Newtek's VT5 and Amiga OS 4.1?

[Crom00]

The VT for pc uses windows and directX, the Host CPU power and the power of the AGP or PCIE graphics card to do the video effect transitions. There has never been a mac version becuase of the non standard Qaurtz graphics engine or whatever it's called. Too risky, another api to program for. Apple could simply make the toaster unsuable with a software update. Remember Apple competes with NewTek for the desktop video marketplace.

Just look at what happened to the Matrox RT2 dv external adpater for MAc. A great unit compatible with final cut, accelerated transtions, realtime DV editing, outout to a second VGA and NSTC monitor. It extended the uses of an entery level G4 quite well...As apple updated osX compatiblity was not insured leaving many with a $1500 doorstop, forcing folks to purchase a mac with DUAL g4's or better for realtime effects.

I use SPEEDEDIT on my macbook unibody runningXP. It's essentially VT5 without the live switching.

[Crom00]

I don't think Newtek will never ever port anything to the Amiga. We should be happy they supported the Toaster - flyer folks as long as they did.

[Crom00]

With technology today you I'm sure can make a toaster VT4000 class device live on just one chip. Maybee an FPGA or something. If you look at the VT4 for pc there are Altera chips on it, I think thats an FPGA or an maybe it's what'scalled an AISIC (if I remember corretly, probably wrong).

[Crom00]

Funny how you have all the Asian knock off or work-alike $80 mp3/camera/game player radio ipod thingy devices out there on EBAY and inner city cell phone stores....

LOL!... They surely outdo the A4000 and TOASTER 4000 in terms of CPU power. They already have 24 bit color? Heck 15 year old $10 VGA card outdid the AGA chipset...

 Slap an FPGA with all the Toaster circuits and code bits. Add breakout video i/o cable and viola... an, IPOD Video Toaster...lol!

Aladdin 4D could provide all the 3d graphics...

[Crom00]

Newtek's Crown jewel these days seems to be the Tricaster. They're popping up quite a lot.

As far as editing is concerned Final cut, Avid, and Adobe Premiere are Kings. Just like 3dsMax and Maya are kings of the 3DWorld.

Still, Lightwave and the modern Video Toaster pop up everywhere. Unfortunatley, more often than not mentioning NewTek get you that "oh yeah... that company.." remark. Yet anything Apple touches appears to become blessed.

SpeedEDIT was VTEdit unbundled from the Video Toaster. It's called SpeedEDIT becuase it's fast in that you don't have to transcode any video, (supports most every video format PC and MAC) wheras Final Cut, Avid, Preimiere have to transcode the video into another codec for use in their editors.

Even so, SpeedEDIT is marketed as another tool for editors to add to their arsenal, not a Final Cut killer.

[Crom00]

GTo understand why the VT4 will never work in a Sam, realize that the VT4 card itself is a high quality capture card for uncompressed video.

It does not speed up or accelerate this process with GPU or custom chip accelerated fuctions...

The transitions FX, drive controllers and "uncompressed video capability" rely on the host systems CPU power, ram and disk speed. This approach was taken to make us of commodity priced PC hardware and make the VT4 system easily upgradeable via software (unline the vt2000/4000)

The card they sell today is slightly revised version of the Vt2/Vt3 cards from like 7 years ago.

You're thinking about the original Amiga Toaster and Flyer card where the 2 cards worked in tandem, the flyer had 3 scsi controllers, I/0 hardware etc and LOTs of custome chips to make it happen in conjuction with ecs/AGA.

So back then becuase soooo much was done with the Flyer and Toaster 4000 cards, you only needed a 25 mghtz setup.

Really there's soooo much going on when you run the VT5 (compared to the old Amiga versions...) it's crazy, when you think about it. If you're in VTedit it's constanly updating the timeline. Built in realtime Vectorscope... Lightwave multitasks, etc... IVGA can capture video from another PC or MAC via ethernet. All of this is possible due to the use of Windows and muti-Ghz setups.

mine is a dual xeon 3.4 gthz 5 gig ram HP XW8000 setup.

I love the "Amiga Way" of working but so much would have to be added to OS4 from scratch.. When I think about it...well I scratch my head in confusion as to why you'd want to go through the effort?

Get a firewire interface working and that alone will keep you busy and most folks quite happpy.

[Crom00]

It's no longer about the Wintel vs. Amiga software philosphy. Newtek have skilled efficient programmers (Amiga veterans to boot...) who know how to code & make use of every last bit of juice a system can offer.

Comparing the VT Amiga series to the PC in terms of functionality is apples to oranges...The PC Toaster has soooo muck more going on and the CPU and it's intstruction sets are being used extensively.

I've spent many hours on VT4/5, Amiga Toaster Flyer, Tricaster AND SpeedEDIT so my position comes from way too much money spent on all this stuff.

Love the Amiga but there's no way you can get modern day functionality of PC VT4 or Tricaster on the currently available Amiga solutions.

It's evlolved way beyond that era.

[Crom00]

Pyromania wrote:
Again the solution here is to adapt the open source Amiga Video Toaster Flyer software to work with the new VT PCI card.

And would you have as much functionality as the PC version?
It's a cool idea, but I see todays Windows and it's robust OS of available tools as an advantage. Yes, XP and Vista crash, I loathe MS, etc. But modern tools for modern jobs.

Running that on a Sam would throw a Monkey Wrench into my workflow. Now I have to switch between AFter Effects. Maya, Lightwave and 3ds Max running on another PC and bring that content to an Amiga? Via what drive setup? U320 scsi array external box? Esata Raid? Remember I want to continue to work uncompressed...

The benefit of the PC toaster is that you get all your content from all apps into the VT4. WITHOUT switching back and forth. I used to do this with Lightwave on a PC and A VT4000T Flyer setup using Jazz drives. I'm not going back to that mess.

I think it's fun idea for tinkerers and fantics but anyone making a business out of it would not do it.

[Crom00]

Exactly bloodline...

How many folks here have actually tried to edit projects on a deadline using modern vs. Amiga VTFlyer setups?

Trust me, once you've used a modern editing setup going back to the Toaster Flyer (even though it was good for the time) is like moving backwards, it's like trying to edit video on a museum relic. I loved my Flyer setup but when I saw a demo of the VT4 or Final Cut and the Matrox RT, heck even I-Movie, I said...this is the future.

Editing on vintage hardware is great for an exercise in Nostalgia and Massocism.

All that being said. VT4000 flyer functionality in an Ipod- Iphone sized device would kick butt. A streaming version would become lenendary... A paradigm shift type product as mentioned way back in the Video Toaster: Revolution video tape.

[Crom00]

Yes the flyer was really easy to teach. Had 2 systems A4000T's. I used to have interns or freelacners just come in and digitize footage all day and trim the footage for me to edit. I was able to teach them everything they needed to know. Did the same with IMovie too.

Adding a timeline to the Flyer that allowed full control of the audio clips would have been great. I never used more than the your Basic Timeline add on. I know there were plugin solutions, never got around to them.

You know a Toaster Flyer  4000, 3 live cameras, VTR or PC with video out,  A pc laptop with a analog to DV bridge should be able to switch and stream live video via flash medica encoder? pretty cool...

I'd rather use a Tricaster or VT5 though. But I'd also tinker with an open Video Toaster style setup. My whole thing is, that new Amiga hardware (sam440, etc) is ridiculously priced to the point that only the extreme Amiga hobbyist would care. Yes I am a member of that faternity, but I have my limits.

I think it'd make more sense to port it to linux as we'd be able to run it on ASUS EEPC tiny laptops with a USB video digitizer. Now we're talkin'

[Crom00]

If you're doing professional video you need the ability to capture ANALOG video sources. Especially if you're doing live switching. Even a show like Rachel Ray actually uses "higer end" Pro-sumer video cameras and they switch of those cameras as sources.

Many of us use the ANALOG inputs as there's a latency issue using firewire for a switch so you'd need higher end cameras with SDI.

Betacam SP is still widely used. Like any pro you need many tools to get the job done. To infer that everyone is totally digital is not correct. We DO digitize the video once then from that point on it remains digital as a AVI or Quictime file or back to any of the flavors of Digital tape.

Once I was done with my flyer projects I'd capture it via a G4 mac with Final cut using an addon YC card or just save it out to a mini-DV deck.


All this talk about Amigas and video will have me lug in my A1200 to demo for students who don't understand what interlace flicker is, NTSC or HD to them it's either TV or computer monitor. Once I show them the NTSC flickering workbench screen they'll get the whole scanline NTSC thing. If they're good I'll let them play Super Stardust.