The company's primary product was Altamira Composer. This PC based software pioneered object-based drawing and image editing. Composer was one of the first to bring important tools such as anti-aliased effects and image sprites to the desktop.[citation needed] The company was acquired by Microsoft in 1994.[1] Thea Grigsby was Vice President of Marketing. David Shantz of WildOutWest, LLC (www.wildoutwest.com) was responsible for branding, package design and the development of a series of image object libraries that were released along with the product.
Seed capital came from Autodesk and second-round financing from a team of venture capitalists (TVI) and private individuals. Altamira's Windows product, Altamira Composer, one of the first image composition applications with image sprites (i.e., non-rectangular, floating images), entered the market in November 1993 (CoSA After Effects 1.0 shipped in January of that same year).
