to mention this requires a reboot.

I was glad to see that little VB app go due to AMS 4's new features to parse reg keys and detect helper apps..

[Corey]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

We also offer support and after-sales help which rivals any software company on the planet. Ask around, you'll see... It's no accident either, we take it very seriously. The future of AMS is very, very bright. Indigo Rose is here to stay and AutoPlay Media Studio's evolution is a big part of that...

Our commitment to you starts when you buy our products as opposed to the makers of many multimedia tools (not naming any names) where their commitment to you ends when you buy the product. We're fundamentally different than most software companies...

Corey Milner
Creative Director, Indigo Rose Software

[Derek]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

Personally, I dont think AMS is anything like VB [of course there will be certain similarities]; it's a totally different type of app. But that's just my opinion. [img]/ubbthreads/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

We also offer support and after-sales help which rivals any software company on the planet.

I think we would all agree that support and after sales help from IR surpases any other! [img]/ubbthreads/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[kpsmith]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

This forum alone is a good reason to invest in AMS. I've never seen a forum so alive an healthy.

Not to mentions such a willingness of IR staff and others to help, provide sample code, work arounds, insight, ideas....

[Worm]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

Now MY ears hurt [img]/ubbthreads/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

AMS is an awesome product with incredible support from IR and the AMS community. It is also expandable as shown in several posting by myself and others by using the Windows API, or even custom DLLs.

VB has its place. I use it daily at my current place of employment to write applications for SQL server databases and Access databases. It can be a very powerful tool when combined with the Windows API and even some third party OCXs (I have a set ot tools that I couldn't live without). Using it, I can do a lot of things that would be extremely difficult, too time consuming, or the workaround doesn't quite give the effect I want in AMS using VB.

VB would be a dificult sell for an Autorun because of its runtime dependencies. I don't know the percentages, but Its certain you'll run across a machine that does not have the VB runtimes, and the autorun would fail.

For me it comes down to this. If its an application that needs to run from a CD, then I choose AMS hands down! If its an application that is going to run from the hard drive, it depends on the complexity of the app. Most of the time, I choose VB. I can throw together my install using Setup Factory, and I'm good to go.

I'm still relatively new to AMS and am sure I have a ton more to learn. I've been using it for about 7 months. I purchased it purely to make Autoruns to install my VB apps. After really digging in and seeing how much I can do with AMS. I see AMS more as a programming tool than a menu maker.

[kpsmith]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

OK Worm...

VB does have it's place in this world... just not to run programs from a CD. Too many system dependencies

I've spent a lot of time behind a tech support phone checking dll versions, installing the latest vbrun.exe, and realizing that some features that work in the old VBrun dll's no longer work in the newer versions. So.. I'm a bit biased on the subject

To bring it back to the subject of the post..

That's what I love about AMS.. It leaves very little footprint on a users machine, doesn't require an install, and the CD often contains everything that a user would need to run the program.

It's as near to a foolproof app as you can get

[Corey]

Re: Why Autoplay Medio Studio

One cool thing is that people who have no programming skills at all can still crank out some pretty cool custom software using AutoPlay Media Studio without scorching their brains.

Corey Milner
Creative Director, Indigo Rose Software