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Live!

15 messages in this thread
#72196From: Vince MacdonaldJun 15, 1987 10:49 AM
John, The "reviews" I read were both written by Matthew Leeds – the second one started with "This is the story of an American Dream – " (his capitals) and went on in the same vein for five pages. Real technical stuff! What with you answering Larry and him answering you, etc., I now know a lot more about Live! than I did before. My thanks to both of you. Vince
#72705From: John FoustJun 18, 1987 2:01 PM
Wow, I didn't know my friend Leeds resorted to such hyperbole. Maybe he wanted to be sure AmigaWorld bought the article. 🙂 If and when you get the chance, it is most important to look at both digitizers, and choose for youself based on the factors that mean the most in your application.
#73364From: Vince MacdonaldJun 22, 1987 9:50 AM
Your suggestion to "try before you buy" is good advice – unfortunately, it's not easy to follow here in Montreal. Like a lot of people, I had to decide between buying DigiView and waiting for Live! by reading everything I could find – including Matthew Leeds' eulogies of Live!. Also read your review of DigiView in "Amazing Computing" – you obviously didn't go to the same school of journalism <that's a compliment, incidentally>. Bought DigiView back in January and have even figured out how to use it as a "frame grabber". Check out Bryce.GIF and Rocky.GIF in DL6 – the keyword is KODACOLOR.
#73430From: John FoustJun 22, 1987 9:45 PM
I didn't write the review of Digi-View in Amazing Computing. It was written by Ed Jakober, a public television technician in the tiny town of Menominee, Wisconsin. I don't think he had a chance to "try before buy" either. What did you mean by "using Digi-View as a framegrabber"?
#73559From: Vince MacdonaldJun 23, 1987 8:24 PM
Ooops – guess I was thinking of an item in one of your columns! Something made me think of you as the "resident expert" on Digi-View and I assumed that you'd written the review. Sorry about that … One of my reasons for buying an Amiga was the promise that I'd be able to digitize images from the TV screen (remember the announcement that Live! would be released in October '85?). When I bought Digi-View, I tried all sorts of ways of "grabbing" a frame from TV, and found that a 35mm. camera loaded with Kodacolor works just fine. Digitizing from the negatives gives better results than either prints or slides – I put a couple of examples in DL6. It isn't really "framegrabbing" – but my message did say that "the keyword is Kodacolor" <grin>!
#73568From: John DraperJun 23, 1987 9:17 PM
Do you use special filters for digitizing from negatives? I have played around with it, "inverting" all the palette colour values in 32 colour mode, but never tried it with HAM mode stuff. It would seem to me that just using filters normally used in printing from negatives might do th trick.
#73568From: John DraperJun 23, 1987 9:17 PM
Do you use special filters for digitizing from negatives? I have played around with it, "inverting" all the palette colour values in 32 colour mode, but never tried it with HAM mode stuff. It would seem to me that just using filters normally used in printing from negatives might do th trick.
#73716From: John FoustJun 25, 1987 1:33 AM
New Tek will someday market a device to stabilize images from a still-framing VCR. They used it to create the stunning 'Maxine Headroom' demo they showed at COMDEX and the West Coast roll-out of the new Amiga machines. This was a number of frames of HAM animation, captured from videotape. The photo technique you mention does work well, but it isn't exactly real-time.
#73829From: Vince MacdonaldJun 26, 1987 9:17 AM
Putting a series of images on videotape and then using a still-framing VCR to digitize them "isn't exactly real-time" either, is it? To digitize in "real-time", we need a video camera aimed at a live subject and connected to the computer in such a way that the image is digitized as the action takes place – and we haven't seen much of that since the late Andy Warhol did it to Debra Harry at the New York premiere. If Live! really starts shipping next month (they've announced release dates before), those of us who haven't had access to prototype units will be able to do this. In the meantime, if we want to digitize a moving subject, the easiest way is to photograph it first – video purists may not like it, but Kodacolor does a nice job.
#73829From: Vince MacdonaldJun 26, 1987 9:17 AM
Putting a series of images on videotape and then using a still-framing VCR to digitize them "isn't exactly real-time" either, is it? To digitize in "real-time", we need a video camera aimed at a live subject and connected to the computer in such a way that the image is digitized as the action takes place – and we haven't seen much of that since the late Andy Warhol did it to Debra Harry at the New York premiere. If Live! really starts shipping next month (they've announced release dates before), those of us who haven't had access to prototype units will be able to do this. In the meantime, if we want to digitize a moving subject, the easiest way is to photograph it first – video purists may not like it, but Kodacolor does a nice job.
#73716From: John FoustJun 25, 1987 1:33 AM
New Tek will someday market a device to stabilize images from a still-framing VCR. They used it to create the stunning 'Maxine Headroom' demo they showed at COMDEX and the West Coast roll-out of the new Amiga machines. This was a number of frames of HAM animation, captured from videotape. The photo technique you mention does work well, but it isn't exactly real-time.
#73559From: Vince MacdonaldJun 23, 1987 8:24 PM
Ooops – guess I was thinking of an item in one of your columns! Something made me think of you as the "resident expert" on Digi-View and I assumed that you'd written the review. Sorry about that … One of my reasons for buying an Amiga was the promise that I'd be able to digitize images from the TV screen (remember the announcement that Live! would be released in October '85?). When I bought Digi-View, I tried all sorts of ways of "grabbing" a frame from TV, and found that a 35mm. camera loaded with Kodacolor works just fine. Digitizing from the negatives gives better results than either prints or slides – I put a couple of examples in DL6. It isn't really "framegrabbing" – but my message did say that "the keyword is Kodacolor" <grin>!
#73430From: John FoustJun 22, 1987 9:45 PM
I didn't write the review of Digi-View in Amazing Computing. It was written by Ed Jakober, a public television technician in the tiny town of Menominee, Wisconsin. I don't think he had a chance to "try before buy" either. What did you mean by "using Digi-View as a framegrabber"?
#73364From: Vince MacdonaldJun 22, 1987 9:50 AM
Your suggestion to "try before you buy" is good advice – unfortunately, it's not easy to follow here in Montreal. Like a lot of people, I had to decide between buying DigiView and waiting for Live! by reading everything I could find – including Matthew Leeds' eulogies of Live!. Also read your review of DigiView in "Amazing Computing" – you obviously didn't go to the same school of journalism <that's a compliment, incidentally>. Bought DigiView back in January and have even figured out how to use it as a "frame grabber". Check out Bryce.GIF and Rocky.GIF in DL6 – the keyword is KODACOLOR.
#72705From: John FoustJun 18, 1987 2:01 PM
Wow, I didn't know my friend Leeds resorted to such hyperbole. Maybe he wanted to be sure AmigaWorld bought the article. 🙂 If and when you get the chance, it is most important to look at both digitizers, and choose for youself based on the factors that mean the most in your application.