With Adobe Director 11.5, HD has arrived in full force. Along with H.264 support in the Shockwave player, you now get the benefits of full-screen HD multimedia capabilities for any apps and games you author using the platform.
Foremost on the list of talents for this version is audio mixing (16-channels, 5.1 surround) with a real-time audio mixer object. The container basically allows you to place multiple sound items onto a single file and mix them down into a multi-layered output for exporting. You can, of course, control the 5.1-channel surround delivery, panning the strength of the signals onto different directions.
Other prominent features for this iteration include native support for MP4, F4V and FLV formats (allowing for flexibility in data sources), media synchronization at the point of delivery and embedded Flash (still no AS3 or Flex, though). It also comes with a new ByteArray member type, which allows users to import and store binary data as a cast member inside their projects. This makes it possible to grab and manipulate content from numerous binary data types – images, movies, music – by simply treating them as byte arrays and modifying them programmatically before playback.
Of course, it comes with the same strengths as previous Director versions, along with some of the most striking deterrents, particularly the deeper Lingo skills necessary for some features along with a very steep price. Being a tool for pros instead of dabblers, though, those drawbacks really aren’t so bad.
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