APPLE II GRAPHICS & SOUND FORUM CONFERENCE LOG February 19,1993 10:00 P.M. Topic: SuperConvert Forum Leader: W. Scott Gentry (AFL Scott) Edited by: Ted O'Hara (AFC Ted) Copyright (c) 1993 America Online, Inc. and Excellent Software, Inc. All Rights Reserved ================================================================== AFL Scott The topic is SuperConvert -- that wonderful program by Seven Hills Software! AFL Scott I suppose I ought to throw out a question... but first... AFL Scott Hey, if you're reading this and you're not staff, you can win five free hours for your logo design! All it has to have on it to be eligible is a star and the words, "Dallas Cowboys. Super Bowl Champions." AFL Scott That's it! So hey, enter now! AFL Scott Now for the first question on SuperConvert... AFL Scott Dave... I've not heard much about the update. How's it coming or has it already been released? SevenHills Unfortunately the update has been stalled...Jason got about halfway through then had something come up. Hopefully he'll get back on track, but right now we have no idea when the update will be available. SevenHills :( AFC Tosh So Jason is still "into" working on it? AFL Scott I was wondering if you could tell us what features would be in the upgrade once it was completed? SevenHills When it's eventually available, the SuperConvert update will show NDAs under System 6. SevenHills Plus a few other things. :) AFC Ted Such as? :) AFA Andy GMTA, Ted :D SevenHills Seriously, the interface is changing somewhat, and a new class of image type has been added AFA Andy SC was the first of the many programs I purchased from SevenHills :) FredW GS Will conversions from Computereyes RAW DATA now be possible? AFL Marty New class of image type? FredW GS >You knew it was coming :)< SevenHills (Monochrome). The preview window has added some menus in its info bar so you can do things like crop the displayed image, view it in various reductions and magnifications. You can switch among displaying the Screen image, True Color image, or Monochrome image in the Preview window. AFA Andy I knew, Fred ;) AFC Tosh me too Fred. :) AFL Marty I knew, Fred. :) AFA Andy LOL!! AFA Andy I guess everyone knows, Fred. AFC DaveS True Color? AFL Scott (The magnified thing with RGB, Black stripes, Dave) AFC DaveS (Scott: Thanks for the reminder :) AFA Andy Have there been any more Mac formats added? SevenHills Some conversions have also been added. ComputerEyes Raw Data is the big one that comes to mind. The magnifications are done by pixels; for the big RBG preview you still have the main menu selection. The preview window is almost like a quick remapping of the True Color image when it's displaying the TCI. That is, the image looks "real," not the separate RGB+black image. AFC DaveS Fred's happy now! FredW GS :)))))))))))))) AFL Scott Ah! That's nice, Dave! It's a shame there was a delay, but I know it must be serious because you're sticking with Jason! I wish more publishers had the guts to stick things out. FredW GS You found ways around the problems you were having with image contrast then? AFA Andy Has multipalette support been enhanced? AFC DaveS Hmm...sounds interesting! SevenHills The image contrast problem is a "feature" of the Computereyes format. To solve it you have to do a Histogram Equalization on the image after it loads. FredW GS I hear about Computereyes and my computer get so exicted it bumps offline !! AFC Ted Uh Oh, Fred ;) AFL Scott I wonder who told you that? :) AFA Andy :) FredW GS OK, and SC does Histogram EQ's? AFA Andy Yes, even now it does. AFL Scott It does in its current form, too, Fred. FredW GS That's what my program does at 1/10000 impulse speed :) SevenHills What Andy & Scott said. :) AFL Scott One thing I really like about SuperConvert is its ability to save in TIFF format. I'd expound, Dave, but I thinkyou could tell us some uses for it that we've never thought of! How about it? AFL Marty Could I suggest something? SevenHills The two big things I use TIFF for are (1) creating awesome slides of IIGS screens, and (2) moving screen shots of the IIGS over to the Mac for documentation. AFC DaveS I'd like to hear Marty's suggestion...it's bound to be interesting :) AFL Scott Sure, Marty! AFL Marty I'd like to have the ability to quickly scale an image to any percent of its original size... present a dialog box and let me type in, say, 85% and have it scale. AFC Tosh I just tried the TIFF conversion.....but had trouble. AFA Andy There are a few uses for TIFF mentioned in the back of the manual. AFC Tosh I saved to an HFS disk.....but my 2 Mac paint programs didn't see it. SevenHills That's an idea...perhaps a button in the Remap dialog (which lets you scale, but doesn't show any percentages). AFL Scott One thing I've been counselling people on here in AGS is the ability to convert Allison Raw images into TIFF for use with programs such as PhotoShop... I hear they come out really nice. I've never seen it, though. AFL Marty As long as I can scale any way I want. SevenHills Tosh, after saving the TIFF image its Mac Type & Creator are nothings....you need to use some Mac program to change the type to "TIFF" so apps will know it is a TIFF image. Also, most paint programs don't load TIFF...you need something "heavy duty" like PageMaker, PhotoShop, etc. FredW GS Grey scale that'd be pretty easy Marty...but color might be a problem. AFL Scott Hint, Donald.. you might want to use GIFConverter on the pictures and select fix filetype. AFL Marty I know color is a problem. That's why I want the program to do it. :) AFC Tosh Ah...thought so...they all come out as "documents". AFA Andy Oh, and GIFConverter is so neat. SevenHills One thing I do is use the shareware program "GIF Converter" to load an image and save it into other formats. Oh, you already have that! :) FredW GS What about converting Allison to Computereys and then TIFF'ing it without the HIST EQ, should work fine. AFC Tosh Thanks, I'll try that. :) SevenHills In the next SuperConvert, if you save a TIFF image onto an HFS disk, SuperConvert automatically sets the type and creator to TIFF/GCON (whatever GIF Converter uses). AFL Marty GIF Converter is for Mac, isn't it? AFC DaveS Great! AFA Andy Dave, will SC be able to open TIFFs? AFL Scott Fred, that's an intermediate step that's not required with SuperConvert... you can go straight from Allison to TIFF under SuperConvert with no problem at all. FredW GS Oooops didn't know it had Allison. AFC DaveS Have there been any speed improvements, Dave? AFL Scott (If you're using it on a Mac, just be sure to select Motorola byte ordering.) SevenHills I think there have been some speed improvements in saving GIF, but that isn't the focus of the update (whenever it is available). We're focusing on refining the interface and making things clearer/easier to use. AFC Tosh I was impressed when the dialog came up so you could choose Intel or Motorola byte ordering. Cool. SevenHills SC can't open TIFFs yet, but maybe someday. The TIFF format is so extensible it's nearly useless, but someday we'll probably get support for some of the popular variations. AFA Andy I find SuperConvert much easier to use than Graphics Exchange. AFC Tosh I agree Andy...SuperConvert is much more friendly. :) AFA Andy Has multipallete support enhanced? FredW GS Does SC do 3200's?? AFL Scott One thing, though... I'd like to see Jason add the ability to include user modules. FredW GS GMTA Andy :) SevenHills I don't think multipalette support has changed, but a remapping to multipalette problem has been fixed AFC Ted Bite your tongue, Fred ;) AFA Andy Well, that's good anyway :) SevenHills SuperConvert loads one or two 3200 color formats, but does nothing with saving them. I'm hoping the next version will support loading the documented 3200 color format instead of the previously-popular format. AFC DaveS I've never been sure what Mac PICT format was...is it saved QuickDraw commands? AFA Andy And I know PICT uses square pixels but so does MacPaint and SC does a good job with them. SevenHills Scott--back to an old comment--what do you mean by "user modules"? For applying effects to an image, or for loading/saving different formats? LL AndyW I don't remember what the actual format is, but the old BW/PICT and color PICT are different.. FredW GS Maybe a scripting language Scott? AFL Scott Dave... a way to enhance the program and make it extensible by documenting an interface and calling procedures for loading/processing/saving new formats as they arrive. That way, everytime a new format comes out, there can be some industrious types out there cranking away. AFC DaveS Scott: Like plug-ins in Adobe PhotoShop, or the modules for DreamGrafix? AFL Scott Exactly, Dave. AFA Andy That sounds good, Dave LL AndyW Sounds similar to what Stuffit Deluxe has.. AFC SteveB PICT is a Mac format, no? LL AndyW Y AFA Andy Yes, Steve :) AFC DaveS SuperConvert could become the PhotoShop for the IIGS. AFC DaveS That would be pretty awesome. AFC Tosh :) AFA Andy It surely would :) FredW GS Also, you could write script to do tedious tasks like converting FLI's unattended. AFA Andy I use Elmacro, Fred ;) BCS Frank FLI's? AFC Ted MS-DOS animations, Frank AFC Ted (i think:)) BCS Frank AhhhH SevenHills Oh...speaking of FLIs, one change we're trying to incorporate is to establish settings for batch conversions so one could do batch conversions with no interaction. Probably won't be complete in the next update, but we're making a step toward that. AFC Tosh Sounds Good. :) AFL Scott Whaddaya think of Plug Ins, Dave? AFC DaveS Dave: Will SuperConvert become the "PhotoShop" of the Apple II world? AFC Tosh Too bad the concept of Extras or Plug ins is coming so late to the GS....but I think its great. SevenHills Perhaps SC will have some features of PhotoShop, but I doubt it will ever have editing capabilities like PhotoShop (it'll stay a converter/transformer of images, most likely). AFL Scott Well, I've got to say that's it's a great program right now -- one that I can't do without! AFC Tosh Thats fine Dave.....It can't try to be everything. SevenHills Scott, I very much like the idea of "plug ins", and we're looking for a good programmer for a technology breakthrough in that area...know anybody? AFA Andy :) AFL Scott Hmmm.... lemme think??? AFL Scott I know someone that will be available in mid-april... AFC Tosh Hey Steve....get busy on your graphics programming...I smell a job. :) AFL Scott if you're interested? :) AFA Andy :) AFA Andy I wonder who ;) SevenHills I'm interested. Note that this isn't specific to graphics, and in fact is more low-level stuff than graphics. SevenHills Also must love IPC and System 6. AFA Andy GW III uses plug ins. AFC Ted IPC? AFL Scott I'll keep my ear to the ground, Dave! AFC Tosh Do we think that Apple will be of any help with "bridging the gap" in years to come? AFA Andy Have they been so far? AFC Tosh True. AFL Scott Steve... you might want to try this out. It would be great experience for you, seriously. AFA Andy HFS FST I think is the only thing on our end. AFL Scott You would get so deep into SuperConvert that you'd find you'll be rewriting portions to accomodate your ideas. SevenHills Actually looking for someone not for SuperConvert or its plug ins, but for coding a new technology that Steve Stephenson and I have completely designed, with the feedback of some other people. AFA Andy Hmmmmm.... Any hints about this new technology? SevenHills Steve S was going to code it, but then he got hired by Apple. AFA Andy Dave, can you give us any hints about the new technology? SevenHills Let's just say it would be something that every application author could take advantage of, and would be very cool. AFA Andy That sounds very interesting, Dave. I can't wait til I hear more about. FredW1726 Has a release date for SC been given SevenHills? SevenHills Nope, Fred. No idea. "It'll be done when it's done!" :) AFA Andy Has a release date been set for TransProg and The Manager? AFA Andy Non-graphics question :) AFC Ted WHAP!!, Andy :) SevenHills Both TransProg III _and_ The Manager have been released! LL AndyW Just out of curiosity, any date on Spectrum yet?? FredW1726 What does SuperConvert cost now 7Hills. SevenHills SC is $39.95 retail. Don't know when Spectrum will be done (it's gettin' there!). LL AndyW I gather the ANSI will be limited in Spectrum.. Not enough resolution to get all the colors, and 80 columns.. FredW1726 Will an interface for user modules to Spectrum be powerful enough to say... write a new front-end for AOL?? :) SevenHills This time I think I'm gonna go before AOL makes me... :) SevenHills Night, all! AFC DaveS Take care, Dave! Thanks for fielding our q's!