| Publishing Database | ||||||
For more than 18 months now, Joel Sciamma has lead a team working
with the Automobile Association's multimedia publishing team designing
the databases that manage the content and copyrights for their
CD-ROM projects.
FileMaker Pro 3.0 was chosen for both tasks due to its low cost
and inherent flexibility. The ease with which attractive interfaces
can be created is also of genuine importance when the databases
are intended to be used by those with developed aesthetic sensibilities.
The screen shots on this page illustrate the databases created
for two recent AA Multimedia projects; "Interactive Britain and
Ireland" and "Birds of Britain and Europe", both of which are
now on sale.
The Introduction to the GB Settlements database containing information on every city, town and hamlet in the UK.
Details from GB Settlements database
The copyright databases track all the assets (which can number
up to 6,000 per project) that an editor has at his or her disposal.
The nature of multimedia assets means that a broad range of rights
and fees have to be accomodated within the database with flexible
reporting that allows for the extraction of items that may need
renegotiation.
Assets in the copyright databases also provide the source for
the media items held in the content management databases which
also hold nearly every scrap of information that will find its
way onto the CD's. The use of FileMaker Pro 3.0 allows each content
database to be altered easily as new projects are started and
allows for great flexibility in handling related items.
The introduction to the Birds of Europe Database
Details from the Birds of Europe Database
Work is now under way to allow for the scripting attributes of dynamic presentations to be incorporated into the content databases as well.