From: Dave Poindexter
Subject: Re: Quadra 950 and VideoSpigot
Reply-To: poindexter@scri.fsu.edu
Organization: SCRI @ Florida State U.
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 92 02:58:07 GMT

In article <1992Oct6.120725.11244@waikato.ac.nz> ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence
D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) writes:
>In article <0096180E.58D289C0@vms.csd.mu.edu>, 2719weberj@vms.csd.mu.edu
writes:
>> Hi all,
>> I am considering getting a Quadra 950 multimedia package under the
>> student pricing package.  This package includes the super Mac
>> video spiget video board etc.  Does any one have any reviews
>> that might help me on this?
>
>I have a VideoSpigot card in my LC. I've been dabbling with capturing

Allow me to add my $0.02 US, I have had a Spigot in a Quadra 700 for about one
month and in a IIfx before that for a few more months.

>The Spigot is very much a low-end digitizer card. Video capture, and even
>on-screen play-through, are very CPU-intensive processes. The good news is,
>your Quadra 950 should be able to manage real-time grabs of movie sequences
>at 30 frames per second with no problems--straight to RAM, at any rate.

This should be true. In tests I have run from digitizing from a VHS recorder,
I've been able to get 28-29 fps on the Q700 in the 160X120 window without sound
and 24-25 fps when recording sound at the same time. The IIfx was not much
slower.

>The bad news is, it's not going to be able to do this at full-screen (480*640)
>resolution. It should certainly do it at on-sixteenth (160*120) resolution,
>and possibly at one-quarter (320*240) size as well.

This is true with the current version of QuickTime. The updated version due to
be released this(?) month is promised to allow the fastest Macs to do 30 fps in
larger windows, possibly up to 640X480. The new co-dec from SuperMac should
also improve QuickTime's capabilities. If things continue to improve at this
pace, perhaps even slower Macs can reach these figures before too long. Of
course all this is just a clever ploy to get all of us to buy Gigabyte hard
drives and a fist full of 16 Mb SIMMs.  ;^)

>Stuff deleted on the capabilities of the Spigot's software, ScreenPlay.
>
>The other way to grab frames is through the standard QuickTime "vdig" (video
>digitizer) interface. Unfortunately the driver for this is still in beta;
>it works, but is not *quite* as robust as it should be. You can use this
driver
>with applications like DiVA VideoShop, that include frame-grabbing
capabilities.

Point of clarification, this vdig is from SuperMac so the Spigot can be
accessed by software other than ScreenPlay. I'm sure other QuickTime
framegrabber makers also have similar system extensions for their hardware as
well.

>ScreenPlay has one annoying characteristic if you run it on a machine with
>built-in audio input (like the LC or Quadra): if you want to grab a movie
>sequence with simultaneous audio, it won't let you use any other audio input
>devices you may happen to have connected. For example, I have a MacRecorder
>hooked to my LC, that I prefer to use for most things, mainly because it
>has a manual recording level control. But ScreenPlay won't give me the option
>of using it! So if I want a decent-quality soundtrack, I have to grab the
>audio separately, and combine it with the video using something like Premiere.

Mr. D'Oliveiro may still be using the pre-MacroMedia version of MacRecorder.
The new version, MacRecorder Pro, comes with a system extension which is
compatable with ScreenPlay. All you have to do if you have a Mac with built-in
audio digitizing capability is plug the digitizer in one of the serial ports
and then go to your Sound control panel and click on the MacRecorder icon on
the bottom of the panel. 

I have not run to many tests recording an audio track with the video, but so
far I'm pretty disappointed. As someone posted a while back, audio captured
with the Q700's built-in digitizer seems to be somewhat distorted due to
possible impedience mismatches(?) with "typical" inputs. The sound digitized
with the MacRecorder seems to have a better more natural range, but so far I've
also had a lot static noises in the signal as well. Does anybody know more
about the audio side of this process? It appears that some extra
filtering/impedence-matching/etc. is needed for acceptable sound.

>All in all, I think the Spigot is a neat product, that has no competition in
>its price range.

I agree that for the price, its a very good product. Digital Vision has just
started shipping Computer Eyes RT for the Mac for close to the same price(?).
Its an external SCSI box which promises to have similar capabilities as the
Spigot. As I understand it, right now the software does not yet support the
capture of more than one frame at a time. Full QuickTime support is promised in
the next release of the software RSN.

>Hope this helps.
>
>Lawrence D'Oliveiro                       fone: +64-7-856-2889
>Hamilton, New Zealand    37^ 47' 26" S, 175^ 19' 7" E, GMT+13:00

Dave Poindexter, Graphic Artist
Supercomputer Computations Research Institute
Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL
poindexter@scri.fsu.edu  ph. (904) 644-7021, fax: 644-0098
***Its Laa-aug. Laa-aug. Its better than bad, its GOOD!***