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From: ali@rocky.STANFORD.EDU (Ali Ozer)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: VCR Info Summary
Message-ID: <664@rocky.STANFORD.EDU>
Date: Mon, 12-Oct-87 22:32:35 EDT
Article-I.D.: rocky.664
Posted: Mon Oct 12 22:32:35 1987
Date-Received: Wed, 14-Oct-87 05:16:16 EDT
Reply-To: ali@rocky.stanford.edu (Ali Ozer)
Organization: Stanford University Computer Science Department
Lines: 41

[]
A few days ago I posted several questions about VCRs and buying one that
I could use with the Amiga for digitizing, animation recording, etc...
Many people have replied; thanks to all who have! Several people have
also sent me mail requesting summaries; I have simply remailed them all
I got. In any case, the main point of all the replies I got was that
a 4-head VCR will NOT necessarily do everything I (and I imagine most other
Amiga owners who want to use the VCR with their Amigas) want. 

- First of all, a 4-head VCR will give you freeze frame, but not good enough
  to digitize. If you want to digitize VCR images with no problems,
  you need a digital VCR. Or you wait for NewTek to come out with the
  device they did Maxine with (a device that is rumored to allow DigiView
  to digitize images from a "normal" VCR).

- Secondly, a 4-head VCR might not be able to paste together short animations
  (3-5 seconds) to make a movie without some "fuzz" between the animation
  sequences. Most people agreed that a "flying erase head" is what you need,
  although the price range then moves up to $1000 or more. If you can't get
  a flying erase head VCR, then the next best thing is "back space editing,"
  in which case the VCR can be rewound while PAUSEd. 

- You need "audio-dub" if you want to create a movie from short animations
  and add a sound track. Most people agreed that audio-dub is the ability
  to record over the sound track without touching the video; but one person
  said audio-dub will *not* work on the Hi-Fi sound track. Audio-dub does
  not come with all VCRs.

Anyway, if you're like me & my roommate and want to buy a VCR mainly for use 
with the Amiga, then make sure you look at the VCR real carefully before you
buy it. If you're thinking of a 4-head VCR, then JVC and Zenith were two
names that were recommended (over RCA, Panasonic, and GE) for good recording
ability.

And, finally a question to Allen Hastings (who is on the net, no???):
Allen, what VCR did you use to create your movies? (Apocalypse Real Soon Now,
which we fully enjoyed at last FAUG meeting, for instance.) 

Ali Ozer, ali@rocky.stanford.edu