Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!helios!csseq!randy
From: randy@csseq.tamu.edu (Randy Hutson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: GIF viewing again and again
Keywords: GIF, graphics, IFF, conversion
Message-ID: <7736@helios.TAMU.EDU>
Date: 27 Aug 90 00:18:18 GMT
References: <5338@harrier.ukc.ac.uk> <2763@corpane.UUCP>
Sender: usenet@helios.TAMU.EDU
Organization: Computer Science Department, Texas A&M University
Lines: 39

In article <2763@corpane.UUCP> sparks@corpane.UUCP (John Sparks) writes:

>If you don't want to shrink the picture down so it fits on your Amiga screen,
>then you need to be able to view a virtual picture. In other words, the GIF
>will be in memory and your screen will be a window that you can slide around
>and view different parts of it. The only program that does this for GIFs is
>VirtGIF as far as I know, but you said you already tried that. And yes memory
[text deleted]

HamLab supports this.  And with the Floyd-Steinberg dithering option turned
on, I have found that HamLab produces much nicer looking pictures than any
of the following GIF viewers or GIF-IFF converters:

	giffy
	hamgif
	iff2gif
	virtgif
	pbmplus
	gifmachine (GIF -> SHAM)
	hamsharp

HamLab is fairly fast (about the speed of HamSharp; not as slow as 
GIFMachine).  It can be configured to run on systems without much 
memory (at the expense of storing intermediate files on disk) or to 
use extra memory for more speed.

I currently have the demo version of HamLab which crops all pictures
to 512x512.  For a $15 fee, you can order the full version from the
author.  (I ordered a few days ago.)  I believe that I got HamLab
off of abcfd20 ("new xanth"), but I couldn't find it there the last
time I looked.  However, you can get the demo version of HamLab (along 
with all of the other GIF software I mentioned above) by anonymous 
ftp to csseq.tamu.edu (128.194.2.20).  Look in the /amiga directory.
(There's nothing new there; just a lot of stuff I got from xanth and
from Fred Fish disks.)


Randy
randy@csseq.tamu.edu