Sausalito, California-based personal computer design automation specialist Autodesk Inc formed a Multimedia division some time back, and the new division has announced that its FLIC file format has been adopted by both IBM Corp as the standard for animation on the personal computer; FLIC is also one of the file formats supported in Microsoft Corp’s Video for Windows. The Ultimedia tools Series is a high-performance multimedia software system for MS-DOS, Windows and OS/2 that sets up standardised hardware and software links, which enable users to choose from a full suite of multimedia tools. Autodesk’s current multimedia tools include Autodesk 3D Studio Release 2, Autodesk Animator Pro 1.3 and Autodesk Multimedia Explorer for generating FLIC files that can be integrated into multimedia presentations using Video for Windows. Autodesk says FLIC files are the most common method of creating and delivering animation on the personal computer. Industry support includes authoring tools like Macromedia’s Inc Authorware Professional for Windows and the CorelDraw 3.0 package. Apple Computer Inc’s Media Exchange Toolkit converts FLIC files to QuickTime movies. Even Topas, which comes from Autodesk competitor AT&T Co subsidiary AT&T GSL, offers FLIC support.
