Director 8.5 Shockwave Studio

by Macromedia

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B00005BAWZ
• Item model number: WDW85D01
• Date first available at Amazon.com: April 10, 2001
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #15,499 in Software (See Top 100 in Software)
  • #24 in Software > Web Development > Web Effects > Objects
  • #57 in Software > Web Development > Web Effects > Animation
  • #98 in Software > Graphics > Animation
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Review

Without Flash, Web surfing would be a much less dynamic experience. And any Flash developer can tell you that without Macromedia Director, Flash presentations would be years behind the brilliant productions peppering the Web today. Director 8.5 Shockwave Studio introduces a powerful new set of 3-D authoring tools, unleashing a whole new dimension for multimedia Web developers.

Employing 3-D graphics technology developed at Intel, developers can import 3-D graphics with textures and animated elements (from 3D Studio MAX, for instance), and apply creative new ways to animate objects and text--from spinning icons to Superman-style logo fly-thrus--on three axes. A Particles System debuts a range of special effects: smoke, water, fire, explosions, you name it. With customizable lighting and camera effects, this package delivers the goods on the 3-D development front. Naturally, the 3-D presentations are fully scalable, ensuring that viewers with systems ranging from chug-a-lugs to the latest gigahertz blazers can enjoy the show.

For e-commerce, online game, and animated entertainment developers, the upgrades are more than worth the bucks--especially given the wonderful collection of new production capabilities. Director 8.5 offers support for XML data, allowing for even more dynamic Web pages, and the new Shockwave Multicast 3 tool dishes up server-side scripting and UDP support. This strong community-building tool now supports twice as many simultaneous users--up to 2,000 at once.

A true gem of a new feature is the seamless support for RealVideo and RealAudio directly within Shockwave content.

Director 8.5 is topped off with an improved publish feature that smoothly builds presentations for the Web, CD-ROM, or even DVD. For having such powerful new capabilities, Director's interface remains surprisingly intuitive. Though many of the advanced effects may thwart impatient newbies, earnest novices won't have too much trouble creating professional-looking presentations. And once the pros get warmed up with this necessary upgrade, expect to see some brilliant new Web-based 3-D games and animated movies hitting a browser near you. --Eric Twelker

Amazon.com Review

Director 8.5 Shockwave Studio is an essential and exciting upgrade for Web authors who need the latest 3-D capabilities, Flash, and RealMedia support. Version 8.5 of Macromedia's Director has strengthened the product's position as a flagship multimedia tool.

The sheer depth and power of Director 8.5 does not hinder beginners, who will find that the streamlined interface and library of drag-and-drop behaviors allow them to produce impressive results quickly. The more experienced user will find that--with more than 800 new commands covered in well-written documentation--Director's Lingo scripting language provides good detail and control over interaction and delivery.

Director's new 3-D capabilities are based on Intel technology, and are geared toward delivering the goods regardless of the user's connection speed. It does this by employing technology that automatically changes the detail of 3-D objects depending on the user's bandwidth and the speed of his or her computer.

Although Director doesn't really help you create 3-D models--you must import these from other third-party applications using the new W3D format--once in place, key frame and bones-based animation are employed to bring these models to life. In addition, there are a number of presupplied 3-D behaviors, particle effects, and an option to render with a flat, cartoon-style look. All these factors combine to give Director some powerful new moves that will undoubtedly be of enormous interest to 3-D developers.

Director 8.5 supports two other important Web technologies that further add to its versatility. RealMedia is now supported, allowing the author to rotate, scale, and skew clips while they are playing. Flash support has been updated to version 5, and, with its improved integration, you can now control Flash media within Director by using Lingo.

Other new and extremely useful features of Director 8.5 Shockwave Studio include support for XML data and better multiuser server support. This includes new server-side scripting and an increase in the number of concurrent users to 2,000, which will enable rich and immersive multiuser experiences.

Game developers and specialists in Web-based interaction will undoubtedly benefit from these new features, which now make Director an essential choice for multiuser, interactive, and online experiences. --John Bloor

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Software you can create anything., November 28, 2001

By 

Jeff Johnson "Jeff Johnson" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Director 8.5 Shockwave Studio (CD-ROM)

This is probably the best software in the world, for one reason only. You can easily create other multimedia software with it. Games for kids, adults, presentations for the boss, greeting cards, web based applications. The user interface is a bit difficult to get used to because it has its own programming language. You can click and drag, AVIs, MPGs, JPGs, GIFs, WAVs or any other file to create whatever you want with it. The big downfall about this software is that Macromedia comes out with a different version of the Shockwave studio once every three months! So you could pay for this, then another will come out!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Easy yet powerful, August 17, 2001

By 

"pacifcace" (Fargo, ND United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Director 8.5 Shockwave Studio (CD-ROM)

I used the previous incarnation of Director when it was still on the Amiga (a very very long time ago) and recently, for a new job, I began to work with it as it has been rebuilt now. I was surprised that it was just as easy to use as before, but it was still deep enough that you could really get into it and get some truly amazing and powerful results from it. I would reccomend it to any developer, despite the high pricetag its much more than worth it for the use you will definately get out of it.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant but doesn't play well with others, July 30, 2002

By 

WebDeveloper (Hollywood, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Director 8.5 Shockwave Studio (CD-ROM)

Director is a powerful bit of software but I have a few complaints:
1. It will make your entire system run slower - even when it isn't open. This ugly bear of a program works at a very low level in your software and can make applications like MS outlook malfunction or run so slowly you'll think they're not working.

Of course if you have a machine to dedicate to developing your director projects, this is not a problem. This was the solution I came by to use it on projects that required shockwave for work. But if your computer is the one stop workhorse of your business, maybe this isn't the best thing to do to it.
(I have run Director on Windows XP, 2000 and 98 and found the same performance problems - but least problematic on Win 2000 - the macintosh version may not have the same problem.)

2. Lingo is a bizarre language to learn. Lingo is the scripting language you must use to unlock the full power of Director. But for anyone familiar with other programming/scripting languages like C++ javascript, or Macromedia's Actionscript for Flash MX will find the mixed syntax confusing and hard to learn.

If this is the only language you ever plan to learn, then go ahead, do it. But frankly with a similar investment of time and energy ou could teach yourself C++ or Java and create the same sort of projects you could in Director - plus many many more- and you multiuser projects could run on UNIX Servers.

In short, for most projects that people create in Shockwave, I would recommend doing them in Macromedia's excellent Flash MX. For more elaborate projects, do them in c++ or Java.

Until Director tosses away the last of it's old stage metaphor lingo and replaces it with true object oriented programming it will remain an aging dinosaur losing ground against newer programs and technologies.