CompuServe Thread

G-E-E-Z-E, J.D.. – I can't believe you've had this post up since the 20th with no replies(!!!) I'm sure there's got to be some video pros out there willing to help. I'd attempt a reply, but it sounds like ya want a professional setup with a budget like that ($10,000 – 15,000.00). But, lacking a better response, we'll just see if we might be able to generate some activity here… O.K…. if this were me, I'd be looking hard at the 3000, simply for the speed for Ray-Tracing high res anims…. Memory? – as much as you can afford. Wipes/fades you can do with either hardware or software (somebody needs to tell ya about the toaster, maybe…) Personally, I've heard some people prefer Imagine over Sculpt for different reasons. If you're doing professional work, sound synch should be added after the video. Deluxe Paint is a paint package that doesn't handle HAM mode. I prefer not to give ya prices here, you may want to pick up an Amiga World magazine and browse a few ads there. Finally, at the risk of repeating myself, if you're wanting 24 bit images, then it sounds to me like you're iching for New Tek's Video Toaster. – There's a lot of video equipment available, but I'd prefer somebody with the background in that area fill you in on that. – Dave

J.D.: As far as software goes, read me reply (message # 6449 in section 6) regarding Animagic. The difference between DPaintIII and DVideoIII: – Deluxe Paint III is a MUST HAVE – Deluxe Video III is a COMPLETE WASTE OF MONEY Cheers, Roger

JD, if you want to do professional stuff, stick with an A3000 or an accelerated A2000-series machine. Anything less would have you climbing up the walls, especially when doing #-D animation. Buy as much RAM as you can afford — anything less than 5 Meg and you'll hit a wall within months. A large, fast hard disk is a must. One quick comment about the 3000: its deinterlaced output will do you no good if you're doing video — what looks great without interlace flicker may turn out to be a disaster when you turn interlace back on. So stick with the normal RGB output. (the large connector, not the VGA-type one) I suggest you pick up the latest issue of Byte for a detailed look at the Video Toaster, a $1600 board that packs a lot of studio functions in one unit. It will serve as switcher, character generator (with antialiased fonts), DVE unit (although the compressed image doesn't look as good as those $xx,xxx units), luminance keyer, genlock and dual 24-bit frame store. Software bundled with the Toaster includes a 24-Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. If you don't want to buy a single-frame controller, the HAM-E from Black Belt Systems (GO AMIGAVEN) will display images in quasi-24-bit quality, and will animate at full Amiga speed. On a fast machine, it means 15-30 frames a second — not as smooth as a single-frame controller, but more interactive and less expensive. I have no idea how well a Toaster and HAM-E can live together. The de facto animation/paint program is Deluxe Paint III; the only mode it doesn't support is HAM, i.e. it will let you use up to 64 colors at once, but to get all 4096 you must buy a HAM paint program. And of course, HAM-E comes with its own paint program, as does the Toaster. Blaq!