Importing QuickTime Movies into Sector Frames

In order to assign QuickTime movies to a Sector, your machine must have QuickTime capability. To have this capability, your computer must support color, and also have QuickTime installed (be sure to restart your machine after installing QuickTime). Assign Movie will be gray if QuickTime is not installed on your machine.

To assign a movie to a Sector Frame, click on the Assign Movie button within the Sector's dialog. A standard Find File dialog will be displayed (shown in Figure 6-44).

Figure 6-44
Find File Dialog -- Choosing a QuickTime Movie

Locate a QuickTime movie on your hard drive. The first frame of the assigned QuickTime movie will be displayed in the center of the Sector Frame as shown in Figure 6-45.

Figure 6-45
Sector with a QuickTime Movie Assigned

Note - Sizing Movie to Sector Frames: You should note that you can use the "Size to Frame" option with movies. If the movie is smaller than the Sector Frame within which it resides, you can check the Size to Frame option (within the Sector Frame dialog) in order to stretch the movie so that it fully occupies the interior of the Sector frame. However, you should be aware that whenever you change the size of the movie by using Size to Frame, the subsequent movie playback is likely to be "jagged." QuickTime is optimized to play best using its default size.

Helpful Hint: Size to Frame allows you to center a QuickTime movie within a sector, if you have imported a movie and subsequently changed the size of the Sector Frame. Simply check the Size to Frame option in the Sector dialog and then click OK. Then, re-open the Sector dialog and un-check Size to Frame. When you click OK, the movie will be centered in the Sector Frame.

 
Playing QuickTime Movies

To begin playing a movie, double-click within the movie frame. This movie will not have any connection to model performance. To pause the movie, click once on the movie. To resume playing, double click on the movie again. To stop playing the movie, click outside the frame.

You can include movies in as many Sector Frames as you'd like (and as memory permits). You cannot initiate the playing of more than one movie at a single instant in time. However, you can begin them playing one right after the other by double-clicking on each movie frame in rapid succession. Depending upon how much horsepower your CPU has, the resulting cascade of movie play may be just right, or painfully slow (with attendant loss of sound synchrony). You'll have to experiment to determine the performance limits of your unique hardware configuration.

See Also