A New Window has been added that provides an easy way for you to change the way you publish your presentations.

It contains settings such as passwords, personalized watermarks, what objects to embed into the presentation, and the compression level.

Screen Saver publishing is now here. Any Presentation can be published as a Screen Saver. The output is a ".scr" file, which can either be directly published or copied into the "Windows\System32" folder on Windows NT,2000 or XP, or the "Windows\System" folder on 95,98 or ME.

The way you exit from the screen saver is programmed as part of your presentation. Most screen savers exit as soon as the mouse is moved over a certain amount of the screen. This is easy to achieve in LM, via a Scene->Mouse Move event. Any other form of exit is also acceptable.

The OnScreen Keyboard has undergone a complete re-write, although the default keyboard looks and acts just like the original.

It is now possible to customise the keyboards, with new graphics and layouts. SkunkLabs will be releasing a pack containing new keyboards soon.

Liquid Media can now embed external files, even if they are not part of the presentation. Embedding these files is as simple as creating a folder called "extern" in the same folder as your presentations "sms" file. Ticking the "Embed Extern Folder" option on the Publish Window then copies all files residing in that folder into your Liquid Media Presentation.

Embedding Files called by the "Global->Execute" action is as simple as ticking the "Embed" option on the Actions Bar, there is no need to copy those files into the extern folder.

The raw ".sms" file that Liquid Media creates when saving a presentation (without publishing) can be quite large when you have many actors and many scenes.

Most of the data that is saved, is path data which compresses extremely well, so we have added compression of the files.

An example of the space it saves, is our SIGGRAPH2003 example presentation, which is 3.96 megs saved with the old version, and 320kb saved with the new one.

Compression can save lots of space, but it can also slow down the loading (and the saving) of the presentation.

By default, the previous versions of Liquid Media would compress all published files at the maximum level, which did introduce a pause while loading them.

This release introduces a slider bar in the Publish Window which allows you to select the level of compression you want. The default is set to mid-low, which still yields a small file, but significantly speeds up the loading.

As publishing your presentation can sometimes take a while when a lot of media has been used, we have added a Progress Bar to help see how far along the publish is getting.

The Thumb for the first Scene, and also the presentations description have been added, uncompressed to the begining of both the "sms" and the "smp" file formats to speed up browsing them. This feature was added now ready for the new interface.

The ability to restrict your Presentations and/or Scenes to only run at or between specific times and dates has been added.

This feature is useful for people creating Kiosk and VidiWall presentations, that can display special holiday Scenes, or control playback depending on the time of day, or day of week.

The ability to trigger any amount of actions at any time and/or date has been added.

This is accessed from the action bar, in the main "Presentation" event combo.

Previous versions of Liquid Media have the ability to run other Liquid Media presentations from with-in a presentation. This release introduces the ability for those presentations to be embedded into your main presentation, including all media and files those presentations use when published.

Now, default publish information such as the publish path, are saved with the presentation, so you no longer need to re-select your output folders each time you load your presentation.

When a presentation was running in Full Screen Mode, and an external file was executed, Liquid Media would minimise, and then execute the file. This proved to be confusing, and did not provide a smooth way of going back to a presentation.

Liquid Media now switches to windowed mode if a global execute occurs in full sceen mode, unless you are wanting that behaviour, and then the "minimise" check can be ticked.

Loading a published presentation used to store all the actors filenames relative to where the ".smp" file resided.

Now that Liquid Media can follow external programs paths, all filenames are resolved to their full path.

If this option is used when running a "Global->Execute" action, the current presentation will pause until the Liquid Media window (or the player window) is clicked on again, or restored from being minimized.

This option is useful for creating menus that run other programs. When your presentation is paused, it also takes up less resources.

Any file that is run or opened via the "Global->Execute" action can now be embedded by simply ticking the "Embed" check. Please note that this option is indescriminate, if you have selected a file that is copyright, it will embed it, making the presentation restricted by the files license.

With this option, LiquidMedia can change the current working folder to that of the program being executed or opened from the "Global->Execute" action.

Some programs require that the working folder be the same as that in which the program resides. Tick this option if this is the case.

When using Scene Transitions, it is sometimes useful to have all other actors on the scene wait until that transition has finished.

Until now, it has meant going through each actor and adding a "Wait" action, but now there is an option in the "Scene Properties" window that when ticked, pauses all the other actors.

This option was added to make Presentation Menus and Controllers more streamlined when the focus is lost to another application.

The presentation is resumed when the Liquid Media window (or player window) regains the Focus.

All the various types of players apart from the standalone Liquid Player have now been merged into one file which takes on all their rolls, and also the role of Screen Saver.

This helps in development and deployment time, and makes it simpler for the end user.

A lot of time has been spent going through Liquid Media's routines, optimizing and cleaning them to get LM running as smoothly and efficiently as possible for editing, playback and loading /saving.

The complete 3D system plug ins have now been merged into the main editor and player files. This means there are less files to copy/ publish with and also means the "Publish to Exe File" option now supports 3D.

The 3D system now also runs many times faster than previous versions.

Liquid Media now supports most common image file types natively without the need of the FilterManager plug in. This plug in is still useful though for importing exotic file types.

Natively supported file types are bmp, wmf, emf, gif, tif, jpg and png.

This release adds to the media capabilities by providing run time actions to change the various formats.

The actors can be changed to selected files, or from variables, or from File Dialogs.

Along with the extra Change Media action, there is also now a "Seek" action that allows you to seek to any position in the media.

There are quick options for the start and end, and the position can be set via variables. Positions can be Relative or Absolute.

These actions have been added to increase the over-all useability of LM with external programs. These actions can also be handy when using LM to drive multimedia from menus.

With the addition of selecting files from variables for the Change Content actions, your presentations can use any media the end-presentation-user selects.

Variables can be loaded and saved, and filled from File Dialogs, so this addition adds much power.

Just like the previous feature, this addition adds the same functionality to the Global->Execute action.

The Commands Menu in the CommandBar has be laid out more carefully to make it smaller, and easier to access all the actions.

As the majority of Move, Resize and Rotate actions get issued with Absolute numbers, their default has been changed to this.

This version of Liquid Media adds the ability to load any ".cur" or ".ani" file for the mouse cursor. This supplements the exiting cursor set that previous versions of LM have.

There is also a "cursor" folder created with the latest install that any cursor files of this type can be copied to, and they are automatically added to the list.

This option has been added to the Global->Execute for backwards compatibility with presentations.

Now any actions can be added for direct keyboard key events, allowing extremely fast response to keyboard entry. The new routines tackle the keyboard at a very low level, allowing much more flexibility for the control of movement of actors among other things.

This action allows a clean exit of your Presentation, even when running sub-presentations from your main presentation.

Via the "Sound->Volume" action, if the ID of the sound equates to a "Mixer Level" (the windows volume mixer) eg "Line-In", the volumes can be changed to allow control over extern sound feeds.

Liquid Media now gives the option to select a Scene inside an external presentation to jump to from an action.

When a presentation is specified from the Global->Run Presentation action, a list under it gets filled with the presentations scenes from which you can select a scene, or leave as default to start from the begining.

These variables can be used for either limiting presentations to certain daylight times, or for supplimenting information displayed/saved.

These variables can be used for either limiting presentations to certain seasons, or for supplimenting information displayed/saved.

This variable contains the Time Zone that the presentation is running in.

These two variable actions (from the CommandsBar) add the ability to set variables to users input in the way of a Load Filename or a Save Filename.

These two variables contain the day of the week, and the day of the year (0-365).

This set of variables contain the elapsed time from the start of the current Scene.

This set of variables contain the elapsed time from the start of the current Presentation.

This variable can be useful for displaying additional information in a presentation only if it is running on a registered users machine

Now Liquid Media can process command-line parameters (when published as an exe file), being available as variables from the Action Bar.

There are two new variables that contain the path from which the presentation (published as an exe-file) has been run, and the temporary folder where any files included with the presentation have been extracted.

This variable can be useful for displaying additional information in a presentation only if it is running from a player or from an embedded Exe File.

Liquid Media now enumerates the "cursors" folder at startup, and adds any cursors in that folder to the cursor list for actions.

By default the folder resides in the Liquid Media install Folder.

Now, you can specify a "Scene End" type from the Presentations Folder, and Scenes default to using that type. You can also change the End type at any time, and all scenes not over-ridden with their own settings will follow the new rule.

When a presentation is loaded, it scans all the scenes End Types, and sets the most common type as the default.

This latest release also adds a new type of "Scene End" type, which ends the scene when either a Mouse Click or a Key Press is issued.

Text copying is now more advanced, with two types of clipboard formats.

Pasting Text to an external program now removes any formatting that existed in the text.

This option has been added to aid finding actors when they have been faded out in any way.

You can turn this feature on and off from the "Show Actor Boxes" Menu option in the View Menu.

Liquid Media now scans presentations when they are loaded into the editor, and sets the presentations default "Scene End" type to the most common to ease bulk changing of the End type.

This version of Liquid Media changes the way the selection marquee works. Instead of selecting all actors that "touch" the marquee, only actors that fall inside the marquee are selected.

The old way of selecting is still available, just hold down the shift key whilst selecting.

Starting a marquee to select actors with a full screen actor in the background can prove to be difficult, so a hot key (m) has been added to trigger marquee mode.

The View menu now has an option to Hide/Show all Persist ant Actors and Template Actors in a Scene.

This is useful to un-clutter a scene, and concentrate on editing the local actors.

The Movie Requester now has an extra tab, called advanced. This tab contains options for controlling how the Movie Creation is handled.

You can control such things as limits for the time, or number of scenes, a scene to stop on, and options for stopping the movie writing when a Presentation->Restart or a Scene->Restart is triggered.

Parsing the Presentation after it has loaded to create the thumbs speeds up loading by a margin, and also enables templates and resistant actors to be correctly rendered.

Previous versions of Liquid Media did not show the Last Scene Actor doing its Transitions when previewing individual scenes.

This version introduces Smart LSA's that display the previous scene at its death for the Transition.

This new release of LM brings multiple selection the Thumb View. Multiple Scenes can now be moved, copied/ pasted, deleted and previewed.

Along with the previous item, Thumbs can be selected with a marquee. Holding down the ctrl key while selecting adds to the selection.

The Progress Bars have been broken down into two slides, the bottom one shows the over all progress, and the top one shows the progress of a sub-task.

When a presentation is loaded in the LM editor, it has 3 sub-tasks, de-compressing, then loading, then creating the thumbs. Seeing the progress in this way helps see how the presentation loads, and helps for choosing compression levels.

Previously, loading published presentations would not allow them to be re-saved, only published as multi-file, then reloaded.

Now Liquid Media allows editing of published presentations, and saves any linked graphics and files into folders located in the same folder as where you are saving to.

The Registration Window had Alpha Transitions In and Out that were not efficient on some systems. It has been removed.

The Actor View scroll bars were counter-sunk into the screen by 32 pixels, which was taking up valuable real-estate. They have now been made flush with the sides of the window/ screen.

This version of Liquid Media adds the ability to speed up changing numbers in Spin Controls.

Holding down the Shift key and/ or the Ctrl while changing a spin objects value zooms the increment by a multiple of 5 for Shift, 10 for Ctrl and 50 for both.

This works for using the mouse's intelli-wheel, and when using the up and down arrows.

Pressing the Right Mouse Button on the Inter-Line Spacing controls on the font bar now resets the inter space to 0 for the selected Text Actor.

Liquid Media now displays the Fonts List in the Font Bar with each font written in its own style.

The color buttons on the Font Bar have been changed from being colored rectangular buttons to iconic buttons to make them take less space.

The Icons are now a Capital A with a small bar underneath that shows the current colors.

The Actions Bar now has three extra buttons, one to copy the current action, one to copy all actions in the current event, and one to paste those actions.

The pasted actions correct the target actor names.

Previous versions of Liquid Media did not save the Report Windows size and position which could prove to be annoying when used frequently. LM now remembers where the Report Window was last positioned.

Liquid Media will soon be broken into different versions, selling at different prices.

A system has been implemented and integrated to control these various versions.

Our Free Version policy has now changed, and it is now back to a Time Out version for all of the Liquid Media products apart from the Liquid Player.

The TimeOut period is 20 days, after which, Liquid Media can still be opened and used, but all outputting and publishing is disabled.

Persistant actors can now be displayed and be edited in all scenes they are present in.

This includes all path movement, embellishments and actions. When editing the actors, it is good to keep in mind that their path has already started in a previous scene.

Liquid Media now has a built-in Templating system that allows dynamic control of all scenes using the template.

By default, all new presentations contain a Master Template, and any number of other templates can be added.

The Templates get listed in the Scene List on the Tools Button Bar, and can be selected and edited from there. They do not appear in the Thumb View Mode.

By default, Liquid Media now creates scenes that use the Master Templates background color. It is still possible to over-ride this by selecting a custom color from the Scene Properties Window.

Liquid Media Actors can now issue an action to Pause or Unpause all Actors but itself.

This is a useful tool for making Linear Presentations.

The Image Actor can now Tile its source Image to the Actors Size rather than Stretch it.

The 3D actors have been optimized, and now perform many times faster than previous versions.

The Media Actor can now have its Balance Tweened from each Control Point, providing a way to create panning effects.

The Media Bar now has Spin Boxes for the Start and Stop Cut time, so times can be entered to an accuracy of .01 seconds.

The LM Editor Media Bar now has an option to save its current Loop settings as the default for all Media actors created from that time on.

Like the Media Bars default Loop setting, the Sound Bar also contains its own one, so the Sound's default can be independant of the Media's one.

Many new Settings are available on the SoundBar to control the Sounds Rate, Volume, Balance, and 3D Position settings. Most options are Tweenable for each Control Point.

If a mp3 or wma is specified for a SFX actor, it automatically loads it as a Media Actor.

Now, to loop an actors path, it is as easy as ticking the "Loop" option from the Path Bar.

A new mode has been added to Text Actors to allow the text to word-wrap. When the Actor is resized, the Text flows to fill the space. This is also the case when the presentation is playing, and can add some interesting looking effects.

Bullet Lists have also been added to the Text Actor, allowing either numbered or graphic bullets for lists.

Liquid Media has a comprehensive Bullet window that allows you to customise your bullets.

Another mode has been added to the Justification Menu, which evenly distributes lines of text to fit the size of the Text Actors Box.

The spacing in-between lines of Text in a Text Actor can now be altered, on a perline basis. The offsets can be either negative or positive.

The Text Actor can now have independant Paragraph Indenting.

Outlines for Text Actors can now be customized to render textures, which can also be the contents of an actor, allowing animated textured outlines.

Using this option in conjunction with the Textured Text can produce some utterly amazing looking Text.

Liquid Media now has a Comprehensive Symbol Window, which can be used to insert any character from any font installed on your computer.

The Text Actor now supports any Character Set and Character Weight built into the font.

When Publishing your presentation, you can now embed any fonts used to make sure that the presentation is displayed correctly on other machines where the fonts may be different.

Liquid Media now supports all Character Sets built using TTF fonts, in any Language.

New modes have been added to the font bar to allow Text Actors to scroll their contents during the course of their path without having to modify the path. This also eases the editing of such text, as it scrolls while entering to keep the current text on the display. Both modes for horizontal and vertical scrolling have been added.

Text smooths more accurately with shadows, effects and when stretched/shrunk.

Zooming or Shrinking the Canvas size now does not affect the Smoothing.

Now that Liquid Media has a Template System, PPT importing has been modified to use them, and reduce the over-all size of the resultant presentation.

This system also retains the ability to directly change the template and have all scenes using it to dynamically update.

There were times when images were not getting smoothed to the correct sizes, producing jaggy looking pictures. The importing now smoothes the images correctly.

Some PPT files were not importing text blocks correctly, any symbol's used in the block were changing the font to that of the symbol. This has now been fixed.

There were still some PPT files that Liquid Media would fail to load. This latest version of Liquid Media has various fixes that allow most files to now import.

If a font could not be found while importing a PPT file, Liquid Media would end up getting the size of the text incorrect. This has now been fixed.

Auto Shapes are an area that Liquid Media could not handle. In the latest version, they are parsed, but not rendered. This will be coming shortly in a new version.

There has been more fixes made to the importing of PPT files in regard to the image transparencies. Multiple slides using the same images would loose their transparancy. This is now fixed.

There has been some trouble with the Liquid Media Installer, and MSI files.

As of version 2.01 we removed the MSI files from the installer as they take up 4 megs of space, and set them to automatically download from the web if they were not installed on the machine. Windows XP comes with them as standard, but there were troubles from some Windows 98 users.

The MSI files have been put back into the installer for this release to allow problem-free installation for all users.

More Templates have been added to the installer.

More Example Presentations and Tutorials have been added to the installer.

Liquid Media can now be updated automatically via our new OnLine Update facility. This can be set to check if there are any new updates (not just the program, but content also) at set frequency, or can be checked via a new option in the Tools Menu.

A backup, and roll-back system has been added to allow any previous version to be re-installed without any need of running an installer, or downloading any files. Very useful if you encounter problems with new versions (especially beta versions).

Now the manual files will be automatically downloaded if they have not been installed on your machine, or there is an update. This elliminates the need to visit our site to download them and manually install.

The player now automatically plays any files that are loaded.

The Liquid Player has been make NT compatible, all options apart from 3D are available from NT.

The different types of Small Players have been merged into one exe file, and made NT compatible.

The Player would crash when cancelling a password dialog, this has now been fixed.

The Cursor keys were not working to change scenes back or forward, this has now been fixed.

The players were not flipping for external programs properly, they now work much more efficiently.