Genlock Emulator #2

[emufan]

the original thread was closed. so i try another attempt.
thinking of those video applications supporting genlock video signals/feeds, it would be nice to have such feature.
for a basic emulation of such thing, I could imagine to have just a video playing in the background.

since other nice features were enabled in winuae, this might be possible too

[Toni Wilen]

No. 100% useless.

[emufan]

Originally Posted by Toni Wilen

No. 100% useless.

naa, dont say so.
imagine one could feed in its old videotapes and could use such multimedia titler to add some subtitles or other neat effects and save the whole with to build in avi-saver.

so like Leandro in original thread said, such superimposing feature of video feed and amiga graphics isn't such a bad thing.

Just dont reject the idea by saying useless, I's also a part of the amiga magic

[Michael Sykes]

Ohh I wouldn't say useless.
I mean we have more software that would make use of that feature than for example floppysound emulation...
But I have no idea how to implement it. You wold have to emulate at least a VCR and the genlock to make it work.

I think it is just not worth the trouble.

[emufan]

maybe in future there could be a way to use some video-digitizer to deliver a realtime stream.
but for a start i was thinking of just a video file which gets used. so just opening a pre-recorded video.
here is an example of what i have in mind: [ Show youtube player ].

[mark_k]

Windows already has the DirectShow API which could allow "any" video capture hardware to work. And at least some level of genlock support is needed for the CD32 FMV cartridge, I think?

[emufan]

that would be cool for sure - webcam realtime video
I found videoInput - a free windows video capture library ( github sources ). videoInput.h "header file is best source of documentation" notes.txt says.

not sure if this is really usefull, maybe it increases your interest

Originally Posted by mark_k

... And at least some level of genlock support is needed for the CD32 FMV cartridge, I think?

your right, the description says so:
CD32 Full Motion Video: the MPEG animation can be genlocked with the Amiga graphics

[Toni Wilen]

CD32 FMV genlock works differently than normal Amiga genlocks.

Normal genlock syncs chipset to incoming video signal (external sync).

FMV video syncs to Amiga chipset. (MPEG chip video sync signals are inputs). Also FMV video mixing does not use Amiga chipset (Denise/Lisa) genlock hardware, it is completely done by chip in FMV module. -> there is nothing in FMV emulation that can be used for "real" genlock support.

[Michael Sykes]

Originally Posted by emufan

that would be cool for sure - webcam realtime video

But there is VidRec/amigavideo.alib for that purpose.

It was a few years ago that I had it running...
But as far as I remember, it was showing an overlay of my webcam/TV card, in a window on my (emulated) Workbench.

[emufan]

Originally Posted by Michael Sykes

But there is VidRec/amigavideo.alib for that purpose.

I found the tool here. i had no clue about that.
But th genlocking thing, at least from my point of view is different. the video i linked above, shows what i would like to see

@Toni.W: thanks for not ignoring the topic.
is there something, technical specs or something I ( we ) can try to find to make such genlock mode working sooner or later?

[Michael Sykes]

Originally Posted by emufan

But th genlocking thing, at least from my point of view is different. the video i linked above, shows what i would like to see

The only thing that comes to my mind is having YT videos as my WB backdrop. I know...
Now you might get a clue why I chose Psycho as my avatar.

[LocalH]

I could see a compelling use case in the sense of emulating (and thus preserving) hard-to-find hardware like that used with the Prevue Guide/TV Guide Channel Amigas (although from my understanding the genlock isn't really anything special, just an example).

As I also said in the last thread, I don't think there should be a pressing need to do something like that now. However, it would be a nice feature to see one day out of the blue.

[amiga_fan]

Originally Posted by Toni Wilen

No. 100% useless.

Just like PPC emulation

Toni, I hope you consider doing it just because it's possible

[Toni Wilen]

Question remains: why?

Nothing requires genlock. All programs that use genlock work without full genlock emulation. You just get blank areas (or some strange color) in place of video display.

No program can detect if there is video signal or not (Genlock connected checkbox = genlock connected with blank video signal): video part does not need to be emulated, it is not like video capture device or similar.

Genclock is much much more useless than PPC. You need PPC to run PPC programs, you don't need genlock to run genlock programs.

[amiga_fan]

Originally Posted by Toni Wilen

... You need PPC to run PPC programs, you don't need genlock to run genlock programs.

The usefulness of ppc programs is debatable :-)

Anyway, I got your point (from a technical point of view), for not doing it.

[Toni Wilen]

Technically you need PPC to run PPC programs. I didn't say running PPC programs is useful

Seriously, if there is genlock program that uses new genlock features implemented in ECS/AGA, then I'll reconsider. So far everything uses original boring system: color 0 gets replaced with video.