						North Coast Software, Inc.
						P.O. Box 459
						265 Scruton Pond Road
						Barrington, NH  03825
						Fax (603) 664-7872

			  PHOTOMORPH(tm) 1.20

				README

			     Aug 10, 1993

This file contains omissions, updates, tips, hints, etc. 
and developments more recent than those described in the manual.

Note: The installation disk now contains both the PhotoMorph
installation and the Video For Windows Setup.  From Windows
run both INSTALL and SETUP for a full installation. Skip SETUP
if you already have Video For Windows installed.

=============== Version 1.20 ====================

* PhotoMorph is now able to create AutoDesk FLC animation files.  Set
  OUTPUT type to "FLC" and compression to "RLE" or "NONE".

* Settings: FLC files can be created either with a dynamic palette (the
  default), or with a fixed palette of 256 colors.  FLC files may also
  be dithered or not.  See the FLC "Settings" dialog for setting these
  options.

* Compatibility has been improved with various CD-ROM and Network
  drivers.

* The AVI player now has an "AutoPlay" feature which allows you to
  play a sequence of AVI files.  Choose the AutoPlay icon from the
  AVI player to access the AutoPlay dialog.  This dialog allows you
  to specify the order, number of times to play the animation, and
  the repeat-flag for the entire presentation.

* Output to Cinepak AVI compression is now included. This compression
  allows much faster playback than Indeo or Video1 but the files
  take much longer to create. 

* PhotoMorph 1.2 uses less memory than before.

* Printing support and compatibility has been improved.


=============== AVI PERFORMANCE ===============

There are several factors that you should take into consideration so that
you may achieve the most optimal capture rates possible for your system:

    1. Disk fragmentation - if your hard disk is highly fragmented then
       it will take more time to access data within files and therefore
       reading and writing AVI files will take up more of your system's
       bandwidth. Because less time is available to the capture process
       when a disk is fragmented, captures rates will suffer. Make sure
       that you periodically defragment your disk (several utilities for
       doing this are available commercially -- PC Tools, WinMaster,
       etc...). Make especially sure that your disk is defragmented before
       you create the AVI file that PhotoMorph will write to.

    2. Disk Transfer Performance -- A hard disk which is slow at
       transferring data will impair playback rates since data will not
       be able to be transferred from the disk fast enough to keep up
       with the rate at which data is being displayed. On these
       slower hard disks you may find that playback rates actually go
       up when the data is being read from a file located on a
       compressed disk volume (logical disk drives created by utilities
       such as Stacker that maintain the data on the disk as compressed).
       This is due to the reduced amount of data needing to be
       read from the disk during the playback process as a result of
       data compression.

    3. System Processor - More powerful CPU chips will allow a greater
       amount of processing in a given amount of time. Much of the
       playback process depends on software execution on the system
       processor, so it follows that more powerful CPU's will yield
       higher playback rates. This is in fact the case, as you can expect
       to get higher capture rates on '486 CPU's versus '386 CPU's.
	
    4. System Clock Speed - For the same reasons stated in 3. above,
       higher playback rates will be achieved on systems that have a
       higher system clock speed. Thus, 50 MHz systems will yield
       higher playback rates than 33MHz systems which will yield higher
       playback rates than 25MHz systems.

    5. System Bus Speed - Most AT compatibles have adapter card buses
       which are set at 8MHz. Some compatibles allow the bus speed
       to be set higher with the tradeoff that some adapter cards may
       not correctly work at the higher bus speed. If all the adapter
       cards in your system function correctly at a higher bus speed then
       you can realize higher playback rates at the higher bus speed.

    6. Local Bus Speed - The use of a local bus video adapter can give
       you up to 4 times the playback speed of a non-local bus video
       card.

=============== Notes ===============

Note: all the installation files for PhotoMorph are compressed
using the Windows Compress utility.  If you need to decompress
them use the Windows 3.1 Expand utility.

Note: If you are updating from an older version of PhotoMorph
install all the new system files (E.G. .EXE and .DLL). 

Indeo Update!
The version of Indeo shipped with PhotoMorph is version 2.12
which is newer than that shipped with version 1.0
of Video For Windows. It offers better performance and
reliability. We recommend that you install it.



