Myths And Magic By Michael "Aussie" Holten

'day all,


What a Show...

First off, a big thanks you to the organizers of the San Diego Symposium (Lively Computers) and Gateway Computer Show St Louis (Bob Sharp). An awesome job, and the greatest spirit at both events. It was terrific to get together with so many folks/users/mates, both in classes, and in the pub... we had some terrific brainstorming sessions in there. Cheers to the lot of you!

These shows/events are also a great time to get together with my developer mates and "shoot the breeze". Bill, Ray, Jeff and I, have all shared common tools and helped each other. We are also sharing ideas that are now expanding radically! Congratulations also to NewTek. Their new pricing will stir up the video world, to be sure. Their whole team seems to be very settled in now, down in Texas. I bet the helicopter flying is just fine.

Welcome the expanded OZware staff...

Recently we have added two fine folks to the OZware staff. Janice who is helping Erica in the monstrous tasks of the office, and Paul Lara, who joins us as Publicist. Both of these folks lift the pressure, add years to our lifetime, take us to the next level, and join us as friends. Cheers to them, and may their efforts benefit us all (no doubt).

Stop Crouton Download...

Having fun seeing the stop crouton in your project? Download the file in this month's Myths & Magic, and you'll see it easily. A colorful, public-domain crouton, from OZware (for A4000 systems.)

Other folks...

I also include some words of advice from a few distinguished Flyer users. Their tips may well help someone out! Keep it up.

Cheers, Aussie


Alert, 4.2 OZ-Note croutons must now follow visuals



With Flyer 4.2 (and with Co-Pilot Audio & Video) we included a set of Note Croutons that allow you to place notes in a Flyer project. These notes are similar to the "Blank" crouton which is located in your effects/control drawer. These blank croutons used to be able to be placed anywhere in your project without affecting playback in any way. Not any more...

4.2 apparently has changed things, and the "Blank" crouton (and our OZ-Notes and Scene markers) can no longer just be anywhere. They must be placed to follow a visual clip (i.e. a Video clip, Flyer Still, Framestore, Switcher etc.) If you place them after an effect then the project will give you an alert when you try to play. Move the note slightly so that it precedes the effect and you will be fine.

The same rule applies at the beginning of a project. If you want a note (such as a scene marker) as the first crouton, then you need to place a visual crouton (like Switcher Black) just before the note. I have no idea why NewTek changed this, and it doesn't appear in any of the listed 4.2 "features".

Alert, Boot Amiga won't boot past colored screens
(from Steve Collins) When the Amiga boots, it goes through a number of colored screens. If the computer fails to boot, then the colored screen may indicate where something failed. Each color means a different thing.

Hopefully no one ever needs this info (right!)
Light gray - all tests have been passed
Red - ROM error
Green - Chip RAM problem
Blue - Custom Chips error
Yellow - 680x0 detected error before software trapped it.


Effect New Stop Crouton - Download
The Stop (effect) crouton is very handy and saves hours of waiting. But sometimes they are hard to see when scanning through your project. Not any more. If you are using the Amiga 4000 then add this and you'll never miss it again. You can see this 60 feet away on a stormy night.



Download this file (Stop.i) and drop it in your Effects/Control drawer, overwriting the old Stop.i

Flyer Edit to crouton with Flyer Stills
(from Myron Achtman) If you have a problem uses NewTek's tool "edit to crouton" or "edit to all audio" with FLYER STILLS try the following: First, set all of your Flyer Stills globally to a long duration, say 1 minute. Now stills will cut fine with the NewTek tool. (Always save your project first)

Flyer Restoring stuck arrows in control panel
(from Bob Andersen) Sometimes when you have a clip's control panel open, the small arrows next to the IN and OUT points get stuck. They will only step one step at a time. If so, click on the PLAY gadget (or crouton image) in the control panel, then click on STOP next to it. That should reset your stuck arrows.

Video Hot video levels affect audio when digitizing
One user called in reporting that bright video levels were distorting his audio. He had digitized sound and video but his audio kept sounding bad on certain shots. Then he noticed that the clips that had problems had highlighted reflections on the chrome on some automobiles in the shot. These highlights went past 100 IRE on his waveform monitor. He lowered his TBC video gain and re-digitized again, with perfect audio now. He experimented and is convinced of his findings.

Some TBC's clip everything above 100 IRE automatically, while others let you dial off the scale. Many of us are also aware that a "too hot title" makes audio buzz when a video is played back to a TV through an RF connector. I guess a similar thing can happen when digitizing on the Flyer with certain TBCs.


A Collection of Installation Notes for Flyer 4.2
The most recent Flyer update (version 4.2) shipped from NewTek last year. (Actually, a number of folks happily carry on in 4.1.) For a part of this issue of Myths and Magic, I will re-quote some postings from NewTek dignitaries (without having asked their permission.) Hopefully, this may help someone in need. These notes all come from NewTek, so if you have questions, please call THEM.

Flyer 4.2 Install: 68030 minimum
Apparently, you must have a 68030 accelerator (or better) installed for Flyer 4.2 to work.

Flyer 4.2 Install: Put Away icons on Workbench
Make sure that you have "put away" any Flyer/Toaster icons left out on the workbench screen before starting the installation

Flyer 4.2 Install: Update from 4.1B or 4.1D?
The 4.2 installation is ideally updating from Flyer 4.1D2cA (got all those letters right?) If you are still using (or went back to using) 4.1B then you are still okay. 4.1D2cA is not required for the 4.2 update, but it will prevent a potential problem. The problem is for Flyers with only a partial or no serial number stored in them. This would be fixed with 4.1D2cA since it would have hit the same problem.

Flyer 4.2 Install: Test Serial number first
If you do not have 4.1D2cA installed already on your machine, then do the following prior to installing 4.2c. Place your 4.2 install disk (the floppy disk) into a disk drive and type the following into a shell window --- df0:c/serialnum read (assuming the drive is df0:) Then press 'Enter'.

If it returns a -1 or partial number, then you should call NewTek Tech Support (1-210-341-8444). Next verify your serial number by calling NewTek Customer Support Dept. (1-800-843-8934). Then store the serial number with df0:c/serialnum "your serial number here"

This is an IMPORTANT step to prevent damage to the Flyer card and is designed to make sure that boards with new chips don't get the wrong software.

Flyer 4.2 Install: Launching Flyer gives error -1
When the Flyer 4.2 Update software installs, but launching of the Flyer fails with error -1.... This can be caused if some cards have invalid (!) serial numbers. Once again, use the SerialNum program as stated above.

Flyer 4.2 Install: Previous Version message
If you get a message that a previous version of software is installed on the machine, ignore (!) There is a slim chance that it could crash the installation. If this occurs, reboot and start installation again

Flyer 4.2 Install: Third Party Drawer
Make sure that you check out the Third Party drawer included on your 4.2 CD. The Flyer 4.2 installation may have moved the drawer into the NewTek drawer, or you can look at it in the CD itself. Some of these files might need to be moved to other locations to use them, so read the "read-me" files so that you don't miss out on these added tools.

Flyer 4.2 Install: Extra Workbench files
On some systems, the 4.2 installation is duplicating many workbench files and placing duplicates inside an extra drawer buried in your Libs drawer. Open a shell and type DIR LIBS:

If you see an extra directory inside of libs: then you have duplicate files that apparently can be removed, freeing up space on your Workbench partition. There are no drawers normally inside of LIBS:

Cheers, Aussie

OZware
21230 Meadow Lake Rd.
Snohomish WA 98290
(360) 805-0148.
ozware@aol.com

Back To The Table Of Contents
Copyright © 1998 Visual Inspirations