ChromaPIX ReadMe File Jim Barber N7CXI (jlbarber@wolfenet.com) William Montgomery VE3EC (William.Montgomery@cciw.ca) www.siliconpixels.com Last Changed 12-JAN-99 Welcome to the ChromaPIX Slow Scan TV Workstation Beta release. ChromaPIX is a brand new 'workstation' approach to SSTV. ChromaPIX is a full 32 bit Windows95 or WindowsNT 4 application that couples multiple front panels to a 'virtual' SSTV engine based on state of the art DSP (Digital Signal Processing) technology. The DSP engine can process SSTV images at near the theoretical limits of the SSTV signal specifications. The front panel user interfaces provids a sophisticated workshop for image composition and processing. System Highlights DSP VM (virtual machine) -Analog signal detection provides superior performance over 'hard-limited' FM detectors by permitting sub-cycle frequency recovery. -Adjustable digital filters allow you to taylor the VM to meet signal environment variations. -DSP VM runs at all times to provide detector spectral display, tuning meter display, and receive autostart based VIS or sync recovery. User Interface -Multiple front panels allow access to the VM. Use one panel to receive or transmit images while loading, compositing, or saving images on other panels. -Most image operations are based on fast drag and drop or 'single click' operations. All controls can be rapidly accessed using powerful tab function panels. -Image processing functions include adjustment of brightness, contrast, hue, saturation, and sharpness. Additional median and average filters quickly remove noise from received images. -Paint operations include most common functions as well as advanced drop shadows and realistically rendered image frames. -A full toolbox of special effects controls is also included. -Disk storage of images is handled by a thumbnail tray which provides small preview images of files on your disk as well as instant drag and drop access to your favorite directories. Load time effects make adding borders and drop shadows painless. An integrated slide show allows you to easily display your image collection. System Requirements o Pentium 90 or above. o 16 mb RAM o TrueColor video card (16, 24, or 32 bit display) o 16 bit, crystal controlled soundcard, with appropraite driver software o Windows 95, or Windows NT 4.0 (SP3) A Word About Screen Font Settings It is strongly suggested that you run Windows with your display settings set to use 'small fonts'. If you have trouble reading 'small fonts' a much better solution is to lower the screen resolution. ie instead of 1024 X 768 on a 15" monitor you might try 800 X 600. If you use 'large fonts' windows will scale up all of the screen elements including all controls and image boxes on the screen to accomodate the larger fonts. Unfortunatly 'fixed elements' such as actual bitmaps (SSTV pictures) will not be scaled up as it is important to maintain their original 'pixel' sizes. The effect of this is that you will end up with large forms on your screen and waste precious screen area. By using 'small fonts', controls become more compact and more screen area is available for real work. Bug Reports If you find a problem with ChromaPIX please document how the problem can be observed and email a report to the addresses above. Please include a full description of your computer system (mem, cpu, speed etc) along with the bug report. Please keep an eye on the web page (www.siliconpixels.com) for any updates - your 'bug' may have been already corrected in an newer release. Registration (All prices in US dollars) Email registration: $120 Media shipment: $ 10 Replacement/update: $ 15 Registered W95SSTV and Robot Helper users are eligible for a 30% discount when they register ChromaPIX, making the cost to those users $84. Unfortunately, we cannot discount media shipments, if they are requested. During the ChromaPIX beta program, we will ship on 3.5" diskettes only. Once the program is officially released, it will be available on diskette or CD-ROM. ChromaPIX is also available through Silicon Pixels agents and distributors. Please check on our web site at http://www.siliconpixels.com for a list of our current dealers. Authorized Silicon Pixels Agents and Distributors USA and worldwide Jim Barber, N7CXI P.O. Box 579 Selah, WA 98942 USA Email: jlbarber@wolfenet.com www: Silicon Pixels Web Site France TBL CLUB Rue de Bas 70120 LA ROCHE MOREY France Email: TBLCLUB@aol.com Japan Fusanori Koide, JG1VEM 5-4-26, Kyonan-cho, Musashino-City, Tokyo, 180-0023 JAPAN Email: jg1vem@ktx.or.jp United Kingdom Roger Wilkins, G3XFA 50, Brookside, BARNWELL, Peterborough, PE8 5PS UK Email: RTWilkins@compuserve.com Notes ===== Unregistered copies of ChromaPIX are fully functional but will only run for 30 minutes per session. This is a 'Beta' release of ChromaPIX and is therefore not fully tested or debugged. Some featues are missing or not functional. As the product is refined new features will be added. Bug reports are always welcome but due to time constraints we may not be able to answer all email. We feel that at this point it is better to spend the time available getting the product finished rather than providing pre-release (beta) product support. For a 'quick-start' guide please read CPIX101.txt ........................................................................................ Summary of Keyboard Shortcut Keys ================================= S Standby A Auto Receive R Receive T Transmit [space] Toggle Mini-Monitor View M Enter Text + Increase Text Font Size while drawing - Decrease Text Font Size while drawing ........................................................................................ Revision History: 20-DEC-97 -initial (private) beta 0.90.00.00 23-DEC-97 -public beta 0.90.01.00 27-DEC-97 -0.90.02 - fix for invalid OCX-DLL version check under non-US/British versions of Windows 95. '30-JAN-98 -changed 'LargeChange' from 10 to 9 for correct thumbnail scrolling opperation. ' -changed paste menu so that the 'default' paste operation ' now pastes into any selection or full screen. The 'other' paste ' option is now 'live paste' which allows dynamic positioning. ' '6-FEB-98 -version .90.05A ' -DoEvents removed from (grid) scroll and Form.Activate. This should 'fix' ' cascading scrolls of thumbnails ' -Edit menu 'Paste' and 'Live Paste' added to clarify paste actions ' -for History and Autosave to 'keep' an image the last line received ' must have been greater than line 190 ' -Spectral display trace color and style now saved and set properly. ' -Load into header and under header now work when dragging between ' GUIs with no selection is active in either GUI. Selections overide ' these load effects. ' -Load into header and under header now work for clipboard pastes. ' -Paste operations now support clipping and scale to fit load effects. ' -fixed font problem when startup restored font was from the 'Symbol' family. ' -If two different images are saved with the same file name but different ' extention then the thumbnail will be generated on each save. The thumbnail ' will therefore match the last file saved with that name. ' -saving an image using an existing file name will force the current file ' to be deleted before the save. This shouldn't be necessary but might fix ' reported problems with occasional page faults during this operation. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- April 98 Version 0.92.00 Changes -High Resolution modes support added -fixed color swatches problem -increased frame 'max' size -added keyboard shortcuts for VM main controls (S,A,R,T) -fixed autoscaling when using 'Large Fonts' -fixed problem where autosaved images would sometimes be Blank (black) -added support for scrolling Lead control for hi-res support on 640x480 and 800x600 screens. -menu load/save image commands -user selected headers added -selectable 'caller ID' OR callsign tag on image (solid or transparent background) -added big colored LEDs to main modes buttons -copy and paste buttons added -updated zoom and clear buttons -fixed bug that could occure with thumbnail grid when deleted images caused the scroll bar to be hidden. (invalid array index) -fixes to user callsign banner display (for scrolled image) -TX cursor changes (for scrolled image) -fixed save routine for VIS Sensitivity and Sharpness to properly handle empty reg keys vs '0' saved values. -added tone generators for 1200,1500,1750, and 1900 Hz -added drag'n drop from Windows Explorer or ACDSee (or similar browser, Does not support PSP 4) -added pref for startup mode ( RX or Auto-RX ) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- June 98 Version 0.94.00 Changes -Support for 2 byte fonts added (Japan) <== Cool! -AVT 24, 90, and 94 modes added <== Cool! -Post-Rx image slant correction slider added <== Cool! -Visual Rx clock calibrate control added <== Cool! -Sync lock range adjust slider added -Optional file date display with name -Four multi line text messages added to painter -Auto recovery from GDI resources exhausted error. -Post-Rx caller ID by left clicking [?] (file info well) -Caller ID detection improved -Rx LED now blinks when sync locked in 'sync pulse' sstv modes -Bugs fixed ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- July/August/September 98 Version 0.95.11 Changes -Lower GDI resource usage now permits 4 GUIs under Windows 95 -Autosave button state saved and restored for GUI 0 -Autosave directory now selectable -Autosave shutoff on disk almost full -Mini-Monitor window added o Double click active image to minimize and display mini-monitor. Double click on mini-monitor to restore GUI. o Use space-bar to minimize all GUIs and display mini-monitor, use space-bar again to restore GUIs and hide mini-monitor o Move mini-monitor by dragging and resize it by dragging the border corner. o Green mini-monitor border indicates RX active. o Use keyboard shortcuts to control the VM even when the GUI is minimized as long as mini-monitor has focus. (S=Standby, A=AutoRx, R=Receive, [Space]=min-max GUIs) -Quad Load 'Load Effects' button added. Drag thumbnail or RX thumbnail to image quadrant to load or double click to load into next quadrant. Also works from clipboard pastes and file loads. -Painter Tools now 'stick' if you right click on then. -Test patterns added for Color Bars, Grey Scale, Resolution and Linearity. Color Bars and Grey Scale can work with selection rectangles. -New SSTV preference added to allow for clearing the screen to black whenever a new image starts being received. -Rx Clock range increased to 7600-8400 Hz ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- September/October 98 Version 0.95.12 Changes -Fixed change directory 'double dialog' bug which occured on some systems when clicking the change directory button or when double clicking on a thumbnail tab. -Corrected 'Tool Tips' for new test pattern buttons. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- October/November 98 Version 0.95.14 Changes -Added Call and Date stamp to bottom of image on TX (Option) -Added 'M' keyboard shortcut that brings up the text entry dialog for rapid text entry. -Added '+' and '-' keyboard shortcuts to change text size while drawing text (live!) Version 0.95.18 Changes -Thumbnail tray will now attempt to restore the scroll position after a file save or delete. -Sync lockin range reduced to +/- 150 Hz to avoid AFC pull due to video leakage into the sync passband. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- December 98 Version 0.96.00 Changes -DSP kernel replaced with 'GEN-3' version (now samples at 11,025 hz) Provides compatibility with more sound cards, and offers performance enhancements. -Highpass filter option added to support new 'super resolution' feature in 'fast' SSTV modes, such as Scottie 2, Martin 2, Robot 36, etc. (Great for MIR pictures!) -Video For Windows module added (CCAP.EXE) -TWAIN interface improved, and moved to seperate module (CSCAN.EXE) -Minor cosmetic changes (tooltip fixes, etc) Version 0.96.02 Changes -Repeater Tone TX button added -CW ID option added -Minor cosmetic changes Version .96.05 Changes -Added prefs for selecting callsign and time options for TX ID stamp -TX Time/Date are now affected by the UTC/Local time preference setting -Expanded range of RX clock values to handle 10,900 Hz to 11,150 Hz (some low cost sound cards require this much range) Version .96.06 Changes 3-JAN-99 -Added support for 'narrow' BP filter. This is a 199 tap 'super sharp' SSTV bandpass filter that will block 'just about all' out-of-band QRM. It does however require extra CPU power. If the CPU load level exceeds 70% then the system will automatically revert to the 'standard' bandpass filter. Version .96.09 Changes 9-JAN-99 -Added option of not generating thumbnail preview files (.PRE) -Added AVT header decoder status messages. -GUI/VM shutdown improved Version .96.15 Changes 12-JAN-99 (version slid up to match JA web W.J.M.) -default audio filter (first run) changed to 'Bandpass'.