›33m  PHOENIX COLOUR DIGITIZER›m
                      ------------------------
                                                by Peter Furey.


   Ed: There is also another locally made digitiser called Prism Digital 
  Colour Splitter for which we will have a review in the next issue, as well 
  as a head-to-head with this one -  it is a very advanced unit 
  technically speaking, and is also available from us ... watch this space.


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    Phoenix MicroTechnologies, a South Australian firm with a reputation for
  making quality hardware pheripherals has released a new colour digitizer
  for the Amiga.

    The digitizing hardware unit is a combination RGB colour splitter and
  digitizer which allows the operator to capture and manipulate full colour
  images from either a video camera or high quality VCR ( or any video
  source ).

    Priced at $499, the digitizer comes in a single external metal case
  with its own external power supply. A large ribbon cable connects your
  Amiga to the digitizer via the parallel port.
  On the front of the unit is a black plastic control knob. This is a built
  in colour saturation control knob which lets you regulate the amount of
  colour coming from the video source.
  Turn the knob full on clockwise for rich colour or back to zero for a
  black and white image.  ( About 1 o'clock is usually the best setting. )

     The hardware comes with a few typed pages of instructions; simple and
  to the point.  A clear diagram shows where to plug in each component, with
  everything clearly labelled.

    By connecting the Luminance and Chrominance plugs on the back of the unit
  with the supplied cable, the digitizer is able to take in the video signals
  from normal sources and from the new PAL S-VHS equipment.
  Much cleaner results can be obtained by employing this method of capture.

    The hardware comes with its own software, aptly named ColourView and
  whilst I found it easy to use and quick to digitize, the final images were
  less than first grade.  Loading the images into another software product,
  Art Department Professional, did wonders for them and I finished up with
  some fine results, but not every time.

  The Phoenix ColourView software is a one step procedure where I had to
  manually select the Red, Green and Blue colours with a click of the mouse,
  altering the control switch which is also on the front of the unit to R, G
  and B at the same time.


                        ›33m    PHOENIX plus DIGIVIEW›m

    The Phoenix Digitizer was also designed to be used as a high quality
  hardware upgrade for the ever reliable Digi-View 4 software and it was in
  this area I had outstanding success.
  Instead of taking separate passes of red, green and blue to obtain a
  colour image, I used the AUTO mode in Digi-View and digitized in one
  simple operation.

    To use the DIGIVIEW software with the digitizer, I had to plug a small
  hardware component into the back of the unit, connect a thin ribbon cable
  to it and the other end to the JOYSTICK port of my Amiga.
  All the hardware and cables are supplied with the digitizer.
  With this in position I experienced fault free operation of DIGIVIEW in
  full colour.
    BUT, if this small hardware component is plugged in backwards, damage
  could result to your computer.  The correct procedure is well documented
  by the Phoenix people, with a large diagram as well.  This did not stop
  one of my friends from being a tad too eager and not bothering to read
  the instructions until it was too late!   He upset his Amiga and lost
  control of his mouse movements. ( MessyMouse! )
  Luckily the computer did not belong to him personally and he was able to
  put the whole thing down to new technology running riot in the back room
  of Perth's busiest computer shop.


    DIGIVIEW also has its limitations...  Only 4096 colours can be used to
  display the final digitised image.  So I had to contend with an image of
  only 4096 colours out of a possible 4 million colours from a video signal.

  Some of the results were just OK, but others were superb!
  The Digitizer operated nicely when producing HAM images of 4096 colours
  directly from a video camera, and even better when converting to the
  complicated Dynamic Ham resolution.


     ›33m Final Analysis›m....  A good product for the low price...



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