e-Picture 1.1
Company: BeatWare
Estimated Price: $199.00
http://www.beatware.com

It's About Time
Anyone who has spent more than a few moments exploring the web knows that it's inundated with lousy banner graphics. Whether from lack of experience or lack of proper tools, the average web banner is a clunky joke that we are only too glad to ignore. While there's not much that can be done about a designer's lack of experience, there is hope for those seeking a tool to streamline the process of creating animated (or static) web banners. This hope comes in the form of Beatware's new product, e-Picture™. Geared specifically for the design and production of animated web banners, e-Picture is an application that is arriving just in time.

Enhancing the familiar.
Upon first firing up e-Picture, you are presented with a toolbar highly reminiscent of Photoshop's "standard" interface. Similarly, operation of the Animation Panel (think of it as a kinetic version of PS's layer palette) is reminiscent of the animation builder found in Macromedia Director, only more intuitive and easier to use. These similarities are hardly an accident, and reflect an effort to make e-Picture fit easily into both the average production environment and the repertoire of the average graphic designer. Tools and menu options were consistently located in just the spot where you would expect them to be, making this application very easy to get comfortable with.

Built for a purpose
For this review, I elected to create a web banner incorporating a few common features: a geometric object; some animated text; an animated object; and a "frame transition." Overall, the process proved to be extremely easy.

Starting a new document, I was presented with the option of selecting from a short set of templates in common sizes from "Standard Web Banner" (468x60) to "Square Web Banner" (100x100). At this stage, you may also select the type of background that your banner will have (transparent white or custom color). I should also note that you can easily create your own templates or modify the preexisting ones, all from within the same easily understood dialog box.

While relatively straightforward, such operations as inserting shapes and text were enhanced by a wonderful "live" feel that is present throughout e-Picture. Similarly, for those of us who prefer to "see what we're doing," e-Picture's "live edit" capability makes it painless to explore various effects such as the ubiquitous drop shadow, using a sliding bar, and observing the live preview. For me, this is one of the areas where the program really shined. By providing the option of live previews for most of its effects, e-Picture allows you to quickly explore your ideas without scrambling to the "Undo" button.

There were some initial concerns regarding the loss of screen real estate that e-Picture's various tool and animation panels cause. However, given the sheer practicality of these features (after all, they're at the heart of what makes this app' so easy to use), one would have to say that they represent a reasonable sacrifice. And besides, that's why we have the WindowShade feature, isn't it?

Of course, the real purpose of e-Picture is to facilitate the creation of animated banners. In this area, I found it to be one of the easiest GIF animation programs that I've encountered. With its clear instructions and, again, highly intuitive interface, the only problem one might encounter is the temptation to over-animate your content. Like all animated GIFs, you're creating a series of images or "frames" which are then played back by the browser. Similar to Macromedia's Director, after the user has defined how many frames are desired in the overall animation, you can create an object (text, shape, an imported graphic, etc.) after first selecting the frame you wish it to start in. Animation can be as simple as selecting the frame that you wish the object to finish in and then dragging the object to its final location; the program takes care of moving the object over the course of the intervening frames. Throughout the creation process, you may view your animations by simply pressing a "play" button. While e-Picture certainly allows you to get more sophisticated in constructing animations (supporting the creation of multiple animated objects as well as the ability to move objects along a user defined bezier curve, to name a few), I was impressed with how quickly one could produce "standard" animations, such as moving or transitioning text or shapes. My first banner, which include animated text, a simulated text entry field with flashing "cursor," and a Javascript mouseover button, required a total of 40 minutes to produce.

While all animations are created in a proprietary format, completed work is easily exported into any of the common formats (including JavaScript). The dialog box for exporting is comprehensive, allowing you to optimize for specific minimum modem speeds, monitor sizes and color tables as well as settings for specific aspects of particular file formats. All in all, e-Picture provides the opportunity to fine tune the final product for the web, and does it in an easy to understand way.

What's the Downside?
Complaints are few. I found that the Tool Inspector (a panel which appears when a tool is selected and displays a tabbed set of features for that tool), while nicely implemented, had some icons which took a moment or two to figure out. For example, the icons representing outline options and fill options were monochromatic and rendered dimensionally. Subjective, to be sure, but clearly an example of how much we become used to "one way" of looking at things. Also, the window displaying an object's properties didn't always change when a new object was selected. However, this "bug" didn't occur more than a few times over the course of a few days.
A minor warning: this application requires a 200 MHz 604e PowerPC at minimum. Testing on a B/W G3/450 was smooth (particularly the live preview features), but I found the performance to be barely acceptable when running on a PowerMac 7300/200.

The Last Word
e-Picture is a strong product that brings together a collection of important features into a single, elegantly executed, easy to use package. At about $199.00 street price, e-Picture is not going to wind up on the desktop of the casual web author. But for those professionals wishing to speed up the production process and likely enhance the quality and sophistication of that output, e-Picture should be a welcome and valuable addition to their collection.

Requirements/Availability
e-Picture requres a PowerPC Macintosh with 32MB of RAM and 10MB of hard disk space running Mac OS 8 or higher. e-Picture can be downloaded from Beatware's web site at http://www.beatware.com, and is fully-functional for a 30 day trial period.

Pros: Familiar interface based on "industry standard" applications. Well integrated and easy to use feature set.
Cons: Fairly high cost (as GIF animation packages go). Requires a modern workstation in order to function at its best.

MacMice Rating: 4

Daniel Martin
dmartin@dom.edu