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TopWhatIFF? For The Creative Amiga User
CONTENTS WhatIFF?-Issue 1.07 October 2022 For The Creative Amiga User T ================================================= |T | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~|[L | __________________________________________________[| |I __==___________ ___________ . ,. _ . __ T| ||[_j L_I_I_I_I_j L_I_I_I_I_j /|/V||(g/| == l| lI _______________________________ _____ _________I] |[__I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_] [__I__] [_I_I_I_]| |[___I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_L I ___ [_I_I_I_]| |[__I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_L_I __I_]_ [_I_I_T || |[___I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I_I____] [_I_I_] [___I_I_j| | [__I__I_________________I__L_] | | | -Row l__________________________________________________j ENTER MAGAZINETopWelcome to WhatIFF?
CONTENTS ============================================================================ -# WhatIFF? - Issue 1.07 - October 2022 #- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --EDITORS DESK-- -MEET THE WRITERS-- A few word from the current editor about the magazine. ---SHELL TALK--- A place for WhatIFF? writers and readers to air out their Amiga laundry or just talk about anything Amiga related! -----REVIEWS---- Reviews of hardware and software, old and new covered. -----GUIDES----- -----ARTICLES------ Guides and support to all things Amiga. -TALKING AMIGA-- Hear from the people making hardware and software for the Amiga. -----LINKS------ ---AMIGA VENDORS--- ---AMIGA GROUPS---- Amiga related links and Amiga vendor websites. -INVENTS CORNER- Kevin Saunders regular column for WhatIFF? --------===============================================================----- NEXT ISSUE *All content copyright of the respective authors 2022* --------===============================================================-----TopFrom The Editor's Desk
CONTENTS ============================================================================ From The Editor's Desk - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ Welcome to another issue of WhatIFF?, as we unbelievably near the end of 2022 the Amiga scene has gone from strength to strength with new hardware and software being released. While there is much to be worried about in the world it warms my heart to see how how Amiga users get together to help each other and work towards the common Amiga good. So saying I wish all our American and Canadian readers a happy Thanksgiving while unfortunately we do not celebrate it in Japan I hope that you all will have a wonderful time with your families and enjoy mountains of turkey and stuffing. It is times like that this remind me of how global WhatIFF? is with writers from Canada, America, United Kingdom, Australia and Japan few magazines can boast of such an international writing staff. I want to deeply thank all of the magazine's contributors for their hard work and support of the magazine. That smoothly brings me onto this issue, while we have lost a writer another has returned Steve Lord reviews the Classic Amiga Programming book, and the ever reliable John Scolieri has written a guide on installing Amiga OS3.2 on an Amiga OS4.1 machine and a review of the Elbox Fast ATA card. Ivan Sorensen has a fantastic article on newcomers to the A1200 and can be found in the Articles section. And that is not all but I do not want to ruin the fun in exploring the magazine. Finally thank you to all our readers who have downloaded the magazine from WhatIFF? website and aminet. Your comments have been very helpful in improving the magazine. Before I sign off, I just want to mention that the next issue will be out in December and it will be our first full year, if there is anything that you would like us to cover, interview or create a guide for then get in contact and we will see if we can accomodate your requests. Have a wonderful October/November, remember to watch something scary for Halloween (Alien never fails!) and see you in December!TopFree For All About The Amiga
CONTENTS ============================================================================ Shell Talk - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ ##To Scanline Or To Not Scanline, That Is The Question! There are many things that get retro computer user and gamers aggitated and ready to argue about but one of them that seems to really raise the hackles of the our particular group are ... scanlines! I generally try to stay out of these arguments since it can quickly turn into a long and winded shouting argument with neither side agreeing. However this is Shell Talk so I do not have to worry about anyone throwing stones at me and also we have a lack of writers this issue so I will have to take up the mantle again. So, scanlines ... I love them. Why do I love them? Well as most people my age and probably those reading this, remember the warm glow of our CRT TVs and monitors. The horizontal lines have been burnt into our collective memories. But for me it also reminds me of the arcades, I remember seeing Street Fighter, Metal Slug and even the 3D games such as Daytona USA on huge CRT monitors. Those scanlines represented the excitement of going to the arcade with its chunky pixels and thousands of colors that my lowly Amiga or SNES could not even dream of reproducing. Fast forward a few years and ... When I started to get back into retro gaming I'd bought an LCD TV. Plugging in my Megadrive with the phono cables I was excited to relive my youth again, instead all I received was a hard jolt of modern reality. My memories of crisp and colorful images was replaced with a blurry and faded mess. This was not the Megadrive of my youth! Shocked by the terrible image before my eyes I quickly turned off the MD and TV and started to think of how I could improve the picture. As is common now, the Internet came to my rescue as I searched about hooking a MD up to a modern TV. It was at this time that I was introduced to the Framemeister and the infamous scanlines. My curiousity was fully peaked at this time and I went shopping for one of these mythical devices. The first time I saw the price I was knocked off my chair but the more I looked at the mess on my TV the more I started to sway and eventually I decided to descend into the rabbit hole that is the, Framemeister! Suffice to say once I received the device and had it setup and hooked to my Megadrive I was immediately convinced this was one of the best purchases I had made. I was so impressed that I ended up buying the special cables for my Super Famicom and PC Engine, it also reminded me to have a look at the scanline settings for my IndivisionAGA. Since then I have not looked back and pretty much with all my computing I use scanlines, when I game or doing pixel work, even as I write this in ProText I use the scanlines from the Indivision. Aside from the warm nostalgia I get, I also genuinely believe that the graphics from the 240p consoles; NES, Master System, Neo Geo, SNES, Megadrive, PC Engine and Amigas look several shades better. There is the belief that the graphics look better because the artists were using the scanlines as an extra effect to their advantage, and there is most likely truth in the statement but also our nostalgia is a strong contender. Finally, and I think this cannot be denied, when you place scanlines over low resolution graphics it does have a tendancy to make them look as if there is more detail. ##What Next? So if you have only experienced the scanlines from the likes of the mini consoles such as the A500 Mini or SNES Mini, grab a real Megadrive or SNES, get yourself a scandoubler such as the Framemeister or OSSC and give those scanlines a try, I think you might be surprised how difficult it is to go back to a life without scanlines.TopWelcome to the reviews section!
CONTENTS ============================================================================ - Reviews - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Elbox Fast ATA 4000 MK-VII review-Part 1 John Scolieri reviews the Elbox Fast ATA ML-VII for the A4000 series of Amigas, find out how he got along the card and why it is part one! AmigaKit A1200 8MB Ram Expansion You may be thinking, huh just another ram expansion card, well the card from AmigaKit just might have a few surprises, find out inside. Classic Amiga OS Programming: An Introduction Review Do you want to get started in Amiga OS programming? Then this just might be the book you have been looking for. Find out more inside. AmyTree 2.2b Review Recently released on Aminet we look at the file browser representing directories as trees and see why this is more relevant than ever on modern Amigas. Clouds AGA Review Clouds AGA a programme close to my heart and still to this day finds much use. Find out more inside why this free programme is still in use almost 30 years later. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Reviews - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#Topelboxfastatapart1review
Reviews ============================================================================ Elbox Fast ATA 4000 MK-VII review Part 1 - by John Scolieri ============================================================================ ##Product Name Elbox Fast ATA 4000 MK-VII ##Available From shop.elbox.com ##Price Euros 166.95 (Inc. VAT) ##Hardware/Software Requirements A3000/A4000 ##Review I used to love running my old Cheetah scsi hard drive in my Amiga 4000 at 18,000 rpm screaming along happily off of my Blizzard Cyberstorm MKIII onboard UW-scsi bus for many years but then I got married and had kids and that loud screaming scsi drive which I adored had to go for my wifes and small kids sanity while living in a small one bedroom apartment. Since then I've been using my Amiga 4000's onboard IDE with various IDE drives until the CF cards, then DOMS and SSD drives came along. Nice and silent they were but sadly no comparison speed wise compared to my old UW-SCSI setup. I had tried the SCSI-SD solution few years back but that was slower than my onboard IDE and it started giving me read-write errors after a year of so of copying tons of small files so back to the onbard IDE I went. (just want to qualify I believe that was v4 early version of the card and I assume the speed and reliability is better nowadays?) Fast forward to last year and I found an old Fasta ATA 1200 by ELBOX in a bin of parts that I think I got from a World of Commodore show about a decade ago and totally forgot about it and that got me thinking about my Amiga 4000 again so off I went to ELBOX's webpage (elbox.com) to happily see they are still making new Fast ATA cards and purchased a sharp looking black Fast ATA 4000 MK-VII Zorro III card. ###Card features: * Fast transfer rate of up to 16.6MB/s * Supports PIO-0, PIO-3, PIO-4 and PIO-5 modes * Compatible with ATA 33/66/100/133 devices * Adds two buffered and terminated ports for 4 devices * LBA 48 support in the onboard BootROM (support of drives over 128GB) * Automatically configured devices * Compatibility with OS4.1 * Boots from any attached HDD, ZIP or LS-120 * support for: HDD drives, Compact Flash cards, CD-ROM drives, CD-R drives, CD-RW drives, ZIP drives, LS-120 drives. Once received the installation of both hardware and software was straight forward and involved installing the included software via floppy and then inserting the Fasta ATA 4000 MK-VII into an open Zorro slot in my Amiga 4000 and re-booting. Great stuff and easy and can't wait to start doing SysSpeed tests and ... hmm that's strange the card wasn't found at bootup. Ok no problem I've seen this before let me try another Zorro slot but same issue. Oh oh that's the only two empty Zorro slots I have as I already have my VA2000 RTG card by MNT Research and my X-Surf-100 by Individual Computers. Next step was to try the FastATA at the other two remaining slots and move around my VA2000 and X-Surf-100 cards but sadly still nothing! Time to ask Elbox support for help and they confirmed that they have no reported issues with either the VA2000 and X-Surf-100 giving any issues with the Fasta ATA4000 MK-VII and they recommended I remove all the Zorro cards and only keep the FastATA...ok thinking to myself that this is no help to me if it works anyhow without my other much needed Zorro cards? My gut feeling aside I removed all Zorro cards except the FastATA and sadly still nothing! Elbox then told me to see if the card was at least seen in the early startup menu...you know the 2 button mouse hold down right before pressing the power button. Again nothing at all. Next Elbox asked to send them over hi definition pictures of the card to cheque for any defects though I couldn't see any myself. After a week or so Elbox said they couldn't see any issue and to remove the socketed chips and re-seat them and also to clean the connector pads again. Did that and still nothing so Elbox asked that the card be sent back to their shop for further investigation. It took a very long time and was very expensive to ship the card back to Elbox in Poland last year during the pandemic..customs, postal workers shortage, slow downs due to Covid etc. etc. Very long story short Elbox didn't find anything wrong with the card. They said it could be a voltage issue, old caps etc. BUT all of my voltages are spot on and confirmed by my trusty multi-meter, all my capacitors were changed two years ago on my motherboard, Zorro board and PSU and my system has been running rock solid for years to boot. I even ran every diagnostic tool I could and all was good...yes even timing issues (there's always that amigan that brings up timing fixes eh lol) Elbox told me they would refund my money but I told them I had already spent a pretty penny mailing the card back to them and asked if they could keep the original card and to please mail me back a new one (I'm a bit superstitious like that). Luckily they agreed and I recently finally got back my new FastaATA 4000 MK-VII card a month ago but no surprise, it had the same issues..sigh. I reached out to the Amiga community as I've always done over the years (even before the internet existed) and there was one other Amiga 4000 owner with similar setup like mine that had no problems with the FastATA go figure while other users said they had some issues when updated to the new AmigaOS3.2 roms but all of them were able to at least see the FastATA in their early-bootup menu so that makes me scratch my head even more!? Well I'm not one to quit that easily eh and that's why this is part one. I figure I'll try my FastATA card out again when there's another physical rom released as there's rumours of a new OS3.3 or whatever the number jump the developer deem fits. If any of you fellow WhatIFF? readers have any advice for me to try out I'd be very happy to hear from you so, don't be shy.TopAmigaKit A1200 8MB Card Review
Reviews ============================================================================ AmigaKit A1200 8MB Card Review - by Timo Paul ============================================================================ ##Product Name A1200 8MB FAST RAM MEMORY EXPANSION (40MHZ FPU OPTION) ##Available From AmigaKit: amigakit.amiga.store ##Price ?56.99 (Inc. 20% VAT) ##Hardware/Software Requirements A1200 ##We All Need Some Memory While it is nice to have a supped up Amiga with an 060 CPU or even one of the Power PC cards, at times we just need a little memory. Coming in at a wallet friendly ?56.99 the 8MB Fast Ram card from AmigaKit provides more than simple memory expansion. On the card it has a slot for an optional FPU and underneath two clock ports, so you can add a real-time clock battery or perhaps something else. AmigaKit has been around for a while and generally has a good reputation there have been some customers who have not received their products but I have not had any trouble ordering from them. In addition being in Japan means that I am exempt from the 20% which reduces the price a bit. Processing time was fast and the card was shipped within a week, shipping time took around 2 weeks and was sent via Registered Royal Mail. Upon receiving the card, everything was packed well as is per usual with AmigaKit and came with a single page instruction manual. The first thing that strikes you is how dinky, if I can use that word, the card is. Previous memory expansion cards took up the entire expansion slot, this card is just over half the size. This meant it was considerably easier to install compared to previous cards and best we not mention the installation of an TF1260 card. The card itself has a slot for an FPU up to 40mhz, and two clock ports, in way these ports a little redundant if all you want is a real-time clock since the A1200 motherboard already has a free port. However there are a number of other expansions available from the clock port such as additional network adapters or even adding a USB port. If the card can handle these expansions is another question though. As with all memory cards the card will disable the PCMCIA port when the full 8MB of memory is used, however there is a jumper to give limiting the card to 4MB of ram allowing the PCMCIA slot to be accessed. Currently the card is at version 1.5 and was originally released in March of 2020. ##In Use Aside from having to change the jumper (which thankfully is on the bottom of the card) when I wanted to access the PCMCIA slot the card worked flawlessly. I encountered no stability issues, and as always the extra fast ram gave my A1200 a nice little boost. While you will not be playing Doom anytime soon with this card, it does make the bootup and Workbench use much easier and faster. In fact if you have a basic A1200 with no expansion this card is ideal, it gives your Amiga the much needed d fast ram but also for the price of a modern video game. Having an FPU on card which does not have a faster CPU seems a bit out of place, if you are going to use an FPU then most likely you will be doing 3D rendering or playing 3D games and if so then you will most likely be using a faster CPU. The old 020 is just not up to any serious 3D work, perhaps in the future AmigaKit can remove the FPU and reduce the cost of the card even more, even if they knocked ?10-15 off the price for a card without an FPU socket it would make it an even better deal. ##Final Thoughts While more and more people are pimping their Amiga's with increasingly powerful accelerator cards, there is still a market for this simple exp ansion card. Some people want to experience the Amiga as it was back in 1992 and most of us could only afford a simple memory expansion card back then. If you take your Amiga out and about, having a simple expansion card that is not easy to be broken or break that bank if it does break, is a great option and this card fills in that need. For myself this card is great as a backup, if my TF1260 is out of action I want to be able to access my Workbench and having the memory card expansion as back up is a great help when things start to go pear shaped. A great little card at a great little price with quality service from AmigaKit. ##Pros and Cons + Cheap and small + Has ability to choose from 4 or 8MB + Additional Clock Ports - FPU not really necessary on this type of product ## Scores Ease Of Use: 10 Documentation: 3 Value For money: 8 Overall: 70% - WhatIFF? BronzeTopClassic Amiga OS Programming: An Introduction Review
Reviews ============================================================================ Classic Amiga OS Programming: An Introduction Review - by: Steve Lord ============================================================================ ## Product Name Classic AmigaOS Programming: An Introduction - E. Th. van den Oosterkamp ## Available From Amazon. I paid ?15.90. ## Special Hardware and Software Requirements Something capable of running AmigaOS, a C compiler or an Assembler. ## Machine Used For Testing Commodore CDTV, 8Mb Slow, 1mb Chip, KS/WB 1.3, Lattice C, CED v3.5 Amiga 4000, 2Mb Chip, 640Mb Fast, KS/WB 3.2.1, SAS/C, AsmTwo, TextEdit ## Review Classic Amiga Programming An Introduction (from now on referred to as CAPAI) by E. Th. van den Oosterkamp is a modern book on Amiga OS development. It aims to cover all classic OS versions in one book, not exactly a trivial task. ## First Impressions The book is split into distinct sections starting with a suggested build environment overview, a nice 68000 assembly primer, a whistle-stop tour of the suggested build environment. this is followed by the book's meat: a reference manual covering various aspects of AmigaOS. This is followed by Appendices covering various topics. The choice of topics appears somewhat incomplete and random. Covering every version of every amigaOS function or device would be too much to expect for a reasonable-sized book. ## Amiga Setup I used two Amigas for this review. Most of the testing was done on a CDTV using CED and lattice C. I also played around with ASM-Two and SAS/C on an Amiga 4000 running Workbench 3.2.1. This gave me a range of Operating System versions and configurations to try. I only used these combinations as my compilers and assemblers were already set up. I don't like running VBCC natively and haven't used ASM-Pro. This choice didn't materially affect the review as I was able to follow the material just as well with more familiar (to me) tools. ## The Book CAPAI covers AmigaOS features including Exec, Intuition, GadTools, ASL, Graphics functions, Dos.library, and for some reason trackdisk.device and Diskfont.library. The choices are odd in some places, and coverage is uneven. For example, It's strange to see 7 pages of ASL function coverage without a single example showing how to apply these functions. The existence of requesters is barely acknowledged beyond man page entries for displaybeep(), displayalert(), autorequest(), and easyRequestArgs(). Coverage of intuition is mostly limited to man-page style references, but the gadtools chapter excellently combines summaries and pulls it all together with examples. The book refers to itself as an introduction. An early section states: "Since the book is written as an introduction it will not cover every single flag or option for the functions that are covered. It will, however, provide a solid base from where you can start writing your own software for the Commodore Amiga" CAPAI is no more an introduction than I am a giraffe. I suspect the book's initial plan was to be an introductory guide for people learning or returning to Amiga. The result is clearly more of a reference than an introduction. And this is where things fall short. The book mostly summarizes the what while pretending the how and why don't exist. I've never read a programming book with so little code inside. Less experienced readers will need to look elsewhere to understand what they're reading. More experienced readers will find the function descriptions mostly too light on detail to be useful. Perhaps the biggest issue with the book is that the bulk - constituting an incomplete set of man-page style content - doesn't add much beyond what's already in NDKs and C manuals. As scathing as this all seems, once you get past the above, the book does some things extremely well. So well, it's worth looking past it's faults for it. Where this book excels is in collating already available information in one place. Most people can't afford a complete set of Amiga manuals, but can download them. As a dead-tree accompaniment to more serious and weighty virtual tomes CAPAI is genuinely a great reference. CAPAI pairs exceptionally well with the Amiga C Encyclopaedia/Manual from Aminet. CAPAI isn't a bad book. It's just not the book it claims to be. For a self-published book the effort really shines through in places. The compatibility references, 68000 primer, and bootblock appendix are outstanding. The Gadtools chapter was particularly well-written. The chapter on trackdisk.device was a solid overview, although I would've preferred something on using devices in general. At ?15.90 I found it a little overpriced. Whomever bought it for ?5 in February 2022 got a bargain. While there are better Amiga programming books on almost every topic this one covers, good luck finding them at those prices. Initial impressions of the author's second book: Bare Metal Amiga Programming are much better. The author clearly refined their approach and boy does it show. I wouldn't expect to see a 2nd edition of CAPAI more in the style of Bare Metal Amiga Programming. But if one ever came into existence I'd buy it in a heartbeat. ## Likes * It's an AmigaOS programming book available to buy in 2022! * It's a good dead-tree accompaniment to better digital materials. * Some of the more discussion-oriented sections are very very good. ## Dislikes * It says it's an introduction, but it isn't. New programmers need not apply. * Summarizes the what but rarely explains the how or why. * The book is sorely lacking in examples. I've never seen a programming book with so little code. * A modern book without mention of modern tools and techniques like cross-dev environments reads as though it's already dated. ## Bugs There are minor editing issues here and there but this is to be expected for a self-published book of this size. Nothing immediately stood out from what I've followed and tried to implement. ## Conclusion If you only want one book on AmigaOS programming, download the Amiga C Encyclopaedia from Aminet. If you only get two books on AmigaOS programming, make it the Amiga C Encyclopaedia and CAPAI. ## Pros and Cons + Handy dead tree reference still commonly available in 2022. + Some absolute gold makes it a great accompaniment to other material. - Much of the content duplicates compiler and NDK documentation. - Frustrating lack of examples and explanations of the why and how. ## Scores Ease Of Use: 8 Documentation: 7 Value For money: 6 Overall: 75% - WhatIFF? BronzeTopAmyTree Review
Reviews ============================================================================ AmyTree v2.2b Review - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ ##Product Name AmyTree v2.2b ##Available From Aminet ##Price FREE ##Hardware/Software Requirments AmigaOS 3.0+ ##Introducing ... AmyTree During my weekly search through the latest uploads to Aminet I came across this intriguing little application. The description lists it as a file system browser presenting the file system as a tree of directories. I found this an interesting prospect as I often have issues finding various audio samples that I created and cannot seem to find them again on my internal CF. Back in the 90s this was not such an issue since my hard disk size was around 200mb, now I have an 8GB CF and as such I have been sampling like crazy, but since I am not that much of an organised person a lot of the samples have gotten lost on the CF in some far off drawer that I have forgotten about. Having the chance to view the file structure from a more visual aspect appealed to me greatly. Downloading the application from Aminet and unpacking it was a very simple and quick process. There was no need to install anything and I was able to run the programme straight from the drawer. After double clicking on the icon a window pops up with several buttons a large empty area on the left and the right side which is mostly greyed out. From the get go you are only able to use four buttons: New Tree, Dim Dir, Clone and ListFile. ##In Use The easiest way to see a directory structure is to drag an drawer or drive over to the blank window on the left. This will quickly display the first level of the directory, drawers that have a + next to them can be opened to display the next level. If you reach the end of the file structure the box will become greyed out, however you can see what files reside in the drawer by clicking on ListFile, a list on the right side will display all files. From here you can see the Info of each file, view DataType, Show (display) and Play the file. There are spaces for other actions that can be applied to the files, they can be added by using the menu to go to Prefs -> Settings -> Config Button. Displaying of directories is very fast and as such has become my goto tool for searching directories, instead of Workbench or DOPUS. It reminds me of the way you can view files in Mac OS X, I often use the file tree format to get to a file that is packed far away on the hard disk. However the programme is not only limited to your hard disk and can be used to access CD-ROMs, infact within the readme file the author states the programme is most useful in this situation. When using other programmes such as DOPUS you can get lost if there is a maze of directories to get to a particular file, AmiTree allows you to see the layout of the directories reducing your chances of getting turned around and lost. AmyTree 2022 is a suprisingly useful programme that does something very simple but does it well and quickly. It does not offer as many options such as DOPUS or DiskMaster however the way that it displays the directories is its biggest and best selling point. However there are a few things that I would like to see improved. When reaching a directory you are unable to see the file contents unless you click on ListFile, this is quite counter intuitive and I found myself often double clicking on the drawer icon expecting to see the tree expand to show the files contained within. ##Final Thoughts It often the case of being a hit and miss when trying new software from Aminet. Programmes often require a number of libraries and other software to be installed. So it was with great pleasure to find AmyTree loading up without the need for additional installations. It is Workbench compliant and looks great with an easy to understand interface. If you find yourself in the situation of increasing directories and not being able to find files again then I suggest having a look at AmyTree 2022. ##Pros and Cons + Easy to install, no other installs + Very fast operation + Offers something different to the standard DOPUS/DM interface - The display of individual files could be easier ## Scores Ease Of Use: 7 Documentation: 8 Value For money: 10 Overall: 83% - WhatIFF? SilverTopCloudsAGA Review
Reviews ============================================================================ Clouds AGA Review - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ ##Product Name CloudsAGA ##Available From Aminet ##Price FREE ##Hardware/Software Requirements A1200/A4000 Released in 1996 CloudsAGA is not a new programme however it is a very useful tool that has stood the march of time. Originally I had been exposed to CloudsAGA from a cover disk on Amiga User International, not being connected to the internet at this time my only network access was via BBSs, as such magazines were the best place to get free software. At this time I was working through my last year of high school and one of the courses I was taking was IB Art, for my final year project I was doing a series of artwork created on the Amiga. CloudsAGA came at just the right time as otherwise I might have skipped this great piece of software. ##In Use Upon first loading the programme you are presented with a screenmode requester, you can choose any resolution that you have in your Devs drawer and choose a maximum of 256 colours available on screen. Once you have chosen your screenmode and colour depth a simple grey screen is displayed with a tool bar on the right. Right clicking brings up only an About and Quit options. The rest of the action takes place on the tool bar on the right. The tool bar offers the following options -> *Size* this can be changed in increments of: 25% = 64x64 50% = 128x128 75% = 256x256 100% = 512x512 200% = 1024x1024 400% = 2048x2048 *Create* quite explanatory, click to start rendering your cloud image. *Palette* here you can choose the sky and cloud colours, changing the settings and you can get some very funky looking clouds. *Smooth* clicking this will essentially add antialiasing to the cloud scene. I highly recommend doing this as it makes the clouds look more realistic. *Save* click to save your scene as an IFF. *Screen* change the current screenmode. *Material* has several options, Clouds, Fire, Dark, Forrest. Setting up your cloud scene is done quickly and simply with a few clicks of the mouse. However do be aware that even a powerful Amiga will take time to render a cloud scene at 400%. Even with my TF1260 running at 60mhz the render time for a 400% image took over 15 minutes to finish. Add to that another 10 minutes or so for smoothing be prepared to lose a lot of time rendering just clouds. Luckily the Amiga multitasks very nicely with the programme so I was able to get on with other things while the Amiga chugged away. During rendering I lost around 500kb of Chip Ram leaving me with 1.2mb. This meant that I could at least start some work on another graphic programme such as Brilliance or DPaint. If you want to experiment with CloudsAGA then I suggest using 25% or 40% to start with, especially if you have a lower specced Amiga. When you start rendering there does not seem to be a way to stop it, so once you click on Create it is time to sit tight and get comfortable. ##Options Most of the options listed above are pretty simple, Palette and Material are essentially the same thing with Material just being a preset of the Palette button. Palette though gives you much more control over all the colours. The requester has sliders for RGB and it is possible to save and load palettes. The rendering of the clouds is random so each time you click on Create you will get a different looking cloud scene. To do this you need to close your current cloud image and start a new one. While it will take more time I find that the smoothing creates a much better image. The first time I created a cloud scene I was impressed but after adding the smoothing I felt I had something that could be used in some artwork. ##Final Thoughts If you are looking for an easy way to add some realistic clouds to your art projects and do not want to use a digital photo then CloudsAGA could be just what you are looking for. It is has a very easy interface and creates some startling realistic clouds. I have found it great for creating a unique sky or even reflection effect. It does take time though to render even on Amigas with fast CPUs if you want to use it at the maximum size so be ready to give your Amiga some aone time while it creates the cloud scene. There is nothing negative that I can think of about this programme except that it would have been nice to have an option to cancel creating the image mid render. Other than that it is a solid piece of software that is still useful almost 30 years later. ##Pros and Cons + Realistic looking clouds + Easy to use + Free - Can't cancel mid render ## Scores Ease Of Use: 9 Documentation: 8 Value For money: 10 Overall: 90% - WhatIFF? GoldTopWelcome to the guides section!
CONTENTS ============================================================================ - Tutorials/Guides - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Running Amiga OS3.2 on Amiga OS4.1 via E-UAE John Scolieri explains how to run a Amiga OS3.2 under AmigaOS 4.1 in comprehensive guide. LightWave 3.5 - 101 Configuration Files Part 2 In our sixth installment of the Lightwave 101 series we take a look at the MOD-config file. Brilliance - Morphing Learn how to create a morph animation with brushes in the ever versatile Brilliance. Reading AmigaGuide Files on Other Devices Learn how to read WhatIFF? anywhere and anywhen with this short guide on reading AmigaGuide files on other devices. Bringing Amiga IFF Images Over To A PC/Mac With the Amiga Artwork Contest looming even closer we look at the different ways you can bring IFF images over to your PC or Mac. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Tutorials/Guides - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#TopAmigaOS3.2 on OS4.1 via E-UAE
Guides ============================================================================= Running AmigaOS3.2 under AmigaOS4.1 - by: John Scolieri ============================================================================= Many 68k applications that don't hit the Amiga custom chips directly can be run directly under AmigaOS4.1 without the use of emulation via E-UAE; however, for those that want to run a complete AmigaOS3.2 setup with their PPC machines running AmigaOS4.1 kas1e over at amigans.net has set up a great easy to follow tutorial which I'll be summarizing in this article so let's GO! 1 - Buy copy of AmigaOS3.2 from your favourite Amiga dealer 2 - Create a folder called AmigaOS3.2CD on your OS4.1 system and copy contents of the OS3.2 CD into it 3 - Download E-UAE with SDL over at OS4depot.net 4 - Unpack E-UAE to whichever drive partition you like 5 - If you already have a .uaerc config file from another system you can copy it to your E-UAE folder on your OS4.1 system else you'll have to use a standard setup file 6 - Open shell. Create hardfile of 100MB min. for the OS3.2 installation using the 'make_HDF system 100' command within the E-UAE folder 7 - Transfer the required rom file i.e kicka1200.rom from the OS3.2 CD to the E-UAE roms folder on your OS4 system 8 - Open your favourite text editor and open the uaerc config file and set to boot from the AmigaOS3.2CD folder you created in Step 2 9 - You can now boot into OS3.2 via E-UAE to format your system partition i.e our .hdf file. 10 - Start the OS3.2 setup installation. Don't forget to install the CPU libs if your setting up an 030, 040, or 060 system 11 - Once the install is complete go back into your text editor and edit the .uaerc config file and comment out the line that boots from the copied AmigaOS3.2CD folder 12 - Reboot E-UAE to load up OS3.2 and fine tune your workbench the way you like it! Sounds easy, right? Thanks to kas1e's great YouTube video you can follow along step by step at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yq__c-9bg70 I might be 'slightly' biased but man it's so cool running the latest Amiga 68k OS on your Amiga PPC system !TopLightWave 101 - Editing Configurations Files
Guides ============================================================================ LightWave 101 - Part 6 - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ ##Modler Config File In the last issue we had a look at the LW-config file, if you remember it gave us the ability to change file requestor settings and render settings which can come in handy when your device names do not match up the default setttings of LightWave. For this installment we will look at the MOD-config file (Modler), after reading this you will have a better understanding of how to update the settings of LightWaves's Modeler. To start off let's have a look at the contents of the file, the file can be found in the same location as the LW-config file; Toaster/3D/. Once you have found the file it can be opened in any text editor and what you will see is the following: MDOP 0 FlatnessLimit 0.500000 QuadTriMode 1 TwoSided 0 CurveDivision 1 UnitSystem 0 FontsDirectory Toaster:ToasterFonts MotionsDirectory 3D:Motions MacrosDirectory Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm MacroListsDirectory MacroList ModelerMacroList StartupMacro Toaster:ARexx_Examples/lwm/LoadFonts.lwm KeyMacroF1 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/Center.lwm KeyMacroF2 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/Center1D.lwm KeyMacroF3 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/BBox.lwm KeyMacroF4 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/Text.lwm KeyMacroF5 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/nextempty.lwm KeyMacroF6 KeyMacroF7 KeyMacroF8 KeyMacroF9 KeyMacroF10 ColorInterface 1 ScreenModeID 0 ##Step By Step Let's take this line by line and explain what each one means and does. * MDOP 0 This is the file identifier and should not be edited. * Flatness Limit 0.5000000 Taken from the value you type in in the New Data Options which can be found in in Options under the Objects panel. It is the flatness percentage that the Modeler will use when determing if a polygon is non-planar or otherwise. The values are written by the Modeler each time you exit the program. * QuadTriMode 1 Can be the values (0, 1 or 2) and will decide if Triangles (0), Quadrangles (1) or Automatic (2) willbe set when you create a new object. Can also be found in the Options panel. * TwoSided 0 Value of 0 = one-sided polygons and 1 = two sided polygons, same as the One Side or Two Sides buttons in the Options panel. * CurveDivision 1 You have the options Coarse (0), Medium (1), or Fine (2), these options will decide how smooth of curve will be calculated when doing functions such as lathing a curve or creating PostScript fonts. * UnitSystem 0 Let's you decide which unit of measurement to use when the Modeler is started. The options are: SI (0), Metric (1), or English (3). * FontsDirectory Toaster:ToasterFonts The drawer that Modeler will look in when loading PostScript fonts. * MotionsDirectory 3D:Motions Like above the default location Modeler will look for finding motion files for Path Extrude or Path Clone (Multiply) * MacrosDirectory Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm Default location for finding macros. Please note the file could also be listed as; MacrosDirectory DH2:LWM * MacroListsDirectory or MacroListsDirectory DH2:Toaster/3D Default location for finding macrolists used in the <> option the Macro pop-up menu. * MacroList ModelerMacroList or MacroList DH2:Toaster/3D/JGMacros The last used Macro list. * StartupMacro Toaster:ARexx_Examples/lwm/LoadFonts.lwm The the macro that was last selected tobe executed when Modeler was started < > * KeyMacroF1 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/Center.lwm KeyMacroF2 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/Center1D.lwm KeyMacroF3 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/BBox.lwm KeyMacroF4 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/Text.lwm KeyMacroF5 Toaster:arexx_examples/lwm/nextempty.lwm KeyMacroF6 KeyMacroF7 KeyMacroF8 KeyMacroF9 KeyMacroF10 or KeyMacroF1 DH2:LWM/Text.lwm KeyMacroF2 DH2:LWM/Router.lwm KeyMacroF3 DH2:LWM/PointSpread.lwm KeyMacroF4 DH2:LWM/LightSwarm.lwm KeyMacroF5 DH2:LWM/CutFaces.lwm KeyMacroF6 DH2:LWM/NextEmpty.lwm KeyMacroF7 DH2:LWM/NearBG.lwm KeyMacroF8 DH2:LWM/PointCenter.lwm KeyMacroF9 DH2:LWM/Center1D.lwm KeyMacroF10 DH2:LWM/Center.lwm The options above are written into the config file if you have selected chosen any keyboard macro shortcuts with the < > option in the Macro pop-up menu. * ColorInterface 1 This is option is only used when using the Modeler by itself, you can choose from a four color (0) or eight color interface (1). * ScreenModeID 0 Setting for the ChangeMode program that comes with the standalone version of LightWave and is used to choose with resolution of Modeler is set when running by itself. ##And we are finished! So there you have it, a quick explanation of the the MOD-config file, I hope that you will find it useful for setting you the Modeler to your liking and also to help get rid of annoying requesters asking for something something volume to be inserted. Good luck with your rendering and we will see you in December for our first year anniversary! TopBrilliance 101 - Morphing
Guides ============================================================================ Brilliance 101 Part 6 - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ Welcome back to another Brilliance tutorial, this time we will be looking at the animation brush and it's morphing ability but first ... Morphing, that which was once a poster child of the 1990s has now become passe, hardly turning a head when it pops up. This is probably due to over use but it can still be a useful effect, and it is incredibly fun to use it programmes such as DPaint and Brilliance. For this issue we will look at morphing a brush to create a short animation. ##First Steps Brilliance makes this an incredibly easy process that once you know how it becomes a very natural and fun process. To start with we need to make two brushes, your start brush and end brush, the one that it will morph into. To make it easy let's create a green filled circle on the left side of the screen and a red filled square on the right side of the screen. Next right mouse click on the scissors icon or the 'Cut Brush' icon, you will see 8 greyed boxes, left click on the 'Cut Brush' icon and again holding the right mouse button cut out the green circle, you will notice that the circle will no longer be on the screen. Go back to the 'Cut Brush' tool bar and left click on the far left top grey box. You will see a thumbnail of the circle appear. Now do the same for the red box, remembering to click and hold the right mouse button. Once you have cut out the red box place it on the top far right box in the 'Cut Brush' tool box. You should have two thumbnails of your brushes, here comes the fun part. Go to the icon on the far left that is next to the camera, it is labeled 'Anim Brush', right mouse click on it to bring up the tool box. Several options will be available: CUT, MORPH, ACTUAL FIT. Since we are doing a morph, MORPH is the area we are interested in. For the moment you can leave FRAMES as is, what we are interested in is the FROM box. Next to it are 8 buttons with the numbers 1-8. Click with the left mouse button on 1 and then go to your brush storage with the 8 boxes. Left click on the far left thumbnail. Wait a short moment and you will see your brush start to morph frame by frame into the other brush. Once it has been finished you can stamp the brush down and each time it will move to the next frame in the morph. ##A Simple Animation Morph To make a simple animation, go to the camera icon on the far left side, this time you can left click as usual to bring up the animation tool bar. First we need to add some frames of animation. To do this all you need to do is click on SET#, when the new menu comes up enter 30 into the 'Total Frames' box, then click on 'Proceed'. Go back to your brush storage and look for the thumbnail that has a grey and white box in the bottom left corner. Once you have chosen your anim brush, left click once where you want the brush to go. Looking at your animation panel click on button that looks like this >|, you will see it move onto the next frame, as you click with the anim brush on each proceeding frame the brush will morph bit by bit. Once you have stamped down the anim brush for all 30 frames, you can play the animation. As you can see this is a very easy way to do a complicated animation. Have a play around with different shapes and colours to see which morph works best, have a go in True Brilliance to get better color control and morph between objects. Good luck and have fun!TopReading AmigaGuide Files on Other Devices
Guides ============================================================================ Reading AmigaGuide Files on Other Devices - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ ##Reading AG Files Anywhere! Over the last few issues I have been asked by a number of readers how to read the magazine on a computer that is not an Amiga. While the magazine is produced to be read on an Amiga there are a number of options for you to read the magazine away from the comfort of your miggy. In this guide we will list options for reading AG files on a Windows, Mac and Linux machine. The options that at present work and have been tested are: * WinGuide www.aminet.net/package/misc/emu/winguide * AGWViewer www.stone-oakvalley-studios.com/post.php?id=000420072020191409 * AmigaGuideViewer www.github.com/andregewert/AmigaGuideViewer * TAWS - The Amiga Workbench Simulation www.taws.ch * WineBotter (For Mac, allows Windows software to run) www.winebottler.kronenberg.org As you can see above there are a number of options, if you are running windows it is as simple as downloading and installing WinGuide or AGWViewer. If you are running a Mac then you will need to install WineBottler first but once this is done you can run both WinGuide and AGWViwer on the Mac desktop like they are native applications. It should be noted that if the AG file does not have the extension .guide it will not show up in the requester file, just add the .guide extension if it is missing and the viewers should load the AG file without issue. Another option that is platform agnostic is to use The Amiga Workbench Simulator (TAWS) an amazing project allowing you to boot into any version of Workbench from 1.0 up to 4.1 Final Edition. From here you can access a copy of WhatIFF? downloaded to your drive and read it as if you are on and Amiga. The caveat of this though is that you need to be online to read the AG files, which might defeat the purpose if you are not online. ##Additionally During my research for this short guide I came across another new program that has been created to read AG files and this one is is running in Java as such it should run fine on Windows, Linux and Mac. AmigaGuideViewer unfortunately I was unable to get it to run on my Mac, since I need to install Java first and ran out of time for this article, hopefully by the next issue I will be able to give my opinions on the software. ##Which One Is For You? Of the three options available the easiest one is most likely TAWS, there is minimum of setup and it renders the AmigaGuide file most accurately. However it needs to be online to work and in this regards limits its usefulness. That brings me to WinGuide and AGWViewer, I do not have a Windows computer and as such had to use WineBottler to use both applications. There is minimal difference between them, the interfaces are both very simple and easy to use, however I felt that WinGuide did a better job of rendering the text and fonts of WhatIFF?. Whichever one you choose it is nice to know that we have several options in 2022 to read old and new AG files.TopBringing Amiga IFF Images Over To A PC/Mac
Guides ============================================================================ Bringing Amiga IFF Images Over To A PC/Mac - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ So you have created a masterpiece on your Amiga but now you want to show it to the world, what do you do? While the Amiga may not be recognised as a serious graphics tool anymore the IFF format still lives on in modern versions of Photoshop. First let's look at what options we have to bring over your files, 1. Convert your file in ImageFX or 2. Copy the file over directly to your PC/Mac and convert it there. Let's start with the latter process since it is the easiest of the two but does come some caveats. ##Bring a Raw Amiga IFF File into Photoshop We will be using Photoshop since it is pretty much the default art package on any modern system. Amiga users are lucky since Photoshop by default supports the Amiga IFF file format however to get it to read the file takes an extra step. The Amiga as you know already does not require a file extension to read a file, it is not necessary to add .iff to your images for example. However on the Mac version of Photoshop and I presume here the Windows version if your file does not have the .iff extension it will refuse to load the file. So all you really need to do is copy the file over to your CF card, USB or e-mail it and once it is on your Mac/PC add the .iff to file and then open it from Photoshop, no need for any importing or conversion. Now to that caveat that I mentioned, while this will work fine with any register based image, i.e. not a picture created in TrueBrilliance, DigiPaint or Deluxe Paint HAM image. If your image is a HAM image then you will need to convert the image in a programme such as ImagFX prior to loading it into Photoshop otherwise you will get some very strange results. ##Converting Your Image in ImageFX Welcome to our second part of our tutorial, if you are here then I presume you have a HAM image that you wish to view or edit on a Mac/PC. First we need to load up an image convertor and in my opinion the best on the Amiga is ImageFX, luckily there are many versions floating around but even more it is still be supported with the latest version being 4.5 available from apps.amistore.net. In the future we will review the latest vesion but for now I recommend using ImageFX 2. Once you have Image FX up and running go to the right side and click on Load, navigate to your file and load it. Do not worry if it does not look exactly like your image, ImageFX has several modes of preview ranging from grayscale to colour with dithering. Now you have your image in ImageFX it is a simple case of clicking on the Save button, you will be presented with several options, I find that TIFF works best for register and HAM images. Change the name of your file and then click on Save. If you want to save time add the .iff extension to your file so it can be loaded right away into Photoshop. So there you have it, two ways how to bring your images into Photoshop be they register or HAM images. Good luck with your Amiga creating!Toparticles
CONTENTS ============================================================================ - Articles - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- A Crash Course to Your New Amiga 1200 Ivan Sorensen guides you through upgrading your A1200 in an economical way and getting the most of your hardware. Modern Amiga Magazines With more than two Amiga magazines being printing monthly and bi-monthly we look at the differences between the two. Onboard FPU on A1200 *Update* Update on the onboard FPU installation guide. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Articles - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#TopUpgrading your A1200 in an Economical Way and Getting the Most of Your Hardware
Articles ============================================================================ A Crash Course to Your New Amiga 1200 - by: Ivan Sorensen ============================================================================ So you have just picked up an Amiga 1200 online. You've checked that the capacitors don't look risky, it turns on, sound is fine, no distortion in the image, great fighting condition! Now you have to actually use the thing. Unfortunately, this is where the saying that retro computing is an expensive hobby often comes in. It is not at all unusual for people to spend as much money on the accessories as the computer itself. This can get especially bad when you are online and seeing all the super-Amiga hardware out there and if you are not careful you are thousands of dollars in the hole without that much improvement over a more modest system. After all, how much Quake 1 are you really going to play before you boot up Turrican 2 instead? I am going to walk through setting up a 1200 in a way that is perhaps a bit more friendly to a mid-range budget. I will try to speak in general terms, since exact pieces of hardware tend to come and go and what is available now may not be for sale in 2 months. You can separate what you need into two groups: Things you absolutely need to use the system and things you want to make it more pleasant to use. ##Required items: * Power supply Your purchase probably came with a power supply, but the old Commodore power supplies did not have a great reputation when they were new and that has not improved over the years. Do yourself a favor and find a modern, aftermarket solution suitable for the Amiga. The one I use was actually intended to be installed in a tower case but it works fine and have served faithfully for a decade though. * Monitor You need a way to display your computer or it won't be all that much use. This used to be a much bigger problem and a lot of older guides still refer to the various hoops you had to jump through. While there are a number of devices that can be used, many modern LCD monitors will display the signal just fine and you can find lists of suitable monitors online. I always test whenever we buy a new computer monitor in our house and the last 4 models have all worked just fine. All you need is a simple amiga monitor to VGA connector and a monitor with a VGA input port and you are in business. The image quality can vary and is rarely perfect but in my experience it is often better than external scan doubling devices and I have never had issues with PAL vs NTSC signals unlike using an old television set. * Input devices Using a mouse driven interface is better with a mouse and you will need a joystick for any action games. With mice I think you will save a ton of headaches just getting an adapter to use a modern mouse. PS2 mouse adapters have been around for years and USB ones have started appearing. Then you can just use whatever cheap mouse you have lying around or get online for the purpose. I use the Cocolino which has scroll wheel support and can use PS/2 mice. It can be found at Alinea Computer Shop: https://www.amiga-shop.net/ Joystick there are tons online, usually labelled as Atari or Commodore joystick. Buying classic joystick can be hit and miss because they are often in poor shape (and were often cheaply made to begin with) so buy a couple or find a seller that makes a nice, new controller for you to enjoy your games. Gamepads with buttons mapped to jump are popular though pads are not always ideal for Amiga gaming. * Speakers What good is fantastic tracker music if you can't hear it? The cheapest solution here is a simple adapter to plug in a 3.5mm connector. Then you can simply use a pair of headphones or simple PC speakers as you see fit. You will benefit from the quality of speakers you connect of course, but bear in mind the fidelity of the audio is not always that high to begin with. If you are using headphones make sure you use ones with volume control as the Amiga does not offer it. ##Additional upgrades * Disk drive If you are planning on using physical floppy disks, you will definitely want an external floppy drive so you can have an additional drive. These are not especially sought after objects so you should be able to pick up an old drive online for fairly reasonable money. The bigger question is whether to replace the internal drive with a floppy emulator like the Gotek. Many new Amiga releases are put out in ADF format, making this the most practical option. * File transfer A floppy emulator will offer easy ways to get things to your amiga, but it still has limitations as it depends on things being available as an ADF. Luckily the Amiga 1200 is born with a PCMCIA slot which was rarely used back in the day but is worth the weight in gold these days. Cheap adapters are available allowing a compact flash card to be read, allowing both easy file transfer from content downloaded on another computer as well as acting as an external or secondary storage device. Compact Flash cards are not cheap but a simple 4 GB card will offer basically infinite file transfer and storage as far as the average Amiga is concerned. * Hard drive The humble Compact Flash card returns to the Amiga when it comes to hard drives. This option has been around for some time and you can even find packages with a prepared card ready to use. A simple 4 GB card will work with any Amiga (though newer operating systems can exceed this amount without having to fiddle with partitions) and of course dramatically increases the usability of the system. If you don't mind opening up your system, you can even have multiple cards configured in different ways and swap them out on the fly. * Accelerator The last piece of kit to consider is the accelerator card. This fits in the trapdoor and usually contains a mixture of a processor and RAM. While the allure of the mighty 68060 and PPC cards is strong, you can get a great card for much less than the prices those cards command now. Determining what your objectives are will help you make a decision here but as cards tend to keep their value, you can get a cheaper card and replace it down the road. You can`t go wrong with the ACA cards from Individual Computers. The minimum port of call is additional RAM: Much classic Amiga software only benefits minimally from added processing speed but almost all applications benefit from extra RAM (and a games machine will need it to take full advantage of WHDLoad of course). A decent 68030 card can be had for reasonable money and will give a noticeable oomph to many programs that are of interest to modern users as well as the various 'Doom clone' games such as Alien Breed 3D. Past the 030 I feel like the costs start to far outstrip the actual benefits you will see from the card, unless your use case is something that specifically needs it. ##In conclusion I hope this gives you a good checklist to go down when evaluating your 'new' Amiga 1200. Many of the options listed above have a minimal cost and will allow you to really get an enjoyable and fun system put together. Many are applicable to systems other than the 1200 of course, but since they are very popular machines I felt I would start there.TopModern Amiga Magazines
Articles ============================================================================ Modern Amiga Magazines - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ ##Magazine Roundup We live in exciting times regarding the Amiga, we have come through the ashes of Commodore's demise, the dark days of the early to mid-2000s, and trepidly entered the 2010s with a new envigored attitude and a multitude of new hardware and software being released. Now in the 2020s, the Amiga has become part of the growing retro scene, bringing old and new users back into the fray. It is a very exhilirating time, in addition to new users and hardware we now have several print Amiga magazines to choose from. Ideally, we would be able to subscribe/buy each issue of each magazine however the financial reality for many of us is not that rosy. So to help the reader of our lowly magazine choose which magazine is suitable for you, we will do a roundup of all the current print Amiga magazines. The article will not cover any of the free magazines since this is more of a buying guide to help you better spend your hard-earned cash. Currently, there are three print magazines, in order of the oldest to the newest: * Komoda & Amiga Plus * Amiga Future * Amiga Addict Komoda & Amiga Plus has been around since the early 1990s, Amiga Future since 1998, and Amiga Addict the youngest kid on the block starting in 2021. Let's take a look at each magazine and see how they differ and are similar. ##Komoda & Amiga Plus - $30.00/year for 4 issues A magazine that is available in digital and physical formats is released 4 times a year and available in Polish and English. The print version features a glossy cover and nice thick pages, it feels strong and well put together. It covers not only Amiga but all Commodore machines. The magazine predominantly writes about games with a few non-gaming articles popping up. The Commodore section has much more content and focuses on the gaming side, the usual interviews, opinion pieces, and guides do pop up occasionally. The quality of the English writing is very good, it is concise and easy to understand, the articles are entertaining and you can feel the passion the writers have for what they are writing about. The magazine covers are always entertaining with some unique artwork. If you are looking for a print or digital magazine that heavily features Commodore games and covers the Amiga then this is the magazine for you. Featuring old and new games for the Commodore computers, articles about the Amiga and new hardware each issue is packed full of information. It is also the largest print Amiga magazine with the current issue at 82 pages. ##Amiga Future - 55 euros/year for 6 issues or 72 euros/year with CD Probably the best known current Amiga print magazine, available in German and English and has been available for over 20 years, has a writing staff of 50 and a subscriber circulation of 800. Each issue comes in at around 54 pages and is published every two months, it covers a variety of Amigas: classic, OS4 and up to Morph OS. The content is always varied with a mix of game, hardware and software reviews. The articles are quite in-depth and technical, with some very interesting pieces on how to use and build hardware for your Amiga. The covers are usually quite pleasing with a very professional look and feel, the pages have become a thicker over the last few issues lending to a heavier and nicer feel to the magazine. Amiga Future has been a stable presence in the Amiga scene providing the only printed source of Amiga information for a long time. As such they have created a solid platform and provide a good balance of games and serious computing articles. One for the more serious and dedicated Amiga user looking for more than just to play games. ##Amiga Addict - ?78/year for 12 issues in the UK or ?108/year outside UK The newest and most expensive print Amiga magazine available, now just finishing their 1st year of publication the new magazine has been going from strength to strength. Publishing exclusively in English, the writing staff are trying to re-create the Amiga magazines of our favourite computers heyday, Amiga Format, Amiga Power and CU Amiga. Each issue comes in at around 58 pages in A4 format with glossy covers featuring large artwork. The magazine covers a variety of Amiga topics but concentrates mostly on games, interviews and software history. The writing is fun and upbeat, taking you back to the British magazines mentioned before. The magazine is published every month so you do not have to wait too long for the latest issue. Amiga Addict is a love letter to Amiga gaming and the community, it is bright and colourful with some interesting inteviews with influential Amigans. While the concentration of articles is games which is understandable as the Amiga was predominatly a games machine in the UK, it does have some serious articles. Recently they have started a series on C programming and the latest issue looks at how to use VistaPro which are welcome additions. If you are looking for a magazine to bring you back to the old days of Amiga gaming, then this is the magazine for you. It is a well produced magazine that has a lot of content and is growing with each issue. ##Final Comments If you had told me 5 years ago we would have three print Amiga magazines in circulation I would have thought you crazy. As such I do not want to criticise any of the magazines but I do want to be honest. Think of this last part as a breakdown to aid for the reader on making up their mind regarding which is the magazine is for them, or maybe all of them! ##Komoda & Amiga Plus * Well written and produced, * Heavy on the games and the text is a little hard * The covers are a thing of beauty and very eye catching * Targets the Commodore and Amiga games with some tutorials occasionally turning up ##Amiga Addict * Professionally written and well put together * Concentrates mostly on games * Has some tutorials but the magazine is more geared towards the Amiga gamer * For the first time Amiga user or returnee, targeting the Amiga gamer and is not for the long time/more experienced user ##Amiga Future * Articles and reviews are quite in-depth and provide a lot of technical information and detail. At the end of the day after reading Amiga Future I feel I have learnt something new. * Not as games orientated as the other magazines. * Targeted at the more experienced Amiga users Finally I just want to thank all the writers on all three magazines, it is has been a pleasure reading each magazine and the Amiga scene is in a better and healthier place thanks to your hard work and contributions. Next issue we will be looking at the magazines that catered to the professional users, Amiga World and Amazing Computing!Toponboardfpu
Articles ============================================================================ Installing Onboard FPU on A1200 Motherboard - Update - by: Timo Paul ============================================================================ ##A1200 Onboard FPU Socket - Update Last issue we described the installation of an FPU socket onto the A1200 motherboard, using the steps taken by Chris Edwards as a guide. In the video Chris used a TF1230 as an example with the FPU showing up. It had been hinted that this might also work with the TF1260, however we after testing the onboard FPU with a TF1260 is is unfortunately not the case. Installing the FPU and socket will not cause any issues with the TF1260 but you will need to use a card that contains an 020/030 or an 040 but it has not been possible to test this technique with an 040. We apologise if the article made it seem that you could get FPU functionality via this route. Sadly the only way to get FPU ability with the TF1260 is by finding a *very* expensive 060 with FPU built in.TopWelcome to voices of the people behind Amiga hardware and software.
CONTENTS ============================================================================ - Talking Amiga - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -= AmigaLove.com's Eric Hill Interview =- When talking about the Amiga is it hard not to mention the Amiga website AmigaLove.com. We have an indepth chat with Eric Hill the creator of AmigaLove.com -= Hernain Interview =- We talk to Hernain a professional animator, Amiga artist and animator. Having won last years Amiga Art Contest with his is Pink Panther animation we get his insights into Amiga graphics and animation. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Talking Amiga - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#TopEric Hill of AmigaLove.com
Talkingamiga ============================================================================ Interview - Eric Hill of Amiga Love ============================================================================ ##Hello, Eric thank you for agreeing to this short interview. To start off can you tell us a little about yourself, who you are? Growing up I was a bit of a global nomad. I was born on Los Angeles in 1971 and had a good life there. But by the end of the 70s my parents were really wanting a big change in their lives. Being teachers, they started to mail resumes - I discovered later - to various countries including Canada, Brazil and Singapore. My father received an offer from Singapore first and they jumped at the opportunity. We lived there for 3 years returning to the US in 1980. because my parents decided to divorce. My mom raised my brother and myself almost single-handedly. We went from Singapore to Texas, where she was from originally. It was a bit of a culture shock to say the least. My formative years were spent in various locations around the Dallas Ft. Worth Metroplex. In the early 90s I joined the Air Force and was stationed in central California. Afterwards I returned to Texas to go back to finish college and eventually entered art school as well. In the late 90s I worked for some software and game companies before I jumped into the Dot-Com Boom as a professional Web designer. I eventually moved to the Bay Area, California. I was chasing a girl and thankfully it worked! In 2003 we tied the knot and by 2007 started a family. In 2011, I moved my family to Seattle, Washington. We love it here and I think my nomadic ways are done. I've been a professional Web (and now mobile) designer ever since. I'm the lead designer for Sporcle, the largest trivia website in the world. ##How did you get started in computers? I was always fascinated with video games and pixels on screens ever since I first saw Space Invaders in a mall in Singapore. I remember begging my mom for a quarter so I could play the game. As soon as my 1st man died she was ready to go! I quickly informed her the game wasn't over, which wasn't well-received. But she waited. I don't think I got to play the 3rd man! When we moved back to the US in 1980 my brother and I were given some sort of Pong machine that hooked up to our 13" TV. There wasn't much to it, really, but we thought it was something special. It even had some sort of bizarre skeet shooting game. Soon after, we got an Atari 2600. Games back then cost as much as they do now, but when you calculate the value of the dollar games back then were painfully expensive - practically two times today's prices! Needless to say getting new games wasn't easy for that cartridge-based system. I only got $1 a week allowance at the time. But I would save up and sometimes buy home video game magazines. It was either that, or blow it on 4 quarters in the arcade machines at the corner 7-11, or the dollar movie theater down the street. I saw Flash Gordon 13 weeks in a row. I'm not complaining! The magazines I'd buy and read over and over would show the latest and greatest for the 2600, Colecovision, Vectrex and Intellivision. Eventually the early home consoles were taken over completely by powerful home microcomputers in the magazine's coverage. It quickly became obvious to me that the Commodore 64 was the ultimate prize, and I devoured the reviews of its games first before going back to Page 1 and reading the magazines again from cover to cover. The Vectrex was a close 2nd, but there were usually only 1 or two games featured in the entire mag each month. I did actually wind up buying a Vectrex, however, with a combination of some Christmas money and some my mom pitched in. How she afforded it I have no idea as she barely made ends meet. I was in total heaven. Even my older brother, who wasn't as into games as I was (he was more into D&D) admitted Pole Position on the Vectrex was pretty cool. In 1985 my parents sold their house in California and that helped change things for us a bit. We moved to Arlington (home of the Cowboys and Texas Rangers), where my mom bought a house. As a result, in 9th grade I finally got my own room! And, more importantly, my mom helped me get a C64. I'll never forget that feeling of complete and total excitement when I brought it home. I soon realized, however, that I needed a disk drive in order to do anything with the machine! The computer sat on my desk for about 2 weeks while I mainly just went through the manual and entered in some short BASIC programs - losing them the moment I turned the machine off! I soon received a disk drive, thank goodness (and it cost as much as the computer!). I felt terribly guilty about having to go back to the store, but I soon forgot that once I felt the power surge through my fingertips :) That year in school, I met a guy who was also big into the C64 and he had a modem. We quickly became best friends. That's when everything shifted into a totally different gear. ##What attracted you to Amiga computers over the competitors? As I've mentioned, I didn't have a magazine subscription nor any real income. My only connection to the latest developments in the scene I loved so dearly was my friend, Jason. He came from a well-off family and his setup was impressive. He had dual drives, for starters, and an actual Commodore monitor. And a modem, which I'd only ever seen in movies or TV shows. And since his step-father was rather well-to-do, Jason could even call BBSes in different states! His skills and reach left me in awe. He'd regularly hand me disks (for free) so I could enjoy the same games he was pulling down on a nightly basis. I remember getting one game, Top Gun, a week before it was even available on retail shelves. In any case, this was all before I was old enough to drive. I had a really cheap used Montgomery Ward 10-speed bicycle, however. And on the weekends I would sometimes ride several miles to the mall so I could see what new titles were on the shelves at Babbages or Software Etc. This one particular time, however, I rode past an office park and noticed a Commodore logo on a store's black tinted glass. All the other buildings were offices, so perhaps someone thought it strategic to put this store out in the middle of nowhere. It had a few other logos on its glass that I recognized (like Apple's) and I thought, "A store? Out here?", Intrigued I rode my bike to the anonymous looking place and walked in. If this place sold C64 software, I'd save at least 3 miles round-trip distance! Now back then - this would have been '86 or '87 - the computer salesmen wore suits, like at a car dealership. It was a bit intimidating. I was a pimply-faced teenager on a crappy 10-speed, not a dollar to my name. When I first walked into the store I saw one of the salesmen stop his conversation and give me a look. Unimpressed to act he soon went back to his chatter with the other employee. Regardless, in the middle of the main floor there was an impressive display with 3 computers, each on their own tall white pedestal in a circular fashion. Each machine had a monitor facing outward, the three creating the shape of a 3-leafed clover if seen from above. My jaw dropped to the floor when I saw the graphics on the first screen, which faced me as I entered the store. It was as if I was looking at something straight from Hollywood. It made no sense to my brain. As I recall, the screen had a red Italian sports car on it. And it was animated. It looked f****ng amazing. It was arcade-level, or honestly better. Mesmerized, after a few moments I walked around to the 2nd screen. Here, I saw the legendary Juggler by Eric Graham, and my brain simply stopped working. Next to the screen was a small rectangular clear acrylic stand - very classy - with a thick white business card sticking out of it. The card informed my broken brain that this was a Commodore computer! A Commodore computer? I have a Commodore computer! I'm a HUGE Commodore guy! But what the hell was I looking at? I was practically gasping for breath and I felt my heart accelerate. I was extremely confused, to say the least. It's hard for me to express my utter shock when I saw the price on the beautiful white business card sticking out of the acrylic stand. It had only been a year or two since I'd convinced my mom to get me the computer of my wildest dreams - the Commodore 64 - yet I'd never even heard of this thing: Amiga. The price, though, made my stomach flip with instant dismay. It was at this point that one of the two salesmen sauntered over to me and asked if I had any questions. I stuttered something to the affect of, "No, thanks. I'm just looking and just want to watch, if that's OK." He nodded with a look that said, "I knew it!", and sauntered back over to chat with the other guy. That was when I knew something really big had happened, and I'd been completely unaware. It was an epic thunderclap that left me deaf and dumb. The things I saw that day! It was equally both awe inspiring and devastating. Feeling way out of my league, I soon left and jumped back on my bike. I rode as fast as I could to the mall to look at the new C64 titles. But my vision had forever been changed. ##Are you more interested in the hardware, software or both? I'm very much interested in both, but with big caveats. I'm completely addicted to the hardware I wish I could have owned from 1985-1990. I also love the operating systems and tools, public domain software, productivity software and games. My particular focus is on NTSC software, which is where most of the productivity software came from and the game studios and publishers I admired: Electronic Arts, Activision, Infocom, Origin, Luscasfilm, SSI, Epyx, Broderbund, Microproaw, Atari, Interplay, FTL, Westwood Studios, Cinemaware, and on and on. And of course if I sprinkle some of the top-shelf UK/EU studios into the mix there's enough to keep my happy for a lifetime. But my relationship with it all is, well, probably weird to some. I absolutely adore OS 1.3. It's from the era I discovered the Amiga and, in my opinion, when the Amiga had the most unbridled potential. 'Old Blue' represents the time when, to me, the Commodore Amiga was at its most magical and inspirational - when the Amiga seemed like it had come from the future. I love to collect and use hardware from that era. The Amiga 3000 is about as far as I go. It's not that I don't appreciate the later hardware and software - I do. But it doesn't hit my buttons quite the same way. By 1993, there were Macintoshes and even PCs which were lightyears ahead of Commodore (if you had the cash). In a weird way, the later Amiga machines actually kind of bring me down sometimes. Now look - if an A3000T or A4000 fell out of the sky of course I would absolutely adore them. But my heart is really linked to the 'original' Amigas: the A1000, 500, 2000 and 3000, which is probably my favorite Amiga next to the A1000 these days. I've just spent a lot of time talking about hardware, but the truth is I really don't like to only focus on hardware constantly. It can get kind of grindy for me after a while. I like my hardware to simply work and I don't want to continuously fiddle with it. And I don't need to make it some monster machine to enjoy myself. The software from the earlier Amiga days is really where I like to spend my time. And when folks create *new* software - especially for the older machines - that really makes my heart sing. And most of the software I'm interested in was aimed at near-stock Amiga 500. (Of course I do use machines with fun upgrades, but I try to force myself to put a cap on it and leave things more or less period-correct. But I do have some very cool upgraded machines (natch). There was also a ton of amazing software made by individuals in the Public Domain scene, which is completely fascinating to explore. The sad truth, though, is that much of it was hobbled with nag-screens or chopped down as demos to be 'unlocked' for a few bucks. As a result, a large portion of what's found on Aminet or Fred Fish disks these days is what I now call 'Deadware'. But the hunt for awesome tools and experiences continues, and it should offer many more years of entertaining exploration. ##You created the website AmigaLove.com, can you tell us what drove you to create the site? Back in 2015 or so I really got back into the scene. I'd always been connected to the C64 and Commodore stuff, but I finally went all-in on Amiga. I was in a place in my life where I could actually afford the systems of my dreams. But I soon became incredibly frustrated with the lack of information online of how to actually do some of what I considered the most basic of tasks. I could find the occasional YouTube video or meandering threads in forums, but they were generally pretty hard to follow or didn't actually tell me specifically what I was looking for. Originally I thought I'd create a blog so I could create informative articles that could be easily found by search engines (and people). But I soon changed my mind. The Commodore scene was always about community. I decided instead to build a forum where like-minded enthusiasts could share experiences and support. And, I made sure it was mobile-friendly from the very start, which most forums were not at the time. I made a pledge to myself that I wouldn't post little clips and tidbits. So many of the forums I had used up to that point where usually filled with advice from folks trying to be helpful, but with no solid answers or instructions - just guesses and snippets of advice where you were expected to fill in the gaps. Over time forums seemed to be a place I'd consider a last resort to answer a question realizing I'd most likely just go running down endless rabbit holes. So, I decided that whenever I'd learned something - even the most obvious to most - I would do my best to articulate the problem and its solution. I knew others might some day find it helpful, but the truth is I wrote posts so that I could follow my own steps later! I knew, at some point, I'd want to do the exact same thing some day and I'd forget. Hah! Thus, Amigalove.com became my own personal journal to assist my terrible memory. I've been blessed to have so many wonderful people join the site along the way and contribute as well. It's never truly taken off like gangbusters, but that's OK because it is a bit easier to manage that way. It also feels more tightly-knit as a result. Interestingly, I think the name I chose - AmigaLove - has made folks actually behave nicer than you might see elsewhere on the internet. You've got to be a real Jack-a-loon if you come to Amigalove.com with an axe to grind or an ego to prop up. ##Your Amiga hardware looks in amazing condition. Was it hard keeping it in such good condition? What tips do you have for other Amigans? There are several contributing factors to keeping our old machines looking good. First and foremost, I only acquire minty looking hardware and software. It has to meet a certain bar for it to even draw my interest. I also have received life-time donations from some folks in the area and around the country who took very good care of there things. Second, since I live in Seattle, Washington, there is almost no humidity to worry about. We do have a lot of moisture here half the year, but the indoor air is very dry. Also, my 'retro room' is downstairs in a cool basement so it's away from heat, which can also cause yellowing to some plastics. Finally, I blacked out the windows of my computer room and storage room, so UV can't find its way in. ##You are also creating YouTube videos and managing AmigaLove.com, do you plan to concentrate more on your YouTube channel? In the beginning when I was learning my way, I would just press record and go for it all in a couple of takes. Over time, my process changed. Now I write scripts and rewrite them multiple times. I'll create sometimes hundreds of video clips and photos for a single video now. It's a lot of work, but I find a great deal of pleasure building them this way now. But I also have a full-time job and family. So, I only produce 1 video every 6 weeks or so. YouTube's algorithm doesn't like me very much as a result. But I don't care about that. I make them for myself first, and the community second. If it wasn't fun, I wouldn't do it at all because there's zero financial incentive attached to it. And that's fine by me. I purposefully don't monetize my website, either. ##Are there any future features that want to add to AmigaLove.com? Yes. Just like the Games Library, I'd like to have a section for my favorite 'tools' and other PD software available for download. This could include files I've found on user group disks that I've never seen elsewhere. I also have been working off-and-on on an upgraded Fred Fish archive. I hope to have more to say about that in 2023. ##And umm sorry but we have to ask how ... many Amigas do you have? Well, this is a little embarrassing. . . Amiga Development System (Zorro edition) Amiga 1000 (stock) Amiga 1000 'Phoenix' Amiga 1000 'Rejuve' - my daily driver. This machine has a 2mb chip Rejuvenator with KS 1.3 and ICD AdSpeed @ 14Mhz. This machine also has a Microbotics Starboard, StarDrive R2 with 1GB microSD, and 8MB modern RAM SLAM board. Finally, it also has A-Max installed on a partition System 6.0.8. Sometimes I remove the Starboard and replace it with the fantastic Parceiro by David Dunklee. Amiga 500 rev 5 'Chickenlips' Amiga 2000 Filled to the brim with period correct upgrades 030 @ 40Mhz. Amiga 3000 With factory installed dual-ROM (1.3 and 2.0) Amiga 3000 With 060, ZZ9000, bigRAM, etc. And I was gifted a re-capped original NTSC A600 HD which I've left stock as an occasional testing machine. ##Of all your Amigas what is your favorite model and why? Every Amiga is awesome. But these days I flip flop between the A1000 and A3000 - and honestly I'm on the 1000 the most. There's hardly anything I want to use that can't run on that machine. But if I need more performance, the 3000 is just so ultra gorgeous and bad ass I just slide over there. ##Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions, I am sure that I say this for all Amiga users that we greatlu appreciate your work in creating AmigaLove, it plays a large role in the Amiga scene. Is there anything else that you would like to say before we finish? Thank YOU for giving me the opportunity to talk at length about my favorite past-time!TopHernain Interview
Talkingamiga =========================================================================== Interview - Hernain, Amiga Animator and Artist =========================================================================== ##Hi Hache, to start with can you tell us a little about yourself? Hi! My name is Hernán, but you can callme "H" (yep, like the letter) I am from Buenos Aires, Argentina and I'm 41 years old. Regarding my job, I am a professional animator and I have worked on a feature film called Condorito The Movie and some TV animated shows such as "Talking Tom and Friends". I currently work as 2D/3D animator for mobile games. Also I have a Youtube Channel about retrogaming, called "Retrocidad". We do tutorials, and live streams and cover all kinds of retro systems using real machines, among them the Amiga 500, for sure! ##How did you get started with computers? My first contact with a computer was in 1985, a Christmas present that our parents gave to my brother and me. It was a Microdigital TK90X. It is a Brazilian clone of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum. With this machine I started in the world of video games. I was only 4 years old, but my brother is older than me so at that time I just watched him play, until I grew up a little. ##What got you into the Amiga? I'm an Amiga user since in 1989 with my first Amiga 500 our parents gave us to me and my brother. I still have this machine with me and I still using it. It was a great impact for us, for its multimedia capabilities, especially because we have gone from a Spectrum to an Amiga 500. The jump was really really huge. ##Recently you redid the Dragon`s Lair II Time Warp animated introduction can you tell us why you chose to do this? Well, It all started one day when I wondered to my self: "What would the Dragon's Lair II intro look like, if it had been released on the Amiga? So, what I did was draw only one frame just for fun (the first shot where the kids talk) to see the look and that was it, I didn't do anything else. Then, fifteen days later I said: "Wait... How would this other frame look like, if the intro had existed on the Amiga?". So I drew another frame of Mordroc and Daphne faces in closeup. Then a couple of days after I was like, "Hey! What if I do the whole intro?" So that's how it was! Just to do a testing of a couple of frames for fun I ended up doing the entire intro. I'm crazy, I know!!! ##You recreated the animation in Personal Paint, why did you choose this particular art programme over the likes of DPaint or Brilliance? As you said, the animation is made from scratch, frame by frame in Personal Paint based on the original frames. I love and choose Personal Paint because it has a very powerful bezier curve tool, similar to vectorial curves in Adobe Illustrator. For sure it's not magic, but they speed up the work a lot when it comes to drawing. ##What was the most difficult part of the recreating the animation? Then most difficult part was recreating the facial expressions in the shots where the character was far away from camera. Remember this animation is at 320x256 so you couldn't see so much detail. I have suffered this more in Princess Daphne, since she has very delicate facial expressions and hand poses. I tried to take care of the detail as much as I could. ##What was the easiest part? The easiest part was the shot where Mordoc is flying with Daphne and says "MINE!". This shot, actualy, is a copy of a previous shot, when Mordroc is flying with Daphne and sticks his face next to hers. So all I had to do was duplicate the shot, and just re-animate Mordroc's mouth to say the word. ##Do you plan to re-create any other introductions? I would love to recreate the Space Ace intro or the animated Tintin TV Show (I love Tintin). I'm between those two, but I can't decide yet. ##Apart from the Dragon`s Lair II introduction what other graphic work have you done on the Amiga and where can we find them? Well, I've made an animation recreating a shot of the Pink Panther Show that won in the animation category on the Amiga Art Contest 2021. You can watch it here: Also I've worked in an Amiga Game called The Dream of Rowan. I did all the graphics, the 3D animated intro and outro. This was the first time doing graphics for an Amiga game. ##Which hardware do you use for creating you art/animations? I use WinUAE to create my animations. I don't make them using a real machine for several reasons: First, because of the loading and saving times. Second, I can set the emulator at high speed and be able to work much faster. And third, I can't imagine doing this kind of work on a CRT monitor. I would go really blind! ##If the prices of the newer Amiga hardware such as the Vampire drop, would you consider working on those machines as well or would you rather stick to the classic Amigas? Well, I have no experience in Vampire, but I might consider it if I try one and it meets my expectations. ##What other computers and Amigas do you own, do you also do graphic work on the other machines? Amiga 500: 512Kb Expansion Amiga 600: 1Mb Chip expansion + 4Mb Fast Ram Expansion Amiga 1200: ACA 1232, 030, 128Mb. Amiga 1200: Terrible Fire 1230, 030, 128Mb ##What do you like most about creating graphics on the Amiga? Doing this for me it is a kind of therapy. I love everything related to animation in any of its styles. Seeing what you create, from literally NOTHING, is coming to life is something very satisfying. On Amiga I love to draw and curiously I also really like the work of choosing the palette. How many and which colors I will use to make the animation. ##If you could have any Amiga setup you want, what would it be? Actually, I'm really happy with my 030 Amiga, but I'd love to experience an 060 processor or why not a Vampire. I have never had experience in either and it would be something great and totally new for me. ##Thank you for your time, do you have any thing you would like to say before we finish? First of all, thank you for this interview. Greetings to all the comunity and AMIGA FOREVER!!!TopWelcome to the links section!
CONTENTS ============================================================================ Links ============================================================================ www.amiganews.net/en/ One of the most up to date and comprehensive sources for Amiga news from around the globe. www.eab.abime.net English Amiga Board, the majority of the users are from Europe, a very friendly and helpful Amiga forum. www.exxoshost.co.uk The resource if you need help or information about the new Terrible Fire cards. www.amibay.com A great place for buying and selling Amiga hardware, they also have some very nice people to give advice about. Of recent it has become very hard to register on the website since their server migration. www.amiga.org Probably the longest running Amiga forum on the world wide web, most American Amiga users are on this board. www.amigaworld.net Another large Amiga website covering all Amigas, includes news, discussions and classifieds. www.amigans.net English Amiga website covering next generation, emulation and classic Amigas. www.amigafuture.de The longest running Amiga print magazine, issues are available in English and German. www.amiga-addict.com Newest English Amiga print magazine, if you are missing the likes of Amiga Power and Amiga Format, then this is the magazine for you. www.ka-plus.pl Commodore and Amiga print magazine avilable in English and Polish. Lots of games content. mancave-ramblings.blogspot.com Our own John Scolieri's personal website. ================================================================== If you have a link that you would like added to list contact: submissions@whatiff.info ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Links - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#TopWelcome to the Amiga vendors section!
CONTENTS ============================================================================ Amiga Vendor Links ============================================================================ Alinea https://www.amiga-shop.net Amedia Computers https://www.amedia-computer.com Amiga 68k http://amiga68k.com Amigakit https://amigakit.amiga.store Amiga MC1 http://amiga1.com Amiga Shop https://www.amigashop.org AmigastoreEU https://amigastore.eu Amiga on the Lake http://amigaonthelake.com Arananet Retro Products https://www.arananet.net/pedidos Arcade Shopper https://www.arcadeshopper.com BuyElbox http://buy.elbox.com Electronics Is Fun https://electronicsisfun.com GGS Data http://www.ggsdata.se My Amiga Shop https://shop.myamigashop.com Relec http://www.relec.ch/fr RetroAMI https://retroami.com.pl Retro Passion https://www.retropassion.co.uk Retro Ready https://retroready.one Sell My Retro https://www.sellmyretro.com Retro Rewind https://retrorewind.ca Sordan https://sordan.ie Tindie https://www.tindie.com Vesalia https://www.vesalia.de ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Vendor Links - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#TopWelcome to the Amiga Groups section!
CONTENTS ============================================================================ Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ******************************************************************* * * United Kingdom United States Canada Germany Sweden * * France Belgium Czech Republic Denmark Finland * * Australia Russia Ireland Scotland Malta Japan * * ******************************************************************* ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topuk
Amigagroups ============================================================================ Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##United Kingdom Amiga North Thame http://www.amiganorththames.co.uk/ Birmingham Amiga Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/BhamAmigaGroup/ LINCS Amiga Group (LAG) http://lincsamiga.org.uk/ Norwich Amiga Group https://norwichamigagroup.co.uk/ North West Amiga User Group http://www.bambi-amiga.co.uk/spudmiga/nwag/index.html South West Amiga Group http://www.southwestamiga.org.uk/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topusa
Amigagroups ============================================================================ Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##USA Sacramento Amiga Computer Club http://www.sacc.org/ Central Texas Amiga Computer Society http://main.org/ctacs Central New York Amiga Computing Enthusiasts https://www.meetup.com/CNY-Amiga-Computing-Enthusiasts Central Texas Commodore Users Group https://www.meetup.com/Central-Texas-Commodore-Users-Group/ Metroplex Commodore Computer Club http://www.amigamccc.org/ Southern California Commodore and Amiga Network http://www.portcommodore.com/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=sccan:start Fresno Commodore User Group http://www.dickestel.com/fcug.htm Westchester Amiga User Group http://www.westchesteramigausergroup.org/ Amiga Computer Users Long Island https://www.facebook.com/groups/202203702519 Southeast Amiga User Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/SoutheastAmigaUserGroup/ Stamford Peterborough Amiga Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/spaguk The Other Group of Amigoids http://togausergroup.org/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topcanada
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Canada Amiga Users of Calgary http://www.amuc.ab.ca Amiga Computer Users of Edmonton http://www.amicue.org ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topgermany
Usergroups Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Germany AUCB Treffen http://www.amigaclub-bautzen.de/ Amiga Club Munster http://acmuenster.de/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topsweden
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Sweden Swedish User Group of Amiga http://suga.se/ Amiga Computer Group http://www.amiga-cg.se/ Syntax Society http://www.syntaxsociety.se/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topfrance
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##France Triple http://www.triplea.fr/ AFLE http://afle.free.fr/ AmigaPower http://www.amigapower.net/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topbelgium
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Belgium Belgian Amiga Club?http://www.amigaclub.be/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topczech
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Czech Republic Luky & Amiga Klub Forever + Czech PowerPC User Group http://powerpc.lukysoft.cz ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topdenmark
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Denmark Amiga Club Denmark http://www.amigaclubdanmark.dk/ Danish Amiga User Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/101927439851660? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topfinland
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Finland Finnish Amiga Users Group http://saku.amigafin.org/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topaustralia
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Australia Sydney Amiga Users Group http://www.saug.org.au Amiga Users Group https://www.amiga.net.au/ MAUG https://www.facebook.com/groups/MAUGr/ Perth Amiga User Group (PAUG) https://www.facebook.com/groups/perthamigausergroup/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Toprussia
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Russia Amiga Information Center (AIC) http://amiga.org.ru ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topireland
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Ireland Amiga Ireland Meetup https://www.facebook.com/groups/amigaireland ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topscotland
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Scotland Scottish Amiga User Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/626138110921245 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Topmalta
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Malta Amiga Malta https://www.facebook.com/groups/amigamalta ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#Top---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#japan
Amigagroups ======================================================================== Amiga Group Links ============================================================================ ##Japan Commodore / Amiga Fan Club Japan http://cfc.amiga.co.jp/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Amiga Group Links - WhatIFF?#TopInvent's Corner
CONTENTS ============================================================================ Invent's Corner - by: Kevin Saunders ============================================================================ ##Brilliance II Tips =Kev_Portrait= for the Amiga Art Contest 2022 Creating pixel artwork on the Amiga is very rewarding especially if it's only available on the Amiga such as Brilliance software. Recently I completed a self-portrait using Brilliance II for the Amiga Art Contest 2022 that is closing this month, so please if you can either create art, animations or music enter the competition. As you may know, I have the honour alongside 'Doug - 10Marc' on judging the entries. My entry as you can imagine is not valid but I wanted to enter for the fun of it and hopefully encourage others. This time I wanted to create a digital self-portrait using the Amiga's Low Res screen resolution of 320 x 256 pixels and 256 colours. If you want to see the actual image I created for the 'Hand Drawn Category', please visit this post. The source IFF file and small tutorial are here for your viewing https://www.patreon.com/posts/72264784 Or this YouTube video https://youtu.be/mTSUl6VYAZE In the speed painting on youtube you can see custom pixel editing alongside three other main tools I used: * Draw Mode RubThru, Brighten/Darken, and Fix Background * Rub-Thru Tool: One of the other effects I used was the Rub-Thru technique. This is where you have two screens loaded into Brilliance and pressing the 'J' key toggles between those screen buffers. In the background buffer, I first drew a few chips on a circuit board as I wanted it to appear in the other portrait image. With careful positioning of the circuit board (I used the cut screen with a brush and placed it into the correct location. * Brighten/Darken Tool: Sometimes when adding shade to a large area of the screen that is quite complex, it is worth setting up (drawing) a brush stamp to pastedown an effect. So in my Patreon post, you'll see I have created a white blockwork area of pixels, this white area is the area I want to create a shadow with multiple levels of shade. I could do this manually but this technique is far quicker. * Fix Background Tool: First, you open an image you want to edit/enhance. Then select the 'Fix/Background' (Padlock icon), this allows you to draw over the image without destroying the pixels, think of it as a temporary extra layer you can work on. Draw the area you want a shadow using all the tools at your disposal such as line, box, circle, and pixel tools. Once you have drawn this shadow (I used white to easily stand out). Cut the brush out using the 'B' key, then clear the screen by clicking the 'CLR' (clear screen). You will notice your original image is still intact. Now select the Darken too in the 'Draw Mode' menu. I would also adjust the 'amount' percentage to something like 15%. Press down the white brush you have onto the area you want to add the shadow to, remember each time you stamp down the shadow it adds extra shadow which is very handy if you want a gradual shadow effect that you see in real life. ##I would like to spend time in the new year creating more tutorials so please contact me if you have a suggestion. Take care and Amiga Forever. Invent | Kevin SaundersTopWhat's coming up in the next issue?
CONTENTS ============================================================================ Next Issue - 1.08 December 2022 ============================================================================ Thank you for reading issue 8, I must apologise that we were unable to get all the content promised in last issue but life has a way of getting in the way. However the next issue due out in December will be a big one for us as we will celebrate our first year. The time has just flown by and since starting the magazine it seems to have gone even faster, we started around the same time as Amiga Addict and have seen them go from strength to strength and I hope that we are doing the same. For the December issue we will have reviews of the A1200.net case, Kickdrum Sample Maker, and a look back at FinalWriter. In additon we will look back to the US based Amiga magazines Amiga World and Amazing Computing, comparing them to the UK magazines. Hopefully, we will also have DiskMimic and AGA Blaster/Converter guides plus the return of MsMadLemon. All in all it should be a great Xmas/one year anniversary issue. See you then! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Next Issue - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#TopMeet the writing staff of WhatIFF?
CONTENTS ============================================================================= Writing Staff ============================================================================= WhatIFF? is an independent magazine created by Amiga enthusiasts from around the world looking for a more serious magazine. The main writers at the moment are a small group but hope to grow in coming issues. * Main Writing Staff * Timo Paul Steve Lord Kevin Saunders John Scolieri Ivan Sorensen * Guest Writers * Maddi Carl Svensson Daniel Reimann We are always interested in new articles, guides or stories, if you have something you wish to submit please send it to: submissions@whatiff.info ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- #Writing Staff - WhatIFF? Issue 1.07 - October 2022#Toptimopaul
Writers Name: Timo Paul Aliases: amifan (EAB) Contact info: timopaul@whatiff.info Websites: www.whatiff.info www.binarybeats.meTopstevelord
Writers Name: Steve Lord Aliases: stevelord (EAB) Contact info: stevelord@whatiff.info Websites: www.thedorkweb.substack.comTopjohnscolieri
Writers Name: John Scolieri Aliases: klx300r (EAB) 328gts (amigans.net) aGS@C64_AMIGA (Twitter) Contact info: johnscolieri@whatiff.info Websites: mancave-ramblings.blogspot.comTopkevinsaunders
Writers Name: Kevin Saunders Aliases: Invent (EAB) Contact info: kevinsaunders@whatiff.info Websites: www.patreon.com/KevinSaunders www.youtube.com/KevinSaunders www.twitter.com/invent71 www.instagram.com/invent71/ www.ko-fi.com/kevinsaundersTopmaddi
Writers Name: Maddi Aliases: MsMadLemon (YouTube) Contact info: msmadzie@gmail.com Websites: www.patreon.com/msmadlemon www.youtube.com/c/MsMadLemon www.twitter.com/MsMadLemon www.facebook.com/msmadlemon msmadlemon.bandcamp.com