-----------------------------------------------
Software
HF CRITICAL MASS  
version 1.2
-----------------------------------------------
Barbara Lattanzi
copyleft 2002

email: threads@wildernesspuppets.net
http://www.wildernesspuppets.net
-----------------------------------------------

HF CRITICAL MASS is freely available software by Barbara Lattanzi, 2002.
It was developed within the authoring environment of Macromedia Director and includes the Director runtime engine.
(The source code written for the core action of HF CRITICAL MASS is available separately at the website -- see download page).


Visit wildernesspuppets.net website to download PC and Mac versions of HF CRITICAL MASS.
http://www.wildernesspuppets.net/hfcm/


HF CRITICAL MASS is based on the 1971 film, 'Critical Mass', by the late Hollis Frampton, to whose memory this work is dedicated.

-----------------------------------------------
INSTRUCTIONS 
-----------------------------------------------
The "HF Critical Mass" software program consists of a single file.  Double-click the file to launch the program. No other files will be installed on your computer.

Once launched, the program's interface includes a way for you to import your selected Quicktime videos into the program. (Quicktime is the name of one of the most common types of video files. Often the filename of a Quicktime movie ends with the extension '.mov'. )

When the video is imported into "HF Critical Mass",  a timeline bar then lets you select where to begin the video. 

When you select the "play video" gadget you will see the video along with time modifier gadgets. 

New with version 1.2:
One of the gadgets, at the video playback screen, is a button to toggle the visibility of the rest of the gadgets on or off. 

---------------------
MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS:
---------------------
Your monitor resolution must be 800x600 minimum.

You must have Quicktime 3 or later installed on your computer.

Recommended: Running this software and your Quicktime video on a fast hard-drive is better. The biggest factor to consider, though, seems to be the file size. File size (the amount of data, not the image dimensions) affects the smooth running of your Quicktime videos within this software.  The smaller the file size, the smoother it gets.

---------------------
ADDITIONAL NOTES:
---------------------

DIMENSIONS of the quicktime movie can be:  
any width, up to 720 pixels wide and any height, up to 486 pixels high. (Larger dimensions simply get cropped.)
---------------------

It is optionally possible to use the software with Quicktime movies that only have an audio track.

---------------------
The Director runtime engine is not built for Mac OS X. 

Until the Director runtime engine is upgraded to Mac OS X, the "HF Critical Mass" software only runs on the pre-X operating systems on the Mac.

-----------------------------------------------
TECHNICAL NOTE 
(that most may want to ignore): 
-----------------------------------------------

The biggest factor for the smooth-running of Quicktime movies within the HF Critical Mass software seems to be this:  the framerate of the Quicktime in combination with the number of key-frames per second encoded when the Quicktime file is first made.  Contrary to my own first impression, file-size does not seem to affect the smooth running of Quicktime videos with this software.  I have had consistent success with huge files, uncompressed full-quality video on the PC.  (The Mac environment is generally less "responsive".) 

When I compress video into Quicktime, I try to use as many key-frames as possible (sometimes as many as 1 per frame), and I try to cut the framerate from 30 down to 15fps (depending upon the content).  This seems to produce good results when running HF Critical Mass software in BOTH Mac and PC environments. 

-----------------------------------------------
KNOWN ISSUE:
-----------------------------------------------

Placing the software on the hard-drive in a folder nested more than 4 or 5 folders from the root of the drive, causes an error at the point of starting the software. (Note: there is no harm done with this error.  It just means restarting the software program.)  If this happens, just put the software file at a higher level of the PC Windows Explorer or Macintosh Finder.  For example, on the PC, place the software in the "My Documents" folder, rather than in a folder nested inside folders inside the "My Documents" folder.  

-----------------------------------------------
OTHER RUNTIME VERSIONS:
-----------------------------------------------

HF CRITICAL MASS was authored using "Lingo", the programming language of Macromedia Director.  Although, it was written to work with the Director runtime engine, the HF Critical Mass coding methods and structure are conceivably translatable to any other programming language that can control Quicktime video playback.

---------------------
ABOUT THE WORK OF HOLLIS FRAMPTON:
---------------------
The films of the late Hollis Frampton spanned the late 1960s through the early 1980s.  His film, 'Critical Mass', made in 1971, is one of a series of films collectively titled 'Hapax Legomena'.  

"'Hapax Legomena' is a seven-part investigation of the specific conditions of cinematic representation and the limitations and paradoxes of visual description and narrative."  (description by Steve Polta - San Francisco Cinemateque, 2002)

---------------------
HOW DOES THIS SOFTWARE RELATE TO THE WORK OF HOLLIS FRAMPTON?
---------------------
While the HF CRITICAL MASS software riffs methods and structures of just one film - adapting these to the interactive digital video environment, it also pointedly restricts itself to the methods and structures of just one film and applies these to your choice of quicktime videos...  

In other words, there is no intention to expand this software open-endedly to become yet another all-purpose tool among many others in the great gushing development of video mix software currently taking place... simulators of all FX processing devices.  But it would be interesting if this software could be experienced on its own terms in a performative montage/projection context.

Approximately 30 years ago, Hollis Frampton constructed a situation in which a film recording of a couple's brief argument could reach 'critical mass' and liquify into the audience's present as something utterly strange. 

With its particular video improvisation interface, HF Critical Mass software mediates the narrative reading of moving images, an approach modelled by Hollis Frampton's film.  It demos how this inter-active reading can shape, twist, morph and stress the particular temporal passage belonging to the viewer - that variously named "here-and-now" or "real time" during which the software is deployed.  

---------------------

-- Barbara Lattanzi
-- June.15.02
-- revised May.2.03

More about HF CRITICAL MASS and other material at:     
http://www.wildernesspuppets.net

-----------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------
