The Digital Media Series
Electrifier Pro 1.0
Reviewed by: Brent Hecht
Review Date 1.13.00
Publisher: Electrifier, Inc
MSRP: $395
QuickTime is only for playing and recording multimedia, right? Wrong! Ever since Apple released QuickTime 3.0, the software has included a very under appreciated feature which supports the integration of interactive elements. With Electrifier Pro 1.0.2 from Electrifier, Inc., Mac users can take full advantage of these interactive elements.
When Electrifier Pro application is first launched, users are asked to choose what size of “New Movie” they wish to create. Options include “Web Page” (464x400), “Web Banner” (464x60), and “Half Web Banner (224x60). While users are also allowed to create their own custom-sized movies, I found the built-in sizes to be very helpful.
Each Electrifier Pro movie can contain one or more “sprite tracks.” To use these tracks, the user can add text and QuickTime objects, such as movies and sound. These “effects” from Electrifier’s impressive collection and “actions” provide for interactivity can also be added. I was able to easily create a movie that included a zooming text effect and an “action” that took a user to a specific URL when the text was clicked. Creating more elaborate movies however was much more difficult. The text tool, which offers no preview mode, proves to be extremely tiresome with prolonged usage. In addition, the inspector window, which is intended to allow control over the details of each item in the movie, often had interface glitches and did not work as expected. Finally, the “Structure” window, which allows for control over each item in the movie via a timeline, did not update correctly, which made my movie’s playback unpredictable at best.
If you can manage to create a movie despite the interface, Electrifier Pro’s biggest strength is its ability to create extremely low bandwidth movies. A ten second-long movie weighed in at only 32k! Obviously, if you include prerecorded QuickTime movies or graphics, the Electrifier Pro movie will be a good deal larger, but it is comforting to know that adding interactivity to an existing movie or graphic will only add seconds to its download time.
Electrifier Pro strikes me as more of a demonstration of QuickTime technology than a professional tool for creating interactive media. Electrifier Inc. appears to have designed Electrifier Pro around QuickTime’s capabilities rather than using QuickTime to supplement innovative features. Also, with QuickTime 4’s newly added Flash capabilities, Electrifier Pro’s usefulness comes into question. Why create interactive media that will work with only QuickTime when you can create media that is compatible with both QuickTime and the much more ubiquitous Flash format? In addition, Flash 4, Macromedia’s Flash creation tool, offers many more features at a lower price. For these reasons, and because of Electrifier Pro’s highly buggy interface, I have a hard time recommending Electrifier Pro to anyone.
Score
4 out of 10
Requirements
PowerPC-based Mac OS
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