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Dust or Magic by Bob Hughes Recommended

ISBN: 0 201 36071 3       Publisher: Addison-Wesley       Pages: 264       Price: £29-95

Categories:   multimedia

Reviewed by Francis Glassborow in C Vu 12-3 (May 2000)

In the second part he writes about a number of individuals together with some great successes as well as some horrific failures. His central focus here, as it is throughout the book, is people. He writes enthusiastically about Voyager (the multimedia company, not the TV programme) though by the time he was finishing this book the company ceased to exist. It was here that I began to feel irritated, not with the author but with the repetitive use of the Apple Mac for innovation. All these great ideas that really do not depend on the platform that were only developed for what became a minority machine. Why did these innovators confine themselves to a single platform? By doing so everyone, creative artists and customers have lost out. The author mentions other machines and projects such as work based on the Amiga as well as the Doomsday Project based on the Acorn BBC machine.

In the final part of the book the author approaches the problems of developing good multimedia products. Once again the focus is on people. You will not find recipes for instant success but you will find a wealth of insight. This is not confined to the products themselves but extend into good management. It is very difficult for me as a reviewer to give you a good overview of a book that is itself an overview. I think that this is a book well worth reading if you have the slightest sense of creativity. The author would be at pains to point out that if you produce anything then you are potentially being creative.

All I can say is that this is a well-written and highly readable book (despite my irritation with some of the typography and layout) that should be widely read by many more people than those that might think the subject was their domain. Multimedia is not new nor are the mistakes. This is not a 'how to' book nor is it a book addressed directly at programmers but reading it should broaden your understanding and give you some insight into what maybe going wrong in your work.