Amiga Collections: MegaDisc/MegaDisc 37 (1993-12)(MegaDisc Digital Publishing)(AU)(Disk 1 of 2)[WB].zip/MegaDisc 37 (1993-12)(MegaDisc Digital Publishing)(AU)(Disk 1 of 2)[WB].adf/Reviews/Vidi_12/Vidi_12

Text File | 1993-12-07 | 16KB | 318 lines

                               Vidi Amiga 12

                             by Rodney Norton


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   After many months of pondering whether or not, I finally decided that I
   wanted a digitizer.  Great, I figured now all I have to do is save a
   small fortune for one.  Well I was wrong.  As much as I am all for
   locally produced products, I can't see myself paying $500 for a colour
   digitizer, so I bought one overseas, from England.  The Vidi-Amiga 12
   colour digitizer at $200 ($27 of which was postage *:) was the best I
   could see on face value.  Hey no need for a colour splitter, it's built
   in, what more could I ask for ?

   It took three weeks for the Vidi to arrive and it happened to come on a
   Friday night at 6pm.  Unfortunately I had to go out that evening and
   wasn't going to be home until 11pm.  I know, how many people go out for
   five hours ? Me, I participate in a Youth Group !


   Wazindabox


   Well I arrived home at around 11pm and headed straight for the Amiga.
   This is going to be fun I thought as I unwrapped the packaging.  Then
   I looked in the box and thought :  Your kidding, this is it ?  One funny
   plastic box with a wire and plug trailing from it, a single RCA to RCA
   cord and four double sided pages of photocopied instructions.


   Setting Up


   Oh well, looks can be deceiving I figured, and so I set out to plug the
   thing in.  Easy !  Seriously, remove the printer plug (if you have one
   connected) and replace that with the Vidi and the trailing plug is then
   either plugged into the through port of your external drive or the
   external drive socket in the back of your Amiga (This supplies extra
   power for the digitizer).  All you have to do then is connect the RCA
   plug, one end at the video out port on a VCR or video camera and the
   other in the back of the Vidi.  It's so easy even a tecnophobic could do
   it with out twitching and passing out.  If, like me almost every plug in
   the back of your Amiga is filled then it's going to get a bit messy.  If
   you have anything in the serial port then remove it, the Vidi is wide
   enough to block that part of the Amiga, but it's no great hassle.  If
   your a multitasking freak (who likes to digitize whilst uploading files
   and  then I suggest you make an extension cord no longer that 15cm to use
   between Vidi and the parallel port).


   Da Softwarez


   Now for the software.  I booted the supplied disk (since then backed up!)
   and was presented with a nice screen with lots of little buttons for me to
   play around with.  But I just wanted to get into the digitizing, it was
   getting late and I was getting tired (Thirteen hyper-active kids at Youth
   group do that to you).  So I pressed the 'Grab' button and the screen
   changed to one showing a Grey scaled image of the current picture being
   supplied from Video or Camera, VCR in my case.  I use a Panasonic
   NV-SD20A four head VCR with jog/shuttle ring.  I consider it to be the
   best video I've come across for pausing and general use and I suggest
   that you use a 4 head VCR as anything less just won't produce still
   enough pauses and colour grabs will be all over the place.

   This image is updated only a few times a second so it's always handy to
   have  a television so you can view the program properly so you don't
   miss the pix you want to digitize.  From the grab screen you can : Grab
   an image in grey, or colour, flip the picture on it's X / Y axis, choose
   interlace on or off, adjust the brigtness, contrast, colour saturation,
   vertical position of the incoming signal, and mix the RGB images into
   it's colour counterpart.  The mixing can be done automatically, if you
   select the grab/mix/view option and it really saves time, but some people
   just like to be annoying and do it themselves so that option was included.
   It does come in handy at times though when you want to check if the RGB
   images are aligned and mix it as a 16 Col. rather than HAM and finding
   out the picture is all wonky and you've wasted your time.


   Gunky Pix & Wasted Money ?


   It was well after midnight (about 3 am) and I had perused the whole
   program and become partially accustomed to it.  But I still had one
   major problem.  All the colour grabs I took looked awful, not just bad,
   but down right disgusting.  I'll admit I'm colour blind but other people
   in the room agreed with me (I don't see in Black and White, I just have
   trouble distinguishing some colours from others etc).  The Grey scale
   pix were fine.  I'd mucked around with all the settings to no avail and
   was rapidly becoming annoyed, thinking I'd wasted $200 on a digitizer
   that could only produce grey images.  So I did the sensible thing - went
   to bed.


   New Day, New Beginning, New problem


   After waking up past 11 am Saturday morning (I like 8 hrs sleep :) and
   doing the usual things one does when one wakes up I booted the software
   and jumped to the grab screen again, only this time to be confronted with
   a requester saying "Video Signal Not Detected" and the choice of 'Cancel"
   or 'Continue'.  Huh, I thought and searched for the flimsy manual.  It
   suggested plugging the RCA end thats usually at the video out into the
   mono RGB out at the back of the Amiga and see if it works then.  I tried
   it and all went well, so I figured I had a faulty VCR (It was 2 days
   old!).  So I switched everything off, unplugged evrything and started
   again, it worked this time (with the RCA plug in the back of the video).
   I was stumped as to what went wrong.  I later realised that I'd forgotten
   to turn the VCR on!  Well I started digitizing again and managed to
   produce some semi-decent colour pictures.  The only thing I can suggest
   is practice, practice and more practice, it does become easier as time
   progresses.


   1 Meg Ram, Phew Just.


   The grabbing can also be set to grab continuously, and this will produce
   a small animation if you have enough memory available.  But only in grey.
   If you want a colour anim then it has to be done manually, but that eats
   up so much memory life ceases to be funny.  On the point of memory, an
   A500 with 1 meg and an external drive will allow no more than two 320*256
   HAM images to be in memory simultaneously, but I have managed to get
   eleven 320*256 16 shade grey images.  2 meg of chip and 1 or 2 meg of
   fast would be the cheapest setup that would produce hassle free
   digitizing at its optimum, but 1 meg will work.  I've managed just fine
   with 1 meg but I'm used to running out of memory and don't get too
   annoyed by it.


   Animate me (The Carousel Button)


   The programs anim facilities are simplistic (to be polite about it) but
   do what it's meant to do - produce animations.  Well actually it does
   little to produce animations, but allows you to play the current
   pictures in memory as an animation, but only those with the same
   resolution and colours as the currently selected image.  When saving or
   loading files (See File Requester) you can choose to save/load as an
   anim file (the standard DPaint 4 Opcode 5 anim format) and thats it
   really.  Unless you delete pictures from the Carousel that you don't want
   they will be included in the anim.


   Your Deleted (The Carousel Button)


   The carousel is also the only place that grabbed images can be deleted
   and is VERY annoying.  For example after grabbing 6 grey images you wish
   to select the best 2 and delete the rest.  You must go from the grab
   screen to the main screen, wait for the main window to redraw a 1/4
   screen version of the last pic you grabbed, then choose 'Carousel' and
   wait for it to draw little 2.5cm * 2.5cm versions of ALL the pictures
   you grabbed and if you've done a lot of them it can take a long time.
   You can then play the pictures in the usual ways (forwards / backwards)
   but only those with the same resolution / colours as the current selected
   image.  Now  to delete the pictures you don't want you must select the
   picture (by clicking on it's miniture version) then wait for the main
   window to redraw the selected image then press the trash can icon.  The
   main window must then redraw a 1/4 screen image of the next picture on
   the right and it all takes an annoyingly long time.  This has to be done
   with each image you want to delete and soon becomes tedious.  It's much
   easier if you want to delete the lot, just select the trash can and
   choose to delete all the pictures when the requester pops up, instead of
   just the current selected one.


   Image Processing For Zilch


   Next we have the Edit menu.  This allows a variety of image processing
   functions to be applied to the current selected picture (determined in
   the carousel section of the program).  The tools are the standard ones
   generally found in most image processing programs : Soft Focus, blur,
   Sharpen, Psychedelic, Smooth, Silk, Negative, Quantize, Threshold,
   Emboss, Edge Detect and finally the Undo button.  Nothing impressive,
   but considering it's a freebie who's complaining.  Me actually, but
   only on one point.  Speed.  I suggest if you decide to muck around with
   these features on a HAM image then find something constructive to do
   away from the computer.  It takes upto 10 minutes to perform some of the
   functions on a standard 1 meg A500.  I don't own an accelerator card so
   I don't know how well it would work with one, but for those people with
   them I hope so for your sake it works well (If you have an accelerator
   card lying around and you don't want it my address is at the bottom of
   the file).  The actual quality of the processed images is quite good and
   out perform some dedicated image processing programs.  Another problem
   with the software is when leaving the Edit screen the main window then
   redraws itself.  It's not a problem if you've changed the image through
   processing it, but otherwise it can become a pain redrawing the exact
   same picture.  If you wish to just quickly view the picture in the main
   window then simply click on it and a full screen version pops up.


   File Requester


   The file requester is a rather well designed part of the program, but
   it still has it's bad points.  When loading/saving you have the choice
   of loading/saving either single frames (IFF ILBM's - which the manual
   describes them as InterLaced BitMaps, odd I thought they were
   InterLeaved BitMaps, Oh well) or  anims (IFF OpCode 5 ANIM).  Again the
   2.5cm square pictures are used (these must also be drawn and take 5
   seconds each, thankfully only 2 are drawn at a time and a slider bar
   used to determine which images are selected) and allow the person to see
   just what they are saving, it's not perfect, but it works reasonably
   well.  After choosing the file you want to save and the format (ILBM
   or ANIM) the annoying ARP file requester pops up and grinds the internal
   drive.  After saving the current file the window with the little pix pops
   up again and you can then coose another picture.  The actual saving of
   the files is a little slow compared to some programs, but it's nothing
   to get worried about, neither are the file sizes the program produces
   which are reasonably small at times.  Loading them into DPaint and
   resaving them will help produce smaller file sizes.


   Who Do You Prefer ?


   The final 2 buttons on the main screen are the preferences buttons.
   These allow you to choose the screen size, colours, optimal pallette,
   error diffusion, the size of the grab screen, and a few other things.
   This can then be saved and used as the default settings.


   Demo V2


   Since purchasing the Vidi I have acquired a Demo version of the new V2
   software.  This new software addresses some of the problems with the
   current version I have, and messes up others.  This new version has more
   options concerning screen displays (great for those A1200, A500+, A3000,
   A4000 owners) whilst still remaining compatable with the older Amigas.
   The memory problem seems to have become slightly worse, as the program
   is now more memory hungry and the standard 1 Meg is just getting to close
   for comfort.  Only 1 HAM image is able to be held in memory at once, and
   this becomes very annoying.

   On the up side the user can jump to any part of the program from almost
   any other part of the program, can load, save and delete from any part
   of the program.  File formats now include 12 and 24 bit raw iff files
   as well as standard ILBM and ANIM.  The animation now has it's own screen
   and looks much better, with control improving 200 %.  The whole screen
   shows the current pictures in memory with the usual mini icons and you
   can select as few or many as you like with out affecting any other part
   of the program.  The usual forwards and backwards play is there, along
   with ping pong and the frame rate can be adjusted among other things.
   Deleting pictures is a matter of highlighting the picture/s (the small
   2.5cm square ones as before) and selecting delete and your asked to
   confirm, thats it.


   A. G. Eh ?


   Full support for the new A4000/A1200 has been included with support for
   all the new screen modes and colours, and hopefully this would mean
   support for accelerators.  The image processing abilities haven't changed
   that much, the screen looks better but the only new features are the Cut,
   Paste and All options.  The latter will apply the chosen process to
   all current images in memory and it still takes for ever to process one
   image.



   Load the Save ?


   The loading/saving requester has been changed and it is a little easier
   to use and takes less time to save several files.  Saving and loading
   can be done from almost anywhere in the program but by far the best
   place is the anim screen.  Just highlight a single image and choose the
   save format (ILBM, 12 bit, 24 bit) and save it or highlight several pix
   and save it as an anim.  No more mucking around with separate windows
   and sliders to choose the picture.  BUT they still use the ARP.library
   file requester and the drive still grinds like crazy.  File sizes are
   about the same as the previous version.


   One of the best features is the ability to turn off the main window
   update.  This saves valuable time and for people who have used the old
   software this alone is almost worth upgrading to the new software.

   On the final note the Vidi Amiga 12 is the best low cost digitizer
   available for the Amiga that I know of.  It's features for price are
   unrivaled, and even if the program has it's quirks, they can be put up
   with !  If you've ever wanted a digitizer then go out and spoil yourself,
   you wont regret it.


   Plug, Plug, Plug    *:-)


   If anyone has an A1200 and would like some 256 Colour pictures for a
   workbench backdrop then write to me and supply a disk and I'd be happy
   to supply them for you.  Please state the program you want them from or
   the actual person you want digitized.  I cannot guarantee perfection
   because I do not have an A1200 but I'll do my best.  Please send a few
   Dollars for my time (No more than $5 for each disk FULL of pix).  I can
   only grab stuff of television or video so please don't request something
   ridiculous unless you are willing to send me a tape and $3 to cover
   return postage.  I can do all other screen formats aswell so if you don't
   own an AGA machine I can still do pix for you for what ever reason !

   Send any requests to:  The Society Of Elrond
                          Rodney Norton
                          PO Box 456X
                          Leumeah
                          2560


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