News scroller/TV on Amiga?

[-BobW-]

I've got this setup at work which toggels between a broadcast news station and a home built news scroller.  I did this with a ATI All-In-Wonder video card on a PeeCee.  About all I can say is it works, but I'm not very happy with it.

Back when I used my Amiga it was strictly for Games and writing papers for school.  I have zero experience with video on the Amiga.

On to the question...  What would it take to set something like this up on a legacy Amiga?  I'm thinking of using an old 1200 or 600.  What hardware or software would I need to aquire?

Here are the requirements:

1) Must be able to pass through a video signal.  The video source is coming from a cable news channel.

2) Must be able to display custom news in the form of text/graphics and possibly even video.

3) Needs to be able to switch automatically between the above sources on 30 minute intervals unless I can think of a better way to do it.

4) Needs to be as cheap as possible.

5) The output would be sent to 2 TV's at opposite ends of the facility.

Any help would be appreciated.

[leirbag28]

 I really have no idea what you are talking about..........But!  it sounds like an A1200 with 8 Megs and SCALA MM300 or 400 would help. Or even SCALA Info Channel

oh oh oh......and a genlock (Super Gen, or SuperGen SX)

[cgutjahr]

-BobW- wrote:
1) Must be able to pass through a video signal.  The video source is coming from a cable news channel.

2) Must be able to display custom news in the form of text/graphics and possibly even video.

3) Needs to be able to switch automatically between the above sources on 30 minute intervals unless I can think of a better way to do it.

4) Needs to be as cheap as possible.

This is exactly what "Scala Multimedia" was made for. The Amiga version was abondoned nearly 10 years ago, but the available versions should handle that easily.

Here's what you'll need (note that I'm living in Germany, used hardware may be more expensive in other countries, especially the US):

1. An A1200 (faster processor than other cheap Amigas, AGA chipset with up to 256 colours, can take standard Laptop HDs) - about 25 EUR/USD
2. A RAM expansion (Scala requires at least 2 MB of FastRAM) - 5-10 EUR/USD
3. A Genlock for mixing the Amiga and TV video signals - no idea about the price
4. Scala Multimedia (preferably Scala Infochannel as this version includes remote maintainance facilities - you'll probably need this to update the textfile containing the "custom news" from a remote computer)

You'll then use Scala to create a presentation that either displays a blank screen (which the genlock will replace with the TV video signal) or your "custom news" in any fancy way you can imagine.

Switching between the two displays can be done in various ways:

1. by a timer (display A for x minutes, display B for y minutes)
2. user interaction (i.e. click the mouse button to switch between the displays)
3. remote (Infochannel only)

Note that with this setup, you're limited to 256 colours and low resulutions (IIRC 736x566 interlaced is the typical Scala resolution) - should be sufficient for a simple text scroller though...

5) The output would be sent to 2 TV's at opposite ends of the facility.

The Amiga setup would just create one video signal, what you do with it (e.g. if you send it to Panama or whatever) is of no interest to your Amiga ;-)

[sir_inferno]

cgutjahr wrote:

5) The output would be sent to 2 TV's at opposite ends of the facility.

The Amiga setup would just create one video signal, what you do with it (e.g. if you send it to Panama or whatever) is of no interest to your Amiga ;-)

lmao  :lol:

[leirbag28]

cgutjahr wrote:

Note that with this setup, you're limited to 256 colours and low resulutions (IIRC 736x566 interlaced is the typical Scala resolution) - should be sufficient for a simple text scroller though...
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What on earth are you talking about? 736x 482 (or 566 in UK) is Braodcast quality S-Video resolution. It works marvelously if you know how.  and its not limited to 256 colors........Ham8 is 256,000 colors and looks excellent if using still images,.....if there appears to be any HAM fringing with the text ontop..simply save the image with the text included adn use the text and image as a single image.  you can save scripts as pictures with scala, or simply use a HAM8 paint program like Brilliance and antialis the text and save it as part of the pic and ther will be no fringing. But theres no need to use HAM8 at all..............not even 256 colors...you can use 64 and it will look great..........if only for text even 8 colors looks good AntiAliased.  SCALA is the Best SOftware for the Amiga............it can do more than you think. 10 times more! I keep discovering cool things all the time.


Every Amiga owner should have this if they still don't

[cgutjahr]

leirbag28 wrote:
What on earth are you talking about?

About the technical limits of the A1200/Scala combination. Actually, I thought the introduction ("With this setup..") would have been sufficient to establish that...

736x 482 (or 566 in UK) is Braodcast quality S-Video resolution. It works marvelously if you know how.

Yes, but Scala's (or the A1200's, to be precise) resolution is 736x566 interlaced, that's quite some difference.

and its not limited to 256 colors........Ham8 is 256,000 colors and looks excellent if using still images,.....if there appears to be any HAM fringing with the text ontop..simply save the image with the text included adn use the text and image as a single image.  you can save scripts as pictures with scala, or simply use a HAM8 paint program like Brilliance and antialis the text and save it as part of the pic and ther will be no fringing.

Please read the original posting again ("news scroller"), then go and make yourself familiar with Scala. No HAM8 I'm afraid.

But theres no need to use HAM8 at all..............not even 256 colors...you can use 64 and it will look great..........if only for text even 8 colors looks good AntiAliased.

That's why I said: "should be sufficient for a simple text scroller though...".

Could you please make yourself familiar with the concept of "paragraphs"? It's pretty hard to read your postings this way.

[-BobW-]

Thanks for the great replies!

I have a 1200 with an '030 and 8 megs of fast ram so I'm good as far as that goes.  Now I need to get my hands on a copy of SCALA and a gen lock.  I've seen both on Ebay fairly recently but I didn't have the sense to bid.

Man, the people at work are gonna {bleep} when they see an Amiga powering this system!  We are strictly a Windows 2000 shop.


Thanks!

[leirbag28]

cgutjahr wrote:
-----------------------------------------------------------
Please read the original posting again ("news scroller"), then go and make yourself familiar with Scala. No HAM8 I'm afraid.
---------------------------------------------------------


I have 4 copies of SCALA MM300 and I use this more than any program in the world........SCALA MM300 and MM400 do have HAM8!!  Just simply load any HAM8 picture as if it were a background.thats it!  now apply text (not recommended by SCALA)   or place the text on the HAM8 pic in True Brilliance or any paint package that can display HAM8, then save it as a pic. Its that simple.

 I was just using SCALA this very minute, then I tested a HAM8 picture...............and of course......It Works!

[leirbag28]

@BobW

 Make sure you get SCALA MM300 or MM400........NOT MM200 or anything less

Only:
 
SCALA MM300
SCALA MM400
SCALA InfoChannel

Try to get the ones that dont require a Dongle....but its ok if you dont.

[-BobW-]

How about an A600?  Would that run SCALA 300/400 at all?  I've been looking for an excuse to add an A600 to my collection.

[cgutjahr]

leirbag28 wrote:

I have 4 copies of SCALA MM300 and I use this more than any program in the world........SCALA MM300 and MM400 do have HAM8!!

BobW wants to do a news scroller, probably full screen (or near full screen), that's why HAM8 is not an option ("no HAM8, I'm afraid").

-BobW- wrote:
How about an A600? Would that run SCALA 300/400 at all? I've been looking for an excuse to add an A600 to my collection.

Sure it would, as long as you equip it with some FastRAM.

[-BobW-]

Cool, I'll start by getting a copy of Scala 400 and a Genlock.  I'll worry about which computer to use later

[leirbag28]

@BobW

Actually SCALA MM300 does work on the A600 but you need 3Megs.........extremely super difficult to get because you see........you need 2Megs chip and at least 1 meg FastRam which has to be through the PCMCIA port (An Apple Newton card will do the trick) or otherwise you have to get an Apollo 630 processor or Turbo 630 or Viper 630...........Even harder to come by.
 But actually on ebay i always find PCMCIA card but very expensive! even for 2Megs!

 I happen to have 3 Amiga 600's..one with 1megabyte........another with 3megabytes..and the last with an Apollo 630  33mhz and FPU and 32 megabytes with a 2Gigabyte PCMCIA card for Music, and a 40Gigabyte Hardrive............and of course SCALAMM300.....................

 Now I was thinking, that if you want to do a news scroller (I guess thats when text just scrolls down the bottom of the screen continuously?) then there is one program that might do this 10 times smoother than SCALA and works perfectly on an A600 with 2Megs.............and that program is called  BROADCAST TITLER 2.0  superb quality Character Generator..........it can disply up to 350 colors on an A600.this program is amazing..its not to be compared with SCALA because SCALA is a Full Multimedia Program and Broadcast Titler is just a Character Generator.........but it does it more nicely than SCALA.........especially the scrollers (herendous interface though, but you'll get used to it)

Either way if You go with SCALA, you cant lose.

Oh Yeah!  by the way.theres another program Like SCALA you may want to look at...........especially cuz its free now!  you can get it here on Amiga.Org its Called MEDIAPOINT.........I have been playing with it...........so far I don't like it but cant judge it yet really.

[leirbag28]

@BobW

 Hey Bob....I just noticed that you are in New York Dude!
I am in New York also..........Maybe I know you?

If I would have known you were in New York and if you would have asked earlier......I could have sold you an A3000 that I just sold for less than $60.00 with tons of stuff including SCALA MM400

[-BobW-]

@leirbag28

What part of New York?  I'm WAAAAY up north about 10 minutes from the Canadien boarder.

I was thinking about the 600 beacuse I thought it would be cool to use something that small.  I'll probably pick up a 1200 on ebay instead.  You can almost always find one there.

I'm not totally locked into the idea of a news scroller, it's just what I'm doing now with the PC.  Right now the scroller is black and white(Think Star Wars only not as nice).  I'll start off with something basic but I would use whatever SCALA could give me.