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saimo
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Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 4-Sep-2019 10:38:49
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Elite Member |
Joined: 11-Mar-2003 Posts: 2453
From: Unknown | | |
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| This project has been gathering dust for 16 years, but I have finally decided to at least let Amigans know about it.
Back in 2002 (or early 2003) I got in touch with a developer who had released a nice AMOS Professional game. While chatting with him, I had the idea of developing a fancy Copper trick that would have allowed the game he was currently working on to flip the screen as seen in the level introduction screens of Project-X. The trick was never used (and the game was never released), but little by little it developed into a full video system for AMOS Professional that, by exploiting the AGA chipset, greatly expanded the platform's capabilities. As an added challenge, I decided to implement the system using AMOS Professional itself (eventually, for performance reasons, I implemented a procedure in assembly, but I did resist the temptation of doing the same for other procedures). Here's how the system documentation introduces the system itself:
The Custom Screens System (CSS) is a system which extends the AMOS Professional screen handling capabilities by exploiting the AGA chipset. It allows to define Custom Screens (CSs), by means of custom Copperlists, that are 100% compatible with the graphic operations (bobs, drawing, texts, buffering, etc.) and that open a wide range of possibilities - most notably non-EHB 64 colors screens and an advanced Dual PlayField mode, named Cross PlayField (XPF).
Features: * up to 8 CSs at once; * CSs with up to 64 non-EHB colors; * CSs usable as normal screens for graphic operations; * CSs display window size and position restricted only by hardware limits; * scrolling fully supported; * 35 ns horizontal scrolling granularity; * extended palette control: * 24 bit RGB color values (for everything); * fading from any palette to any other palette; * palette allocation, mixing, masking, etc. * XPF: * up to 8 bitplanes; * per-color opacity/transparency of the Front CS freely defineable; * all that can be done with CSs can be done with XPFs, too; * miscellaneous visual effects; * miscellaneous utility procedures; * Copperlist optimization.
The CSs comes in the shape of a collection of procedures written in AMOS Professional itself (except for one written in assembly).
This video shows a what the system was capable of; more specifically, how the system can overlay two indipendent screens (in the examples, the background has a depth of 5 bits and the foreground has a depth of 3 bits, but the depths can be any from 2 to 6, as long as their sum is at most 8), manipulate their palettes and degree of blending, and execute the flip screen effect that got everything started.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtlVPMdFhi0
Although CSS was fully functional and complete with tutorials and documentation, I never distributed it because, at some point, I realized I could have obtained more flexible and performing results by implementing the core idea differently. So, I started a new system from the scratch, called Advanced Video System (AVS). When it was about 80% done, a terrible thing happened: I lost the sources! I managed to recover some older sources, but I felt too bad to restart the development (not to mention that I was about to move country, so I did not have much time left). In my dreams, one day I'll use CSS to rework two old games of mine, but honestly I don't know if I'll ever have a chance to. Last edited by saimo on 05-Sep-2019 at 02:08 AM. Last edited by saimo on 04-Sep-2019 at 11:20 AM.
_________________ RETREAM - retro dreams for Amiga, Commodore 64 and PC |
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OlafS25
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 4-Sep-2019 13:10:30
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Elite Member |
Joined: 12-May-2010 Posts: 6338
From: Unknown | | |
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| @saimo
I do not know if you know it already
there was "the game extension" of Mr. Cahill which supported AGA too
I tested it by opening AGA screen and loading iff that worked
I did not make more explorations because I missed f.e. sprites which I could use in it. |
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saimo
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 4-Sep-2019 14:45:43
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Elite Member |
Joined: 11-Mar-2003 Posts: 2453
From: Unknown | | |
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| @OlafS25
Yes, I knew that there were extensions with AGA features, but things evolved naturally from the initial flipping effect and, anyway, the fun was precisely in writing that stuff ;) _________________ RETREAM - retro dreams for Amiga, Commodore 64 and PC |
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zErec
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 5-Sep-2019 14:34:08
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Cult Member |
Joined: 17-Dec-2003 Posts: 514
From: Germany | | |
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| @saimo
On Word -> AWESOME!!! I would love to give it a try. _________________ - AmigaX1Ooo with OS4.1FE // CD32/SX32Pro/SX1/CD32Shuttle - A600-Vampire600 FPGA // A4KT/CSPPC233,144MB,PCI, AOS4.1.6FE - MACmini 1.5GHz // Pegasos 2 1GHz // Efika - ATARI Falcon/060/SuperVidel // ATARI Falcon MK X |
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saimo
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 5-Sep-2019 14:49:32
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Elite Member |
Joined: 11-Mar-2003 Posts: 2453
From: Unknown | | |
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| @zErec
Quote:
Thanks
Quote:
I would love to give it a try. |
Sorry, but I'm not planning to distribute it because: * it isn't optimal and it has some limitations (AVS would have been much better, but I don't have time to work on it); * I can't afford to give support (too much in a mess)._________________ RETREAM - retro dreams for Amiga, Commodore 64 and PC |
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NutsAboutAmiga
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 5-Sep-2019 16:25:45
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Elite Member |
Joined: 9-Jun-2004 Posts: 12817
From: Norway | | |
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klx300r
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 5-Sep-2019 20:46:17
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Elite Member |
Joined: 4-Mar-2008 Posts: 3836
From: Toronto, Canada | | |
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| @saimo
way over my head to understand fully but sounds really cool and I know you make one of a kind games with awesome gameplay for our beloved C64's and miggies so I'm sure this next little project is something I'm gonna love! _________________ ____________________________ c64-2sids, A1000, A1200T-060@50(finally working!),A4000-CSMKIII ! My Master Miggies- Amiga 1000 & AmigaOne X1000 ! mancave-ramblings X1000 I BELIEVE |
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saimo
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 5-Sep-2019 21:16:09
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Elite Member |
Joined: 11-Mar-2003 Posts: 2453
From: Unknown | | |
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| @NutsAboutAmiga
Thanks!
@klx300r
Thanks for all the kind words, but this is an ancient and dead project. If I had had infinite time, I'd have surely used it for some game, but reality is different. _________________ RETREAM - retro dreams for Amiga, Commodore 64 and PC |
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klx300r
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 5-Sep-2019 22:56:54
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Elite Member |
Joined: 4-Mar-2008 Posts: 3836
From: Toronto, Canada | | |
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| @saimo
as I get older I've learned that ones version of 'reality' changes quite often...flipping a coin determines whether for good or bad _________________ ____________________________ c64-2sids, A1000, A1200T-060@50(finally working!),A4000-CSMKIII ! My Master Miggies- Amiga 1000 & AmigaOne X1000 ! mancave-ramblings X1000 I BELIEVE |
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saimo
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Re: Custom Screens System (fiddling with AMOS Professional and AGA) Posted on 6-Sep-2019 10:10:32
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Elite Member |
Joined: 11-Mar-2003 Posts: 2453
From: Unknown | | |
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| @klx300r
I definitely wish flipping a coin would give me infinite time _________________ RETREAM - retro dreams for Amiga, Commodore 64 and PC |
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