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From: hrlaser@crash.cts.com (Harv Laser)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.graphics
Subject: DCTV - quick overview
Keywords: DCTV
Message-ID: <7426@crash.cts.com>
Date: 5 Feb 91 18:27:15 GMT
Organization: Crash TimeSharing, El Cajon, CA
Lines: 115

I got a DCTV last Friday. This is just a quick overview of my impressions
of it so far... not a full blown review.

DCTV consists of a small black external plastic box about the size of
a small sony walkman with a number of cable inputs and outputs on one
side and a pair of trim pots.  It connects to Amiga's parallel and
RGB ports (parallel port connection not required if you don't plan to
digitize thru DCTV), and then an output cable is run from the DCTV's
composite (NTSC) outport to either the video IN port on the back of
your Amiga (1080/1084) monitor or similar port on your MultiSync type
monitor or optionally to a second NTSC monitor.  The unit can be
easily used with just one Amiga monitor, by using your monitor's front
switch to flip 'tween RGB and NTSC at the appropriate times.  In
most cases the trim pots on the DCTV box (tint adjust and pixel adjust)
will not need to be touched. 

The DCTV software comes in two forms depending on how much RAM you have:
either one large (approx 350K program) with all features in it, or two
smaller programs, one the digitize/process program and the other the
paint program.  With 3 MEG or more RAM you can easily use the larger
program.  Two other disks contain example pictures and an animation.
DCTV requires a font in 3 sizes be installed into your FONTS: dir and
the iffparse.library be installed into your LIBS: dir.  An installer
program handles these things swiftly.

The software multitasks just fine. You can leave DCTV running, flip your
monitor back to rGB mode and go about your regular Amiga work. 

I've digitized from my Canon rc-250 "Xapshot" still video camera with
excellent results.  I don't own a camcorder and I haven't tried 
hooking up my VCR yet.  DCTV is a "slow scan" color digitizer that
requires a constant, frozen signal from a source for 6-10 seconds. Thus
it is not a "framegrabber" and cannot grab a picture from a running
video tape. The tape has to be paused and steady.  A Laserdisc player
with stillframe would be an excellent source too. 

If you don't own any video source there are other ways to get imagery
into DCTV.  It'll load in any IFF24 format file which many Amiga programs
can now generate.  You could even use ASDG's TAD or ADPro to convert
downloaded .GIF picture files, save them out as IFF24 and load them
into DCTV with wonderful results. (I've done a bunch of these). 
Save VistaPro or Turbo Silver or Imagine out as IFF24. etc. etc. 
Or you could use DCTV's amazing Paint program to create your own
imagery fromscratch or modify any imported or digitized image. 

The Paint program is really something quite wonderful. It is lacking
a couple of important (to me) features.  No UNDO. (it instead has
a "quick raw save / quick raw load" button pair but UNDO would be 
better. No coordinates display. It accesses any fonts but it can't
handle ColorText fonts. (Digital Creations tell me all these lacking
features will be in the next version). 

Unlike NewTek's ToasterPaint where you paint on a HAM screen then push
a button and see your picture flow onto a separate NTSC display, in
DCTV Paint you paint DIRECTLy onto the NTSC display in realtime, so
you immediately know what you're getting.  The paint program is VERY
complex and has more buttons and gadgets and tools than I've ever
seen in an Amiga paint program... it will take a while to learn. I'm
still ending up getting unexpected results because I forget exactly
what mode I'm in, but the more I work with the thing, the more respect
I have for it, except for its shortcomings mentioned above.

Some operations such as resizing a brush if that brush is the entire
screen, down to a quarter screen size, can take a minute or two to
complete. However they've nicely implemented almost all the Deluxe Paint
keystrokes that Amiga artists have come to expect in paint programs
('j' to go to the swap screen, etc...).  

Unlike pixel painting or HAM pixel painting, painting on an NTSC screen
is much more forgiving of little mistakes. Nonetheless the paint program's
magnify mode is excellent for doing tiny touchups. 

Between the paint program and the digitize/process program's controls
(bright, contrast, sharpness, etc. etc.) you'd be hard pressed not to
get the results you're looking for. The wide range of controls and features
in these programs is excellent and if you've enough memory and have loaded
the large version of the software, switching between them (such as
if you are in the paint program and decide you want to increase the
picture's overall brightness in the process program) is seamlessly
achieved. Just press a button and you're now in the other module with
your picture still on the screen. 

To summarize, DCTV is a killer piece of work and, for a "1.0" software
release is very solid and full-featured. Two disks full of example
pictures are a good bonus.  For a $499 list price Ithink they could've
tossed in a tutorial videotape to get you started.  The manual (written
by three friends of mine, Bob Eller, Jim Meyer (.info magazine's DTP
columnist) and Dennis "Aloha Fonts" Hayes is not the fattest book
you've ever held in your hands but is well done, logically layed out,
and generally complete. (sorry... "laid out".. (slapping self)).

My local dealer (Creative) sells DCTV for $399. So a hundred buck discount
off list should be common with the mail order discounters. (not an
endorsement for Creative.. just a fact).

Sorry, Europeans and Oz folks... no PAL version yet. 

I'll try to field any questions about using DCTV if they're not too
terribly technical :)

We already have quite a few user-made DCTV format pix up on People/Link
for downloading. 

Oh one more thing.. the DCTV file format is a 736x482 hi-res picture.
Any standard "show" programcan display them. Without the DCTV connected
though you get a picture that looks something like patterened sandpaper..
rather useless :)

DCTV's software does not currently have any animation features itself
but separate DCTV pictures can be saved out, sequenced together into 
an .anim file with any program that can make those (Makeanim, BuildAnim,
Animation Station, Director, Animagic, etc. etc.) played back and viewed
in DCTV (NTSC) mode. So animation is not a problem. A short VistaPro
DCTV animation of Mount St. Helens rotating around is included on one
of the extra disks that come with the package.