Republic of the Philippines 1

Cagayan State University

Sanchez Mira Campus

MODULE 2: MULTIMEDIA HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

At the end of this lesson, you will be able to:

 Identify the hardware and software specifications

 Install authoring software

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 2
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

PRESENTATION OF CONTENT

Multimedia Hardware
Most of the computers now-a-days come equipped with the hardware
components required to develop/view multimedia applications. Following are
the various categories in which we can define the various types of hardwares
required for multimedia applications.
 Processor – The heart of any multimedia computer is its processor. Today
Core i7 or higher processor is recommended for a multimedia
computer.
o CPU is considered as the brain of the computer.
o CPU performs all types of data processing operations.
o It stores data, intermediate result and instructions (program).
o It controls the operations of all parts of 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.
o Primary Memory- Primary memory holds only those data and
instructions on which computer is currently working. It has limited
capacity and data gets lost when power is switched off. It is
generally made up of semiconductor device. These memories are
not as fast as registers. The data and instructions required to be
processed earlier reside in main memory. It is divided into two
subcategories RAM and ROM.
o Flash Memory- Cache memory is a very high speed
semiconductor memory, which can speed up CPU. It acts as a
buffer between the CPU and main memory. It is used to hold those
parts of data and program which are most frequently used by
CPU. The parts of data and programs are transferred from disk to
cache memory by operating system, from where CPU can access
them.
o Secondary Memory: This type of memory is also known as external
memory or non-volatile. It is slower than main memory. These are
used for storing Data/Information permanently. CPU directly does
not access these memories; instead they are accessed via input-

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 3
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

output routines. Contents of secondary memories are first

transferred to main memory and then CPU can access it. For
example, disk, CD-ROM, DVD, etc.
 Input Devices - Following are the various types of input devices which
are used in multimedia systems.
o Keyboard- Most common and very popular input device is
keyboard. The keyboard helps in inputting the data to the
computer. The layout of the keyboard is like that of traditional
typewriter, although there are some additional keys provided for
performing some additional functions. Keyboards are of two sizes
84 keys or 101/102 keys, but now 104 keys or 108 keys keyboard is
also available for Windows and Internet. The keys are following:

Sr. Keys Description

No.

1 Typing Keys These keys include the letter keys (A-Z) and digits keys
(0-9) which generally give same layout as that of
typewriters.

2 Numeric It is used to enter numeric data or cursor movement.

Keypad Generally, it consists of a set of 17 keys that are laid
out in the same configuration used by most adding
machine and calculators.

3 Function Keys The twelve functions keys are present on the

keyboard. These are arranged in a row along the top
of the keyboard. Each function key has unique
meaning and is used for some specific purpose.

4 Control keys These keys provide cursor and screen control. It

includes four directional arrow key. Control keys also
include Home, End, Insert, Delete, Page Up, Page
Down, Control(Ctrl), Alternate(Alt), Escape(Esc).

5 Special Keyboard also contains some special purpose keys

Purpose Keys such as Enter, Shift, Caps Lock, Num Lock, Space bar,
Tab, and Print Screen.

o Mouse - Mouse is most popular Pointing device. It is a very famous

cursor-control device. It is a small palm size box with a round ball
at its base which senses the movement of mouse and sends
corresponding signals to CPU on pressing the buttons. Generally,
it has two buttons called left and right button and scroll bar is

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 4
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

present at the mid. Mouse can be used to control the position of

cursor on screen, but it cannot be used to enter text into the
computer.
o Joystick - Joystick is also a pointing device, which is used to move
cursor position on a monitor screen. It is a stick having a spherical
ball at its both lower and upper ends. The lower spherical ball
moves in a socket. The joystick can be moved in all four directions.
The function of joystick is similar to that of a mouse. It is mainly used
in Computer Aided Designing (CAD) and playing computer
games.
o Light Pen - Light pen is a pointing device, which is similar to a pen.
It is used to select a displayed menu item or draw pictures on the
monitor screen. It consists of a photocell and an optical system
placed in a small tube. When light pen's tip is moved over the
monitor screen and pen button is pressed, its photocell sensing
element detects the screen location and sends the
corresponding signal to the CPU.
o Track Ball - Track ball is an input device that is mostly used in
notebook or laptop computer, instead of a mouse. This is a ball,
which is half inserted and by moving fingers on ball, pointer can
be moved. Since the whole device is not moved, a track ball
requires less space than a mouse. A track ball comes in various
shapes like a ball, a button and a square.
o Scanner - Scanner is an input device, which works more like a
photocopy machine. It is used when some information is available
on a paper and it is to be transferred to the hard disc of the
computer for further manipulation. Scanner captures images from
the source which are then converted into the digital form that can
be stored on the disc. These images can be edited before they
are printed.
o Digitizer - Digitizer is an input device, which converts analog
information into a digital form. Digitizer can convert a signal from
the television camera into a series of numbers that could be
stored in a computer. They can be used by the computer to
create a picture of whatever the camera had been pointed at.
Digitizer is also known as Tablet or Graphics Tablet because it
converts graphics and pictorial data into binary inputs. A graphic
tablet as digitizer is used for doing fine works of drawing and
images manipulation applications.
o Magnetic Ink Card Reader (MICR) - MICR input device is generally
used in banks because of a large number of cheques to be

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 5
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

processed everyday. The bank's code number and cheque

number are printed on the cheques with a special type of ink that
contains particles of magnetic material that are machine
readable. This reading process is called Magnetic Ink Character
Recognition (MICR). The main advantage of MICR is that it is fast
and less error prone.
o Optical Character Reader (OCR) - OCR is an input device used to
read a printed text. OCR scans text optically character by
character, converts them into a machine readable code and
stores the text on the system memory.
o Bar Code Readers - Bar Code Reader is a device used for reading
bar coded data (data in form of light and dark lines). Bar coded
data is generally used in labelling goods, numbering the books,
etc. It may be a hand-held scanner or may be embedded in a
stationary scanner.Bar Code Reader scans a bar code image,
converts it into an alphanumeric value, which is then fed to the
computer to which bar code reader is connected.
o Optical Mark Reader (OMR) - OMR is a special type of optical
scanner used to recognize the type of mark made by pen or
pencil. It is used where one out of a few alternatives is to be
selected and marked. It is specially used for checking the answer
sheets of examinations having multiple choice questions.
o Voice Systems - Following are the various types of input devices
which are used in multimedia systems.
 Microphone- Microphone is an input device to input sound
that is then stored in digital form. The microphone is used for
various applications like adding sound to a multimedia
presentation or for mixing music.
 Speaker- Speaker is an output device to produce sound
which is stored in digital form. The speaker is used for various
applications like adding sound to a multimedia
presentation or for movies displays etc.
o Digital Camera - Digital camera is an input device to input images
that is then stored in digital form. The digital camera is used for
various applications like adding images to a multimedia
presentation or for personal purposes.

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 6
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

o Digital Video Camera - Digital Video camera is an input device to

input images/video that is then stored in digital form. The digital
video camera is used for various applications like adding videos
to a multimedia presentation or for personal purposes.
 Output Devices - Following are few of the important output devices,
which are used in Computer Systems:
o Monitors - Monitor commonly called as Visual Display Unit (VDU) is
the main output device of a computer. It forms images from tiny
dots, called pixels, that are arranged in a rectangular form. The
sharpness of the image depends upon the number of the pixels.
There are two kinds of viewing screen used for monitors:
 Cathode-Ray Tube (CRT) Monitor - In the CRT, display is
made up of small picture elements called pixels for short.
The smaller the pixels, the better the image clarity or
resolution. It takes more than one illuminated pixel to form
whole character, such as the letter 'e' in the word help. A
finite number of characters can be displayed on a screen
at once. The screen can be divided into a series of
character boxes - fixed location on the screen where a
standard character can be placed. Most screens are
capable of displaying 80 characters of data horizontally
and 25 lines vertically.
 Flat-Panel Display Monitor- The flat-panel display refers to a
class of video devices that have reduced volume, weight
and power requirement compared to the CRT. You can
hang them on walls or wear them on your wrists. Current
uses for flat-panel displays include calculators, video
games, monitors, laptop computer, graphics display. The
flat-panel displays are divided into two categories:
 Emissive Displays- The emissive displays are devices
that convert electrical energy into light. Examples are
plasma panel and LED (Light-Emitting Diodes).
 Non-Emissive Displays- The Non-emissive displays use
optical effects to convert sunlight or light from some
other source into graphics patterns. Example is LCD
(Liquid-Crystal Device)
 Printers - Printer is the most important output device, which is used to print
information on paper.
o Dot Matrix Printer- In the market, one of the most popular printers
is Dot Matrix Printer because of their ease of printing features and

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 7
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

economical price. Each character printed is in form of pattern of

Dot's and head consists of a Matrix of Pins of size (5*7, 7*9, 9*7 or
9*9) which comes out to form a character that is why it is called
Dot Matrix Printer.
o Daisy Wheel- Head is lying on a wheel and Pins corresponding to
characters are like petals of Daisy (flower name) that is why it is
called Daisy Wheel Printer. These printers are generally used for
word-processing in offices which require a few letters to be send
here and there with very nice quality representation.
o Line Printers- Line printers are printers, which print one line at a time.
o Laser Printers- These are non-impact page printers. They use laser
lights to produce the dots needed to form the characters to be
printed on a page.
o Inkjet Printers- Inkjet printers are non-impact character printers
based on a relatively new technology. They print characters by
spraying small drops of ink onto paper. Inkjet printers produce high
quality output with presentable features. They make less noise
because no hammering is done and these have many styles of
printing modes available. Colour printing is also possible. Some
models of Inkjet printers can produce multiple copies of printing
also.
 Screen Image Projector - Screen image projector or simply projector is
an output device used to project information from a computer on a
large screen so that a group of people can see it simultaneously. A
presenter first makes a PowerPoint presentation on the computer. Now
a screen image projector is plugged to a computer system and
presenter can make a presentation to a group of people by projecting
the information on a large screen. Projector makes the presentation
more understandable.
 Speakers and Sound Card - Computers need both a sound card and
speakers to hear audio, such as music, speech and sound effects. Most
motherboards provide an on-board sound card. This built-in-sound card
is fine for the most purposes. The basic functions of a sound card are that
it converts digital sound signals to analog for speakers making it louder
or softer.
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. To produce these media elements( movies, sound, text,
animation, graphics etc.) there are various software available in the market

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 8
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

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
Following are the various categories of Multimedia software
 Device Driver Software- These softwares 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.
Multimedia Application:
Multimedia applications are created with the help of following mentioned
tools and packages.
The sound, text, graphics, animation and video are the integral part of
multimedia software. To produce and edit these media elements, there are
various software tools available in the market. The categories of basic software
tools are:
 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. It has following
features:
o Creating new file, opening existing file, saving file and printing it.
o Insert symbol, formula and equation in the file.
o Correct spelling mistakes and grammatical errors.
o Align text within margins.
o Insert page numbers on the top or bottom of the page.
o Mail-merge the document and making letters and envolpes.
o Making tables with variable number of columns and rows.
 Painting and Drawing Tools- These tools generally come with a graphical
user interface with pull down menus for quick selection. You can create

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 9
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

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.These
software have following features:
o Tools to draw a straight line, rectangular area, circle etc.
o Different colour selection option.
o Pencil tool to draw a shape freehand.
o Eraser tool to erase part of the image.
o Zooming for magnified pixel editing.
 Image Editing Tools- Image editing tools are used to edit or reshape the
existing images and pictures. These tools can be used to create an
image from scratch as well as images from scanners, digital cameras,
clipart files or original artwork files created with painting and drawing
tools. Examples of Image editing or processing software are Adobe
Photoshop and Paint Shop Pro.
 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. These software have following features:
o Record your own music, voice or any other audio.
o Record sound from CD, DVD, Radio or any other sound player.
o You can edit, mix the sound with any other audio.
o Apply special effects such as fade, equalizer, echo, reverse and
more.
 Video Editing Tools- These tools are used to edit, cut, copy, and paste
your video and audio files. Video editing used to require expensive,
specialized equipment and a great deal of knowledge. The aritistic
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. Today computers
are powerful enough to handle this job, disk space is cheap and storing
and distributing your finished work on DVD is very easy. Examples of
video editing software are Adobe Premiere and Adobe After Effects.

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 10
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

 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.
Classifications of Multimedia Software
 Music sequencing and notation
 Digital audio
 Graphics and image editing
 Video editing
 Animation
 Multimedia authoring

1. Music Sequencing and Notation

Cakewalk: Cakewalk is a well-known older name for what is now called Pro
Audio. The firm producing this sequencing and editing software, Twelve
Tone Systems, also sells an introductory version of their software, "Cakewalk
Express", over the Internet for a low price.
Cubase: Cubase is another sequencing / editing program, with capabilities
similar to those of Cakewalk. It includes some digital audio editing tools.
Macromedia Sound edit: Sound edit is a mature program for creating audio
for multimedia projects and the web that integrates well with other
Macromedia products such as Flash and Director.

2. Digital Audio
Digital Audio tools deal with accessing and editing the actual sampled sounds
that make up audio.
Cool Edit: Cool Edit is a powerful, popular digital audio toolkit with
capabilities (for PC users, at least) that emulate a professional audio studio,
including multitrack productions and sound file editing, along with digital
signal processing effects.
Sound Forge: Sound Forge is a sophisticated PC - based program for editing
WAV files. Sound can be captured from a CD - ROM drive or from tape or
microphone through the sound card, then mixed and edited. It also permits
adding complex special effects.
Pro Tools: Pro Tools is a high - end integrated audio production and editing
environment that mns on Macintosh computers as well as Windows. Pro

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 11
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

Tools offers easy MIDI creation and manipulation as well as powerful audio
mixing, recording, and editing software.

3. Graphics and Image Editing

Adobe Illustrator: Illustrator is a powerful publishing tool for creating and
editing vector graphics, which can easily be exported to use on the web.
Adobe Photoshop: Photoshop is the standard in a tool for graphics, image
processing, and image manipulation. Layers of images, graphics, and text
can be separately manipulated for maximum flexibility, and its "filter factory"
permits creation of sophisticated lighting effects.
Macromedia Fireworks: Fireworks is software for making graphics
specifically for the web. It includes a bitmap editor, a vector graphics editor,
and a JavaScript generator for buttons and rollovers.
Macromedia Freehand: Freehand is a text and web graphics editing tool
that supports many bitmap formats, such as GIF, PNG, and JPEG. These am
pixel - based formats, in that each pixel is specified. It also supports vector -
based formats, in which endpoints of lines are specified instead of the pixels
themselves, such as SWF (Macromedia Flash) and FHC (Shockwave
Freehand). It can also read Photoshop format.

4. Video Editing
Adobe Premiere: Premiere is a simple, intuitive video editing tool for
nonlinear editing — putting video clips into any order. Video and audio are
arranged in tracks, like a musical score. It provides a large number of video
and audio tracks, superimpositions, and virtual clips. A large library of built -
in transitions, filters, and motions for clips allows easy creation of effective
multimedia productions.
Adobe After Effects: After Effects is a powerful video editing tool that
enables users to add and change existing movies with effects such as
lighting, shadows, and motion blurring. It also allows layers, as in Photoshop,
to permit manipulating objects independently.
Final Cut Pro: Final Cut Pro is a video editing tool offered by Apple for the
Macintosh platform. It allows the capture of video and audio from
numerous sources, such as film and DV. It provides a complete
environment, from capturing the video to editing and color correction and
finally output to a video file or broadcast from the computer.

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 12
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

5. Animation
Multimedia APIs
Java3D is an API used by Java to construct and render 3D graphics, similar
to the way Java Media Framework handles media files. It provides a basic
set of object primitives (cube, splines, etc.) upon which the developer can
build scenes. It is an abstraction layer built on top of OpenGL or DirectX (the
user can select which), so the graphics are accelerated.
DirectX a Windows API that supports video, images, audio, and 3D
animation, is the most common API used to develop modern multimedia
Windows applications, such as computer games.
OpenGL was created in 1992 and has become the most popular 3D API in
use today. OpenGL is highly portable and will run on all popular modern
operating systems, such as UNIX, Linux, Windows, and Macintosh.

6. Rendering Tools
3D Studio Max includes a number of high - end professional tools for
character animation, game development, and visual effects production.
Models produced using this tool can be seen in several consumer games,
such as for the Sony Playstation.
Softimage XSI (previously called Softimage 3D) is a powerful modeling,
animation, and rendering package for animation and special effects in films
and games.
Maya, a competing product to Softimage, is a complete modeling
package. It features a wide variety of modeling and animation tools, such
as to create realistic clothes and fur.
RenderMan is a rendering package created by Pixar. It excels in creating
complex surface appearances and images and has been used in numerous
movies, such as Monsters Inc. and Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. It is also
capable of importing models from Maya.
GIF Animation Packages For a simpler approach to animation that also
allows quick development of effective small animations for the web, many
shareware and other programs permit creating animated GIF images. GIFs
can contain several images, and looping through them creates a simple
animation. Gifcon and GifBuilder are two of these. Linux also provides some
simple animation tools, such as animate.

7. Multimedia Authoring
Tools that provide the capability for creating a complete multimedia
presentation, including interactive user control, are called authoring programs.

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 13
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

Macromedia Flash is a multimedia platform used to add animation, video,

and interactivity to web pages. Flash is frequently used for advertisements,
games and flash animations for broadcast. More recently, it has been
positioned as a tool for "Rich Internet Applications" ("RIAs"). Flash manipulates
vector and raster graphics to provide animation of text, drawings, and still
images. It supports bidirectional streaming of audio and video, and it can
capture user input via mouse, keyboard, microphone, and camera. Flash
contains an object - oriented language called ActionScript and supports
automation via the JavaScript Flash language (JSFL).
Flash content may be displayed on various computer systems and
devices, using Adobe Flash Player, which is available free of charge for
common web browsers, some mobile phones, and a few other electronic
devices (using Flash Lite).

Macromedia Director Adobe Director (formerly Macromedia Director) is a

multimedia application authoring platform created by Macromedia — now
part of Adobe Systems. It allows users to build applications built on a movie
metaphor, with the user as the "director" of the movie.

Author ware was an interpreter, flowchart - based, graphical programming

language. Author ware is used for creating interactive programs that can
integrate a range of multimedia content, particularly e - learning
applications. The flowchart model differentiates Author ware from other
authoring tools, such as Adobe Flash and Adobe Director, which rely on a
visual stage, time - line and script structure.

Quest: Quest, which uses a type of flowcharting metaphor, is similar to Author

ware in many ways. However, the flowchart nodes can encapsulate
information in a more abstract way (called "frames") than simply subroutine
levels. As a result, connections between icons are more conceptual and do
not always represent flow of control in the program.

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 14
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

Classification of Media

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 15
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

MULTIMEDIA HARDWARE/SOFTWARE SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

MULTIMEDIA HARDWARE SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
• Developer side
• It is also for the end user expectation – the type of hardware platform
• Several types of hardware components that need to be considered:
 Memory and storage device
 Input devices
 Output devices
 Communication Device (optional)
MULTIMEDIA SOFTWARE SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
• Expensive software offer advance and powerful features which requires
higher skill. However, there are software that can help to save time and
to organize a project which are less expensive.
• Several types of software:
 Text editing and word processing tool
 Painting and drawing tools
 3D modeling and 2D animation tools
 Image editing tools
 Sound editing tools

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS
 Republic of the Philippines 16
Cagayan State University
Sanchez Mira Campus

Reference:
https://www.tutorialspoint.com/multimedia/multimedia_system.html

MULTIMEDIA SYSTEMS