Conference hydra::amiga_v1

I don't own any render/animation sw and even though I _believe_ my experiences
might qualify me for a response, I'll refrain from doing so.
It seems to be the concensus on UseNet that Sculpt has a nicer editor/user 
interface, whilst Silver has some other advantages, regarding speed.
There are some products on the brink of release or already released that look
very good, like Leo Schwabs onion. Another demo I've seen obviously used
solid modeling, and this quite nicely and speedy.
    
>    Plus how much better would tha A3000 be over a A2000 for producing
>    animations.

Depending on what processor card you plug into the A2000, the A2000 might even
be faster than an 25MHz A3000. However the 32bit architecture, video enhancer,
new custom chips, expandibility (RAM and CPU wise) at the A3000 price make the
choice obvious pro A3000.
And don't even _think_ about rendering without at least an 68020/68881 machine
with min. 2MB 32 bit RAM.

Regards,

<CB>

    
    
    	I own both Sculpt-Animate 4D and Silver as well as C-light,
    Animator Apprentice, Forms in flight, and other PD programs.
    
    	I like the user interface and object building in Sculpt 4D.
    Turbo Silver gives you more control over how an object is rendered
    ( textures, refraction, reflections ... ). I think DW render has
    the best looking output. And last but not least I like the modeling
    concepts in Animator Apprentice.
    
    	I am using Animator Apprentice to design and choreograph the
    animation. I then use a custom program I wrote to translate that
    into Sculpt 4D scripts. I build my object and render using Sculpt-4D.
    I like the 24 bit per pixel output from Sculpt. If I was rendering
    for Amiga HAM mode I would translate the Sculpt animation to Turbo
    Silver to be renderd.
    
    	I suggest you look at all the software available and the conversion
    programs to find a system you like. Some of the PD software is great
    for a start.
    
    	I do believe that every bit of CPU you can get helps. You also
    need 3-4 Meg of memory. Any add-on memory should be 32 bit ( half 
    the speed of a 68020 or 68030 comes from the memory ).
    
    	There are many genlocks on the market now. You ony need one if
    you want to overlay your graphics on top of other video ( VCR,
    Camcorder ). Then the real money starts when you get into $$$ video
    equipment.
    
    			Steve Peters
    

    In talking with several people on this topic I get the impression
    that Turbo-Silver gives a better image,but at the cost of a steep
    learning curve. I have just started to play with turbo-silver SV
    last night. I've had it awhile but have been too busy to use it.
    I have purchased the tape "World of Silver" from Impulse,and 
    consider it a must if you go the Turbo-Silver route. This is 
    assuming of course you go the Amiga Route. Impulse has just released
    'Imagine'.Imagine it said to have a nicer interface,and even more
    advanced rendering ability. I am going to take advantage of the
    upgrade asap. 
    	Now when considering the Hardware you have to look at several
    points. I have just went through the internal process of aquireing
    a decstation 386,8meg of memory,80 meg hard drive,VGA graphics,and
    a color monitor. The cost was considerable,and I would not trade
    my 2000 for it today. If you want to go to video it cost more because
    the signals are not interlaced. I use a SuperGen 2000s for genlocking.
    	If you plan on using the finished product for anything but home
    use I would say the cheapest Genlock would be the SuperGen. Unlike
    the 2000s it is external,and cost around $795.00 . 
    The Mac has the software you mentioned,but there is more to video than 
    rendering an image. The Amiga has many programs that will allow
    the user to due titling etc,and controll the genlock with the titling
    software. Then the ever present Multitasking becomes an issue. I
    will not even consider a system that will not multitask.
    	On the matter of 3000 vs 2500 I plan to keep my 2000,and upgrade
    to a 030 board. I still like the idea of having the 6800 available
    to drop back on if needed. The big advantage of the 3000 is the
    flicker free display. I don't know if this affect the ability to
    genlock or not. You can output a non interlaced signal to video
    fine,but the catche is you cannot make a copy of the tape. As for
    performance I don't think the 3000 will have anything over 3'rd
    party hardware. It lookas good but so did the 1000. IMHO I think
    the 3000 missed the mark. As for the OS Very few products seem to
    run under 2.0 without problems. For video work spend the extra money
    and get the 2500/030. You will have the 32bit memory,and the 32
    bit proccessor,with more expanability.Many use the bridgeboard to
    display the amiga generated graphics with a Targa on the IB* side.
    							bill

    re: .3
    I would like to understand your comment "You can output a non
    interlaced signal to video fine, but the catch is you cannot make a
    copy of the tape"    What is it that would make it difficult to copy
    the video tape?
    
    Thanks,
    
    DV780::DAVISG
    

    Thanks for all the advice, I'm off to see my local Amiga dealer here
    in Geneva this afternoon. I will come back and give you some idea of
    the costs of systems here as compared to the US. One thing for sure
    is that they will be more!
    
    Regards
    Dom

    RE .4
    	It seems that you can put out an noninterlaced signal to video
    tape fine,and play it back. For a reason unknown to me if you do
    so the quality of the tape for viewing is ok,but any future generations
    suffer greatly. This was also mentioned in the documentation for
    the Supergen 2000s. You do not have to be in hi res mode,but you
    must run setlace,or a similar program before giong to tape. All
    the video specific programs I own including Deluxevideo three offer
    you a way to force interlace,and advise"Make sure you force interlace
    mode before recording in NTSC"
    							bill

    	Once you go to a chroma-subcarrier signal you need interlace.
    There is not enough bandwidth to put both luminance and chromanance
    in a TV channel, so, they allow the spectra of the signals overlap.
    The chrominance is phase modulated on a sub-carrier (the color burst
    is the reference). Once the chromanance has been extracted it must be
    cancelled out so it does not show up in the luminance. NTSC and PAL do 
    this differently. But in both modes, interlace is an integral of the
    chroma sub-carrier cancellation. It is surprinsing that first
    genertation tapes look OK.

    Managed to get to EduSoft the Amiga dealer here in Geneva, and here are
    some of the prices quoted me (pre hagling over deals) with a swiss
    franc rate of 1.423 to the dollar.
    
    A3000/16/40   Sfr 5950
    
    A3000/25/40   Sfr 6950
    
    A300/25/100   Sfr 7950
    
    + 1225 Sfr for Multsync Screen
    
    The A2500/30 is not an option here in Europe I was told, but a
    2500 + 6820 + coprocessor 68881 +2MB/+40MB would be total Sfr 6475
    
    How does this compare with US prices I wonder.
    
    Regards,
    Dom
    
    P.s. The A3000 was not yet available, and they could not give a firm
    when it would be.
    

Re: .3

>The big advantage of the 3000 is the flicker free display. I don't
>know if this affect the ability to genlock or not.

It doesn't, and the 3000 can still produce a normal interlaced
display when needed for video work.

>As for performance I don't think the 3000 will have anything over 3'rd
>party hardware.

An Amiga 3000 will be faster than a Amiga 2000 with an accelerator board
that has the same clock speed as the 3000.  The 3000 has 32 bit access
to chip ram, and from the hard disk controller to all ram.  This gives
it an edge.

Right now, if someone is thinking about buying a fully loaded 2000 versus
a bare 3000, I'd recommend the 3000:

	The 3000 is cheaper than a 2500/30.
	The 3000 is faster than a 2500/30.
	The 3000 comes with a "flicker fixer" standard.
	The 3000 has the two meg Agnus.
	The 3000 can hold more memory (you can upgrade the motherboard
	  to 6 Meg to 18 meg by filling in sockets).

>As for the OS Very few products seem to run under 2.0 without problems.

Remember, the version of AmigaDOS running on the demo models of the
3000 is a field test version, and surely contains bugs.  It is premature
to use it to see how compatible the final release will be with current
products.

>For video work spend the extra money and get the 2500/030. You will have
>the 32bit memory,and the 32 bit proccessor,with more expanability.Many
>use the bridgeboard to display the amiga generated graphics with a Targa
>on the IB* side.

The 3000 initially appears to be less expandable when you count expansion
slots.  However, once you subtract the slots in the 2000 that would go
to a memory board and a disk controller, the 3000 doesn't look to bad.
(On a 3000, you also don't have to choose between a FlickerFixer and
an internal genlock or the video toaster).  The 3000 does accept any 2000
board, including the both models of the bridge board.  A Targa board
should still be usable.

The bridge board/Targa solution is obviously an interim solution until
the Video Toaster ships (the toaster also provides a 24 bit frame
buffer).  I have heard that the toaster doesn't fit in the 3000.  NewTek
cheated a little on the size of the board(s), and the result is the toaster
is physically too large for the 3000.

If the above is true, it does make a compelling reason to go with a
2000 instead of a 3000 for video work.

re .9:

If you really want either raw speed or lots of slots, the 3000 isn't the
right machine. There are a number of faster processor boards, and there
are also ways of not using up the slots.

The GVP ads point out that their full-blown 3001 gives you both lots of
fast ram & a 32 bit wide SCSI controller without using up any slots.

The Hurrican boards allow 16Meg of 32 bit ram on the board, meaning you
have to chew up one slot for the SCSI board, leaving you with as many
Zorro slots as you have on the 3000.

And of course, the GVP is now available in 50 MHz versions, and the Hurricane
gives you a 28MHz synch design, which the designer claims is faster than the
33MHz GVP card.

Finally, there's someone advertizing a 25MHz '040 board as > 2x the speed
of anything else out there for most things, and even more for floating point.
Anyone seen one, or know more than is in the ads?

If you consider the long run, though - the 3000 will almost certainly have
a higher resale value than any similarly-equipped 2000 in a couple of years.
That's what convinced me to sell my 2000 and invest money in a 3000 rather
than upgrading my 2000.

	thanx,
	<mike

Re: .10

You are certainly correct that there exist processor accelerator cards for
the 2000 than make it faster than a 3000.  However, I sort of expect that
3000 versions of those card will appear soon...

I really don't expect that any of the currently available high-end accelerator
cards will show up for the 3000. After all, what's the point of dropping even
a 50MHz '030 in a 25MHz 3000? The accelerator board will cost most of what
the 3000 did, and won't even double the system speed.

Of course, I do expect that GVP, CSA & others will be doing '040 cards
for both machines. If you've got patience and lots-a-bucks, such a card
in the 3000 is clearly the way to go - you get both the high-speed processor
and the performance boost from the 32 bit design, plus a better resale when
that machine is old hat.

Mostly, I wanted to point out that the 2500/30 vs. 3000 comparison ignored
other vendors accellerator cards. The people I know doing serious 3d work
are on 2000s with custom accellerator cards (50MHz '030's with 10s of K of
static cache), not 2500/30s.

	<mike

    The line about New Tek's board being a little bit larger than standard
    and it will not fit in a 3000 just gave them an excuse to delay it
    again and again and again and again and again...oh no, I have started 
    to stutter just like them.
    
    Jean