COS ~~~ Coded By Andrew Campbell A Black Dragon Design Production ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A Public Domain release - freely copyable ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ WHAT IS COS? ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Cos is an experimental image generating program that uses trigonomical functions - Sine, Tangent and Cosine - to form strange patterns. It adds depth to these bizzare creations by using an effective method of colour shading. Cos will NOT make superb, detailed pictures FOR you- it's a kind of... weird PATTERN maker and you can save anything you might regard as "cool" out to disk as IFF. Similarly, you can load in your own IFF screens (eg. made with Dpaint, etc) and, well, mess them up I suppose. If your computer is anything less than an A1200, you could end up making coffee whilst the program performs some of it's more complex functions. Ah well. HOW TO USE COS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ When the program has loaded, you'll be presented with a small green menu at the bottom of the screen. Using the mouse, you can select functions with the LEFT button, or remove the menu to see the "work screen" behind by clicking the RIGHT button. To choose and perform one of Cos's many weird but wonderful effects, simply press one of the icons with a pattern on it (it'll turn RED), then click on GENERATE (bottom right) or TEST (bottom, middle-ish). Not all functions are that easy to see when they first start - be patient and you'll be rewarded with some superbly odd results. On top of all the pattern-making icons, you can select a further FOUR modes for each one! COS (cosine), TAN (tangent), SIN (sine) or RND (random) - and these can have some wildly different effects! Experiment and you'll soon see what I mean. COS'S ICONS EXPLAINED ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ GENERATE = create the pattern in 16 colours with shading applied. TEST = create the pattern in 1 colour with no shade. UNDO = pretend you haven't done what you just have. PAL = cycle through various preset colour palettes. INV = inverse the current colour palette. LOAD = load an IFF picture (ONLY IFF and ONLY 16-colours LOWRES) SAVE = save current picture as IFF (please note LOAD and SAVE use the standard AMOSPro requester, as this is version one of the program and I haven't gotten around to coding my own yet. I've been BUSY alright?!?!) COS = generate current pattern using Cosine (usually the best). TAN = use Tangent (often very bizzare results) SIN = sometimes the opposite of COS, sometimes very different. RND = this could do anything! Try it - you'll be surprised. Some functions are FIXED random, others are TOTALLY random! Some routines will go on for EVER unless you stop them with the mouse! Sometimes this may cause your machine to CRASH, so be careful. The AMOS source code to this program will shortly be available with the cool AMOS diskmag AMOSzine (F1 Licenceware) so get in contact if you'd like these routines for your own use. HOW DOES GENERATE WORK? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The generate technique works by adding one value to the colour beneath the current place of drawing. Hence, a pixel will start out as a very dark one, and the more times it is "overwritten" the brighter it will become. Because of the complexity and repetitiveness of Cos's patterns this technique eventually gives a smooth shading effect. COS CREDITS ~~~~~~~~~~~ Cos exists cos......................Andrew Campbell coded it. Cos was created for.................Jen Allen of Megamuddle Productions. :-) x x x Created using.......................AMOS Professional 2.0 AMOS Professional Compiler 2.0 Crunched using......................StoneCracker HISTORY ~~~~~~~ Cos v1.1 ~~~~~~~~ Changes/improvements since v1.0: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 13.8.95 ~~~~~~~ * GENERATE is now slightly faster due to new AMOS commands. * Pressing ESCAPE quits the program. * Pressing F1 changes the colour of the mouse pointer. :) * There are now 19 colour palettes instead of just 9. These include brighter and more varied colours. * Some example pictures included. Cos v2.0 ~~~~~~~~ Changes/improvements since v1.1: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 21.8.95 ~~~~~~~ * NEW MENU Incorporated (swapped for colour cycling buttons). * Colour cycling now activated using: F1 - <--- F2 - STOP F3 - ---> * Mandlebrot fractal world incorporated. * Julia fractals incorporated. Use RND function for best results. * Menu colours changed from green to blue. :) 27.8.95 ~~~~~~~ * Pattern generator incorporated from original ILLUSIONS source (but enhanced and enlarged). * Star effect added. Works well with GENERATE on light backgrounds. * Screencopy effect now returns to menu instead of looping until a button is pressed. * Screen/mouse colours changed upon bootup. Cos v2.1 ~~~~~~~~ Changes/improvements since v2.0: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 16.12.95 ~~~~~~~~ * CURRENT STATUS bar added to show which effect is currently being generated. means it will go on forever unless the mouse button is pressed. Other effects are TIMED - ie: they will go on until they reach a specific point, then they'll stop, or you can stop them manually with the mouse. TIMED effects NOT perfected yet, machine can still crash. :( * Several new buttons/features implimented. These include a huge sine wave screen effect which has some very impressive results. * New Black Dragon Design 96 Workbench icon added. :) * Several bugs fixed. (end of file)