**************************************************************************** ******************************** POLYED V1.0 DEMO ************************** **************************************************************************** WARNING: ~~~~~~~~~~ THIS VERSION IS ONLY THE DEMO AND WILL `BOMB OUT` AFTER ABOUT HALF AN HOUR, IF YOU WOULD LIKE A VERSION WHICH WILL NOT `BOMB OUT` THEN SEND A DONATION OF FIVE POUNDS TO THE ADDRESS AT THE END. THE VERSION I AM SENDING YOU WILL HAVE ALL THE LATEST THINGS THAT I HAVE ADDED INCLUDED!! SUCH AS..... `COPY FRAME` FUNCTION `DELETE FRAME` FUNCTION THE OPTION TO CHANGE THE NUMBER OF MAXIMUM FRAMES And anything else I have added. HOW TO USE POLYED V1.0: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Although this is a demo of the full thing I have included everything you will need to make your own animations. The load and save requester isn`t very good as you need to offset the mouse a little bit to the right and downwards in order to highlight the file or option you want, its still usable though. When you load POLYED you are confronted with a screen saying that POLYED was made with AMOS, click the left mouse button to proceed. Now the main screen should now appear, on the right hand side you can see the tool box, there are no pull down menus in POLYED as I find them annoying!! Instead POLYED is accessed by using the toolbox and the keyboard, on this disk there should be and IFF picture called `POLY key layout` this picture is in black and white and should be printed out if you have a printer, if not I suggest that you should at least look at it and write down the keys some where to help you use POLYED to the full. THE TOOL BOX: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ From top to bottom LOADING A POLY ANIMATION: The load icon is represented by an arrow pointing from a disk to a strip of film, click on this with the left mouse button and the load requester will come up, then select the file you want to load as a POLY anim. SAVING A POLY ANIMATION: The save icon is represented by an arrow pointing to a disk from a strip of film, click on this with the left mouse button and the save requester will come up, then select the file you want to save as a POLY anim. POLYED has a built in gadget which will only allow it to load POLY anims if you select something other than a POLY anim then the computer will ask you to load a POLY anim again. CHANGING THE CURRENT FRAME NUMBER: The `-10` icon will take you back ten frames The `-` icon will take you back one frame The `+` icon will take you forward one frame The `+10` icon will take you forward ten frames ABOUT GADGET: The `ABOUT` gadget will display a screen showing some information about the program, just click the left mouse button to get back to the main screen after you have read it. CHANGING THE CURRENT POLYGON NUMBER: The `-` icon under the `ABOUT` icon will take you back one polygon. The `+` icon under the `ABOUT` icon will take you forwards one polygon. CHANGING THE COLOUR PALETTE AND MAXIMUM NUMBER OF FRAMES: Select the `COLOUR/PREFS` icon and a screen will be displayed showing blocks of colours at the top of the screen and an extra large block below these showing the current colour, click on the colour you want to change and then change the position of the R (Red), G (Green) and B (Blue) squares to get the colour you want, remember that you can set there levels from 0 to 15. To get back to the original screen click on exit or press the `ESC` key. On the right you will see a section which can be used to change the maximum number of frames in your animation, a 1000 frame animation which will last for 285 seconds (4 mins 45 secs) will only take up 352k(Less than half a disk!!) The minimum number of frames allowed is 4, the maximum being 9999, but you can only fit about 2375 frames onto a 836k disk. (11 mins 19 secs.) Alas.. The demo will not let you change the maximum number of frames in your animation but the full version does... ...Instead the demo has a fixed maximum number of frames which is 100,(This will let you make an anim of about 30 seconds, this will take up about 36K) FRAME DELETE: This does not work in the demo.... COPY FRAME: Nor does this.... CHANGE THE CURRENT COLOUR: Simply click the left mouse button on any one of these eight colours which are stacked in two rows of four. Then depending on which colour the cross is the colour will selected. THE KEYBOARD: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Key What it does (Or at least it should!!) F1 Play anim looped (Restart anim if paused) F2 Stop anim F3 Pause anim F5 Play anim once slightley faster (Cannot be interupted) Esc Exit from colour changer screen/prefs screen A Load POLY anim S Save POLY anim C Goto colour changer screen/prefs screen Large Enter Key Copy frame (Disable in demo version) Del Delete frame (disabled in demo verision) Help Call up the about screen Up arrow Increase Polygon number Down arrow Decrease Polygon number Left arrow Decrease Frame number Right arrow Increase Frame number 1 to 8 Change the current colour I X1 O X2 P X3 [ X4 K Y1 L Y2 : Y3 # Y4 - Decrease one of the X or Y co-ordinates by one depending on which X or Y key is also held down + Increase one of the X or Y co-ordinates by one depending on which X or Y key is also held down DRAWING A POLYGON: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In order to draw a polygon you will need to be on the main screen in the area left of the TOOL BOX, this is where all the polygons will be displayed, simply click the left mouse button and a cross should appear under the main mouse cross, do this another three times at different positions and a polygon the same colour as the current colour will be displayed. Each polygon has its own number from 0 to 39 and its own colour, each frame has 40 individual polygons which can be displayed at any one time. The default setting of an undefined polygon is the backround colour 0 and all its co-ordinates being 0. Each polygon has eight individual co-ordinates: X1,Y1,X2,Y2,X3,Y3,X4,Y4 The X co-ordinates tell the computer how far Left or Right the point is. The Y co-ordinates tell the computer how far Up or Down the point is. If you glance at the TOOL BOX while you are drawing polygons then you can see that it shows you the current place of the coordinates, as well as the current frame number, the current polygon number, the current colour and and the current mouse co-ordinates. If you are drawing a polygon and make a mistake whilst doing so, click the right mouse button once and then you can redraw the last point you done, or alternatively press the right mouse button twice to redraw the second last point that you drew, the same applies for the third last point if you press it thrice. This will not work if you have ploted all four points onto the screen instead you will have to either redraw the polygon again or use the keys to make slight adjustments to the polygon. When you are drawing a polygon some functions will not work, but you can still change the current colour, the current polygon and the current frame, at the moment I am presently making changes to the registered version which will make things easier to change and make the whole thing a bit more usable. *************************************************************************** POLYED V1.0 IS COPYRIGHT © 1993 Aaron Sethi POLYED V1.0 IS SHAREWARE It may not be altered, included on a coverdisk, included in a commercial package or in a disk magazine without my written permission. It may be copied as long as no profit is made by any one other than the author of POLYED V1.0, also any copies made must include the following files: POLYED V1.0 POLY key layout POLYED.Doc (This one!!) POLYPLAY_V1 POLYPLAY_V1.AMOS I have tried to get rid of all the bugs, but I`m sure some slipped in, but in no way is the author responsible for any damage caused by POLYED V1.0 *************************************************************************** WHY POLYED? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The main reason I made this was because I was sick of having `out of memory` messages when I tried to make animations with my favourite art package DPaintIV. So I decided to get out Amos and make my own art package which takes up less space. As yet POLYED has very few extras but as time goes by I`m slowly improving it. Talking of slow I have to admit that POLYED is a sloath as far as playback is concerned!!!(3.5 frames per second) But the advantage of being able to make animations much longer than an IFF anim with the same amount of memory must be worth something? TIPS: ~~~~~~~ Unfortunately detail is only possible by using lots of small polygons. Also its a good Idea to have an idea before jumping in. Remember that the program will display polygon 0 first and 40 last so you will find that if polygons are over lapping then the higher the polygon number the more front most it will be....(Does that make any sense???) WHAT I USED: (not that any one cares!!!) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Amiga 500+ (1meg) AMOS the Creator1.34 AMOS Compiler 1.34 DPAINT IV 95.8 CAPITAL FM FINAL WORD: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ If you have AMOS then load up POLYPLAY_V1.AMOS and have a look at it!! If you just want to watch a POLY anim and not actually edit it then use the POLYPLAY_V1 utility on the disk. If you want to make a donation of five pounds, then send it to the address below, any one who makes a donation will receive the latest version of POLYED free. Or if you have any comments or ideas about how to improve this thing, or even a spare Lamborgini Countach Aniversary Quatrovolvole (In red preferably!(I can but only dream.....)then write to me at: MR A SETHI 10 RUSSELL COURT STRASBURG ROAD BATTERSEA LONDON S.W.11 5HZ