Apex Alpha demo running on a Nemesis-equipped Falcon030 + Videlity on VGA

Apex Alpha...

Apex Alpha was a sequel to Apex Media for the Atari Falcon030 computer. It was made for the following tasks:

> pixel painting

> layer painting

> instancing multiple 'Apex'-like workflows at once

> extend support for automation of titling & animation

> previewing/organizing/linking project content

This project picked up where Apex Media left off - providing better painting tools for truecolour work and better support for video hardware variations.

Apex Media had a fairly hardcoded GUI and couldn't really take advantage of extended display modes. It was also tied somewhat by its 256-colour bitplane mode support.

This successor was intended to be truecolour only and came with a new GUI which offered very high performance in TC modes but without being tied to specific video resolutions or hardware. Video cards (e.g. Nova) were supported using drop-in driver files.

Layer painting was implemented via 'browser windows' which could hold layers but also communicate with other windows via dynamic links. Vector TrueType (TTF) support was built into the package and implemented with the DSP.

The project began around 1996, again in 100% 68030 assembly language, with DSP56001 accelerated components.