WEBVTT 00:00.000 --> 00:02.640 Android. 00:30.000 --> 00:33.800 Welcome to the Computer Chronicles. 00:33.800 --> 00:37.480 A computer that can talk thanks to a built-in speech chip. 00:37.480 --> 00:40.920 A computer with exceptional graphics and sound capabilities. 00:40.920 --> 00:43.400 A computer that can do multitasking. 00:43.400 --> 00:49.300 It's called the Amiga 500 and at under $1,000, some say it's got the best price performance 00:49.300 --> 00:51.840 ratio of any computer on the market. 00:51.840 --> 00:57.000 Today we take a look at the Commodore Amiga on this edition of the Computer Chronicles. 00:57.000 --> 01:24.320 The Computer Chronicles is made possible in part by CompuServe, featuring an online reference 01:24.320 --> 01:30.360 library, Wall Street reports, at-home shopping, airline reservations, games, and hundreds 01:30.360 --> 01:32.360 of other services. 01:32.360 --> 01:39.680 CompuServe, helping people get the most from computers. 01:39.680 --> 01:42.960 Additional funding is provided by McGraw-Hill, publishers of Byte. 01:42.960 --> 01:47.580 Byte's detailed technical articles on new hardware, software, and languages cover developments 01:47.580 --> 01:58.460 in computer technology worldwide. 01:58.460 --> 01:59.740 Welcome to the Computer Chronicles. 01:59.740 --> 02:01.860 I'm Stuart Shafae and this is Gary Kildall. 02:01.860 --> 02:04.980 Gary, I'm playing a game called Interceptor here from Electronic Arts. 02:04.980 --> 02:09.540 It's a new F-18 flight simulation game written for the Amiga and as you can see, the graphics 02:09.540 --> 02:10.540 and the sound are spectacular. 02:10.540 --> 02:14.940 When you talk about the Amiga, one tends to talk about graphics and sound. 02:14.940 --> 02:17.940 It's a pretty good general purpose computer, but it's kind of the Rodney Dangerfield of 02:17.940 --> 02:18.940 personal computers. 02:18.940 --> 02:21.980 It doesn't get very much respect among the IBMs and the Macs of the world. 02:21.980 --> 02:22.980 Why is that? 02:22.980 --> 02:24.700 Well, Stuart, part of it is the Commodore heritage. 02:24.700 --> 02:27.740 The Commodore brand name is associated with the low-end computers. 02:27.740 --> 02:30.260 When it first came out, it was pitted up against the Atari 520ST. 02:30.260 --> 02:34.940 The 520ST was about $500 and this came out at about $1,500, so it really didn't match 02:34.940 --> 02:35.940 up. 02:35.940 --> 02:38.660 And moving up market is difficult because, of course, there's distribution channels that 02:38.660 --> 02:40.260 they didn't have established. 02:40.260 --> 02:44.140 There's a cumulated software base we found with the Mac and the IBM PC and the Amiga 02:44.140 --> 02:45.140 just didn't have that. 02:45.140 --> 02:47.700 Now, we're starting to see some really good software being written for the Amiga, so that 02:47.700 --> 02:48.700 situation may change. 02:48.700 --> 02:53.020 Okay, Gary, we're going to take a look at the new Amiga 500 and the Amiga 2000 and we'll 02:53.020 --> 02:56.500 see some of the new exciting software that is being written for the Amiga. 02:56.500 --> 02:59.860 We're going to begin by going to Oakland, California and taking a look at a man who 02:59.860 --> 03:04.820 uses an Amiga plus DigiView and Deluxe Paint to make a living as a professional photographer 03:04.820 --> 03:08.380 and designer. 03:08.380 --> 03:13.040 Larry Keenan is a San Francisco photographer who has added the Amiga to his collection 03:13.040 --> 03:15.300 of photographic equipment. 03:15.300 --> 03:20.540 Working with a video camera, a digitizer, and a software package called DigiView, Larry 03:20.540 --> 03:23.300 can create new images directly on screen. 03:23.300 --> 03:28.540 Basically, it was a logical extension of my business because I work with a lot of different 03:28.540 --> 03:33.340 elements in photos that the digitizing process was like another brush. 03:33.340 --> 03:35.020 It's just another technique. 03:35.020 --> 03:42.540 It allows me to take a photograph that I've already have in a stock file and resize it, 03:42.540 --> 03:43.540 take out elements. 03:43.540 --> 03:47.500 For instance, you have a favorite photograph that you want to use for something and it's 03:47.500 --> 03:50.100 got telephone lines all in it. 03:50.100 --> 03:53.860 It's got cyclone fences, lots of problems. 03:53.860 --> 03:57.460 And you can go in and you can digitize these areas out. 03:57.460 --> 04:03.320 Larry is well known for his ad work and magazine covers and increasingly for his artwork decorating 04:03.320 --> 04:05.220 software packages. 04:05.220 --> 04:09.840 The computer gives him a definite advantage in dealing with the deadlines imposed by commercial 04:09.840 --> 04:13.080 work and it lets him be more independent. 04:13.080 --> 04:16.300 This is the main difference in this technology. 04:16.300 --> 04:23.300 It allows artists, photographers, illustrators, anyone in the art field to take an image, 04:23.300 --> 04:28.980 digitize it on their own terms and present it rather than being a victim of a technician 04:28.980 --> 04:33.380 basically doing it and you have no input, none. 04:33.380 --> 04:38.620 Making the switch from a sharp lens to a fuzzy monitor is not without its problems. 04:38.620 --> 04:44.220 Larry regrets the low resolution of a computer screen compared to photographic film and he 04:44.220 --> 04:48.620 finds it hard to keep up with constant changes in the technology. 04:48.620 --> 04:49.620 But he's optimistic. 04:49.620 --> 04:54.340 The trick is to learn the process because that won't change, just the quality will change 04:54.340 --> 05:07.860 in the future and that's the important part. 05:07.860 --> 05:10.300 Joining us in the studio now is Heidi Turnipseed. 05:10.300 --> 05:13.340 Heidi is an animator with Five Rings Company in Southern California. 05:13.340 --> 05:17.220 Next to Heidi is Adams Douglas, Director of Product Development with Micro Illusions in 05:17.220 --> 05:18.220 Southern California. 05:18.220 --> 05:19.220 Carrie? 05:19.220 --> 05:21.860 Heidi, you're now using computers to help you with classical animation techniques. 05:21.860 --> 05:24.620 Why did you choose an Amiga over an IBM PC or Mac? 05:24.620 --> 05:31.740 Well, it was advertised as having full animation capability, the Blitter technology and the 05:31.740 --> 05:37.900 4-channel sound, the 4096 colors and the very reasonable price were all factors. 05:37.900 --> 05:39.940 So the graphics really drew the machine off. 05:39.940 --> 05:40.940 Absolutely. 05:40.940 --> 05:45.180 Now, you have a program here with Photon, I guess, that you're using for your animation. 05:45.180 --> 05:48.300 Can you show us how it works? 05:48.300 --> 05:54.060 Here's an animation pencil test that I shot of my 10 drawing cycle of a galloping horse 05:54.060 --> 06:01.460 and I'm able to test the animation at home, alter the drawings, re-digitize them and save 06:01.460 --> 06:03.420 them back to disk until I've polished them. 06:03.420 --> 06:06.900 So the black and white drawings are not drawn on the machine itself, they're done externally? 06:06.900 --> 06:07.900 That's right. 06:07.900 --> 06:08.900 Okay. 06:08.900 --> 06:10.460 And what was your next step after this? 06:10.460 --> 06:15.780 At this point, I animated a rider on a separate level, digitized that, mapped it onto the 06:15.780 --> 06:20.780 galloping horse frames, saved them separately so that I can always refer to a horse alone 06:20.780 --> 06:24.380 if I want to, and then I called them up in a paint program and colored them. 06:24.380 --> 06:25.740 Could you pull that up for us? 06:25.740 --> 06:29.100 And while you're loading that version, Adams, let me ask you about the software she's using. 06:29.100 --> 06:30.580 What's it called and how does it work? 06:30.580 --> 06:36.700 Okay, this is the cell animator module of our Photon Video line of products and they're 06:36.700 --> 06:44.300 a set of modules you can use for various video applications either at home or professionally. 06:44.300 --> 06:50.060 This particular one is a tool for animators to use to arrange frames, play them back in 06:50.060 --> 06:54.620 any order, reload them, edit them, and it does support all of the graphics modes available 06:54.620 --> 06:56.060 on the Amiga. 06:56.060 --> 07:01.140 With any type of memory you might have, it'll dynamically adjust to that. 07:01.140 --> 07:05.220 Now, Adams, there's usually a graphics picture that takes an awful lot of storage, so how 07:05.220 --> 07:08.420 much memory does it require to do animation? 07:08.420 --> 07:14.300 Usually you can fit on an 8 megabyte Amiga, which is what we got sitting here. 07:14.300 --> 07:17.980 Depending on the graphics mode, if you're in pencil test mode, which takes up the least 07:17.980 --> 07:21.300 space, you can fit well over 1,000 frames. 07:21.300 --> 07:29.100 And the longer, more complex colored sequences, you can go down, it goes down to like 100 07:29.100 --> 07:30.100 frames. 07:30.100 --> 07:34.100 But you have great versatility in the way you can play those frames back out, so it's 07:34.100 --> 07:38.180 not as much of a constraint as it would be if you were only playing it back on the screen. 07:38.180 --> 07:40.980 Heidi, how are we doing with the next generation of the horse here? 07:40.980 --> 07:42.780 Well, we've loaded up the last frame. 07:42.780 --> 07:43.780 And? 07:43.780 --> 07:44.780 I'm going to call it up here. 07:44.780 --> 07:49.620 And here we have the full color version of the previous scene. 07:49.620 --> 07:51.980 Now, how do you do the coloring process here? 07:51.980 --> 07:53.700 Do you color each individual frame? 07:53.700 --> 07:55.260 Yes, I do. 07:55.260 --> 08:01.420 And I have the capability of filling a shape and incorporating the line around the outside 08:01.420 --> 08:05.240 of the shape so that the line is actually a deeper shade of the fill color. 08:05.240 --> 08:10.700 This is something that is impossible due to the man hour requirements where it could be 08:10.700 --> 08:12.180 done in traditional cell animation. 08:12.180 --> 08:15.820 Now, how about the video output from this? 08:15.820 --> 08:18.660 Is this commercially usable, like for broadcast, for example? 08:18.660 --> 08:23.140 Well, apparently with a third-party Genlock product that has just come out on the market, 08:23.140 --> 08:24.140 it is. 08:24.140 --> 08:26.820 And I'm going to be anxious to test that myself. 08:26.820 --> 08:29.420 Heidi, you've got another demonstration with a background in it. 08:29.420 --> 08:31.180 And I want to ask you to load that up also now. 08:31.180 --> 08:33.780 And I want to ask you one more question while Heidi's doing that. 08:33.780 --> 08:37.860 What kind of hardware configuration do you need to run something like PhotonCell N? 08:37.860 --> 08:45.100 It will run on a standard Amiga with, we would recommend at least a megabyte of memory. 08:45.100 --> 08:46.100 And you could load. 08:46.100 --> 08:47.540 You can run it on a 500, you're saying? 08:47.540 --> 08:49.460 Oh, yeah, you could run it on a 500 easily. 08:49.460 --> 08:52.500 There's no special hardware video requirements. 08:52.500 --> 08:56.380 Those are added as options depending on what you want to do with what you create. 08:56.380 --> 08:58.620 Okay, Heidi, what do we have now? 08:58.620 --> 09:03.900 What we have here is a full-color animation sequence that I built from my original pencil 09:03.900 --> 09:06.980 drawings using the Amiga computer. 09:06.980 --> 09:11.860 I utilized the computer to color each frame, pick them up onto the full-color background 09:11.860 --> 09:16.700 that I painted using the Photon paint program, saved each discrete frame to disk. 09:16.700 --> 09:18.740 There are 80 frames here. 09:18.740 --> 09:22.060 And colored each frame myself in the computer. 09:22.060 --> 09:23.620 Okay, very nice. 09:23.620 --> 09:25.900 What does this mean to the animation industry? 09:25.900 --> 09:31.820 Well, it means that I, as an individual classical animator, can produce my own full-color animation 09:31.820 --> 09:32.980 sequence in my own home. 09:32.980 --> 09:35.060 All right, so you can be competitive with big studios, huh? 09:35.060 --> 09:36.060 You bet. 09:36.060 --> 09:37.060 Heidi, thank you very much. 09:37.060 --> 09:41.100 In just a minute, we'll take a look and listen to the music capabilities of the Amiga with 09:41.100 --> 09:43.140 a hot new program called Music X. 09:43.140 --> 09:55.220 So stay with us. 09:55.220 --> 09:57.300 Joining us in the studio now is David Joyner. 09:57.300 --> 10:00.220 David's a programmer with Micro Illusions and the developer of Music X. 10:00.220 --> 10:01.700 And back with us, Adams Douglas. 10:01.700 --> 10:05.780 David, we've seen how an Amiga can be used for professional animation. 10:05.780 --> 10:07.620 What does an Amiga do for you as a musician? 10:07.620 --> 10:14.020 Well, it allows me to essentially set up a multi-track recording studio in my home. 10:14.020 --> 10:18.020 The synthesizers nowadays all have what is called MIDI, which stands for Musical Instrument 10:18.020 --> 10:19.060 Digital Interface. 10:19.060 --> 10:22.940 It's like a set of agreements between various music synthesizer manufacturers as to how 10:22.940 --> 10:25.060 their various instruments can communicate with each other. 10:25.060 --> 10:28.860 And the computer can receive that information and process it in various ways. 10:28.860 --> 10:34.140 And I will now try, attempt to record a performance and show you how it works. 10:34.140 --> 10:39.260 I'll set the tempo to some reasonable value, 131 quarter notes per minute. 10:39.260 --> 10:40.940 I'll now start to record. 10:40.940 --> 10:45.420 The drum machine, which has been synchronized to the computer, will automatically start. 10:45.420 --> 10:53.820 So now you're making a visual recording. 10:53.820 --> 11:03.980 And I'll stop that, store it into the machine. 11:03.980 --> 11:10.860 Now if I go back to the beginning and play again, you can see it's got controls just 11:10.860 --> 11:11.860 like a tape recorder. 11:11.860 --> 11:14.500 Fast forward, rewind, and play. 11:14.500 --> 11:17.700 This program has been designed to work on various levels. 11:17.700 --> 11:19.160 On the surface level, it's very simple. 11:19.160 --> 11:22.540 But at the same time, you can dig down deep into its innards and sort of... 11:22.540 --> 11:25.020 But right now what you've done is you've recorded one segment of music. 11:25.020 --> 11:26.820 And how many segments can you record now? 11:26.820 --> 11:32.780 You can record up to 250 segments in the computer, although 20 of them can play at once. 11:32.780 --> 11:33.780 Okay. 11:33.780 --> 11:36.820 So can you show us how you manage some of those segments? 11:36.820 --> 11:37.820 Here's the editing screen. 11:37.820 --> 11:39.340 Well, there's various different editors. 11:39.340 --> 11:43.300 I'll show you the simplest one, which is the bar editor, which shows the music as a series 11:43.300 --> 11:44.980 of bars. 11:44.980 --> 11:51.540 And in fact, you can drag notes around. 11:51.540 --> 11:52.540 Shut that off. 11:52.540 --> 11:53.540 Anyway... 11:53.540 --> 11:57.700 So what are some of the other controls that you have? 11:57.700 --> 12:01.620 Well, I'll show you some of the other screens. 12:01.620 --> 12:07.100 There is the librarian screen, which allows you to send sound data to the synthesizer 12:07.100 --> 12:10.380 and make the synthesizer play different sounds. 12:10.380 --> 12:14.820 You can store the various patches from the synthesizer onto disk. 12:14.820 --> 12:15.820 There's going to be... 12:15.820 --> 12:16.820 Let's see. 12:16.820 --> 12:18.700 We have filters. 12:18.700 --> 12:24.940 What these allow you to do is process your playing in real time and change your performances. 12:24.940 --> 12:25.940 Here's an example of... 12:25.940 --> 12:29.020 This takes a second to load. 12:29.020 --> 12:33.940 And the key map editor, which allows you to redefine the behavior of the musical keyboard, 12:33.940 --> 12:39.260 sort of like musical keyboard macros, which you can assign a sequence of notes to a key 12:39.260 --> 12:40.620 on the keyboard. 12:40.620 --> 12:44.500 And I've always been interested in the idea of sort of co-composition, co-performance, 12:44.500 --> 12:48.140 not just a human composing and not just a computer composing all by itself, but together 12:48.140 --> 12:50.780 in a synthesis. 12:50.780 --> 12:54.540 There's a lot of things that I'm interested in developing in experimental techniques in 12:54.540 --> 12:55.540 music. 12:55.540 --> 12:59.260 So you see this as more of a combination of the talents of the machine and the talents 12:59.260 --> 13:00.260 of the performer. 13:00.260 --> 13:01.260 Exactly. 13:01.260 --> 13:05.580 David, what does MusicX do that's new in terms of this kind of music software? 13:05.580 --> 13:08.980 Well, it's new in the sense that it's affordable. 13:08.980 --> 13:13.420 It runs on a machine that's affordable and a machine that has color. 13:13.420 --> 13:15.420 The Amiga is a very creative machine. 13:15.420 --> 13:18.340 I think it has a very creative spirit to it. 13:18.340 --> 13:22.900 And I think that many musicians are attracted to that, and they're dying for an excuse to 13:22.900 --> 13:23.900 buy one. 13:23.900 --> 13:26.660 Adam, MusicX is in development now, right? 13:26.660 --> 13:28.620 I mean, you're still working on this thing. 13:28.620 --> 13:29.740 When's it going to hit the market? 13:29.740 --> 13:31.500 This will be out in about two months. 13:31.500 --> 13:32.500 Okay. 13:32.500 --> 13:33.500 And you said it's reasonable. 13:33.500 --> 13:34.500 What will it cost? 13:34.500 --> 13:36.780 $290, I believe, something like that. 13:36.780 --> 13:41.300 Although by the time this program airs, it may be less than two months. 13:41.300 --> 13:42.300 Okay. 13:42.300 --> 13:45.740 And is this for the professional musician, primarily MusicX, or is it for a person who's 13:45.740 --> 13:48.500 not a performer and can still take advantage of this? 13:48.500 --> 13:52.980 Well, I think the program can adapt to various levels of talent. 13:52.980 --> 13:59.900 If you're an amateur musician, sort of like I am, I'm really sort of a musician techie, 13:59.900 --> 14:03.660 I like to be able to compose on a screen because I'm not that great of a keyboard player. 14:03.660 --> 14:10.100 On the other hand, I want something that the professional can also use in his work. 14:10.100 --> 14:11.100 One last question. 14:11.100 --> 14:13.840 We've heard of the Atari ST a lot from musicians. 14:13.840 --> 14:16.180 How does that compare to an Amiga for what you're doing? 14:16.180 --> 14:20.160 Well, I think the Amiga is a little bit more polished in the way it's designed. 14:20.160 --> 14:23.820 And I'm hoping that MusicX will be able to support a lot more features because of the 14:23.820 --> 14:25.740 multitasking power of the Amiga. 14:25.740 --> 14:27.540 David Adams, thank you very much. 14:27.540 --> 14:30.940 Now we know about the music and graphics capabilities of the Amiga. 14:30.940 --> 14:33.820 There are also scientific applications on the Amiga. 14:33.820 --> 14:41.260 Wendy Woods has a report from the Smith Kettlewell Eye Research Foundation in San Francisco. 14:41.260 --> 14:43.860 Now you see it, now you don't. 14:43.860 --> 14:47.180 The letter E vanishes when the motion stops. 14:47.180 --> 14:51.620 In this experiment, the lines with the black squares appear to be crooked. 14:51.620 --> 14:55.340 But when the color is changed to green, they are straight. 14:55.340 --> 15:00.520 These are two of dozens of visual experiments being conducted at San Francisco's Smith Kettlewell 15:00.520 --> 15:06.340 Eye Research Foundation, where a team headed by Dr. Ken Nakayama is studying human visual 15:06.340 --> 15:11.540 perception and specifically how motion is involved in helping us to see. 15:11.540 --> 15:17.260 Dr. Nakayama creates these experiments using Amigas, running deluxe paint software from 15:17.260 --> 15:18.260 Electronic Arts. 15:18.260 --> 15:23.660 Well, the Amiga, especially at the time that it emerged about two years ago, was really 15:23.660 --> 15:27.020 the only thing on the block to do the kind of things that we wanted to do. 15:27.020 --> 15:30.900 It has a really great graphics capability, as you're probably aware. 15:30.900 --> 15:36.460 It has special hardware which enables you to move images around without even the CPU 15:36.460 --> 15:37.900 knowing it's happening, essentially. 15:37.900 --> 15:39.380 So you can just do things very, very fast. 15:39.380 --> 15:41.740 You can't do it on the previous machine. 15:41.740 --> 15:47.140 Dr. Nakayama feels that Amigas, and micros in general, are opening a whole new field 15:47.140 --> 15:48.780 of vision research. 15:48.780 --> 15:53.980 The motion that you can achieve on a computer screen simply cannot be duplicated by standard 15:53.980 --> 15:55.700 eye tests. 15:55.700 --> 16:00.780 People here are pioneering the use of low-cost micros with technically sophisticated graphics 16:00.780 --> 16:02.460 in vision research. 16:02.460 --> 16:07.940 And eventually, these Amiga graphics experiments may end up in clinical settings to test actual 16:07.940 --> 16:10.660 patients with vision problems. 16:10.660 --> 16:25.780 In San Francisco, for the Computer Chronicles, I'm Wendy Woods. 16:25.780 --> 16:30.220 With us in the studio now are Tim Jennison, president of NewTek of Topeka, Kansas, and 16:30.220 --> 16:32.820 next to Tim, the vice president of NewTek, Paul Montgomery. 16:32.820 --> 16:38.220 Stuart, so far we've seen the Amiga used for animation and for a musician's tool. 16:38.220 --> 16:40.500 We have a TV camera sitting here, so I guess we've covered all the bases. 16:40.500 --> 16:42.220 We're up to video on the Amiga. 16:42.220 --> 16:46.420 Tim, why did you choose the Amiga as a target for your product, a video product? 16:46.420 --> 16:51.140 Well, the Amiga, of all the computers on the market, is really most well-suited for video 16:51.140 --> 16:52.140 use. 16:52.140 --> 16:54.940 Right out of the box, it's without any other display cards. 16:54.940 --> 16:56.220 It's got NTSC video. 16:56.220 --> 17:01.480 It can display 4,096 colors at once, which is really enough to get a photographic quality 17:01.480 --> 17:02.860 image on the screen. 17:02.860 --> 17:08.460 Plus, with certain coprocessor chips and internal circuits, it's really a powerhouse. 17:08.460 --> 17:11.460 It's got the throughput and the horsepower to do what we need to do. 17:11.460 --> 17:12.980 And what does your product consist of? 17:12.980 --> 17:19.500 Well, the video toaster is a peripheral that turns the Amiga into a professional video 17:19.500 --> 17:20.500 box. 17:20.500 --> 17:22.780 It really consists of four main sections. 17:22.780 --> 17:28.540 First of all, it's a display card, and it carries the Amiga past 4,096 colors, so you 17:28.540 --> 17:32.420 can display really millions of colors on the screen at once with more resolution. 17:32.420 --> 17:36.540 And certain Amiga software packages can already take advantage of that increased resolution 17:36.540 --> 17:37.540 and color. 17:37.540 --> 17:43.460 Second, it's a frame grabber, or a video digitizer, so it can grab frames from a VCR or a camera 17:43.460 --> 17:45.740 60 times a second in full color. 17:45.740 --> 17:52.500 You can use that all by itself to capture frames for saving on disk and later recall. 17:52.500 --> 17:57.140 You can import the images into a paint program and do cut and paste operations, for example. 17:57.140 --> 17:59.020 We'll see how it works. 17:59.020 --> 18:00.020 Okay. 18:00.020 --> 18:04.500 First of all, we're looking at the toaster now, displaying live video 60 times a second. 18:04.500 --> 18:07.220 And this is coming off the camera that's sitting on our desk right here. 18:07.220 --> 18:11.340 The camera runs into the toaster, and the toaster runs into this monitor. 18:11.340 --> 18:14.260 I can slow down the frame rate so you can see that it is really capturing images. 18:14.260 --> 18:17.500 If you want to move your hand, Gary, you can see that it's really... 18:17.500 --> 18:18.500 A little delayed. 18:18.500 --> 18:19.500 Yeah. 18:19.500 --> 18:22.180 Okay, some of the effects it can do. 18:22.180 --> 18:27.980 This is tumbling around the X axis, tumbling around the Y axis. 18:27.980 --> 18:28.980 This is a zoom. 18:28.980 --> 18:32.580 These are typically effects that would be very expensive if you hadn't... 18:32.580 --> 18:35.940 You'd go buy broadcast quality kind of material. 18:35.940 --> 18:36.940 Mm-hmm. 18:36.940 --> 18:42.900 These effects might cost $20,000 on up to $300,000 to do with traditional video equipment. 18:42.900 --> 18:46.420 This is a moving blind effect. 18:46.420 --> 18:53.700 Here's a quad mosaic, and then there's kind of a kaleidoscope effect there. 18:53.700 --> 18:56.300 This is a 16-level mosaic. 18:56.300 --> 19:01.780 We can do a receding mosaic, which is kind of interesting. 19:01.780 --> 19:02.780 And zoom in. 19:02.780 --> 19:09.700 And we can do what we call an infinity slide, like an infinity mirror effect you'd see at 19:09.700 --> 19:11.300 the barber shop. 19:11.300 --> 19:15.380 Here is a mirror effect reflected around the center. 19:15.380 --> 19:16.380 This is called pixelization. 19:16.380 --> 19:18.220 It's a very popular effect in commercials. 19:18.220 --> 19:21.300 It gives it kind of a high-tech computer look. 19:21.300 --> 19:22.300 This is called a push-on. 19:22.300 --> 19:28.340 This is used widely as a transition from one scene to another in a video. 19:28.340 --> 19:31.580 The picture flying around on the screen is an example of what a TV engineer would call 19:31.580 --> 19:33.860 an ADO effect. 19:33.860 --> 19:35.180 And this is... 19:35.180 --> 19:38.160 You would pay a lot of money to get this kind of effect. 19:38.160 --> 19:42.260 Another ADO type effect is the sphere, which is usually reserved for the very expensive 19:42.260 --> 19:43.260 broadcast equipment. 19:43.260 --> 19:47.380 The beauty of the toaster is that these are all software-based effects. 19:47.380 --> 19:51.060 So the more software we write for the toaster, the more effects it will do. 19:51.060 --> 19:53.700 Paul, who's the customer for this kind of a board? 19:53.700 --> 19:57.620 The customer is one of the 7 million camcorder owners in the U.S. right now. 19:57.620 --> 19:58.620 It is education. 19:58.620 --> 20:02.340 It is corporate sales and training tapes. 20:02.340 --> 20:06.220 It's anyone who really has an interest in video or a need to do video. 20:06.220 --> 20:10.140 This will give them that slick television look that people are becoming accustomed to. 20:10.140 --> 20:15.460 So for example, if I had a small business and I wanted to have video in my PR department 20:15.460 --> 20:17.060 and I could build myself, right? 20:17.060 --> 20:18.060 Absolutely. 20:18.060 --> 20:23.100 You don't see this right now, replacing things like ADOs and professional quality broadcast 20:23.100 --> 20:25.540 effects equipment, do you or do you? 20:25.540 --> 20:30.340 Well, I do because even if a station has these very high-quality units, they're typically 20:30.340 --> 20:31.820 a kind of a precious resource. 20:31.820 --> 20:33.660 And you have to line up to use them. 20:33.660 --> 20:39.020 And if you're renting time on them, it's typically $300 an hour for the really top stuff. 20:39.020 --> 20:42.300 So now a small ad agency has access to this sort of thing. 20:42.300 --> 20:45.500 And even a TV news department has to line up for this sort of thing. 20:45.500 --> 20:48.660 Now they could get those effects very cheaply. 20:48.660 --> 20:49.820 What would the next steps be? 20:49.820 --> 20:53.220 What are the things you're trying to add to the video toaster as you improve it? 20:53.220 --> 20:56.700 We've got a number of add-on products planned for it. 20:56.700 --> 21:02.460 We'd really like to get the entire production process into a single box. 21:02.460 --> 21:06.620 And we're working on all the remaining bits and pieces to do that so we can really truly 21:06.620 --> 21:08.220 have desktop video. 21:08.220 --> 21:11.900 When you say desktop video, that's obviously sort of an analogy to the desktop publishing 21:11.900 --> 21:12.900 situation. 21:12.900 --> 21:14.740 Paul, what do you really mean by desktop video? 21:14.740 --> 21:18.300 Desktop video is the marriage of personal computers and video. 21:18.300 --> 21:25.900 So it gives a much more professional quality to equipment that traditionally is very expensive. 21:25.900 --> 21:28.020 Using the computer technology, you can do it now fairly cheap. 21:28.020 --> 21:31.380 Do you think the consumer is going to really be doing the full editing in their home in 21:31.380 --> 21:32.380 the future? 21:32.380 --> 21:33.380 If it's easy enough. 21:33.380 --> 21:34.380 And that's what we've really tried to keep in the system. 21:34.380 --> 21:35.380 Do you see that trend? 21:35.380 --> 21:36.380 Yes, absolutely. 21:36.380 --> 21:38.260 How much does the toaster package consist of, Tim? 21:38.260 --> 21:40.820 What do you get and how much does it cost? 21:40.820 --> 21:47.540 Well, for a whole system, you would need a VCR, a camera or a camcorder, the Amiga and 21:47.540 --> 21:50.740 the toaster card. 21:50.740 --> 21:55.700 All told, you would pay somewhere around $2,000 for everything. 21:55.700 --> 21:57.100 And how about the toaster product itself? 21:57.100 --> 21:58.100 I mean, what is that? 21:58.100 --> 22:00.540 The toaster itself is listed for $799. 22:00.540 --> 22:02.220 And that's a board? 22:02.220 --> 22:03.620 That's a board that goes into the Amiga. 22:03.620 --> 22:07.540 Do you see some combination, as Gary mentioned, we've seen music and we've seen animation 22:07.540 --> 22:12.100 so far in this program, now video, of really taking these things together and going into 22:12.100 --> 22:15.580 a real comprehensive creative work environment? 22:15.580 --> 22:17.780 Absolutely, yeah. 22:17.780 --> 22:20.340 And you guys working on that in any direction or working with other? 22:20.340 --> 22:23.980 We're working on an NTSC paint program that would take the output of this and manipulate 22:23.980 --> 22:28.020 it in millions of colors, an animation product, a titling product. 22:28.020 --> 22:29.300 So I see that. 22:29.300 --> 22:31.300 And it's also compatible with all Amiga software. 22:31.300 --> 22:32.980 Okay, gentlemen, thank you very much. 22:32.980 --> 22:34.540 That's our look at the Commodore Amiga. 22:34.540 --> 22:48.460 Hope we'll see you here again next week on the Computer Chronicles. 22:48.460 --> 22:53.080 In the random access file this week, yet another company has announced a rewritable optical 22:53.080 --> 22:55.700 disk storage system for PCs. 22:55.700 --> 23:00.200 But this time, Advanced Graphic Applications of New York says it will actually ship its 23:00.200 --> 23:01.760 system this November. 23:01.760 --> 23:07.780 The rewritable laser disk drive will have 650 megabytes capacity and use 5 1⁄4-inch 23:07.780 --> 23:08.780 disks. 23:08.780 --> 23:11.860 The company says the drive will operate as a standard DOS peripheral. 23:11.860 --> 23:14.780 The price is $5,000. 23:14.780 --> 23:19.140 Apple says it'll be coming out with a fix for its new version 6.0 of the Mac operating 23:19.140 --> 23:20.140 system software. 23:20.140 --> 23:23.740 The new version, dubbed 6.01, is due out any day. 23:23.740 --> 23:29.780 A variety of bugs showed up in 6.0, and the new release contains 19 patches that reportedly 23:29.780 --> 23:32.260 correct the problems. 23:32.260 --> 23:36.700 Software maker Broderbund has announced a new venture with 11 Japanese partners to convert 23:36.700 --> 23:41.540 successful Japanese software titles to popular American computer formats. 23:41.540 --> 23:46.700 The new joint venture, called Kyodai Software, will be based in San Rafael, California. 23:46.700 --> 23:50.940 They're promising 12 new software titles in the first year. 23:50.940 --> 23:56.680 Symantec, most well-known for its MS-DOS program, such as Q&A, has unveiled five new software 23:56.680 --> 23:58.580 packages for the Macintosh. 23:58.580 --> 24:03.260 The programs include a planning, writing, and presentation package called More2, an 24:03.260 --> 24:10.460 electronic mail system called Inbox, and three program development packages in C and Pascal. 24:10.460 --> 24:12.260 Time for this week's software review. 24:12.260 --> 24:14.500 Here's Paul Schindler. 24:14.500 --> 24:18.620 You know, a blank spreadsheet can be anything, but above all, it's intimidating. 24:18.620 --> 24:23.040 It is, in short, a tool so flexible that it's useless, kind of like a personal computer 24:23.040 --> 24:24.660 without software. 24:24.660 --> 24:29.060 Microsoft Excel can sometimes seem that way, as can any electronic spreadsheet. 24:29.060 --> 24:31.020 What do you do with the blank screen? 24:31.020 --> 24:32.860 Enter Heizer Software. 24:32.860 --> 24:37.940 For $4, you get a floppy and a catalog listing more than 500 templates and macros which can 24:37.940 --> 24:40.820 help you figure out how to make the most of your spreadsheet. 24:40.820 --> 24:43.460 Like this guided tour of Excel. 24:43.460 --> 24:45.240 It's self-written in Excel. 24:45.240 --> 24:48.460 It shows you how you can take advantage of the software's power. 24:48.460 --> 24:52.060 Or there's this income tax worksheet template from the sample disk. 24:52.060 --> 24:54.460 It sure beats writing your own from scratch. 24:54.460 --> 24:58.240 Each of these came from another user, like you, who felt it would be useful. 24:58.240 --> 25:02.780 They sent it to Heizer, who charges customers from $5 to $50 and shares the proceeds with 25:02.780 --> 25:03.780 the authors. 25:03.780 --> 25:08.740 So, spend $4 for the sample disk, or see if Heizer wants to distribute your template. 25:08.740 --> 25:11.960 Microsoft Excel templates from Heizer Software in Pleasant Hill, California. 25:11.960 --> 25:15.060 For the Computer Chronicles, I'm Paul Schindler. 25:15.060 --> 25:19.540 The new video display safety law in Suffolk County, New York, has gotten lots of press 25:19.540 --> 25:24.900 attention lately, but last week, NYNEX threatened that it would close its directory assistance 25:24.900 --> 25:29.060 operation on Long Island because of the new VDT law. 25:29.060 --> 25:33.740 NYNEX says the law imposes unnecessary costs on the company, which would have to be passed 25:33.740 --> 25:35.060 on to consumers. 25:35.060 --> 25:41.620 The Suffolk County VDT law requires employers to provide visual rest breaks, non-glare screens, 25:41.620 --> 25:44.100 and free eye care. 25:44.100 --> 25:48.240 Computer researchers at Carnegie Mellon University say they've come up with a new sophisticated 25:48.240 --> 25:53.940 speech recognition system that can understand any human voice speaking at a normal, rapid 25:53.940 --> 25:54.940 rate. 25:54.940 --> 25:55.940 The system is called Sphinx. 25:55.940 --> 25:58.980 It currently has a 1,000-word vocabulary. 25:58.980 --> 26:03.980 Finally, scientists at the Hughes Research Lab in California say they've developed a 26:03.980 --> 26:08.460 prototype for the first three-dimensional stacked microprocessor. 26:08.460 --> 26:11.940 The chunk of silicon is about the size of a tuna fish can. 26:11.940 --> 26:17.620 It includes 1,024 separate processors in a 32-by-32 array. 26:17.620 --> 26:22.580 The researchers say they hope to build a 3-D chip with more than 16,000 processors that 26:22.580 --> 26:27.420 could have the power of the world's largest supercomputer, but use only 50 watts of power 26:27.420 --> 26:29.700 and be small enough to fit in your hand. 26:29.700 --> 26:31.180 That's it for this week's Random Access. 26:31.180 --> 26:34.040 We'll see you next time. 26:34.040 --> 26:38.980 The Computer Chronicles is made possible in part by CompuServe, featuring an online reference 26:38.980 --> 26:44.980 library, Wall Street reports, at-home shopping, airline reservations, games, and hundreds 26:44.980 --> 26:47.700 of other services. 26:47.700 --> 26:54.300 CompuServe, helping people get the most from computers. 26:54.300 --> 26:57.540 Additional funding is provided by McGraw-Hill, publishers of Byte. 26:57.540 --> 27:02.200 Byte's detailed technical articles on new hardware, software, and languages cover developments 27:02.200 --> 27:05.900 in computer technology worldwide. 27:05.900 --> 27:12.140 For a transcript of this week's Computer Chronicles, send $3 to PTV Publications, Host Office Box 27:12.140 --> 27:16.180 701, Kent, Ohio, 44240. 27:16.180 --> 27:42.900 Please indicate program date.