Introduction

EGIrun is a utility to view and test FLIC file animations.

Most functions are accessed through the menu button: . Before you can use any of the other buttons, you must open a FLIC file first. To this end, you click the menu button and select “Open...” from the menu.

To exit the program, open the menu and choose the “Exit” item. Alternatively, you can type Alt-F4 or Esc.

Topics

•	Playing a FLIC file

•	Stepping through the animation

•	Settings and display modes

•	Transparent animations

•	Scaling animations

•	Viewing FLIC information


A FLIC file is an animation file format developed for Autodesk Animator. EGI supports an extended FLIC file format, see http://www.compuphase.com/flic.htm for details.


What has been troubling me more than any other aspect of this product are the pictures. Obviously, I had to make a few demos to show the capabilities of EGI. Equally obvious was that the manual should provide examples, with pictures. But I am a programmer, not an artist. So I was worried about were to obtain pictures that I could use (both technically and legally). I was lost in the woods... hadn’t eaten for days.

Until Fanni popped by! Fanni is a charming little creature that lives in the world of fantasies (in the world of my fantasies, anyway). Fanni needed only one word-and-a-half to understand my worries, and, with a few giggles, she immediately volunteered to model. What a splendid idea! Although that was easier said than done... you see, Fanni never stands still for over a second. She is constantly wiggling and twisting and bending that flexible body of her in any imaginable shape (which also makes her an ideal heroin for this kind of animation). But after a few hours work, I guess I had her proportions and appearance about right.

Fanni’s sparse comments on the fruits of my work were that I probably am a decent programmer, but definitely not an artist. Well,... I guess fantasy always looks prettier than reality.


Playing a FLIC file

1.	Open a FLIC file with the “Open...” item on the menu. (Open the menu with the [image] button.)

2.	Click on the [image] button.

3.	When the animation stops, or when you wish to end the animation, click on the [image] button.

4.	Remove the animation window from the screen with the “Close” item on the menu.

When a segment has multiple segments, the player will adhere to the segment sequence and repeat count that are specified in the FLIC file. If these are not specified:

•	If the segment is repeatable (it has a ring frame), and the repeat count is not set, the player uses the “repeat count” that is set in the “Settings” menu option.

•	If no “next” segment is given for the current segment, the player goes on to the segment that physically follows the current segment. At the end of all segments, it jumps back to the first segment.


Stepping through an animation

Instead of playing a file, you can also move through an animation step by step.

The forward stepping button [image] ignores the repeat count in a segment. If a segment has a ring frame, the “Next” button always loops back from the last frame of a segment to the first frame.

Backward stepping, [image], never loops. You cannot step back if you are already on the first frame. Note that the FLIC file format was not designed for backward stepping, so this may be slow, especially for long animations.

Stepping from segment to segment

By typing and holding the Ctrl key while you click on the [image] or [image] buttons, you switch to the previous or next segment.


Settings and display modes

You can adjust the playback speed and the display mode of the animation via the menu. You can also display information regarding the playback in the caption of the animation window.

Repeat segments with a ring frame
The repeat count is overruled when a segment has a specific repeat count.

Animation speed
Initially set to the speed of the FLIC file. Set this value to zero for benchmarking (play as fast as possible). Sound may not play correctly if you change the playback speed.

Show filename in the caption
To display the current filename in the caption of the animation window.

Show segment number in the caption
To display the current segment number in the caption of the animation window.

Show animation speed in the caption
To display the actual (measured) playback speed in the caption of the animation window.

Show region
The region is displayed as a thin dashed line.


Transparent animations

If you play a FLIC file that contains transparency masks, you can load a background image to display beneath the animation. The menu item “Load background...” is only enabled for FLIC files with transparency information.

The stand-alone animation viewer that comes with EGI supports bitmap masks and multilevel masks in a window. It plays animations with region masks on the desktop.

The image to load must be in the .BMP format. The background image is mapped to the palette of the animation, so it may not look optimal.


Scaling animations

The animation window can be resized using the standard window techniques.

Note: Animations with bitmap masks cannot be scaled in transparent mode. Only transparent FLIC files with multilevel masks or region masks can be scaled. Use the "FLIC info..." menu item to see whether (and what kind of) masks are present in the FLIC file.


Viewing FLIC information

After opening a FLIC file, you will find the general statistics of the FLIC animation under the option “FLIC info...” in the menu. (Open the menu with the [image] button.)

Among the information displayed is:

Name
The filename of the animation.

Frame size
The size (in pixels) of the animation (the is the original size, not the size to which the animation was scaled).

Colour depth
The maximum number of colours in the animation. A colour depth of 8 (bits) gives 256 colours; a 15-bit colour depth gives 32768 and 16-bit gives 65536 colours.

Segments
The number of segments in the animation. A standard FLIC file has no segments and shows this value as 0.

Frames
The number of frames in the current segment (this is the number of frames in the complete animation if the animation has no segments).

Speed
The “design speed” of the animation: the speed at which the animation is intended to run.

Keyframes
The keyframe interval, or “None” if no keyframes are available.

Transparency
The kind of transparency masks included in the animation, or “None” if no transparency information is stored.

Delta region
Whether or not a “delta region” is included in the animation. A delta region allows for quicker display for systems that support it.

Audio
Whether digitized audio is embedded in the animation.

Script
Whether a run-time script is embedded in the animation.