Index Homepage Support

Cinematograph

DVD MPEG VCD/SVCD AVI QuickTime movieviewer

for Windows 2000, Windows NT 4.0, Windows ME, Windows 98, Windows 95

Copyright © 2000 by Carl Verner Skou, All rights reserved


Cinematograph Description.


Cinematograph is a high performance and high quality movie viewer based on DirectShow/COM for Windows 2000, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 98 and Windows 95. Cinematograph displays DVD, MPEG, Video Compact Disc, Super Video Compact Disc, AVI, Windows Media Video and QuickTime movies on a black background meaning no other pictures, windows will disturb the movies shown. You have the option for resizing the movies on the fly - if you love movies the widescreen format 16:9 is just for you - enter your own movie theater. You can collect your movies in a collection and set different options for each movie: Size, rating, alias name. Further you have an option for parental control, where you can specify from where your children can view movies ( folders, CD-ROM and DVD discs ).

An autosearch option gives your the possibility to search harddisks, CD-, DVD-discs for movies supported by Cinematograph, the search result can be inserted directly into a movie collection.

Cinematograph is designed around a VCR-control with the well known play, pause, stop etc. for easy handling of movies. The design of the program makes it very user-friendly - and under the hood the advanced features of the Cinematograph engine and the DirectShow engine is running silently, ensuring you can enjoy your movies.

The DVD support in Cinematograph is a release, which I have been looking forward to for a long time - Cinematograph is developed con amore to movies - in the days of the early versions of Cinematograph, there were only access to AVI and QuickTime movies in small size and in low quality, the movies were typical only a couple of minutes in length. A major improvement were MPEG-1 movies, which showed the direction of movie handling on the personal computer - and now with DVD - it is possible to enjoy movies in superior quality and with excellent sound - a movietheater experience on your desktop.

Cinematograph is a very popular program, and it entered the top ten download list on Rocket Download in just two weeks in the summer of 1999. You can find Cinematograph on all major download sites as i.e. Rocket Download, 32 Bit Resource Center, Download 32, CNet Download and Microsoft NT Resources. Remember, your support will help Cinematograph to get better, and the best support you can give, is to register Cinematograph, check out the orderform.

For further information, please visit Cinematograph Homepage.

Index


How to install Cinematograph.

Run SETUP.EXE and follow the instructions.

Some distributors are repacking Cinematograph, this can mean, Cinematograph's setup-program cannot find it files, when you are trying to run SETUP.EXE from inside the unpacking program. Solution: Unpack all the files to a temporary folder or to a floppy disk and run SETUP.EXE from either the folder or the floppy disk.

The distributed shareware version of Cinematograph cannot make a silient Setup.

The following files are in the distributed shareware version:

If a file is missing, this is not the original distributed shareware version and you should inform either the distributor or the programauthor Carl Verner Skou ( e-mail: cvs@mail.dk ) about it. All distributors repacking the archive must ensure all the above files are available in the archive and that all files are the newest version.

It is not allowed to distribute any registered version of Cinematograph.

Index


How to uninstall Cinematograph.

Open Control Panel, click on Add/Remove programs, click on Cinematograph, and follow the instructions.

If you have saved any movie collections in the folder containing Cinematograph, the folder and the movie collections are not removed. Remove the folder containing the movie collections with Explorer.

Index


Conditions.

You are hereby granted a
license to use Cinematograph on an evaluation basis for a period of 30 days from the date of acquisition. If you like Cinematograph and wish to use Cinematograph after this period has expired, you must register it.

Cinematograph may not be sold or distributed for compensation without the express written consent of Carl Verner Skou.

Distributors must contact Carl Verner Skou

Index


What is an evaluation version?

An evaluation version provides a way to obtain and evaluate software, and hereby gives the users the opportunity to try a program before buying it. You are allowed to use Cinematograph for 30 days, after using Cinematograph after 30 days, you must purchase a licensed copy
( see the orderform ) or remove the program from your system.

Index


Requires.

Index


What kinds of movies are supported?

Cinematograph supports all the major movie formats

Depending on the configuration of your system the quality and playback of the movies will be different. DVD movies requires either hardware based decoding or a very fast system, minimum a Pentium 133 MHz should god enough for hardware based DVD viewing, a Pentium II 350 MHz is recommended for software based DVD decoding. If you want to view MPEG movies in full screen without dropping of frames, a minimum system based on a Pentium II and a fast graphiccard ( AGPx2 ) is required. A smaller system Pentium I will properly drop frames or have delays showing MPEG movies in larger size than typical 320x240. Other movie formats will also vary, but as a rule of thumb AVI and QuickTime movies should be shown without problems.

Please see below for further instructions about MPEG and QuickTime.

Index


DirectShow, MPEG and QuickTime.

Microsoft DirectShow is required to view AVI, MPEG and QuickTime 1.0-2.0 movies. DirectShow is installed by the component Direct Media either by Microsoft Internet Explorer or Microsoft DirectX Foundation. DirectShow is the descendent to Video for Windows and ActiveMovie, and it improves speed, quality of supported movie formats in significant ways.

If you have installed
MS Internet Explorer version 4.0 and newer or DirectX version 5.x and newer, you should have DirectShow installed on your system. If not, either:

Install Internet Explorer and remember to select Multimedia as one of the components.

or

Install MS DirectX Foundation

Microsoft DirectShow/DirectX Foundation can be downloaded from Microsoft, please go the web-site:

http://www.microsoft.com/directx/

To view Microsoft Media Video movies/recordings ( *.asf, *.wmv ) you must have updated your system with latest
Windows Media Player. You can download the latest version from Microsoft:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/


Index


Apple QuickTime Movies.

In order to view all QuickTime Movies 1.0-4.x, Apple QuickTime version 4.x must installed on your system. Apple QuickTime can be downloaded from Apple:

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/

You can only view the QuickTime movies in normal and double size.

Index


DVD.

Quick introduction to DVD playback with Cinematograph: Start Cinematograph, press eject on Cinematographs VCR control, insert the DVD movie, press eject again on Cinematographs VCR control. Wait for a moment, press play or enter - enjoy your DVD movie in widescreen format.

DVD is supported by Cinematograph, if your system has a DVD-drive and DirectShow supported DVD-drivers, where the drivers can be to the graphicadapter ( typical software based ) or to hardware based MPEG-2 decoding. You might need to get updated drivers to DirectShow form the vendor. The drivers from the vendor are required, because DirectShow is dependent on minidrivers for DVD, MPEG-2 and Dolby Digital AC-3 decoding ), further the vendor provides a licensed descrambling of the content scramble system ( CSS ), which descrambles the DVD movie, and the drives take care of regionalization and analog video proctection ( if TV output ).Wihtout the drivers you are not able to view DVD movies.

Windows 98 or Windows 2000 recommended for DVD viewing. Notice, you must have the latest drivers installed for your graphicadapter ( and MPEG-2 hardware decodercard ).

Cinematograph coexists with your existing DVD software and does not change anything, so you can use your existing DVD software, when not using Cinematograph - but why should you! To use Cinematograph as your DVD player, start Cinematograph, press eject on the VCR controlbar, insert a DVD disc and press eject once again on the VCR controlbar to load the DVD movie. After a moment Cinematograph will have prepared the DVD movie for playback. When Cinematograph is running, you can change DVD movies as described above, do not use the eject button on your DVD drive to change DVD movies, if a DVD movie is loaded or running, allways use the eject button on Cinematographs VCR control.

You can call the DVD menu by pressing stop on the VCR controlbar, when a DVD movie is playing. You can also
right click the mouse to call the Cinematograph's main popup-menu, the first menu item - when playing DVD movies - is access to the main DVD functions. If the menu items under the DVD functions are greyed out, this means, either you are in a DVD menu and should select one of the items, or the DVD menu are not available at this point of DVD playback ( i.e when starting a new DVD movie, where the copyright information of the movie/company is displayed ).

You can set your DVD preferences in properties ( press F4, select DVD - if a DVD movie is loaded, you are s
end directly to the DVD options ). DVD Playback gives the option to select, how a DVD movie should be rendered, select hardware only, if your system has MPEG2 hardware. TV output signal should only be checked, if you have a TV connected to your MPEG2 hardware. Forward and rewind speed can be between 2x and 10x, but the actual speed for high values will depend on your DVD drive.

Most new DVD movies are in widescreen format, older movies are typical in normal TV output format. To view the older DVD movies, select Full Screen View in Cinematograph.

To use parental level, you must enable parental control in Cinematograph and specify a password.

Cool features of Cinematographs DVD support are further:

For more information on DVD and Cinematograph, please visit Cinematograph Supportpage.

Index


Video/Super Video Compact Disc

Cinematograph can autoplay Video Compact Discs and Super Video Compact Disc, when a VCD or SVCD disc is inserted. Cinematograph does not support menus or karaoke. To step through the typical startmenu of VCD/SVCD use the forward button in Cinematographs VCR control.

The layout of the VCD disc must be \mpegav containing the video sequences. For SVCD the layout must be \mpeg2. If your VCD/SVCD for some reason does not have this layout, Cinematograph is not able to autoopen and autoplay the disc, use a manual opening and selecting to the movie.

If you record your own AVI, MPEG, QuickTime, Windows Media Video movies, and do not create VCD or SVCD, save your videos in a folder named \Video, and create a CD disc with this structure ( \VIDEO, where the folder \VIDEO contains your videos). When your insert the disc with your own movies, Cinematograph will autoplay your own movies! Also movies placed in the root of the CD disc will be autoplayed. Cool feature.

Be patient before autoplay starts, Cinematograph is first looking for DVD, then VCD and SVCD and then home-made movies, and this check can take some seconds.

Index


Powermanagement

Cinematograph disables your screensaver, when it starts and enables it again on exit. This is done, because you should be able to watch your movies without any interruptions - surely when watching a DVD movie, you would not like the screensaver to be activated. If you are using a battery-driven laptop, Cinematograph will stop and exit, if the laptop reports low battery conditions.

Index


VCR controlbar, timedisplay, ruler.

You do all the basic operation with the VCR controlbar, which you can hide and restore with F3.

The timedisplay can be called with Ctrl+T, alternative Shift+F3. You can toggle the timedisplay between current, remaining and total time by clicking on the captionbar of the timedisplay. Remove the timedisplay again with Ctrl+T or Shift+F3.

The ruler is called by Alt+F3 and removed again by pressing Alt+F3 once again.

You can hide all controls ( VCR controlbar, timedisplay and ruler ) by pressing Ctr+H.

To get a popup menu with access to all functions, right click with the mouse anywhere on the screen. Alternative you can press Shift+F10 to call the popup menu.

Index


Full view mode.

You have the option for hiding all controls when in full view mode. Just press any key, i.e. spacebar/ESC to get the VCR control back again.

Index


Ruler view.

A ruler can be shown and is used to drag to a new position with the mouse, when a movies is shown or playing. The ruler will not be available in full screen view. If you are in full screen view and checks "Show ruler" in Properties, the view will be reset to the double size. If "Show ruler" is on and you change the size of the movie to full screen, the "Show ruler" check is removed.

Index


Fast forward, slow motion.

When playing single movies in the format DVD, MPEG-1 and AVI you are able to do fast forward or slow motion playback. If you are playing a collection of movies fast forward will step to next movie in the collection. To use fast forward in collection, open a collection, select the movie you want to playback and either double click on the movie or select Play ( not Play All ).

Index


Parental Control.

Parental Control is aimed at families with small children in the age 0-8.

Parental Control is a based on a password control, which enables you to control from which folders and CD discs, your children are allowed to watch movies with Cinematograph. Further it limits the functions: Internet access from inside Cinematograph, rename, delete, remove movies.

All non-allowed folders and CD discs are filtered out from the playlist, Cinematograph is using.

In the properties of each movie in a Cinematograph collection you can specify a movierating. If the movierating isn't
General all ages [G], the movie can only be shown after having entered the password, if Parent Control is enabled.

To enable Parental Control, you must specify a password, which later it used to change Parental Control and to set folders, CD discs allowed for the children.

Notice, Parental Control only works with movies shown by Cinematograph. You must use Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000 to secure your system based on useraccounts, if you want to make a general protections of which movies can be shown by the system.

Hint: If you lose your parental password, just double-click with the right mousebottom on the yellow textarea in Parental control and you are asked, if you want to remove password and parental control.

Index


NT 4.0 and Menu Command sounds.

If you have Menu Command sounds enabled in NT 4.0, then if you use the popup menu to open and play a movie in Cinematograph, the sound of the movie could be disabled. If this is the case, disable Menu Command sounds in NT 4.0, or press Play in the VCR control.

Index


DirectShow/DirectX and drivers.

Be sure to have the latest drivers to your graphic adapter and soundcard, when using DirectShow/DirectX. If you have an older version of the drivers and they do not support the features in DirectShow/DirectX, you can experience lower performance and even programcrash.

You can diagnose your system with DXDIAG.EXE, if you have DirectX 5.x or newer installed.

DXDIAG.EXE is on Windows 95, Windows 98 found in the folder:

\Program Files\DirectX\Setup

on Windows 2000 in the systemfolder

\WinNT\System32

Index


Command options.

You can select a movie or collection to be played and if the movie or the collection should be repeated at startup of Cinematograph.

Command options:

/R = Repeat
drive:\Foldername\Filename

/S = Repeat, no title, all controls hidden
drive:\Foldername\Filename

Notice: /S option only with registered versions


Example:

Cinematograph /R D:\Videos\Music.mpg

Index


Further instructions.

Read the help Cinematograph.hlp for further instructions. Examine the Trouble Shooter in the help, if you have problems.

Index


Special features.

Index


Y2K - year 2000.

Cinematograph is year 2000 compliant. You should update your Windows system with all Y2K fixes to ensure your system is full year 2000 compliant.

This year 2000 statement about Cinematograph version 2.1.0.0 and newer is given as it is without warrant either expressed or implied.

Index


Support, shareware.

Read the online help for further instructions. All registered users will have free update to the later release version and all future versions of Cinematograph. Please read the
license agreement. Use Order to order and pay your own personal copy of Cinematoraph.

Please, visit
Cinematograph Homepage and Cinematograph Supportpage for the latest version avaible and further information about Cinematograph.

Best whishes for many pleasant hours with your movies and Cinematograph.

Yours

Carl Verner Skou

July 2000

Internet: cvs@mail.dk "The Dolphin"

Index


Index

Cinematograph Description

Apple QuickTime Movies

Command options

Conditions

DirectShow, MPEG and QuickTime

DirectShow/DirectX and drivers

DVD

Fast forward, slow motion

Features

Full view mode

Further instructions

Home-made movies

Homepage

How to install Cinematograph

How to uninstall Cinematograph

License

NT 4.0 and Menu Command sounds

Orderform

Parental Control

Powermanagement

Requires

Ruler view

Super Video Compact Disc

Support, shareware

VCR controlbar, timedisplay, ruler

Video Compact Disc

What kinds of movies are supported?

What is an evaluation version?

Y2K - year 2000


Top Homepage Support

Updated 8th of August 2000. Copyright © 2000 by Carl Verner Skou cvs@mail.dk

No part of this document may be changed without the written permission of Carl Verner Skou