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Sierra Print Artist is a computer program from Sierra Home (part of Sierra Entertainment, which is owned by Vivendi SA). The software allows the user to make cards, calendars, stationery and other assorted crafts and then print them with their printer. The current version is 25. [1]
The program was originally developed by Pixellite Group in the early 90s. The DOS version was written by Christopher Schardt. The original Windows version was written by Mr. Schardt, and Ferdinand G. Rios and Tracy Elmore of SAPIEN Technologies, Inc. Vince Mills handled later versions.
The program was first published in 1992 under the name Instant Artist by Autodesk. After half a year or so, Autodesk decided to abolish its consumer products division. Maxis then published the program under the name Print Artist. In 1995, Sierra On-Line purchased Pixellite Group and the rights to the software and it became known as Sierra Print Artist. It was published under Sierra's "Sierra Home" label and continues to be today despite several purchases and mergers of Sierra On-Line beginning in 1996.
The underlying vector-graphics/font-effects technology was developed by Dane Bigham and Christopher Schardt. It was first used in Banner Mania, published by Brøderbund, also written by Christopher Schardt. Steve Hales wrote the Macintosh version of BannerMania. Marty Kahn (the author of the original Print Shop) wrote the Apple II version. The technology also found its way into what would eventually become the WordArt add-in for Microsoft Word.
A popular feature of the program was the Graphics Grabber, developed by Vince Mills, which enabled the program to handle a catalog of thousands of vector and bitmap graphics, organized by keywords. Sierra Home also publishes Hallmark Cards-licensed versions of the program as Hallmark Scrapbook Studio Deluxe and Hallmark Holiday Card Studio.
AutoCAD is a 2D and 3D computer-aided design (CAD) software application developed by Autodesk. It was first released in December 1982 for the CP/M and IBM PC platforms as a desktop app running on microcomputers with internal graphics controllers. Initially a DOS application, subsequent versions were later released for other platforms including Classic Mac OS (1989), Microsoft Windows (1993) and macOS (2010), along with companion web and mobile applications.
Vector graphics are a form of computer graphics in which visual images are created directly from geometric shapes defined on a Cartesian plane, such as points, lines, curves and polygons. The associated mechanisms may include vector display and printing hardware, vector data models and file formats, as well as the software based on these data models. Vector graphics is an alternative to raster or bitmap graphics, with each having advantages and disadvantages in specific situations.
Sierra Entertainment, Inc. was an American video game developer and publisher founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Williams. The company is known for pioneering the graphic adventure game genre, including the first such game, Mystery House. It is known for its graphical adventure game series King's Quest, Space Quest, Police Quest, Gabriel Knight, Leisure Suit Larry, and Quest for Glory, and as the original publisher of Valve's Half-Life series.
Alias Systems Corporation, headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, was a software company that produced high-end 3D graphics software. Alias was eventually bought by Autodesk.
Autodesk, Inc. is an American multinational software corporation that makes software products and services for the architecture, engineering, construction, manufacturing, media, education, and entertainment industries. Autodesk is headquartered in San Francisco, California, and has offices worldwide. Its U.S. offices are located in the states of California, Oregon, Colorado, Texas, Michigan, New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Its Canada offices are located in the provinces of Ontario, Quebec, and Alberta.
Broderbund Software, Inc. was an American maker of video games, educational software, and productivity tools. Broderbund is best known for the 8-bit video game hits Choplifter, Lode Runner, Karateka, and Prince of Persia, as well as The Print Shop—originally for printing signs and banners on dot matrix printers—and the Myst and Carmen Sandiego games. The company was founded in Eugene, Oregon, and moved to San Rafael, California, then later to Novato, California. Brøderbund was purchased by SoftKey in 1998.
Autodesk Alias is a family of computer-aided industrial design (CAID) software predominantly used in automotive design and industrial design for generating class A surfaces using Bézier surface and non-uniform rational B-spline (NURBS) modeling method.
The Print Shop is a basic desktop publishing software package originally published in 1984 by Broderbund. It was unique in that it provided libraries of clip art and templates through a simple interface to build signs, posters and banners with household dot-matrix printers. Over the years, the software has been updated to accommodate changing file formats and printer technologies.
Autodesk Animator is a 2D computer animation and painting program published in 1989 for MS-DOS. It was considered groundbreaking when initially released.
PhysX is an open-source realtime physics engine middleware SDK developed by Nvidia as a part of Nvidia GameWorks software suite.
AutoSketch is a 2D vector drawing program by Autodesk. It is less powerful than Autodesk's AutoCAD and does not support 3D models.
Design Web Format (DWF) is a file format developed by Autodesk for the efficient distribution and communication of rich design data to anyone who needs to view, review, or print design files. Because DWF files are highly compressed, they are smaller and faster to transmit than design files, without the overhead associated with complex CAD drawings. With DWF functionality, publishers of design data can limit the specific design data and plot styles to only what they want recipients to see and can publish multisheet drawing sets from multiple AutoCAD drawings in a single DWF file. They can also publish 3D models from most Autodesk design applications.
Antic Software was a software company associated with Antic, a magazine for the Atari 8-bit family of computers. Bound into issues of the magazine, the Antic Software catalog initially sold Atari 8-bit games, applications, and utilities from the recently defunct Atari Program Exchange. Original submissions were later added, as well as public domain collections, with all software provided on self-documented disk. When the Atari ST was released, it became a mixture of Atari 8-bit and Atari ST software and sold some major Atari ST titles such as CAD-3D. The magazine insert changed names several times, eventually being branded as The Catalog.
This article deals with productivity software created for the Amiga line of computers and covers the AmigaOS operating system and its derivatives AROS and MorphOS. It is a split of the main article, Amiga software.
The history of computer animation began as early as the 1940s and 1950s, when people began to experiment with computer graphics – most notably by John Whitney. It was only by the early 1960s when digital computers had become widely established, that new avenues for innovative computer graphics blossomed. Initially, uses were mainly for scientific, engineering and other research purposes, but artistic experimentation began to make its appearance by the mid-1960s – most notably by Dr. Thomas Calvert. By the mid-1970s, many such efforts were beginning to enter into public media. Much computer graphics at this time involved 2-D imagery, though increasingly as computer power improved, efforts to achieve 3-D realism became the emphasis. By the late 1980s, photo-realistic 3-D was beginning to appear in film movies, and by mid-1990s had developed to the point where 3-D animation could be used for entire feature film production.
Broderbund Software Inc. v. Unison World, Inc., 648 F. Supp. 1127, 1133, was a United States District Court for the Northern District of California software case, initially important in determining how U.S. copyright law applied to the look and feel presented by a software product. It took an expansive position which later courts increasingly rejected.
Autodesk Gameware is a discontinued middleware software suite developed by Autodesk. The suite contained tools that enable designers to create game lighting, character animation, low level path finding, high-level AI and advanced user interfaces. On July 12, 2017, Autodesk removed Scaleform, Beast, HumanIK and Navigation from their online store, and announced the ending of support for the products.
Banner Mania was a banner making program for IBM PC compatible computers, enabling the user to create banners, posters, signs and logos. It was released by Broderbund in 1989 and was developed for Pixellite Group by Presage Software Development and written by Christopher Schardt and Dane Bigham.
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