From: bscott@nyx.cs.du.edu (Ben Scott)
Subject: Re: Trying to find the perfect morpher
Summary: Manual or automatic?  
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Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix at U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 08:07:11 GMT

In article <69774@cup.portal.com> blackbelt@cup.portal.com (Ben - Williams) writes:
>Ben Scott writes:
>
>"a 244K Addendum file?  That's way beyond reasonable.  I will look forward to
>
>    Reasonable is one of those slippery, individually defined terms. You are

True.  But I wonder how many users out there would disagree with me?  (I'm
not asking for public replies here, nor taking a survey - this newsgroup has
enough messages already...)

>    situation. If Imagemaster was priced where it should be for the features
>    it provides, it would be financially feasable to do a new manual on a
>    regular basis - but we believe that the Amiga market absolutely will not
>    support that kind of pricing.

Please consider the possibility that you have things bass ackwards - with a
more up-to-date manual, or at the least, PRINTED addenda ("addendum" doesn't
quite cut it in this case...) and a 3-ring binder format, might justify a
higher price for many people.  Perhaps selling two versions, a low-end with
a simpler set of functions, and a higher end with all the feeps and
whistles, might allow you to widen your customer range, even if it adds to
your technical support workload.
  
>"Yes, I realize that [bug was easy to get around] as well.  But with bugs

No, that's not what I meant exactly - there were two sentences of yours in
the segment I quoted, and I was replying to the second one in which you said
that version 9.22 was already shipping.  I did not know the bug was easy to
geet around.

>    so are tested minimally. The HAM defaults got by us simply because no one
>    here uses HAM as a default - we like the register modes better. Note that

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if by "register modes" you mean something to do
with HAM-E output, there are probably several users out here who can't use
them.  I myself have access to a Toaster, a DCTV, and a DMI Resolver, and
still would use HAM display mode in Imagemaster for most operations due to
the better speed of screen refreshes.
  
>    The addendum is part of the manual. Your failure to treat it that way is
>    not in accordance with the organization of the package we sold you - your
>    choice, again, but your implied assertion that the morphing is not
>    documented is unsupportable. It *is* documented, there ARE mentions of it.

OK, I will go further and say that in the version (9.20, though the floppies
say 9.19 on the label) I have, it is not well documented IMO, even in the
"addendum" file.  Perhaps I'm reading it without the context of reading the
entire printed part of the manual, but I found a lot of things not
mentioned.  Like how to work with the warp/transparency curves - I can't get
them to work at all, actually; I suspect it's another v9.2 bug though. 
 
>"I'd recommend you add that [vector preview] to Imagemaster if you haven't
>already (I couldn't find mention of it anywhere)."
>
>    It's possible we'll do that - it's not a very high priority, though.
>    Imagemaster can already generate an image-based morph preview in just a
>    few minutes on a 3000-class machine. There are much higher priority items

96x60 res doesn't show me enough.  Morphs can get very detailed, I don't
have to tell you.  The wireframe, despite the fact that it does not include
any of the image, tells me more about how well I've placed my vectors.   
 
>"Also, I had a lot of trouble keeping the (non-morphing) background stable
>
>    Hmm. You should be able to get a high degree of isolation by adding edges
>    to the points surrounding the areas to be controlled, and then
>    surrounding the morphing region with an enclosed, edged, IShape that does
>    not move. Edge features are v21+, I'm not sure what version you have, btw.

As stated above... edges would be nice.
 
>Ben (Williams... we could get confusing here... :^)

Nah - I don't post here enough to get confused when someone posts a question
to "Ben"... 

.                            <<<<Infinite K>>>>

--
|Ben Scott, professional goof-off and consultant at The Raster Image, Denver|
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|"Don't tug on that - you never know what ][The Raster Image IS responsible |
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