Slide show Pictures Question - IFF ILBM

[Peter]

I have some pictures that I got from the internet (NO not rude ones) and they are all in different formats, JPEG etc... I want to use all the pictures in an Amiga slide show so the question is, what is the best format and size to convert all these pictures to?

I was using Imagestudio and I was guessing it would be 640 x 512 ILBM-IFF format - is that right?

Also colour setting - is it ok to leave the colours as they are - some picutures have 16million colours - is that ok to leave or should I think about reducing colours in the pictures?

[s2325]

I'm using in my slideshows 320x256x32 IFF files. Resized in IrfanView, converted with XnView. Small Amiga program "seepic" can not show more than 32 colors: [ Show youtube player ]

[mfilos]

640x512 ILBM-IFF format is the best for usage imho.
Now... for color information, you can give it a test, checking out how fast they load.
Converting them to 256colors from the palette that exists there already, is pretty nice though.

[Peter]

I was looking at seepic, that's interesting to know it can only do 32 colours - I'll have a play with that. I'm also looking at AGASSM (another slideshow creator) I'll have to check and see how many colours that supports.

Converting some images down to 256 leaves them looking a bit shaky in certain areas - I wondered if there was a happy medium setting somewhere between but Imagestudio only seems to want to use the set 16 Million or custom colours between 2-256.

640x512 does seem pretty stable - just need to work out the colours now and see if AGASSM supports more than 256. I know it wont do 24bit images - are 16million colour images 24bit?

Another question... how do I best pack images to make them smaller in file size - I read that AGASSM supports "Power packer" and I have seen that around but never used it - is power packer easy to use?

What's the latest (or last) version available?

Once again guys - cheers for any info!

[TCD]

Originally Posted by Peter

I know it wont do 24bit images - are 16million colour images 24bit?

They are.

[Peter]

Hey TCD - good to see you!

Yes, I just discovered that AGASSM doesn't like the 16 million colour images so I will have to think about reducing the colours... a lot! Quality is going to suffer but it's not a perfect World.

[s2325]

Some converters may have few dithering methods.

[TCD]

Thanks

For AGA machines you should use 256 colours. Try XnView to reduce colours.

[rockape]

Hi Peter,

I use Visage which has plenty of tooltypes for setting such as SLIDESHOW SCALE etc

See http://aminet.net/package/gfx/show/Visage

"Visage is an IFF ILBM/JPeg/PNG/Datatypes viewer for the AmigaOS version 3.0 and higher. Main features include:

Supports AA (AGA), ECS, RTG, PCHG, SHAM and CLUT.

Can display "deep" pictures in all formats on ECS Amigas, rendered in HAM, "normal" color or grayscale.

Can scale "rendered" pictures to fit the screen.

Extensive monitor support. Uses a BestModeID()-like function to find a suitable mode (if needed)."


Regards, Michael

aka rockape

[Peter]

Thanks all - plenty to experiment with... anyone know anything about my Power Packer question...? :-)

[Retrofan]

Originally Posted by rockape

Hi Peter,

Can display "deep" pictures in all formats on ECS Amigas, rendered in HAM, "normal" color or grayscale.

Off topic, but what is exactly a "deep" picture for ECS? I've got a message about that can't display a deep picture in WinUAE with ECS with a picboot program (Rainboot), but I don't know what images I could use.

[daxb]

If you don`t really need small files, don`t pack them. First, you should try picture viewer like the mentioned Visage before you "change" the pictures. More viewer to test are VT (Viewtek), CyberShow, V, maybe multiview, ...

What to use or make depends on your whishes, hardware config. Should it display as fast as possible? Best quality view? Nice slideshow effects? ...?

[thomas]

Originally Posted by Retrofan

Off topic, but what is exactly a "deep" picture for ECS? I've got a message about that can't display a deep picture in WinUAE with ECS with a picboot program (Rainboot), but I don't know what images I could use.

IFF DEEP is a file format used to store 24bit truecolor images in chunky format. It is supported by TVPaint, for example.

The usual IFF picture format is IFF ILBM (interleaved bitmap) which stores the data in planar format. Storing 24bit images in ILBM format is possible but counterproductive because they need to be converted to chunky before they can be displayed.

[Peter]

I know it's not the best thing to do to pack the images but I was hoping to make a boot-able floppy of a slide show so I was thinking that packing the images would allow more on a disk but I've never used anything to compress files on an Amiga - hence my Power Packer question... is power packer the best compressor to use...?

What's the latest version?
Is it easy to use?

[daxb]

Easy way is to use JPEG, PNG or IFF (with compression). So you don`t need to pack them with an external packer.

Or check different picture viewer if they support packed files. E.g. Visage guide says: "IFF ILBM pictures can be Xpk compressed." Then you can use XPK for pack pictures but it needs to load xpkmaster.library and sublibs. Some extra space on disk needed.

[Peter]

AGASSM apparently can use Powerpacker packed images in it's slide shows.

When I try to use Powerpacker (V4 or V5) and I try and pack one IFF-ILBM image file it wont work - Powerpacker states that the buffer has overun and the file cant be crunched...?

Any ideas?

[BippyM]

Peter,

PPShow is a viewer made by the guy who made Power Packer.. It supports most formats AGA/ECS/OCS etc

[Peter]

I want to take a look at seepic again but I cant find it on my drive anymore - where can I get seepic full program people?

[s2325]

You can find it in the Zone now.

[Peter]

Cheers!