VisorCentral.com - Eyemodule 2 on a VDX; number of grays?

Show 20 posts from this thread on one page

VisorCentral.com (http://discussion.visorcentral.com/vcforum/index.php)
- Springboard Modules (http://discussion.visorcentral.com/vcforum/forumdisplay.php?forumid=10)
-- Eyemodule 2 on a VDX; number of grays? (http://discussion.visorcentral.com/vcforum/showthread.php?threadid=11900)

Posted by thorin on 02-16-2001 06:36 AM:

Has anyone tried using an Eyemodule 2 on a visor Deluxe(not platinum or prism)?

If anyone has, I was wondering if you could tell me how many shades of gray are displayed, and how many grays you can takes movies in.

Better yet, If someone could post some pictures and movies taken on a Visor Deluxe, I'd be thrilled.

thanks in advance....

__________________
-thorin

I have a webcomic. You should read it, or I may do something rash. <b><a href=http://driveby.keenspace.com/>Drive-by Loitering</a></b> is updated every monday, wednesday and friday.

<!img src=http://www.frontfly.com/myrouter/vcsig2.gif alt="Soundsgood is too elite for the punks."><img src=http://www.frontfly.com/vcsig.gif ><!img src=http://www.frontfly.com/myrouter/vcsig2.gif alt="Soundsgood is too elite for the punks.">

Posted by PDAENVY on 02-16-2001 01:52 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by thorin
...some pictures and movies taken on a Visor Deluxe...

It doesn't matter what Visor is used to take the images/movies. The capabilities are determined by the EM. So to know how they look on your Visor for yourself, you'll have to view them on your Visor. If you want to know how they'll look on your PC, then all you need is any EM2 images/movies to check it out.

__________________
Jeff

Posted by bkbk on 02-16-2001 04:47 PM:

I think in the new manual they either state or strongly suggest all EM2 apps are optimized for 16 grays, even on a VDX.

Posted by thorin on 02-16-2001 09:50 PM:

i dunno..

I dunno, but i got the impression from the eyemodule website that you could only take colour movies on a visor prism, and only b&w(16 shades of grey?) movies on VDX's and Platinums.

Again, I'd be thrilled if someone would post a "black and white" movie taken on a VDX for me.

Thanks!

Posted by bkbk on 02-17-2001 03:38 AM:

Yeah, I think that's the case w/the movies -- kinda crazy, but there you have it.
Even wackier is that you don't get the *choice* w/a color PDA to shoot them in b&w if you want ... and, y'know, save some bytes?
It's like the EM2 is a b&w device for the b&w HSVs & a color one for the Prism.
Hopefully, when James finishes his review, he'll include a lot of examples.
(We're anxious, dude!)

Posted by eyebrowse on 02-18-2001 03:24 AM:

No color movies on B&W Visors...

Helpful user Larry posted to the mailing list the following from the EM2 manual:

Note: Only a color Handspring handheld will capture color Mini-Movies. B&W Visor handhelds can only capture B&W Mini-Movies.

Which is odd, but there you have it.

__________________
<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0"><tr><td><a href="http://lightfantastic.org/eye/"><img src="http://lightfantastic.org/eye/ryanozawa/w-beach3-sm2.jpg" width="80" height="60" border="1"></a></td>
<td valign="top"><font size="2">Ryan Kawailani Ozawa<hr size="1" color="#ff0000"><b>eye</b>browse > eyemodule gallery & users' group<br><a href="http://lightfantastic.org/eye" target="_blank">http://lightfantastic.org/eye</a></font></td></tr></table>

Posted by LarryN on 02-18-2001 03:10 PM:

Re: No color movies on B&W Visors...

quote:
Originally posted by eyebrowse
Helpful user Larry posted to the mailing list the following from the EM2 manual:

Note: Only a color Handspring handheld will capture color Mini-Movies. B&W Visor handhelds can only capture B&W Mini-Movies.

Which is odd, but there you have it.

Hmmm...[blush] I stand quoted. [/blush]

There's a few other b/w references in the manual:

"...downsizing a Full Size (color) image on a B&W Visor handheld will convert the image to B&W" -you have the option of downsizing a fullsize photo...

"You can beam Full Size color images from color to B&W Visor handhelds. The image will be converted to B&W for viewing on the B&W Visor handheld, but wil still appear in color when transferred to your computer"

.. and one (kinda crummy IMHO "feature")
"Note: Beaming to or from the original eyemodule application will cobvert the transferred inages to B&W Palm Size"

After playing with the EM2 for a few hours, it's really cool, but with any night lighting situations, it suffers from really grainy pictures, very much like the EM1.

Posted by bkbk on 02-18-2001 03:57 PM:

Arrrrgh, so sad to hear.
Any chance you could make some postings?
Do the mm's play back on the Visor mm, too -- or are they "as large as" the Visor's screen?
When they convert to the PC, is there the ability to enlarge them?
Any chance the mic picks up SOUND that can then be heard on the PC? (I know that's a stretch -- as I realize they'd prob. trumpet this pretty loudly, if it could, but I can hope, can't I?)
Have you found that you can leave the view-screen on for long periods (longer than EM1, that's for sure) and that the batt. life just tolerates it, as it seems to suggest in the literature?
Finally, are you working w/a b&w unit, or the Prism?
Man, I wish it wasn't a holiday wknd, w/apparently the whole world who's gotten an EM2 on vacation!
TIA for any data you can provide.

Posted by LarryN on 02-18-2001 04:35 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by bkbk
Arrrrgh, so sad to hear.
Any chance you could make some postings?

I'll work on the postings. I just switched ISP's and I've gotta find out where I need to upload stuff to. I'd attach the file to this post, but it's nearly 3mb's. I think those with dialup access would kill me.

quote:
Do the mm's play back on the Visor mm, too -- or are they "as large as" the Visor's screen?

Yes, they play back "nearly" fullscreen in slideshow mode. There is a toolbar when simply viewing it.

quote:
When they convert to the PC, is there the ability to enlarge them?

Nope, unless you count your quicktime options to enlarge. I tried double size, and it begins to get pixellated.

quote:
Any chance the mic picks up SOUND that can then be heard on the PC? (I know that's a stretch -- as I realize they'd prob. trumpet this pretty loudly, if it could, but I can hope, can't I?)

I wish... Nope there as well.

quote:
Have you found that you can leave the view-screen on for long periods (longer than EM1, that's for sure) and that the batt. life just tolerates it, as it seems to suggest in the literature?

Kinda too soon to tell... I'll followup. If you are talking about the auto-off on the Visor, it is not overridden.

quote:
Finally, are you working w/a b&w unit, or the Prism?

Happy owner of a Prism.

quote:
Man, I wish it wasn't a holiday wknd, w/apparently the whole world who's gotten an EM2 on vacation!
TIA for any data you can provide.

Tell me about it! I picked up the GPS Companion and the EM2 yesterday on one of my crazy shopping sprees. I did use my Avantgo 10% off Compusa coupon though! I got the "what's that?" thing... It took a while to discover that they were talking about my Prism/MiniJam combo, and not the e/avantgo coupon. (Pretty scary).

Posted by bkbk on 02-18-2001 04:50 PM:

Hey, thanks for all the quick response data. I almost feel like I'm the only one home surfing the Web today.
A drag about the sound. Maybe this would have doubled the file size or something, tho. (Too funny, about attaching 3mb here.)
Also the pixelation at only 2x of the QuickTime files.
Didn't think I'd wish so har so fast for an EM3, but consider it done!
Still, it's a big advance over EM1.
Great to hear the AvantGo coupon really works.

P.S. I didn't mean about the auto-shut off -- just when you're framing a photo (or video), can you take your sweet time w/out fear of the viewfinder frying your AAA's (like the EM1 does)?

Posted by LarryN on 02-19-2001 12:36 AM:

Coupla pics and .mov clip

Ok.. I uploaded a couple of pics to the net. Granted, they are preliminary pics, and I have not done any photo massaging that would normally be done. My impressions are that they are a little fuzzy. That is fixable in any photo editing software.

Pic of my home base... 129k

Some kids I know 84k

5 second movie clip of woods (very exciting, you know!) 2.8Mb

The size of photos taken does vary.... I've taken a few now, and they're between 60k and 150k... Go figure. Again, these are a rough sample of a few photos I've taken today.

Posted by bkbk on 02-19-2001 03:55 PM:

Hey, killer posts!
I'm sold on the thing. $200 isn't that much (to me, I guess), esp. for what you get.
I was esp. glad to see that in the shot of the kids you got very dark areas -- but no white dots! To me, this is 10x better than EM1 already.
And hey, that slow pan around the woods -- better than ANY of the "Blair Witch" footage. You're too modest -- you should try to become a cinematographer.

Seriously, though, I was shocked at the great level of quality, both in fine detail and perfection of color / evenness of tones, etc.
And I was amazed to find the mm size is much bigger than I orig. thought. (I only got to view them once before -- on a PC w/the screen set for much higher res. than I set mine.)
I'm pleasantly surprised, all around.
It might even make me buy a Prism -- and I might keep my HSVD so I can shoot some stuff in b&w!

When you cite the size of the photos, is it the on-board fig. when it's shot, or like the EM1, the more reasonable size once it transfers to the PC?
Thanks again for the quick posts.

Posted by LarryN on 02-19-2001 04:09 PM:

quote:
Originally posted by bkbk
When you cite the size of the photos, is it the on-board fig. when it's shot, or like the EM1, the more reasonable size once it transfers to the PC?

That's the size when transferred to my PC. Strangely enough, the size of "some kids I know" on my Prism is 124K, but on my PC, it was brought down to 84K. I would have thought that it would be the converse.

Now, I'm going to have top find out if there's some jpg compression that's occurring, that can be modified. I didn't even look to see if there are settings for the new conduit.

Posted by bkbk on 02-19-2001 07:09 PM:

I kind of presumed you either had an EM1 or knew this was how they worked -- but yeah, the 187K of the largest color size of the EM1 would commonly end up as only, say 90k on the PC ... really frustrating since it's on the Visor that you really need most to save mem.
Still, I consider anything under 187K an improvement, so you've gotta give IDEO some credit....

Posted by eyebrowse on 02-20-2001 08:38 AM:

Capabilities with B&W vs. Color Hardware?

quote:
Originally posted by bkbk
Yeah, I think that's the case w/the movies -- kinda crazy, but there you have it. Even wackier is that you don't get the *choice* w/a color PDA to shoot them in b&w if you want ... and, y'know, save some bytes? It's like the EM2 is a b&w device for the b&w HSVs & a color one for the Prism.

A most educational explanation on this point was just posted by an IDEO guru on the mailing list that I think everyone will find helpful. (Thanks to the IDEO team for taking everything in stride!)

Says an engineer:

Quick version: because of the display hardware, B&W on a color device will not save you memory.

Long version: B&W visor screen hardware displays the Y part of YUV, and Prisms display RGB. In order to get a B&W movie to view on a Prism, you have to convert it to 16-bit RGB, which adds size. When you transfer images around, the program automatically converts them (you may notice that B&W Palm-size images grow to 38K on a Prism.) You could conceivably capture a YUV movie on a Prism, but you wouldn't be able to view it. Full-size images are a different sensor mode (24-bit RGB->JPEG) which is saved independently from the preview image.

Clears things up for me, at least a bit. (But then again, I struggle with color optimization in Photoshop all day, so...)

Posted by thorin on 02-22-2001 08:52 AM:

Will somebody please post a b&w movie taken on the em2 already?

Posted by bkbk on 02-22-2001 08:45 PM:

Let me 2nd that vote.

Also could someone ans. what the "burn rate" is on the view-screen? I noted in James' recent review (and feel free to chime in here, James) he stated after about 5 photos he lost about 10% of batt. life.
But is this w/the viewer "continually running"? Or, say, 5 sec. per-shot (enough time to both view & snap the photo)? The EM2 site seems to state you can view for much longer periods than EM1, which easily burns out my batts. 100% after, say, only 3 min.

Posted by LarryN on 02-22-2001 11:57 PM:

bkbk, a 100% after 3 minutes!!! I just played with my EM2/VPR, and used it for 4 minutes just walking around (It appears to have an auto shut-off every 1 min., and I let it shut off 4 times). My battery went from 88% to 83% (which is even better than James got).

Posted by bkbk on 02-23-2001 01:29 AM:

quote:
Originally posted by LarryN
bkbk, a 100% after 3 minutes!!!

Yesireebob -- they appear to have added the auto-shut-off to EM2. Since I have the wiseguy gene, I thought I'd test it -- I just ran my batt. level down to about 25% from 75% with just "2 cycles" of letting the Visor's auto-shut-off run out (not the EM1's), which I think I have set for 2 min. (Sometimes I set the AutoOff shareware app for 5 min!)

I'm gonna presume they have def. pulled off some kind of pwr. mgmt. miracle for EM2, too.

All times are GMT. The time now is 03:50 AM.

Show 20 posts from this thread on one page