Multimedia Systems

Multimedia Definitions

 Multimedia is something people can see, hear, touch and read on websites,
radio, television, video games, phone applications, retail stores, cinema halls
and ATMs.

 Multimedia can be defined as a combination of picture, text, sound, video and

animation. In simple terms, multimedia is the combination of more than one
media.

 Multimedia is the medium which provides information to the users in the form
of text, audio, video, animation and graphics. The information is delivered to
the users by digital or electronic means.
Interactive multimedia

 When a user is allowed to control the elements of multimedia

then it becomes interactive multimedia.

 Interactive multimedia is called hypermedia when the user is

given the structure of linked elements to control it.
Media Examples

• There are various components that make up a multimedia production. In a

program, more than one media element is necessary to call it a multimedia.
Some examples of media are given below:

▪ Text and typography.

▪ Colored, pictorial or graphical backgrounds
▪ Images and graphics such as photographs, illustrations, cartoons,diagrams,
shapes, arrows, lines, etc.
▪ 2D and 3D animation.
▪ Audio files such as a song, sound effects, music, etc.
▪ Video files such as a short movie clip, advertisement.
▪ Buttons and menu for easy navigation in a program.
Categories of Multimedia

 Based on how multimedia programs are used, multimedia can be

divided into two forms :
▪ linear multimedia
▪ non-linear multimedia.
Categories of Multimedia

linear multimedia
 Information is read or viewed in a continuous sequence.
 Begins at a predetermined starting point and ends at a predetermined
end point.
 Linear multimedia works very well for providing information to a large
group of people such as at training sessions, seminars, workplace
meetings, etc.
 lacks all the features with the help of which, a user can interact with the
application such as the ability to choose different options, click on
icons, control the flow of the media, or change the pace at which the
media is displayed.
 Example: Powerpoint presentation is one of the most common
examples of linear multimedia.
Categories of Multimedia

Non-linear multimedia

 information is not presented in sequential or chronological

manner.
 Non-linear multimedia programs are usually interactive and
require audience interaction.
 Example: One of the most common examples of this form of
multimedia is the Web.
Hypermedia and Multimedia

 Whereas we may think of a book as a linear medium, basically meant to be

read from beginning to end, a hypertext system is meant to be read nonlinearly,
by following links that point to other parts of the document, or indeed to other
documents.
Hypermedia and Multimedia

 Hypermedia is not constrained to be text-based. It can include

other media, such as graphics, images, and especially the
continuous media - sound and video.

 Hypermedia can be considered one particular multimedia

application.

 World Wide Web is the best example of a hypermedia

application.
The World Wide Web
 The largest and most commonly used hypermedia application. Its
popularity is due to the amount of information available from web
servers.
 WWW technology is maintained and developed by the World
Wide Web Consortium (W3C), although the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF) standardizes the technologies.
 The W3C has listed the following three goals for the WWW:
- universal access of web resources (by everyone
everywhere)
- effectiveness of navigating available information
- responsible use of posted material.
Components of multimedia

 There are some basic elements that present the multimedia:

 text, graphics, Audio, animation, video and interactivity –
that can be included in a multimedia presentation.

A TRUE multimedia presentation combines all of these elements.

Components of multimedia

1. TEXT
 Traditionally text has been used to convey messages. Text is an excellent way
for delivering information, but can often be too slow at getting the message
across. If you only have 3 seconds to grab someone's attention, text is not
going to get the job done.
 Hardware requirement for text:-
- keyboard for text data entry on the computer.
- OCR (optical character recognition) is used to input different types of
documents such as pictures, graphics, typed text, or handwritten text.
- A monitor is used to display information on a computer screen.
- A printer is also an output device used to extract hard copies in printed form.
Components of multimedia
Software required to take text:-
 Text processing: – A multimedia computer system must have the capability of test
processing for better use and presentation of text information.
 Text Editing: – Text editors and word processing packages are used to create, edit, and
layout a text document.
 Text Style:- Paragraph styling, character styling (like bold, italic), etc., font families
and accessories, and their relative location in a document.
 Text Searching: – Text information can be used much better by the text searching
feature of a word processor.
 Text Editing Tools- These tools are used to create letters, resumes, invoices, purchase
orders, user manual for a project and other documents. MS-Word is a good example of text
tool.
Components of multimedia
2- GRAPHICS
 They refer to images, digital art, drawings, outlines, sketch, etc. The use of
graphics in multimedia increases the usefulness and presentation of the
definition.
 Adobe Photoshop is a popular graphics editing application that allows you to
easily edit graphics and make them more powerful and appealing.
 There are two types of Graphics:
• Bitmap images- Bitmap images are real images that can be captured from
devices such as digital cameras or scanners. Generally bitmap images are not
editable. Bitmap images require a large amount of memory.
• Vector Graphics- Vector graphics are drawn on the computer and only require
a small amount of memory. These graphics are editable.
Components of multimedia

 Painting and Drawing Tools- These tools generally come with a

graphical user interface with pull down menus for quick selection.

 You can create almost all kinds of possible shapes and resize
them using these tools. Drawing file can be imported or exported
in many image formats like .gif, .tif, .jpg, .bmp, etc.

 Some examples of drawing software are Corel Draw, Freehand,

Designer, Photoshop, Fireworks, Point etc
Components of multimedia

3. Audio
 Sound must be recorded and formatted so the computer can understand and
use it in presentations.
 Two common types of audio format are Waveform (WAV) and Musical
Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI).
 WAV files store actual sounds as music CDs and tapes do. WAV files can be
large and may require compression (like mp3).
 MIDI files are much smaller than WAV files, but the quality of the sound
reproduction is not nearly as good.
Components of multimedia

 Sound Editing Tools- These tools are used to integrate sound

into multimedia project very easily. You can cut, copy, paste and
edit segments of a sound file by using these tools.

 The presence of sound greatly enhances the effect of a mostly

graphic presentation, especially in a video.

 Examples of sound editing software tools are: Cool Edit Pro,

Sound Forge and Pro Tools.
Components of multimedia
4. ANIMATION
 Animation doesn't necessarily have to involve 3D graphics to be effective in a
multimedia presentation. Also simple animations add enjoyment to the
presentation and attract more the attention of the viewer, definitely they are more
effective than static pictures. Animations are particularly useful to simulate real-
world situations, such as the flight of a jet airplane.
 Animation and Modeling Tools- An animation is to show the still images at a
certain rate to give it visual effect with the help of Animation and modeling
tools. These tools have features like multiple windows that allow you to view
your model in each dimension, ability to drag and drop primitive shapes into a
scene, color and texture mapping, ability to add realistic effects such as
transparency, shadowing and fog etc.
 Examples of Animations and modeling tools are 3D studio max and Maya.
Components of multimedia
5. VIDEO
 Video makes use of all of the elements of multimedia - but at high costs. Video
files can be quite large, so they are usually reduced in size using compression.
Common video compression formats are Audio Video Interleave (AVI),
Quicktime, and Motion Picture Experts Group (MPEG or MPEG2).
 Video Editing Tools- These tools are used to edit, cut, copy, and paste your
video and audio files. Video.
 The artistic process of video editing consists of deciding what elements to
retain, delete or combine from various sources so that they come together in an
organized, logical and visually planning manner.
 Examples of video editing software are Adobe Premiere and Adobe After
Effects.
Components of multimedia
6. INTERACTIVITY
 Interactivity allows the viewer to navigate through a presentation in their own
way and at their own pace. The user can jump from topic to topic and skip areas of
little interest. Online catalogues are an ideal example of useful interactivity.
Especially touchscreens make the interactivity perfect.
 Interactive elements include pop-up menus, small windows that appear on the
computer screen with a list of commands or multimedia elements for the user to
choose. Scroll bars, usually located on the side of the computer screen, enable the
user to move to another portion of a large document or picture.
 The integration of the elements of a multimedia presentation is enhanced by
hyperlinks.
Features of Multimedia
 1. Very High Processing Power: There is a need for the high processor to deal with the
large amount of data that is used in Multimedia.
 2. File System: There is a need for an efficient file system that can able to run the
media continuously. To run these media files, we need very high-disk bandwidth rates with
a disk scheduler that can speed up the data transfer rate of the disk.
 3. File formats that support Multimedia: There are so many file formats that are
supported by multimedia. These file extensions are - JPEG, MPEG, AVI, MID, WAV, DOC,
GIF, and PNG. A file format known as AVI contains both audio and video files. It allows
the play of audio and video simultaneously. But there is a restriction on the conversion of
one format to another format.
 4. Input or Output: The input or output system should be very fast in nature. The
information or output should be efficient to play both the playback and recording
simultaneously.
Features of Multimedia
 5. Operating system: There is a need for a high-speed operating system that responds
very fast.
 6. Storage and memory: A Multimedia system needs a large amount of storage space
in which all the audio, video, animation and text should be saved.
 7. Network support: Multimedia supports network systems like Local Area Network
(LAN), Wide Area Network (WAN), internet, intranet, mobile telephony, and so on. These
multimedia networking applications are referred as continuous-media applications and
require high communication latency. Communication Latency is the time it takes for a data
packet to be received by the remote computer.
 8. Software tools: There is a need for various software tools that are used to prepare a
multimedia presentation like multimedia editing software, programming language and
graphics software,
Multimedia Hardware
 Most of the computers now-a-days come equipped with the hardware components
required to develop/view multimedia applications.
▪ Processor: The heart of any multimedia computer is its processor. Today Core i5 or
higher processor is recommended for a multimedia computer.
▪ Memory and Storage Devices - You need memory for storing various files used during
production, original audio and video clips, edited pieces and final mined pieces. You
also need memory for backup of your project files.
▪ Input Devices - Following are the various types of input devices which are used in
multimedia systems. (Keyboard, mouse, joystick, light pen, track ball, scanner,
Digitizer, Magnetic Ink Card Reader (MICR), Optical Character Reader (OCR) , Bar
Code Readers , Optical Mark Reader (OMR) , Voice Systems , Digital Camera, Digital
Video Camera)
▪ Output Devices - Following are few of the important output devices, which are used in
Computer Systems(Monitors, Printers, Screen Image Projector , Speakers and
Sound Card )
Multimedia Software
 Multimedia software tells the hardware what to do. For example, multimedia software tells the
hardware to display the color blue, play the sound of cymbals crashing etc.
 There are various software available in the market such as Paint Brush, Photo Finish, Animator,
Photo Shop, 3D Studio, Corel Draw, Sound Blaster, IMAGINET, Apple Hyper Card, Photo Magic,
Picture Publisher.

Multimedia Software Categories

▪ Device Driver Software- These software are used to install and configure the multimedia
peripherals.
▪ Media Players- Media players are applications that can play one or more kind of multimedia file
format.
▪ Media Conversion Tools- These tools are used for encoding / decoding multimedia contexts and
for converting one file format to another.
▪ Multimedia Editing Tools- These tools are used for creating and editing digital multimedia data.
▪ Multimedia Authoring Tools- These tools are used for combing different kinds of media formats
and deliver them as multimedia contents.
Area of Multimedia Applications

 Electronic Encyclopedia
- For example, there are available encyclopedia that contain video programs
depicting animal behaviors and other natural phenomena.
- One advantage of the electronic medium is the huge storage capacity that it
offers at very low cost.

 Education
- For example, medical schools use multimedia-simulated operations that enable
prospective surgeons to perform operations on a computer-generated "virtual"
patient.
Area of Multimedia Applications

 Commerce
- Multimedia is also used in commercial applications. Multimedia games allow
players to race Indy cars or battle each other from the cockpits of giant robots.
- Also architects and designers use multimedia presentations to give clients tours of
houses that are not even built yet.
 Communication Technology and Multimedia Services-
- These services may include:
Basic Television Services, Interactive entertainment, Digital Audio, Video on
demand, Home shopping, Financial Transactions, Interactive multiplayer or
single player games, Digital multimedia libraries, E-Newspapers, e-magazines.