CompuServe Messages

When the Video Toaster is closer to release (about 1 week prior), we will be posting specifications and recommended product list in AmigaVendor (area #3). But to answer your question, the Toaster is very useful with a one camera or camcorder (input in camera mode) for doing special effects, 24bit frame grabbing, character generation and switcher effects between the still store and live camera. If you were interested in running multiple cameras, each additional camera (upto 3) need to have genlock backs. For the additional cameras, we recommend the Panasonic D5000 or D5100. These cameras come with genlock backs and sell for under $1000 each. We did the entire Penn & Teller production with 3 of these cameras and 1 Video Toaster. These cameras will sync to your home camera or camcorder for an upto 4 camera broadcast type shoot. In terms of VCRs, there have been some fairly interesting releases in the last 6 months. On the low end, Panasonic has just released the 4990 SVHS deck with TBC. This deck sells for about $1300 and has some editing capabilities. For the professional videographer (but still on a limited budget) we recommend the Hitachi VLS100 deck. This deck sells for about $2800 and has a TBC which you can sync up to other TBC VCRs or genlock cameras, (unlike the Panasonic 4990) and has the very high end feature of SMPTE time code. With a couple of these decks, and a compatible Amiga A/B roll editing hardware and software you have about the equivalent of a low end TV station for 1/10th the cost. But the Video Toaster is useful for many other applications that do not require cameras at all. For example, the Toaster has two 24bit broadcast quality composite frame buffers compatible with all 24bit IFF products and popular 3D products like Turbo Silver and Sculpt4D. Seeing the output of these products in 16 million colors in full NTSC resolution (over 400 horizontal lines) is cool. You can also use the character generator to create screens with smooth gradations, 35ns fonts, and smooth rolls and crawls. When you combine these features along with the Video Toaster's effect engine, you have a 16 million color slide show that will put any MACII (selling for alot more) to shame. If you add a camera at this point, you are dealing with true color frames in your slide show as well and if you feel like it, the Video Toaster will load in any standard Amiga IFF graphics mode file (like Digi-Paint 3 or Deluxe Paint III). If you have any other questions, please ask.