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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: AmigaBruno on February 16, 2013, 03:54:06 PM
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I've recently been doing graphics on my Amiga A500 with Deluxe Paint III, like I did years ago. I also plan to get a copy of Photon Paint soon, especially as I started with Photon Paint.
Of course, it would be much easier and quicker if I had a compatible graphics tablet, but finding one nowadays would be difficult, which has even made me consider trying to make one at some stage in the future.
I think it makes sense to assume that any such tablet would be plugged into the mouse/joystick port, because the software already expects input from that port.
I think I've read that the Wacom KT-0405-A KT0405A ArtPad 2 II 5" Graphics Tablet is compatible, but that uses the serial port. Looking on eBay, there are a few, but mainly for parts or not working and postage on these from the USA to the UK is high.
The Atari 8 bit graphics tablet plugs into a joystick port and I read that the Atari reads it as a pair of paddles. I think this may be compatible, but I'm not sure how paddles are different to joysticks.
Another tablet I remember from years ago is the Koala pad, which was compatible with various computers, but I'm not sure if it requires its own software.
I hope people will be able to advise me on this. It could be an interesting electronics project for me at some stage in the future. Meanwhile, I'll continue to to graphics more slowly with the mouse.
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Yes, I'm using an ArtPad II. It used to be connected to my Amiga 2000 and it worked (no pressure though, but I was fine with that). I was using a free driver off aminet.
I haven't tried to attach it to my A500 yet. When I switched from big-box Amigas to WinUAE for graphics work (much faster CPU for graphics processing) I moved the Wacom tablet to the PC, where it worked as well (with its own drivers).
There were native graphics tablets for Amiga, but they are hard to find.
As for the Koala Pad, it's too low-resolution for Amiga graphics (i.e. it has a number of X and Y sensors which are under the resolution of most Amiga screens. Also, I don't thing anyone ever wrote a driver for it to run on Amiga. Lastly, it's not great at finely sensing where your pen is - okay for coarse stuff (i.e. VIC-20, C64) but I doubt for Amiga.
PS: when I bought my ArtPad II off eBay I remember it was quite cheap, being the old serial kind, and it was brand new in a box, shrink-wrapped.
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Yes, I'm using an ArtPad II. It used to be connected to my Amiga 2000 and it worked (no pressure though, but I was fine with that). I was using a free driver off aminet.
I haven't tried to attach it to my A500 yet. When I switched from big-box Amigas to WinUAE for graphics work (much faster CPU for graphics processing) I moved the Wacom tablet to the PC, where it worked as well (with its own drivers).
There were native graphics tablets for Amiga, but they are hard to find.
As for the Koala Pad, it's too low-resolution for Amiga graphics (i.e. it has a number of X and Y sensors which are under the resolution of most Amiga screens. Also, I don't thing anyone ever wrote a driver for it to run on Amiga. Lastly, it's not great at finely sensing where your pen is - okay for coarse stuff (i.e. VIC-20, C64) but I doubt for Amiga.
PS: when I bought my ArtPad II off eBay I remember it was quite cheap, being the old serial kind, and it was brand new in a box, shrink-wrapped.
So, that confirms the Artpad II works with the Amiga. I don't know what the pressure would be used for.
You seem to know a bit about the Koala Pad, as you say it has a number of X and Y sensors. What do these sensors consist of?
I remember from using the Amiga years ago that it was the normal thing to just plug in any peripheral and it worked without a driver. It seemed that only printers required drivers, but on the PC drivers were always required. Why would a graphics tablet require a driver for use on the Amiga?
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pressure is used to determine the thickness of your brush. the harder you press, the thicker the line. this works very natural and something I wouldnt do without. (I have an a4 size tablet for my pc)
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pressure is used to determine the thickness of your brush. the harder you press, the thicker the line. this works very natural and something I wouldnt do without. (I have an a4 size tablet for my pc)
I see. Well, I'm only talking about Deluxe Paint and Photon Paint. In Deluxe Paint and from what I remember Photon Paint as well, you select the brush thickness from an on screen menu. Just because the input device is different won't change that.
I'm now reading this site about making a graphics tablet to get the general principles http://www.bongofish.co.uk/wacom/wacom_pt1.html .
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You seem to know a bit about the Koala Pad, as you say it has a number of X and Y sensors. What do these sensors consist of?
The Koala Pad acts as if it was a pair of variable resistors one in each direction. So when you touch the pad, there's an x and y resistance that corresponds to the point you touch. The paddle hardware in the computer reads that out as a pair of values. I'm more familiar with the Atari 8-bit machines. The paddles read from 0-255 which was greater than the screen resolution in color mode.
It makes me wonder though... the resolution limit was mainly a result of the computer. If you used a a/d converter with more resolution, say 10 bits, could you get more meaningful resolution out of the Koala Pad? It's still a rather small drawing area though.
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Maybe if you could find the serial protocol for one of the tablets supported on the Amiga you emulate it using an android tablet (with usb serial port converter)
for an Amiga 1200 or something with TCP/IP you could go wireless and forget about serial...
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The Koala Pad acts as if it was a pair of variable resistors one in each direction. So when you touch the pad, there's an x and y resistance that corresponds to the point you touch. The paddle hardware in the computer reads that out as a pair of values. I'm more familiar with the Atari 8-bit machines. The paddles read from 0-255 which was greater than the screen resolution in color mode.
It makes me wonder though... the resolution limit was mainly a result of the computer. If you used a a/d converter with more resolution, say 10 bits, could you get more meaningful resolution out of the Koala Pad? It's still a rather small drawing area though.
This sounds great! I don't understand it all at the moment, because I need to study some more about electronics, but I think this will put me on the right track.
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This sounds great! I don't understand it all at the moment, because I need to study some more about electronics, but I think this will put me on the right track.
Essentially the Koala Pad was exactly like having a pair of rotary game paddles hooked up to the joystick input on your C64 or VIC-20. In fact, if you hooked paddle controllers to any program that used the Koala Pad, you could "draw" in a manner of speaking (like an etch-a-sketch). One paddle would provide the X co-ordinate, the other the Y co-ordinate.
The Koala Pad returned an analogue resistance value to the input on the joystick port. This was sampled by the VIC(?) chip on the VIC 20, and (maybe) the SID chip on the C64 to convert it to a digital value it would report to the program.
I'm not sure if the Amiga can do analogue to digital conversions on the joystick ports. I've never seen paddle controllers used on a an Amiga.
It's certainly possible to hook a Koala to an Amiga if you have the knowledge of how to do analogue to digital sampling on one of the Amiga's ports.
And Deluxe Paint and some other programs did in fact have pressure sensitivity (from some of the Amiga specific tablets) if you had a tablet that was specifically supported by Deluxe Paint ---- I think the tablet for the Amiga was called SummaSketch or perhaps that was the name of the company.
As for the Amiga's lack of drivers vs. PC....well....you still needed drivers on the Amiga side, it was just that the hardware could be recognized by the Amiga without setting IRCs and figuring out hardware conflicts, etc.
You can't just plug a graphics card into an Amiga, for instance, without installing RTG software (which is essentially a driver).
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Amazon has them:
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Pad-II-Graphics-Erasing/dp/B001IQ3XF4
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Amazon has them:
http://www.amazon.com/Art-Pad-II-Graphics-Erasing/dp/B001IQ3XF4
That's about what I paid on eBay.
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I could be wrong, but building an interface between modern tablets and an Amiga doesn't sound /too/ difficult. Are there any current drivers on the Amiga that allow you to use analog paddles in place of a mouse? If so, the absolute-positioning thing is solved. Most cheap active USB tablets are HID compliant (ie: Aiptek), Microchip have some small microcontrollers with USB capability and 12bit ADC, as well as example HID libraries for a few dollars.
Couple that with a couple of I2C/SPI ~500K Digital Potentiometers, and you should be able to throw together a HID to "Analog" converter, which will crap out an X/Y resistance value for an X/Y position on the tablet. I'd have no idea how to action pressure sensitivity though, as I believe the Amiga only has two Analog inputs per port.
I guess if you wanted to sacrifice absolute positioning and opt for relative positioning (like a mouse) to gain pressure sensitivity, you could use the V/H/VQ/HQ pulse inputs to move the cursor, and use the paddle input for pen pressure
...Of course this all assumes an off-the-shelf driver/application exists for this type of behaviour
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I'm not sure if the Amiga can do analogue to digital conversions on the joystick ports. I've never seen paddle controllers used on a an Amiga.
The hardware is there to read analog resistance on the Amiga's joystick ports. I've never seen anyone use it either.... although I think some of the 3-button mice used the analog inputs as the 3rd button.... after all, a button is just a variable resistor with only 2 values... 0 and infinity. ;-)
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I thought I should let everyone know that after all this time, I've recently managed to buy a classic Amiga graphics tablet from eBay, which has arrived today, Wednesday, October 28. This tablet is called a "Tabby" by Micrograf, with installation software by Datel. I'll let you know how I get on with it. I think this will greatly accelerate my production of artwork, as well as improve the quality of the artwork. I hope to transfer and upload some artwork I've already done quite soon, possibly on a dedicated website. I have found out how to transfer files between my Amiga A1200 CF card hard drive and a PC hard drive using WinUAE, but this doesn't seem to work under Linux with FS-UAE.
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Ive found using PCMCIA port with CF card to be a very nice way of transfering files.
No need for WinUAE, just open windows from CF card directly in Windows.
Need a CF card reader on the PC too, but I guess you already got that.
http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=42&products_id=440
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Ive found using PCMCIA port with CF card to be a very nice way of transfering files.
No need for WinUAE, just open windows from CF card directly in Windows.
Need a CF card reader on the PC too, but I guess you already got that.
http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=42&products_id=440
I've already got the PCMCIA CF card reader, but still haven't bought a CF card to go with it because I wasn't sure which ones were compatible. I then looked on my eBay Purchase History and I think it said Transcend cards are the compatible, but now I can't view this item in my Purchase History anymore.
Unfortunately, I've just tested my new graphics tablet and found out that so far I can't get it to work. I first tried it from within Deluxe Paint IV AGA and got the error message "Can't open tablet.library". I also tried some software on the accompanying floppy disk, but that doesn't respond to input from the tablet. There is no file called tablet.library on the floppy disk. I searched on Aminet, but there doesn't seem to be any file called tablet.library. I hope someone can help me find out what to do next.
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Unfortunately, I've just tested my new graphics tablet and found out that so far I can't get it to work. I first tried it from within Deluxe Paint IV AGA and got the error message "Can't open tablet.library". I also tried some software on the accompanying floppy disk, but that doesn't respond to input from the tablet. There is no file called tablet.library on the floppy disk. I searched on Aminet, but there doesn't seem to be any file called tablet.library. I hope someone can help me find out what to do next.
http://www.bigbookofamigahardware.com/bboah/product.aspx?id=778
See last comment on this thread. Person seems to have contact with the original author? http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?57175-Micrograf-Tabby-Graphics-Tablet
(http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?57175-Micrograf-Tabby-Graphics-Tablet)
Or maybe try reaching out to the person who bought it on this site. ;)
(http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?57175-Micrograf-Tabby-Graphics-Tablet)
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Does anyone remember "The Wiz" drawing tablet? I think it connected on the serial port?
and it had drivers...
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Few weeks back I purchased a serial port Art pad II from ebay for $17 USD. It was missing the power supply but it was a common power supply I found at the thrift store for 50 cents)
(http://www.danschallock.com/amiga/artpadII.jpg)
I have not tested it yet, but I bought it after researching what wacom tablets are supported by FormAldiHyd.lha which is freely available on Aminet.
According to that programs description it does support pressure sensitive features provided the Amiga program does (they list Art Effect as an example).
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FormAldiHyd V2.3 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ FormAldiHyd is a driver intended for the Aldi/Medion/Tevion MD 9310 graphic tablet and WacomIV compatible tablets (Graphire, ArtPad, A3, A4, A5 and PenPartner). Experimental support for SummaGraphics compatible and AceCad tablets has been added with this release but remains untested. This program has been out some time now and has proven to be stable. It fully works with: - AipTek HyperPen 6000 (maybe other boards aswell, still unconfirmed). - AipTek HyperPen 8000 - Aldi/Medion MD 9310 and Aldi/Tevion LT 9310 It works partly with: - Wacom IV compatible (Graphire, ArtPad, A3, A4, A5 and PenPartner) - SummaGraphics compatible boards (unconfirmed). - AceCad boards (unconfirmed) It does currently NOT work with: - Wacom V series (Intuos) (might be added on demand) Starting with V2.2 it finally works with MFC and IOBlix serial ports! This is probably the only tablet driver that correctly works with all known (MUI) applications and at the same time has full pressure support. Some portions of the code have been ported from the xf86HyperPen.c source by Roland Jansen and Christian Herzog , who has taken over development of xf86HyperPen.c. The experimental WacomIV support has been ported from the xf86Wacom.c source by Frederic Lepied . Short list of features: - Comes both as CLI-only/WB (no GUI) and MUI version. - Can be run either in 9600 or 19200 baud mode (HyperPen only). - Supports pressure, which can be scaled to your requirements (e.g. with ArtEffect). - Versatile support of the functions keys at top of the tablet. - Can play sounds on button presses to make clicks audible. - Supports a threshold value for the left mouse button. - Middle and right mouse button can be swapped for stylus. - Mouse and Stylus can use different active areas. - Mouse can be used in relative mode. A mode for left handed people is also available. - Automatic detection of stylus and mouse. - Tablet orientation can be changed by swapping x and y coordinates. - Lots of different resolution can be chosen (up to 3048 LPI!). - Fully compatible with MUI applications. - Even works with low level software that reads the input events directly (Cinema4D, MagicMenu, etc.) Usage ~~~~~ There are two different programs for you to choose: FormAldiHyd - tablet driver with MUI interface (interactive) Formalin - CLI only/Workbench version (argument/ToolTypes driven) Please send me an email if you use this program. Thanks to those who have done so already.
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It seems like it would be hard to beat a $17 dollar price point if it works as described.
;)
ugh. Sorry for being lazy and scaling down the tablet picture and hosting it.
Uggh part 2: I couldn't stand it, I scaled it down. :)
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So it seems from Oldsmobile_Mike's post that it's NOT pressure sensitive and may not require tablet.library. I want to use it from inside Deluxe Paint. It comes with software that I can't get to work. I should point out that the pen is attached by a wire and has buttons on it. Here are some pics. I wonder what to do now?
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It comes with software that I can't get to work.
Obviously I'm not familiar with this particular piece of hardware, but from the screenshots shown on the Amibay link it looks like it should have a disk called "tabbyControl", with an icon for "Install-TABBY", and then an application called "TabbyControl", and an AmigaGuide help file that may provide some assistance.
Did you receive the disk with the install file shown in those pictures? That's what I'd start with - what exactly happens when you try to run the installer?
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I have turned the Amiga off and unplugged it while I get read to go out, but it seems there is nothing called installer and nothing with the file name you mentioned. There are icons to turn it on or off, but these are called something else, possibly "Genius tablet". There's some software showing a graphic screen representing it, but the pen or stylus looks different.
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There are icons to turn it on or off, but these are called something else, possibly "Genius tablet".
It sounds like you have the wrong disk. In case you are unable to see them, the screenshots in the link to the Amibay site I posted earlier seem to show the software you should have. I'll copy them here in case you are unable to see them:
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This looks nothing like my disk, so that's the problem! Now, where can I get a copy of this software? I've already searched, but can't find it.
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This tablet works fine with Amiga ArtPadII KT-0405-R using Wacom drivers.
Not mine: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Wacom-ArtPad-II-Tablet-NO-PEN-Untested-KT-0405-R-Intuos-Graphics-Used-Good-/171721863027
Also if you need a pen this cheap Samsung will work.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/White-OEM-Touch-Stylus-For-Samsung-Galaxy-Note-S-Pen-N7000-I9220-/111349191148?hash=item19ecedd1ec
The Pen is an OK replacement, a little too slim for my taste.
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I think what he's saying is, you may have better luck just buying a different tablet and pen, than in tracking down the correct driver disk for yours. ;)
Maybe register on Amibay and message the guy in that thread I posted a link to earlier? :)
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So it seems from Oldsmobile_Mike's post that it's NOT pressure sensitive and may not require tablet.library. I want to use it from inside Deluxe Paint. It comes with software that I can't get to work. I should point out that the pen is attached by a wire and has buttons on it. Here are some pics. I wonder what to do now?
I have an Artpad tablet and the software basically takes over the mouse pointer in workbench and inside any other software that you run. It never needed tablet.library in Dpaint to work inside Dpaint,
Does the tablet move the mouse pointer in Workbench? is there a configuration inside the icon tooltypes to specify the serial port that its connected to? The serial port unit number?
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So far I've had no sign of life out of my Micrograf Tabby at all. Of course I mean that it doesn't move the mouse pointer or do anything at all.
The seller has now admitted that in spite of describing it as "used" and claiming that it worked,he actually found it in his loft and didn't have an Amiga to test it on.
This tablet came with what looks like a PC to Amiga serial adaptor. I have just unplugged it from the adaptor and checked that the plug looks the same as an Amiga mouse/Atari joystick plug. I think the next stage is to plug it in to an Amiga mouse port and see if it does anything. I could try it on my A500 Plus, which I hardly use. Some time ago I plugged in an Atari Touch Tablet, which didn't damage my mouse port, but as soon as Workbench loaded I got an error message saying that it wasn't supported.
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I think the next stage is to plug it in to an Amiga mouse port and see if it does anything.
Dude. No.
I don't know why this is so hard. Read the links I provided. Look at the pictures. It is a PC tablet. This is a 9-pin PC serial port. At best it will do nothing. At worst it may damage your mouse port in unforseen ways. YOU NEED THE PROPER AMIGA DRIVER DISK AS SHOWN IN THE SCREENSHOTS (http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?57175-Micrograf-Tabby-Graphics-Tablet&p=568944&viewfull=1#post568944) AND MENTIONED IN THE BBOAH ARTICLE (http://www.bigbookofamigahardware.com/bboah/product.aspx?id=778).
If you are unsuccessful in tracking down that disk from anyone on the forums, the next-best suggestion I can give you is register on Amibay. Contact the person from this post (http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?57175-Micrograf-Tabby-Graphics-Tablet&p=584904&viewfull=1#post584904), who says they might be able to get in touch with the person who wrote the software.
Or just buy a different tablet that comes with the software you need or works with software available on Aminet.
#Facepalm #INeedMoreCoffeeToDealWithThisForumToday ;)
The seller has now admitted that in spite of describing it as "used" and claiming that it worked,he actually found it in his loft and didn't have an Amiga to test it on.
ROFL. ;)
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So far I've had no sign of life out of my Micrograf Tabby at all. Of course I mean that it doesn't move the mouse pointer or do anything at all.
The seller has now admitted that in spite of describing it as "used" and claiming that it worked,he actually found it in his loft and didn't have an Amiga to test it on.
This tablet came with what looks like a PC to Amiga serial adaptor. I have just unplugged it from the adaptor and checked that the plug looks the same as an Amiga mouse/Atari joystick plug. I think the next stage is to plug it in to an Amiga mouse port and see if it does anything. I could try it on my A500 Plus, which I hardly use. Some time ago I plugged in an Atari Touch Tablet, which didn't damage my mouse port, but as soon as Workbench loaded I got an error message saying that it wasn't supported.
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I have now contacted the user on Amibay, as well as a large Amiga dealer on eBay about getting the right driver. The dealer actually sold a Tabby disk just before I got my tablet! I suppose the reason why the Atari Touch Tablet didn't ruin my Amiga mouse port is because it was designed to plug into an Atari joystick style port.
I notice there are six programs on Aminet that come up in a search for "tablet driver". I wonder if any of them is compatible with the Micrograf Tabby?
The way things stand at least I've got a PC to Amiga serial adaptor.
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I wrote the driver for the Amiga for the Tabby graphics tablet - I'll resurrect what I can find and post it here :)
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I wrote the driver for the Amiga for the Tabby graphics tablet - I'll resurrect what I can find and post it here :)
Awesome! Many dancing bananas for you, sir. :) :banana: :banana: :banana:
Perhaps if you'd be willing to release the software to the public, someone could upload it to Aminet so that it would be available to future users, as well?
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I wrote the driver for the Amiga for the Tabby graphics tablet - I'll resurrect what I can find and post it here :)
Thank you so much! I hope this will enable me to use it within DPaint, which is all I really want. :drink::drink:
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I wrote the driver for the Amiga for the Tabby graphics tablet - I'll resurrect what I can find and post it here :)
Wow! That's what I'm talking about. 5 more bananas! :banana::banana::banana::banana::banana:
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Here we go then, driver and short story here http://www.binarydevotion.com/?p=213
If I remember rightly it was quite a CPU hog so play with the priority as appropriate. Try the different modes too, as the tablet is quite jittery so I tried to model the effect of the pointer being attracted to the tablet coordinates by a spring (high initial acceleration getting slower), "gravity" (the tablet coordinates were "downhill" and the pointer would roll towards them) and filtered. I think. Need to reinstall my Amiga to check all this :)
I should probably rewrite this with better knowledge... but this works.
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And I'll put this onto Aminet, too :D - have reached out to the aminet admins as this includes commodore "installer", which Micrograf received a license to distribute but I'm not sure whether can be included on Aminet...
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Fantastic! Hope this is helpful to the OP. Great story, glad you made a little money for your work, and even more so that you're still around to help folks out. :D
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Essentially the Koala Pad was exactly like having a pair of rotary game paddles hooked up to the joystick input on your C64 or VIC-20. In fact, if you hooked paddle controllers to any program that used the Koala Pad, you could "draw" in a manner of speaking (like an etch-a-sketch). One paddle would provide the X co-ordinate, the other the Y co-ordinate.
The Koala Pad returned an analogue resistance value to the input on the joystick port. This was sampled by the VIC(?) chip on the VIC 20, and (maybe) the SID chip on the C64 to convert it to a digital value it would report to the program.
I'm not sure if the Amiga can do analogue to digital conversions on the joystick ports. I've never seen paddle controllers used on a an Amiga.
It's certainly possible to hook a Koala to an Amiga if you have the knowledge of how to do analogue to digital sampling on one of the Amiga's ports.
And Deluxe Paint and some other programs did in fact have pressure sensitivity (from some of the Amiga specific tablets) if you had a tablet that was specifically supported by Deluxe Paint ---- I think the tablet for the Amiga was called SummaSketch or perhaps that was the name of the company.
As for the Amiga's lack of drivers vs. PC....well....you still needed drivers on the Amiga side, it was just that the hardware could be recognized by the Amiga without setting IRCs and figuring out hardware conflicts, etc.
You can't just plug a graphics card into an Amiga, for instance, without installing RTG software (which is essentially a driver).
I use an analogue joystick with the the the programs that support the option, so Amigas can "see" a potentiometer from game ports, only requires a digital to analogue adapter cable.
Chris
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Well done! I've just downloaded and unarchived that on my laptop running Linux and read the documentation. I plan to install it on my Amiga A1200 later today. I hope to post some screenshots soon.
Of course, after installation I may well find that the Tabby itself doesn't work because of physical damage, but I'm now a member of a club which makes, fixes and modifies things, so I can take it over to there, plug my Amiga A1200 into an LCD TV via SCART and we can get it working. I also saw a Wacom tablet in their premises, but I don't know how old it is or if it's compatible.
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Good luck :D
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Here we go then, driver and short story here http://www.binarydevotion.com/?p=213
If I remember rightly it was quite a CPU hog so play with the priority as appropriate. Try the different modes too, as the tablet is quite jittery so I tried to model the effect of the pointer being attracted to the tablet coordinates by a spring (high initial acceleration getting slower), "gravity" (the tablet coordinates were "downhill" and the pointer would roll towards them) and filtered. I think. Need to reinstall my Amiga to check all this :)
I should probably rewrite this with better knowledge... but this works.
What a brilliant website that is! Going to enjoy reading that tonight. :)
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Back in the days (ca. 1993) I wrote a driver for serial "digitizer" (tablet without pressure sensor) and had adapted it to send DPaintIV commands from a a toolbar (the tablet allowed for a pice of printetd paper below its transparent surface).
All aimed at commercial project which eventually fell through.
No I don't have the sources anymore, but the protocol was pretty straightforward.