Planestate v1.2 (Sept, 2000)
Copyright (c) 1999-2000 Joakim Eriksson
---------------------------------------
Planestate is a higly configurable electropaint inspired 3d
screensaver for Win9x,2000 and WinNT that shows an endless
helix of whirling colors mix, twist and turn to form a never
ending display of hypnotic motion patterns.

Requirements
------------
 - Pentium
 - Windows 95,98,2000 or NT 4
 - 3D accelerator card

Drivers/Gfx cards
-----------------
What if I own a...

...Voodoo Graphics, Voodoo Banshee, Voodoo 2, or Voodoo Rush?
   Download the very latest drivers from www.3dfx.com and install them.

...regular 2D/3D accelerator under Win9x?
   Either download the latest drivers from your respective hardware
   vendor's web site, or download GLSETUP that will auto detect your
   hardware and install up-to-date drivers. GLSETUP can be found
   at www.glsetup.com

...regular 2D/3D accelerator under WinNT?
   Download the latest drivers from your respective hardware vendor's
   web site and install them.

...regular 2D card that doesn't have any 3D acceleration under Win95?
   Download the software OpenGL drivers that can be found at
   ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/softlib/mslfiles/opengl95.exe

...regular 2D card that doesn't have any 3D acceleration under Win98/WinNT?
   You don't have to do anything. All needed drivers are already installed
   on your system.


Speed
-----
If you run the screensaver under Win9x in software mode you should set the
desktop to 16bit for maximum performance.

Under WinNT the screensaver will automatically set the correct screen mode
for you.



Options screen
--------------
The options screen is everything but logical so beware! However, it can
be fun to play around with when you are bored, so feel free to try it out.

A short description of how the system is built.

When you go into the animation panel, the program will load an
animation and show you the work frame of that animation.
The work frame is the frame where all the changes go. If you 
create a new frame that you like, you can go into the animation
panel and select the animation you want to store the frame in and
press either "Add frame" or "Replace frame" depending on what you
want to do.

Don't forget that the only animation that will be kept when you
leave the animation panel is the current one! So for example if you
add a new animation and then select another animation and leave the
animation panel then the animation you created first will disappear!

The animation mode is automatically turned off when you 
change one of the sliders so if you change a slider
then you have to reactive the frame animation.

Don't forget the F5 button. It helps a lot when designing
new frames.  Also remember that as default the screensaver
will randomise between all the available frames. If you want it
to only show the same animation all the time then press the 
RAND ANIM button on the ANIM panel and click on the
animation you want it to always show.

If you find a nice animation then send it to me at jme@planestate.net
with your name and the animation file attached to the email.

The animation files can be found in the Anim folder in the planestate
folder (Usually C:\Program Files\Planestate\Anims\).


How-To...
---------

  ...select a new animation
  -------------------------
  If you want to change the animation then run the screensaver
  in configuration mode and do the following.

  1. Press the "Anim" button on the lower right (Shortcut key 's').
  2. Turn off the automatic animation selection by pressing the
     "Rand anim" button.
  3. Click on an animation in the list named "Animations on disk".
     If there are more animations than the list can hold then press
     the two arrows just to the right of the "Animations on disk"
     text.
  4. Press the Main button on the lower right (Shortcut key 'q') to
     see the animation in action. Let it run for about 10 seconds so
     it has time to settle in.
  5. Repeat step 1,3 and 4 until you find a nice animation.
  6. When you have found an animation you like, then just quit. The
     last selected animation will be saved automatically as the one to
     use.

  ...change the background
  ------------------------
  In the configuration window press the "BGround" button (Shortcut key
  'w'). Press the large arrows to change between the available backgrounds.
  When you quit you will be asked if you want to change to the new
  background or not.

  ...create a new animation
  -----------------------------

  Here is the steps you should take to make a completely new animation.
  Lets make the simplest one possible. An animation that visualises a bunch
  of planes on a row that increases and decreases the horizontal size.

  1. Start the screensaver in configuration mode
  2. Press the little button next to the big "Color" button
     it should look like a little square now and the description
     text should be "Stop animate between the frames". Press that
     so it looks like a arrow.
     By doing so you are telling the system to not animate
     between the frames we have in the animation.
  2. Press the RESET button in the bottom right corner
  3. Press the ANIM button.
  4. Press the NEW ANIM button
     Now a new animation should be visible under the
     "Animations of disk" panel. (The left one)
  5. Right click on the newly created animation. 
     It should have a name like "NEWANIM x" where x is a number.
  6. Change the name of the animation to something a bit
     more fitting like "Test anim". End with RETURN.
  7. Press the ADD FRAME button to add the frame we made before
     to the animation.
  8. Click on the newly added frame. By clicking on the frame
     you also clone it into the work frame. (This isn't actually
     needed now because this is the frame we already have
     in the work frame)
  9. Press the MAIN button to go back to the frame "designer"
  10. Drag the X scale (Top section to the far left) slider up
      a bit. So it's more or less in the middle.
  11. Press the ANIM button
  12. Press the ADD FRAME
  13. Now if you click on the two frames in the animation you
      will see how they look like in the little preview.
  14. Press the big RED square. This is so we change from
      a randomised frame selection to a "walking" frame selection.
      Because we have so few frames it's better to do it that
      way otherwise he might choose for example the first frame
      a lot of times and then we can't see the animation in
      action. But as a default it's better to have it in random
      mode otherwise the animation will quickly become predictable.
  15. Because the frames we have are absolutely still (Except
      for the color changing) we should lower the time that he
      takes before choosing a new frame.
      Do that by draging the second slider (The one on the right)
      quite far down.
  16. Press the SAVE ANIM button to save the newly created
      animation.
  17. Press the MAIN button
  18. Finally press the little ARROW button next to the COLOR
      button to activate the frame animation mode again.
  19. Sit back and wait for him to select the other frame.

  Well that's it. It's quite a lot of work for such a simple
  animation but when you know how to do it then it's just
  to replace the simple frames we did here with something
  more fun that contains animations in the frames.


How it came to be
-----------------
While I was working on a demo for the operation 3dfx screensaver compo
that was held back in march 1998 i noticed a screensaver called
electropaint that was running on an SGI machine. I was amazed by the
movement patterns the screensaver generated, and started to wonder
how the effect was made. It would definitely be a good effect to add
to the demo so I tested a few things.

It wasn't supposed to reach the complexity of electropaint, it was
just going to be something simple for me to play with and have
as another effect in the demo.

That didn't happen. Instead I added more and more things to the effect
and I realised too late that the deadline for the compo was getting very
close so I had to kill the whole demo and make a screensaver instead.

After a few weeks of hard work, I released the screensaver under
the name of "Beyond the stars v0.9" as an entry for the compo.
There was a lot of things that didn't make it to the screensaver so
it was extremely limited. However, it did manage to get a 5th place.

When the compo was over I stopped working on the screensaver, but
exactly one year later (march 1999) I resumed the project.


Notes
-----
If you put the screensaver on a cover disc or use it in some other
strange way (think big screen, think rave party) then please email me,
because I'm interested in knowing where the screensaver ends up!


Known bugs
----------
- Hardware acceleration doesnt work on ATI cards in Win NT 4.0
  while running it as a screensaver.
  I can't do anything about this because its a bug in Microsofts
  DX3 code that forces ATI drivers to default back to software mode.


Author
------

The screensaver was made by Joakim Eriksson while the following
people helped me out with some parts of the underlying routines
Johan Tornqvist, Joakim Birgersson, Martin Zettergren and
Anders Tornblad. Torbjorn Ahman was the creator of the nebula
pictures used in the sky box background.


Contact info
------------

Please send comments, suggestions, ideas, bug reports and new animations to

  jme@planestate.net

The latest version and more info can be found at

  http://www.planestate.net

The company i work for can be found at

  http://www.xponential.net


Terms of use
------------

Planestate is shareware, and may be previewed for 14 days.
Continued use of Planestate after 14 days requires you to
register it for a cost of $14.95.
Planestate will show unregistered messages until it has been
registered but it will not cease functioning even after
the 14 day trial period. It is your responsibility
to register.

Registration entitles you to free updates to ALL future
versions of Planestate.

Registration is handled through www.shareit.com.

If you would like to register Planestate, you can do 
the registration online at:

  http://shareit1.element5.com/programs.html?productid=106233

Alternatively, you can go to http://www.shareit.com and
enter the program number 106233 there

ShareIt accepts most forms of payment, including credit cards
and fax orders.

Upon registration you will be emailed a registration key
that can be entered in the registration box found on the
screen selection dialog.


Legal
-----

All versions of Planestates are copyright protected and are
the property of Joakim Eriksson.  Until further notice, this
software may be used for free for up to 14 days. Thereafter, in order
to continue to use the software, you must pay $14.95 per computer
and register the software with Joakim Eriksson. 
  Registration entitles the user to use all future shareware versions of 
Planestate, but not to technical support.
  The serial number received when registering may not be copied, sold
or distributed in anyway.

The unregistered version may be freely distributed, provided the
software package is distributed with all its original files and not
modified in anyway. 

Joakim Eriksson holds the right to spread all planestate animation
files.

  To the maximum extent permitted by law, Joakim Eriksson
disclaims all warranties regarding this software, express or implied,
including but not limited to warranties of merchantability and fitness
for a particular purpose.  In no event shall Joakim Eriksson be liable
for consequential, special, incidental or indirect damages arising out
of the use or inability to use this software even if Joakim Eriksson
is aware of the possibility of such damages or a known defect.

	By using this software, you are agreeing to the above terms.


