Digital photography and video, MP3 players, smart phones and the World Wide Web have become essential in today's world. The digital representation of images, video, animation, sound and text has become integrated in every part of our lives and their combination into multimedia is routine. Digital multimedia is often interactive. People can interact with multimedia using playback controls, or more innovatively using direct manipulation, and they can interact through multimedia - user interfaces that incorporate multimedia elements permit new ways of working with data and computation.
Digital Multimedia is the best selling core text for undergraduate and masters courses in the exciting discipline of multimedia, combining a broad and deep account of technology with an inside understanding of multimedia content and its practical application. Beginning with an overview of the nature of multimedia and digital representations, it continues with chapters devoted to each media type, detailing how they are represented in digital form and how they are created and manipulated on computers. Later chapters describe how media may be combined and how scripting may be used to add interactivity. Whole chapters are devoted to visual design and accessibility, and to how multimedia may be delivered over the Internet. Each chapter includes key point summaries and exercises. An extensive glossary of important terms is provided.
This third edition has been extensively revised and updated to reflect changes in technology, the increasing importance of interactivity and the emerging role of multimedia as an interface to applications and services.