MacroMind VideoWorks

MacroMind VideoWorks was an early animation program that was developed by MacroMind (predecessor of Macromedia).

Product history
Marc Canter, Jay Fenton and Mark Stephen Pierce of MacroMind had originally designed a multimedia application called SoundVision with graphics, text, and sound capabilities for Apple Computer's Macintosh 128K. The media elements were timed by a "score" based on an early implementation of MIDI. At the insistence of Hayden Software, the publisher, the sound and graphics features were split into two products that became MacroMind MusicWorks and VideoWorks, which were released in October 1984 and June 1985, respectively. The programming was done by Fenton and Dan Sadowski.

In December 1985, Fenton implemented a customized version of VideoWorks with Tiny BASIC that was licensed to Apple to build interactive training demos. Apple had previously been using audio cassettes for guided tours of their new Macintosh line. The first such animated tour to be built with VideoWorks was for the Macintosh Plus. Apple was unable to build interactive tutorials with their own technology until Bill Atkinson created HyperCard in 1987.

VideoWorks II added color capabilities and was self-published by MacroMind in 1987. In 1988, Canter announced that that the next version, VideoWorks Professional, would feature additional paint capabilities. It was released in 1989 as MacroMind Director 1.0.

John Henry Thompson and Erik Neumann developed a new scripting language called Lingo to replace Tiny BASIC in VideoWorks Interactive Pro. It was released in April 1990 as MacroMind Director 2.0.