🚀 go-pugleaf

Hello! 
 
  You probably won't get much talk from Amiga users here in
comp.multimedia.  Most of the Amiga multimedia enthusiasts hang out in
comp.sys.amiga.multimedia ... Anyway, I will post what I know and have
experience here.. If you wish for a followup or more personal
communication, let me know. (If you have direct Internet access, we may
be able to set up a time to TALK (using the TALK command).
 
   1. I see your concern with the smaller Amiga base of users(compared
to the Mac).  Currently, there are approximately 9 million Macintosh
users versus 3.5 million Amiga Users.  However, it is a fact that over
50% of desktop video platforms today are Amiga based.  You may have
heard of a device called the Video Toaster. It is available to Mac and
IBM users, but is Amiga based.  If you were to purchase one for a Mac or
IBM, all you are actually purchasing is an Amiga 2000 with the Video
Toaster installed in it, and you are connecting the Amiga to the Mac/IBM
through the parallel port for user control.  The Video Toaster, however,
was developed for the Amiga computer.
 
	Just in case you haven't heard of the Toaster, briefly stated, it is a
professional broadcast quality video production system that many cable
television stations, and some PBS stations use for all of their video
titling and animation.  The Toaster by itself costs about $1800, and an
Amiga 2000 is needed to install and operate it(the Amiga 2000 would
probably run you about $1800 for one with a nice sized harddrive, which
would be necessary).  Now this would be the ideal system, however, it
would probably put you out of your price range.  So let's talk about
other systems.
 
   2. The MacIntosh dealer told you wrong when he said there were more
Multimedia software available for the Macintosh than for the Amiga.  The
Amiga was designed from the ground up as a multimedia platform.  That is
why with an Amiga, you get direct NTSC video output, nice, smooth
animation, and a Multitasking operating system.

	One thing needs to be brought up about the multitasking o/s's.  True,
the Macintosh's System 7 claims to support multitasking, however, it
would be better to refer to it as Context Switching.  In order to
achieve true multitasking, you need several coprocessors that take the
work load off of the main processor.  With the Macintosh, the Motorolla
does everything... If you want to multitask, it does everything twice,
or three times, which tends to show considerable lag time.  

	The Amiga on the other hand, has proprietary custom chips designed by
Commodore.  The Motorolla basically handles the math side of the
computer(unless you have a seperate math coprocessor installed). It also
handles a few other things as well.  The main 4 custom chips in the
Amiga are called Agnus, Paula, Denise, and Gary. (I know.. corny names,
but hey, they do the job!)  The Agnus controls ALL Amiga animation. The
Paula handles the "static" graphics and palette.  The Denise handles the
Stereo Sound, and the Gary handles all I/O.  AmigaDOS (the operating
system) was built right off as a multitasking O/S, making use of the
Custom Chipset.  (Mac's O/S was not designed as a multi-tasking o/s, and
does not have the hardware to back it up. The multitasking is totally
software related).  Thus, with the Amiga, independent functions are
routed directly to the chip that handles it... freeing up unnecessary
calls to the Motorolla, and allowing it to do other tasks. 

	As far as Multimedia software goes, You already found out how much less
expensive the Amiga software is (versus the Mac and P.C.). And you can
rest assured that there are definately more Amiga Multimedia software
packages out there than their is for the Mac(and probably, the Mac and
PC combined).  Scenery Animator is a package designed for home use...
one of the many.  Besides that, there are several authoring systems such
as AmigaVision(comes with the machine), CanDo, AMOS, Foundation, The
Director II, Ultracard, etc.  For graphics, you have Deluxe Paint IV,
DigiPaint, Art Department Professional, etc.  For rendering, you have
Imagine, Turbo Silver, Sculpt 4-D, Real 3D, and Caligari.  For
animation: Disney Animation Studio, Deluxe Paint IV, Director.  

	As for hardware, you have the professionally used Video Toaster(and
many others).  You also have various 24bit graphics boards, Video
Digitizers(color), Scanners, Audio Digitizers, etc.

   3.  The MacIntosh probably would need something even faster than a
Motorolla 68040 to get up to speed with the Amiga... after all, the Mac
lacks the custom chips. It's as though we have a microprocessor
dedicated only for animation, another for sound, another for graphics,
and another for I/O.  The Mac and PC lack this.
 
   4. Unlike the Mac or PC, the Amiga uses standard NTSC video output,
and meets broadcast quality specifications. No need to worry about a converter.

   5. I suggest you call 1-800-66-AMIGA (or 661-AMIGA in canada) and
have Commodore send you all the informaton they can about the Amiga and
Multimedia.  Also call a company called NewTek, and get their free video
cassette on the Video Toaster (very very impressive).  If you can, try
and rent or watch the video from AmigaWorld magazine (I forget the name
of it) that has 3 volumes of nothing but animations done on an Amiga.
Oh, and check out comp.sys.amiga.graphics, comp.sys.amiga.multimedia,
and comp.sys.amiga.audio.
 
   6. As far as a few of your other questions go, YES, the Amiga can
play Soundtracker files (no need for audio boards either).  As a matter
of fact, Soundtracker files originate from Amigas.  And remember this:
With an Amiga, for only about $300, you can FULLY EMULATE a Macintosh.
For about $500, you can fully emulate a 386SX. For free, you can emulate
a regular IBM PC (with a shareware software program.. The other
emulators are hardware).  Oh, and the Mac emulators available have at
times been clocked to run faster than a regular Macintosh.
 
   7. Lastly, I do warn you that on September 11th-13th there is a World
of Commodore show in Pasadena California.  There, Commodore is expected
to release their latest machines, AmigaDOS 3.0, and something called the
AA chipset, which is an enhanced Amiga custom chip set that will
eventually be the new standard for Amiga's (24bit graphics, CD quality
sound, etc.)  Even if you are not interested in the new Amiga stuff (the
older machines will be compatible with it), wait until after the show to
purchase your Amiga.  After the show, prices will probably drop for the
older machines.
 
   Check out your local BBS's and see if you can find an Amiga Users
Group to go to... There, they will be happy to demo off the only machine
in the world a person could possibly get attatched to!
 
   Anything else, just let me know!
 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
   // John Dudley        dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov
 \X/  AMIGA: The creative computer for the creative mind.

In article <1992Sep4.182640.16397@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:
>
>   1. I see your concern with the smaller Amiga base of users(compared
>to the Mac).  Currently, there are approximately 9 million Macintosh
>users versus 3.5 million Amiga Users.  However, it is a fact that over
>50% of desktop video platforms today are Amiga based.  You may have
>heard of a device called the Video Toaster. It is available to Mac and
>IBM users, but is Amiga based.  If you were to purchase one for a Mac or
>IBM, all you are actually purchasing is an Amiga 2000 with the Video
>Toaster installed in it, and you are connecting the Amiga to the Mac/IBM
>through the parallel port for user control.  The Video Toaster, however,
>was developed for the Amiga computer.
> 

Except Video Toaster, is there any other good video or graphics hardware
for Amiga? I ask that because people keep repeating again and again. Is
this the only one for Amiga?

dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:


>Hello! 
>   2. The MacIntosh dealer told you wrong when he said there were more
>Multimedia software available for the Macintosh than for the Amiga.  The
>Amiga was designed from the ground up as a multimedia platform.  That is
>why with an Amiga, you get direct NTSC video output, nice, smooth
>animation, and a Multitasking operating system.

I don't believe that you get NTSC output standard in the Amiga 2000 or
3000 any more. The 1000's had it, but I believe you now need a Toaster
or DCTV like device to get NTSC. I may be wrong about this (I don't have
one in front of me) but none of the 2000's or 3000's we used last year had 
NTSC output directly from the machine.

>	As for hardware, you have the professionally used Video Toaster(and
>many others).  You also have various 24bit graphics boards, Video
>Digitizers(color), Scanners, Audio Digitizers, etc.

The DCTV is 21bit, if I remember correctly and does do a good job of
rendering NTSC output. The original poster was looking for animation
straight from Hard Drive. I don't think the DCTVs can do that, at least not
without some more help (either software or hardware). In my computer
animation courses last year, we were limted by the 9M RAM in the 3000's we
were using. 

>   4. Unlike the Mac or PC, the Amiga uses standard NTSC video output,
>and meets broadcast quality specifications. No need to worry about a converter.
See Above Comment

On the Video Toaster -- I think NewTek raised the price of the toaster
to somewhere near $2500 last year, did they not? This may be a list 
price, however, and it may be had for less. The Toaster is a wonderful
piece of equpiment though. If you plan to expand your system later, it
may be worth it to buy a 2000 (The Toaster won't fit in a 3000) now and
use a DCTV until you get up funds for a Toaster.

>   7. Lastly, I do warn you that on September 11th-13th there is a World
>of Commodore show in Pasadena California.  There, Commodore is expected
>to release their latest machines, AmigaDOS 3.0, and something called the
>AA chipset, which is an enhanced Amiga custom chip set that will
>eventually be the new standard for Amiga's (24bit graphics, CD quality
>sound, etc.)  Even if you are not interested in the new Amiga stuff (the
>older machines will be compatible with it), wait until after the show to
>purchase your Amiga.  After the show, prices will probably drop for the
>older machines.

This will be interesting to hear about.
 
>   Check out your local BBS's and see if you can find an Amiga Users
>Group to go to... There, they will be happy to demo off the only machine
>in the world a person could possibly get attatched to!

Heh, people get attached to all sorts of things. :) Even PC clones and
(Heavens forbid) Macintoshes. 
 
>---------------------------------------------------------------------------
>   // John Dudley        dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov
> \X/  AMIGA: The creative computer for the creative mind.


--Pete Tevonian
  tevonian@sumter.cso.uiuc.edu

In article <1992Sep4.234254.11508@newshub.ariel.yorku.ca> cs902125@ariel.yorku.ca (SHUK C YIP) writes:

>Except Video Toaster, is there any other good video or graphics hardware
>for Amiga? I ask that because people keep repeating again and again. Is
>this the only one for Amiga?

There are about a dozen or so graphics boards for the Amiga, which
all vary in price, preformance, quality, and task they are suited
for.  The Toaster gets mentioned so often because it is not just a
graphics board, but the heart of a TV studio (Switcher, character
generator, etc) and comes with an incredible 3D animation package as
well.  Personally, I have no use for the toaster, but I could find a
use for DMI's Vivid 24 (an accelerated 24 bit board, with
programable resolution, upto at least 1280x1024).  Now if only I
could afford it :)

Rick

-- 
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________.sig____________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
The generic .sig          Rick Blewitt     rblewitt@ucsd.edu

In article <Bu39Mn.2Gx@news.cso.uiuc.edu> tevonian@sumter.cso.uiuc.edu (Pete Tevonian) writes:
>dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:

>>Amiga was designed from the ground up as a multimedia platform.  That is
>>why with an Amiga, you get direct NTSC video output, nice, smooth
>>animation, and a Multitasking operating system.
>
>I don't believe that you get NTSC output standard in the Amiga 2000 or
>3000 any more. The 1000's had it, but I believe you now need a Toaster
>or DCTV like device to get NTSC. I may be wrong about this (I don't have

The straight composit plug is gone, but since the video frequency
does not need changing, a converter is very cheap, in fact, the 23
pin video connector does have composit signals coming to it.

>The DCTV is 21bit, if I remember correctly and does do a good job of
>rendering NTSC output. The original poster was looking for animation
>straight from Hard Drive. I don't think the DCTVs can do that, at least not
>without some more help (either software or hardware). In my computer
>animation courses last year, we were limted by the 9M RAM in the 3000's we
>were using. 

With the right anim player, I'm certain that it can be done.  One
thing to remember, since the speed of the drive is limiting, the
deltas have to be fairly small (1MB/s drive -> 66K delta at 15fps).
This is of course true of any system.

Rick

-- 
_____________________________________________________________________
_____________________________.sig____________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
The generic .sig          Rick Blewitt     rblewitt@ucsd.edu

In article <Bu39Mn.2Gx@news.cso.uiuc.edu> tevonian@sumter.cso.uiuc.edu (Pete Tevonian) writes:
>
>I don't believe that you get NTSC output standard in the Amiga 2000 or
>3000 any more. The 1000's had it, but I believe you now need a Toaster
>or DCTV like device to get NTSC. I may be wrong about this (I don't have
>one in front of me) but none of the 2000's or 3000's we used last year had 
>NTSC output directly from the machine.
 
Yes, you have to spend $25 to buy the modulator for A2000 or A3000 if
you want NTSC output. However, it is very cheap.
 
>The DCTV is 21bit, if I remember correctly and does do a good job of
>rendering NTSC output. The original poster was looking for animation
>straight from Hard Drive. I don't think the DCTVs can do that, at least not
>without some more help (either software or hardware). In my computer
>animation courses last year, we were limted by the 9M RAM in the 3000's we
>were using. 
 
With ShowMaker or MediaMaker + DCTV or HAM-E plus, you can play a full
screen 21 bit animation + sound directly off your hard drive. I think
this is what QuickTime can't handle. Anyway, there are over 20 different
graphics cards for Amiga. (range from 18bit to 32bit) eg. OpalVision, it
bundles with the world 1st 24 bit ACTION game, (yes! action) King of
Karate.

>On the Video Toaster -- I think NewTek raised the price of the toaster
>to somewhere near $2500 last year, did they not? This may be a list 
>price, however, and it may be had for less. The Toaster is a wonderful
>piece of equpiment though. If you plan to expand your system later, it
>may be worth it to buy a 2000 (The Toaster won't fit in a 3000) now and
>use a DCTV until you get up funds for a Toaster.
 
You can buy Video Cozzy to connect Toaster with A3000. It is something
like external Video slot. So, you can have two video slot. One in A3000
and one in Video Cozzy.

>>   7. Lastly, I do warn you that on September 11th-13th there is a World
>>of Commodore show in Pasadena California.  There, Commodore is expected
>>to release their latest machines, AmigaDOS 3.0, and something called the
>>AA chipset, which is an enhanced Amiga custom chip set that will
>>eventually be the new standard for Amiga's (24bit graphics, CD quality
>>sound, etc.)  Even if you are not interested in the new Amiga stuff (the
>>older machines will be compatible with it), wait until after the show to
>>purchase your Amiga.  After the show, prices will probably drop for the
>>older machines.
>
>This will be interesting to hear about.

I think the most excited one is EMPLANT. It is a color MAC II Emulator
for Amiga.

Hello, me again.

Thanks to everyone who answered quetsions I had by email or here.

I have a few more answers now, which seem to be:

  * QT *can* double buffer from hard disk, and in fact, does this by
default.  However, no one answered my question about whether it can do
it in more than the small window the dealer showed.  I'm still looking
for whether I can animate in full screen on a standard Mac-II (which
is all that is within my price range).

  * I found out that a 68040 Mac Quadra will not fall within my
hardware budget.  But somebody indicated a 68030 Mac can be expanded
with a 68040 later.

  * About 4 billion people mailed me about the "Video Toaster".  It
sounds neat, but also, an amiga 3000 equipped like I want with a video
toaster is outside of my price range.  The toaster by itself is $2500
from the local dealer, and he said it needs a $1200 "Time Base
Corrector" (whatever that is) to be useful.  Also, I'm not sure I have
much use for the things the toaster does (real time wipes/fades/etc).
So I thank everyone for the suggestion but I just don't think this
device is all that useful to me.  THe DCTV looks muhc more useful
right now, not to mention I can afford it.

  * Someone on here posted that Amiga 3000s were limited to 9 Mb, but
I have found out this is not true.  THe dealer sells 64 Mb expansion
memory cards for it, and he says you can have more than one in the
3000 at once.  (However, they are quite expensive).

  * The Mac *can* play soundtracker modules, I found out.  And yes,
they are the same ones I have on my 386, so I can just move them over
and use them.

  * Several people told me the Macintosh dealer was wrong when he said
there was more multimedia programs for the Macintosh.

  * A raytrace renderer, unfortunately, falls out of my price range
for either the Mac or the Amiga (although there are freeware ones
available for both).  Commercially, the cheapest renderer either
dealer carried was $250, which would leave me no money for other software.

  * Several people expressed doubts that the Mac System 7 can
multitask that well.  They claimed that the reason the Mac dealer
didn't do that demo (2 renders/download 9600/word processor) is
because he couldn't.  But I find this a little hard to believe because
everything I've ever heard says that Mac System 7 is a multitasking OS.

 * A few people emailed me about an Amiga "4000", but my dealer has
never heard of such a thing, and says if it was going to appear this
year, he'd know of it.  So it will probably be too late for my needs,
and possibly too expensive.

* Someone else emailed me that even though devices such as DCTV exist
for the Amiga, you can't run programs on them.  Is this true?  He said
that for the Macintosh, you can run a program designed for, say, 8 bit
color, on a 24 bit color card, and all the software will know what to
do and work right.  He said that almost no programs can be run on the
Amiga graphics cards, which sounds strange, because what good would
they be then?  Is this true?  Can I, say, take my word processor or
whatever and run it on DCTV or other such display devices?  (Ie, any
old program)?

 * Several people emailed me that the Amiga can emulate a Macintosh
for around $300.  However, one said this was only in B&W, which doesn't
do me much good :-)

* Somebody mentioned that "MPEG" will become very important soon to
multimedia.  I know there is MPEG for the Mac, but dunno about the
Amiga - is there MPEG available there, or will there be?

That's what I've found out so far, thanks to people's kind responses.
Basically, I got a lot of mail saying to consider the Amiga more
seriously than I was.  So I am.  I am still concerned about its small
base though - just for example, in my hometown there used to be 2
Amiga dealers about 4 years ago but they have both gone out of
business and now I have to drive 50 miles to find a dealer, but there
are still several Mac dealers in town (and the required 5 billion PC
dealers :-) ).  My concern is that the Amiga is fading out, esp. since
someone sent me email saying that several major software vendors are
not porting to it any more, and that many of the "Biggies" such as
FrameMaker, Lotus 123, AutoCad, etc, don't run on the Amiga at all.

So basically, I like what I have seen from the Amiga, maybe more than
the other platforms, but mostly I am afraid that I'll be stuck with a
"TRS-80" type of machine in a few years - one that was nifty relative
to the competition, but is ignored by the industry.  If it wasn't for
that fear, I'd be more tempted.

Anyway, thanks for the information I received.  The thigns I still
need to know are:

  * Can Quicktime movies be played on a standard 68030 color Macintosh
in full screen mode at 24 fps??  I guess everything kinda hinges on
this.  If I have to stick to 2 inch windows that makes nice demos, but
doesn't do me much good :-).   If it does, I'll probably end up with a
Mac just because of the above concerns.  If not, then I'll hafta go
with the Amiga just to get full screen animations.  Info on this?

  /M "no .sig" D

In article <1992Sep4.234254.11508@newshub.ariel.yorku.ca> cs902125@ariel.yorku.ca (SHUK C YIP) writes:
> In article <1992Sep4.182640.16397@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:
> >
> >   1. I see your concern with the smaller Amiga base of users(compared
> >to the Mac).  Currently, there are approximately 9 million Macintosh
> >users versus 3.5 million Amiga Users.  However, it is a fact that over
> >50% of desktop video platforms today are Amiga based.  You may have
> >heard of a device called the Video Toaster. It is available to Mac and
> >IBM users, but is Amiga based.  If you were to purchase one for a Mac or
> >IBM, all you are actually purchasing is an Amiga 2000 with the Video
> >Toaster installed in it, and you are connecting the Amiga to the Mac/IBM
> >through the parallel port for user control.  The Video Toaster, however,
> >was developed for the Amiga computer.
> >
>
> Except Video Toaster, is there any other good video or graphics hardware
> for Amiga? I ask that because people keep repeating again and again. Is
> this the only one for Amiga?

It would be hard to name a piece of hardware for the Amiga that *isn't*
video of graphics related.  And yes, many are very good.  (Such things
as the Impact Vision/24, DCTV, HAM-E, etc. all come to mind, and there
are many others.)

--

=====================================================================
 Robert Kesterson             "First learn computer science and all
 robertk@taoami.lerctr.org    the theory.  Next develop a programming
                              style.  Then forget all that and
                              just hack."        -- George Carrette

In article <1992Sep6.145949.7467@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu>, mdicker@nyx.cs.du.edu (Mike Dickerson) writes:

>   * QT *can* double buffer from hard disk, and in fact, does this by
> default.  However, no one answered my question about whether it can do
> it in more than the small window the dealer showed.  I'm still looking
> for whether I can animate in full screen on a standard Mac-II (which
> is all that is within my price range).

This could depend very heavily on the sort of material you're trying to
play. If it's a computer-generated animation, with a relatively small area
of movement against a static background, then it may very well work. However,
if you're playing back realistic images (such as video previously captured
from a VCR or other source), then there's a lot more information in each
frame.

I'd say, don't get your hopes up. Another posting in this newsgroup mentions
performance improvements in a new, upcoming version of QuickTime. But with
QuickTime 1.0, I don't think you're going to get full-screen, full-frame-rate
output without significant hardware assistance.

>   * Several people told me the Macintosh dealer was wrong when he said
> there was more multimedia programs for the Macintosh.

I don't know about relative numbers, but I'd be a little surprised if any
other platform had a bigger variety of multimedia-*compatible* software than
the Mac. You can import QuickTime movies into both Microsoft Word 5.0 and
WordPerfect 2.1. You can create them with Mathematica 2.1. You can create
and import them with MacroMind Director 3.1 and Canvas 3.0.4. And then
there are the applications for editing digital video, like Adobe Premiere
and DiVA VideoShop. I even saw a demonstration of using Adobe PhotoShop to
edit frames directly in a QuickTime movie! (It had to be uncompressed, though.)
I think most of the 3D modelling and animation packages, even if they aren't
directly QuickTime-savvy yet, can export their output as PICS files, which
can be converted to QuickTime movies with several utilities.

On the Mac, multimedia isn't a separate application; it's just part of the
OS.

>   * Several people expressed doubts that the Mac System 7 can
> multitask that well.  They claimed that the reason the Mac dealer
> didn't do that demo (2 renders/download 9600/word processor) is
> because he couldn't.  But I find this a little hard to believe because
> everything I've ever heard says that Mac System 7 is a multitasking OS.

There's multitasking, and there's multitasking. Preemptive systems like the
Amiga do a better job of sharing out the CPU between multiple CPU-intensive
activities. On the Mac, you have to rely on applications voluntarily giving
up the CPU often enough to avoid starving other applications of processing time.

But the Mac has a lot of nice interprocess communication facilities, to
let you get information between applications easily. The most basic example
is simple cut-and-paste; under System 7 you also have publish-and-subscribe
("hot links") and AppleEvents.

> * Someone else emailed me that even though devices such as DCTV exist
> for the Amiga, you can't run programs on them.  Is this true?  He said
> that for the Macintosh, you can run a program designed for, say, 8 bit
> color, on a 24 bit color card, and all the software will know what to
> do and work right.  He said that almost no programs can be run on the
> Amiga graphics cards, which sounds strange, because what good would
> they be then?  Is this true?  Can I, say, take my word processor or
> whatever and run it on DCTV or other such display devices?  (Ie, any
> old program)?

I, too, would like to know for sure. The Mac was built with a hardware-
independent graphics model from the ground up, whereas the Amiga seems
highly reliant on the peculiarities of a particular set of graphics chips.
*Can* you indeed plug a 24-bit display into an Amiga, and immediately run
all your existing applications on it in 24-bit mode, like you can on the Mac?

> * Somebody mentioned that "MPEG" will become very important soon to
> multimedia.  I know there is MPEG for the Mac, but dunno about the
> Amiga - is there MPEG available there, or will there be?

MPEG for the Mac--that's news to me! An important part of QuickTime is its
image-compression services. The standard set of compressors provided includes
JPEG (which is meant for single frames, as opposed to MPEG which includes
a pretty sophisticated scheme for optimizing out similarities between
frames as well). It's an open architecture, and you can plug in alternative
compression algorithms, or alternative implementations of existing algorithms
(e g a hardware card that does JPEG). But I haven't heard that anyone has
actually come out with an MPEG implementation yet.

>   * Can Quicktime movies be played on a standard 68030 color Macintosh
> in full screen mode at 24 fps??  I guess everything kinda hinges on
> this.  If I have to stick to 2 inch windows that makes nice demos, but
> doesn't do me much good :-).   If it does, I'll probably end up with a
> Mac just because of the above concerns.  If not, then I'll hafta go
> with the Amiga just to get full screen animations.  Info on this?

I'd like to know what sort of images you saw on the DCTV. Were they
computer-generated animations, or captured digital video?

Lawrence D'Oliveiro                       fone: +64-7-856-2889
Computer Services Dept                     fax: +64-7-838-4066
University of Waikato            electric mail: ldo@waikato.ac.nz
Hamilton, New Zealand    37^ 47' 26" S, 175^ 19' 7" E, GMT+12:00
To someone with a hammer and a screwdriver, every problem looks
like a nail with threads.

In article <1992Sep7.183146.10658@waikato.ac.nz> ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) writes:
> In article <1992Sep6.145949.7467@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu>, mdicker@nyx.cs.du.edu (Mike Dickerson) writes:
>
[ some stuff deleted ]
>
> >   * Several people told me the Macintosh dealer was wrong when he said
> > there was more multimedia programs for the Macintosh.
>
> I don't know about relative numbers, but I'd be a little surprised if any
> other platform had a bigger variety of multimedia-*compatible* software than
> the Mac. You can import QuickTime movies into both Microsoft Word 5.0 and
> WordPerfect 2.1. You can create them with Mathematica 2.1. You can create
> and import them with MacroMind Director 3.1 and Canvas 3.0.4. And then
> there are the applications for editing digital video, like Adobe Premiere
> and DiVA VideoShop. I even saw a demonstration of using Adobe PhotoShop to
> edit frames directly in a QuickTime movie! (It had to be uncompressed, though.)
> I think most of the 3D modelling and animation packages, even if they aren't
> directly QuickTime-savvy yet, can export their output as PICS files, which
> can be converted to QuickTime movies with several utilities.
>
> On the Mac, multimedia isn't a separate application; it's just part of the
> OS.

This is just as true or more so on the Amiga.  It would be hard to find an
application that won't let you import an animation or sound or whatever.
I do note, however, that you can't insert an animation into your average
word processor (probably because it wouldn't make much sense to print an
animation).  But most anything else, you can.

And as far as the format comptibility between applications, that is not
much of an issue on the Amiga. Nearly every program which deals with
images, sounds, etc., will work with the IFF file format.  Those that don't
normally get flamed out of existence very quickly.

> >   * Several people expressed doubts that the Mac System 7 can
> > multitask that well.  They claimed that the reason the Mac dealer
> > didn't do that demo (2 renders/download 9600/word processor) is
> > because he couldn't.  But I find this a little hard to believe because
> > everything I've ever heard says that Mac System 7 is a multitasking OS.
>
> There's multitasking, and there's multitasking. Preemptive systems like the
> Amiga do a better job of sharing out the CPU between multiple CPU-intensive
> activities. On the Mac, you have to rely on applications voluntarily giving
> up the CPU often enough to avoid starving other applications of processing time.
>
> But the Mac has a lot of nice interprocess communication facilities, to
> let you get information between applications easily. The most basic example
> is simple cut-and-paste; under System 7 you also have publish-and-subscribe
> ("hot links") and AppleEvents.

The Amiga also has cut and paste (via the system clipboard), "hot links", and
probably most important of all, ARexx.  ARexx is an interprocess communication
and control language.  With it, you can have programs communicating with and
controlling each other in ways that provide capabilities above what the normal
application does.

>
> > * Someone else emailed me that even though devices such as DCTV exist
> > for the Amiga, you can't run programs on them.  Is this true?  He said
> > that for the Macintosh, you can run a program designed for, say, 8 bit
> > color, on a 24 bit color card, and all the software will know what to
> > do and work right.  He said that almost no programs can be run on the
> > Amiga graphics cards, which sounds strange, because what good would
> > they be then?  Is this true?  Can I, say, take my word processor or
> > whatever and run it on DCTV or other such display devices?  (Ie, any
> > old program)?
>
> I, too, would like to know for sure. The Mac was built with a hardware-
> independent graphics model from the ground up, whereas the Amiga seems
> highly reliant on the peculiarities of a particular set of graphics chips.
> *Can* you indeed plug a 24-bit display into an Amiga, and immediately run
> all your existing applications on it in 24-bit mode, like you can on the Mac?

*As of the current release of the operating system*, that is correct.  However,
that is not as much a drawback as it may seem.  In most cases, the high-color
boards are supported by the applications you would want to run on them.
(For example, all decent image processors, ray tracers, etc., will output to
just about any graphics board you can plug in.)

> > * Somebody mentioned that "MPEG" will become very important soon to
> > multimedia.  I know there is MPEG for the Mac, but dunno about the
> > Amiga - is there MPEG available there, or will there be?
>
> MPEG for the Mac--that's news to me! An important part of QuickTime is its
> image-compression services. The standard set of compressors provided includes
> JPEG (which is meant for single frames, as opposed to MPEG which includes
> a pretty sophisticated scheme for optimizing out similarities between
> frames as well). It's an open architecture, and you can plug in alternative
> compression algorithms, or alternative implementations of existing algorithms
> (e g a hardware card that does JPEG). But I haven't heard that anyone has
> actually come out with an MPEG implementation yet.

There isn't yet, but it has been said that there will be.  JPEG is common,
but MPEG isn't there yet (does *any* platform have MPEG yet?)

> >   * Can Quicktime movies be played on a standard 68030 color Macintosh
> > in full screen mode at 24 fps??  I guess everything kinda hinges on
> > this.  If I have to stick to 2 inch windows that makes nice demos, but
> > doesn't do me much good :-).   If it does, I'll probably end up with a
> > Mac just because of the above concerns.  If not, then I'll hafta go
> > with the Amiga just to get full screen animations.  Info on this?
>
> I'd like to know what sort of images you saw on the DCTV. Were they
> computer-generated animations, or captured digital video?

While I can't say what the images were that were shown, I can say that given
a fast enough hard drive, you should be able to do full-screen DCTV animations
even if *every* pixel changes between frames.  (The DCTV was demoed at one
trade show by running several minutes of digitized video from the the movie
"Back to the Future".  In fact, it was pumping full-screen, full-motion
video out, along with stereo 16-bit sound.)

> Lawrence D'Oliveiro                       fone: +64-7-856-2889
> Computer Services Dept                     fax: +64-7-838-4066
> University of Waikato            electric mail: ldo@waikato.ac.nz
> Hamilton, New Zealand    37^ 47' 26" S, 175^ 19' 7" E, GMT+12:00
> To someone with a hammer and a screwdriver, every problem looks
> like a nail with threads.

--

=====================================================================
 Robert Kesterson             "First learn computer science and all
 robertk@taoami.lerctr.org    the theory.  Next develop a programming
                              style.  Then forget all that and
                              just hack."        -- George Carrette

In article <1992Sep7.183146.10658@waikato.ac.nz> ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) writes:
>
>I, too, would like to know for sure. The Mac was built with a hardware-
>independent graphics model from the ground up, whereas the Amiga seems
>highly reliant on the peculiarities of a particular set of graphics chips.
>*Can* you indeed plug a 24-bit display into an Amiga, and immediately run
>all your existing applications on it in 24-bit mode, like you can on the Mac?
>

Some, not all because AmigaDos doesn't support 24 bit directly. eg. DCTV
is supported by most rendering and graphics programs, however, not
application programs.

No. The reason Video Toaster is mentioned so frequently is because its
one of the best products (especially for its under $5000 complete system
cost) available today for ANY production studio.  However, the Toaster
is only one of many Video and Animation products.  

For Video, there's software, and software/hardware combinations.
    - Deluxe Video III
    - Deluxe Productions
    - The Director
    - etc.

One hardware key for VIDEO (processing/editing) is the genlock.. an
inexpensive little device for the Amiga that allows you to overlay live
video on computer graphics, or vice versa.  Then you have the various
brands of Time Base Correctors, Editing Suites, etc.

For animation (not necassarily video production) you have VERY GOOD
products at inexpensive prices such as Vista Pro 2.0, Imagine(one of the
best), Art Department Professional, Scenery Animator, Scenery Generator,
Genesis, Deluxe Paint IV, DigiPaint 3, and many MANY MANY other
products. Just pick up an Amiga magazine sometime... they even have some
Amiga magazines dedicated to only video or graphics.

In article <Bu39Mn.2Gx@news.cso.uiuc.edu>, tevonian@sumter.cso.uiuc.edu
(Pete Tevonian) writes:
> dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:
> 

> 
> I don't believe that you get NTSC output standard in the Amiga 2000 or
> 3000 any more. The 1000's had it, but I believe you now need a Toaster
> or DCTV like device to get NTSC. I may be wrong about this (I don't have
> one in front of me) but none of the 2000's or 3000's we used last year had 
> NTSC output directly from the machine.
> 

 The hardware that controls video in the Amiga outputs it in accordance
with NTSC timing, etc.  Now it is true that you need a device to convert
the standard Analog RGB signals over into NTSC, but commodore
sells this device roughly $20.(it comes bundled in some Amiga systems) 
But you do not need anything expensive to do this.

> The DCTV is 21bit, if I remember correctly and does do a good job of
> rendering NTSC output. The original poster was looking for animation
> straight from Hard Drive. I don't think the DCTVs can do that, at least not
> without some more help (either software or hardware). In my computer
> animation courses last year, we were limted by the 9M RAM in the 3000's we
> were using. 
> 

I don't know what software you were using, but most of the Animation
creators I have seen for the Amiga WILL in fact allow you to view the
animation in real time from Harddrive.

> 
> On the Video Toaster -- I think NewTek raised the price of the toaster
> to somewhere near $2500 last year, did they not? This may be a list 
> price, however, and it may be had for less. The Toaster is a wonderful
> piece of equpiment though. If you plan to expand your system later, it
> may be worth it to buy a 2000 (The Toaster won't fit in a 3000) now and
> use a DCTV until you get up funds for a Toa
  
Newtek raised the price of the Video Toaster 2.0 to $1895... it can be
had for around $1500.  A standalone system (Amiga with toaster) costs
around $4000.00....

> 
> --Pete Tevonian
>   tevonian@sumter.cso.uiuc.edu

John Dudley
Vertex Laboratories

Ok... to answer a few of your questions, true, the Mac may be able to
handle MOD files.. but just remember that they can only be created on
Amigas, and always have been.
 
The Toaster your dealer mentioned was much more expensive than I have
ever seen(maybe he was talking about some sort of standalone system w/Amiga)
 
The new Amigas are scheduled to come out this year.. Commodore does not
release information on new machines until they actually show the
machines(i.e. this weekend in Pasadena).
 
The Mac was never built to multitask.. only it's software was... The
Amiga's software and hardware from the beginning were created FOR multitasking.

The smaller Amiga base in your area may be true... In my area, for
example, there are about 4 or 5 Amiga dealers, yet only Sears carries
the Mac(to my current knowledge for my area).
 
As stated, the Amiga base is hovering between 3.5 and 4 million
installed systems IN USE.  Over 50% of professional desktop video
producers use Amiga's for their work.

The Amiga IS here to stay for quite some time.

The Amiga's video boards(third party) CAN be used with other software!!!
I don't know WHO told you something as outrageous as that. And when you
install a video board, you STILL have the Amiga's native video chips on
motherboard.... You don't lose those.

From what i've seen, the Amiga's animation is much faster and
less-jagged than the Mac and IBM.... The Mac just seems to be too jerky
and unstable.
 
Like I said, call Commodore at 1-800-66-AMIGA for info to be sent to
you, and call NewTek(forget their 800#) for info on their products.

The part of Video Toaster that does those great animations is a software
package called Lightwave 3d.
 
If you would like me to, I could whip up a small video tape of various
Amiga anim's I have seen and created so you can see what an unexpanded
machine (Amiga 500 -> $399) can do! (leave me E-mail for details)

 Does anyone else find it so strange that people say Mac/Multimedia
GREAT! Lot's of software!  YET, the only thing that I have ever seen
mentioned is QuickTime..??? (AmigaVision's direct competitor)

ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) writes:

>I'd like to know what sort of images you saw on the DCTV. Were they
>computer-generated animations, or captured digital video?

They were computer generated, but the entire frame was changing each
time, because it was a flying-observer type of deal where objects were
moving in the scene and also the observer was moving too which had the
effect of the entire background of the image changing.  Looked
way-fine.  The salesdroid indicated it had been rendered on an Amiga
3000 with some sort of animation program. 

   M/

dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:


>handle MOD files.. but just remember that they can only be created on
>Amigas, and always have been.

Well, this is getting of the topic of multimedia, but I don't believe
this is true.  I know there are mod creator programs for PCs, for example.

>The Toaster your dealer mentioned was much more expensive than I have
>ever seen(maybe he was talking about some sort of standalone system w/Amiga)

Well, according to an Amiga rag I picked up, the mail order price for a
toaster is $2100.  THe dealers price was a litle higher, but then,
he's a dealer, not a mail order house.

>From what i've seen, the Amiga's animation is much faster and
>less-jagged than the Mac and IBM.... The Mac just seems to be too jerky
>and unstable.

This I agree with you though.  I noticed that too, in comparing the
two systems in the same day.  It wasn't a true side-by-side A/B
comparison, but the difference in speed & smoothness was pretty
noticable.  Still though, one has to be wary of demos of this sort -
they can be made to show anything that you want to show. 

  /M

Here's another brief update on things I have learned since my last posting.

* The DCTV can *not* run all software on the Amiga.  However, it is
supported by most graphics software, just not things like word
processors where it is of questionable use to process words in 18 bit
anyway.   Still though, this point bothers me a little - that it isn't
that transparent that anything can be run on it.  I think the point
here goes to the Mac, with more transparent support for graphics.

* In the current state, a Mac/68030 can *not* do full screen quicktime
animations at any reasonable speed or smoothiness.  To get this, you
have to add hardware which is far, far outside of my price range.
This point goes to the Amiga.

* Although MPEG players exist for the Mac/PC, they aren't very good
yet.  MPEG needs hardware, they say, or at least much faster CPUs.
People who emailed me about this say that it is a neat idea but not
yet practical for useful work, and needs to be given more time to get
"mature".  Neither machine wins here.

* The Amiga has special CPUs for things like sound, disk I/O, etc,
which give it a higher throughput, which is wht it was able to do
animations from HD (didn't use the CPU) whereas my 386 system of about
the same speed can't, and the Mac has trouble too.  Point here goes to
the Amiga.

* QT is scheduled for an upgrade which improves speed of animation by
2 to 3X.  Alas, this isn't enough to get full screen at high frame
rates yet.

Well, I have almost made up my mind now, and mostly because of point #2
above.  If I had infinite amount of money to spend, or at least more
than I have now, I would go with the Mac.  But since my budget is
somewhat limited, I will end up with the Amiga system, as the Mac in
that price range cannot do full screen animation in video resolution,
which is a *must* for what I want to do.

Again thanks to everyone for the help in choosing this system.  I
learned a lot about them both in the last few days, and I found the
choice was harder than I thought, because they both had strenghts and
weaknesses which made it a "fuzzy" choice.  But since full screen
animation is what I want to do, I think Quicktime isn't quite there
yet.  Maybe if I was going to buy a system in 2 or 3 years I would
make a different choice based on the improvements to QT.  But right
now, it would be too expensive to get a QT system to meet my needs.
I plan to get an Amiga 3000 with 16 Mb RAM, 120 Mb HD, and DCTV for
hardware.  Maybe I'll expand the memory later, and add a removable
hard disk, but right now I can't afford those things yet.

   /M

In article <1992Sep8.175412.422@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>, dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:
>
>  Does anyone else find it so strange that people say Mac/Multimedia
> GREAT! Lot's of software!  YET, the only thing that I have ever seen
> mentioned is QuickTime..??? (AmigaVision's direct competitor)

Perhaps a recap of what QuickTime actually is is in order.

QuickTime is Apple's multimedia extension to the Macintosh OS. It provides
a range of services to applications:

      * Routines for manipulating a standard "Movie" in-memory data structure
  	and on-disk movie file format. This includes services for creating,
	editing and playing movies.
      * Image compression services. These include a standard set of compression
	algorithms (including JPEG), with the ability to plug in others.
	Compressors can do frame-differencing on image sequences, and this
	ability is used heavily in typical movies.
      * A Component Manager for handling add-ons to the basic QuickTime
	architecture. For example, image compressors are components; you can
	implement custom compression algorithms, or alternative implementations
	of existing algorithms (e g a driver for a third-party JPEG board).
	Video digitizers are also a standard component type, which allows any
	video digitizer board to work with any application capable of accepting
	video input. In addition you can create custom component types for your
	own purposes.

A movie consists of one or more tracks. A track has an associated medium
(or "media", as the documentation insists on calling it).

The medium has a type (current standard ones are video and sound), and there
must be a corresponding handler component present on your system to handle
media of that type. The medium contains a reference to the file which holds the
data samples, and each sample has a time attached to it, relative to the
medium's time scale.

A time scale is an integer number, representing the granularity with which
time can be measured in the medium or movie. For example, a time scale
of 1000 indicates that time is being measured in units of 1/1000 second.

A track basically maps the samples from the medium's time scale to the movie's
time scale. The track contains a sequence of edits, each mapping a contiguous
portion of media time to movie time. A track may contain empty segments, which
don't map to any valid portion of the medium (for a sound track, such segments
would appear as silence; for a video track, such segments would make no
contribution to the image displayed at that point). A part of the medium may
appear in the track more than once. Another part may not appear at all.

Tracks can be arranged into "alternate groups". For example, you might have
a number of audio voiceover tracks, each in a different language. You simply
choose the desired language in which you want to play the movie, and QuickTime
will automatically choose the right track from each alternate group. Alternate
groups can also represent the same data stored at different levels of
quality, e g 16-bit stereo sound versus 8-bit mono, 24-bit-per-pixel images
versus 1-bit-per-pixel. QuickTime will automatically select the most
appropriate track from each group, based on the hardware capabilities of your
machine.

Different movies can share common data. When you copy and paste movie segments,
you're only copying the track edit lists (and other settings), not the actual
media data. This makes editing very fast, and avoids using up disk (or RAM)
space with multiple copies of the sample data.

However, it can make it harder to distribute the final movie to someone else,
and it can also impact playback performance, if the system has to seek all
over your hard disk to fetch various segments of the movie. For this reason,
QuickTime provides "movie flattening" services that you can use once you've
finished an editing session. These copy all the data for a specified into a
new file in the right sequence, optionally interleaving it for playback
efficiency, and leaving behind all the unneeded data. The result is a
self-contained movie file that you can distribute to others.

That's a simplified description. There's quite a bit more to it than that
(like transformation matrices, the standard movie controller, and how nicely
QuickTime ties in with the existing QuickDraw graphics system), but it's
probably best if you read the QuickTime documentation for yourself. There
are already loads of applications that support QuickTime--not just multimedia-
specific ones like MacroMind Director, Adobe Premiere and DiVA VideoShop, but
even more "mainstream" ones like word processors, presentation packages and
drawing programs. There is even a neat system hack, called Wild Magic, that
lets you bring QuickTime movies into the huge base of existing applications
that only know how to display ordinary QuickDraw pictures.

Now, does that sound like AmigaVision to you?

Lawrence D'Oliveiro                       fone: +64-7-856-2889
Computer Services Dept                     fax: +64-7-838-4066
University of Waikato            electric mail: ldo@waikato.ac.nz
Hamilton, New Zealand    37^ 47' 26" S, 175^ 19' 7" E, GMT+12:00

In article <1992Sep8.175412.422@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:
>
> Does anyone else find it so strange that people say Mac/Multimedia
>GREAT! Lot's of software!  YET, the only thing that I have ever seen
>mentioned is QuickTime..??? (AmigaVision's direct competitor)

I think AmigaVision's direct competitor is HyperCard, SuperCard,
MacroMind Director...... 

In article <1992Sep9.041425.9379@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu>,
mdicker@nyx.cs.du.edu (Mike Dickerson) writes:
> ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) writes:
> 
> >I'd like to know what sort of images you saw on the DCTV. Were they
> >computer-generated animations, or captured digital video?
> 
> They were computer generated, but the entire frame was changing each
> time, because it was a flying-observer type of deal where objects were
> moving in the scene and also the observer was moving too which had the
> effect of the entire background of the image changing.  Looked
> way-fine.  The salesdroid indicated it had been rendered on an Amiga
> 3000 with some sort of animation program. 
> 
>    M/

  The fact that it was rendered on an Amiga 3000 doesn't mean too much.
The Amiga 2000 or 500 could do the same rendering, albeit slower.

If your decision is to buy an Amiga, I do warn you again that you may
want to consider (if there is no rush) purchasing it towards the end of
the month.  More information will be available this weekend, but as it
stands now, some new machines (Amiga's) are supposed to be release this
weekend... now wether or not it is a better system or more expensive, as
soon as they come out, prices on the current machines WILL drop. Also,
new versions of Amigavision (AmigaVision Professional 3.0) is suppose to
be announced, and if you wait until after this weekend's show, you'll be
eligible for it for free, even if it is not shipped yet with your machine.
 
I also urge you to get a few Amiga magazines before you go with your
purchase, and see what the machine is like.  See if you can go in to
your dealer for a few hours and "test drive" the system, JUST to make
sure that you are making the right decision...
 
You may also want to look at possibly getting an Amiga 2000.. maybe with
an accelerator... or possibly the 3000T (I haven't heard recent prices
of it in a while).
 
Congratulations on your future purchase of your Amiga, and if you need
ANY help what-so-ever, just leave me E-Mail, and I'll see what I can do.
 
Sincerely,
 
------------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------
    /// John Dudley
 \\///  Vertex Laboratories
  \X/   Only AMIGA Makes it Possible!

dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:


>If your decision is to buy an Amiga, I do warn you again that you may
>You may also want to look at possibly getting an Amiga 2000.. maybe with
>an accelerator... or possibly the 3000T (I haven't heard recent prices
>of it in a while).
> 

Latest I saw, (this past weekend in an Amiga World mag of unkown date),
the 3000T with 5M RAM, 120M HD and 28(?)mHz 68040 was going for $5,995

>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>-------------
>    /// John Dudley
> \\///  Vertex Laboratories
>  \X/   Only AMIGA Makes it Possible!

--Pete Tevonian

In article <BuE1qL.7AK@news.cso.uiuc.edu>, tevonian@sumter.cso.uiuc.edu
(Pete Tevonian) writes:
> dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:
> 
> 
> >If your decision is to buy an Amiga, I do warn you again that you may
> >You may also want to look at possibly getting an Amiga 2000.. maybe with
> >an accelerator... or possibly the 3000T (I haven't heard recent prices
> >of it in a while).
> > 
> 
> Latest I saw, (this past weekend in an Amiga World mag of unkown date),
> the 3000T with 5M RAM, 120M HD and 28(?)mHz 68040 was going for $5,995
> 
> 
> --Pete Tevonian


Those were Manufactured Suggested Retail Price.... The street price was
quoted to me by a dealer for around $4000.00.....
 
NEWSFLASH!!
 
  From now through October 31, 1992, purchasers of a Commodore Amiga
3000 will receive a *FREE* CDTV system
and networking hardware/software.  Ask your local dealer about this promotion.
 
  And if you don't know what CDTV is, go ahead and ask! (It's something
like Phillip's CD-I machine, but this can be converted into a full blown
computer if you buy a keyboard and external drive)
 
  This promotion will provide your 3000 with a CD ROM player!
 

dudley@cebaf4.cebaf.gov (John Dudley) writes:
> The Amiga on the other hand, has proprietary custom chips [...]
> The Agnus [chip] controls ALL Amiga animation.

This is a too popular misconception.  Compressed animation file playback
on the Amiga is done by the 680x0, of course, since only a cpu has the
capability of running data decompress/placement code.

The main reason why animations look good on the Amiga is because they
are double-buffered, which hides the limited cpu->display access bandwidth
and planar-layout update artifacts of the current chipset.  For similar
reasons, double-buffering is usually a desirable trait for any system.

> Lastly, I do warn you that on September 11th-13th there is a World
> of Commodore show in Pasadena California.  There, Commodore is expected

This is good advice (wait until this weekend, then check the Amiga groups).

Also, robertk@taoami.lerctr.org (Robert Kesterson) writes:
> [...] I can say that given a fast enough hard drive, you should be able
> to do full-screen DCTV animations even if *every* pixel changes between
> frames.  (The DCTV was demoed at one trade show by running several minutes
> of digitized video from the the movie "Back to the Future".  

Such demos are meaningless, especially since the normal AmigaDOS file system
was bypassed for that one.  I wish I had a dime for every person who was
told about that demo but who later found that realtime true fullscreen/motion
(especially in the highest DCTV color res) is impossible with stock setups.

Nevertheless, an Amiga/DCTV combo is inexpensive and there are ways around
any limitations.  What a lot of people do is use a single-frame-record VCR
and output their large-delta DCTV frames one at a time... this method is
often used/required on other systems as well.  An alternative I've heard of
is to use a good genlock and overlay smaller-delta frames in multiple passes.

kevin <kdarling@catt.ncsu.edu> <76703.4227@compuserve.com>

ATTENTION: To the future purchaser of the Amiga 2000 or 3000...... DON'T
GET IT!
 
I strongly urge you to consider the new Amiga 4000.... it has much
better graphics WITHOUT additional hardware.
 
The newly released Amiga 4000 (a mailorder house I know of is selling it
for $2800) comes with the new AGA (Advanced Graphics Architecture)
chipset.... (Yep! A bunch of new names for chips like Dorothy, Lisa,
Alice, etc.).... But this new chipset(which might not be compatible with
earlier Amigas) includes higher resolution modes, and a palette of 16.8
million colors.  Some screen modes allow you to get a full 256,000
colors (from the selectable 16.8 million) on screen at one time.
 
This new machine may make it so that you would not need to purchase the
A3000 with DCTV, etc... Plus, this system comes standard with the
Motorolla 68040 microprocessor.

Check out the amiga newsgroups (comp.sys.amiga.advocacy, and
comp.sys.amiga.misc) for more information on this new machine.

If you do decide to go with the 3000, make sure your dealer is giving
you the free CDTV Multimedia Machine WITH your 3000... if not, call
Commodore and find out why not.
 
Once again... a new machine was released this weekend.. Check it out!