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Thread: CYGN-B

  1. #141
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    I think I am who you think I am, Jon. I thought much of the efficiency of a ui design you developed.

    Adam: I'm happy to participate in abstract (cycloid) related discussions, though travel may not be practical.

    I'm about to excavate from under boxes my C64 and see if I can't get the DOGN MOTION routine to produce output. It's natural to suspect a subtlety in my implementation of ADC's effect on the v flag.

    Regarding lumia, I remember an effect called, I think, "crystal dimple" (used in Starship, in the Daniel S piece before the rolling "dimple tube" effect came on) that produced an effect like a nebula with material streaming out of an opening in the middle of it. I remember watching the effect being adjusted between shows so the material would flow out of, rather than into, the nebula. I wonder how it worked.

  2. #142
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    Heat up a piece of Plexiglas slowly until it becomes plastic (Don't get it too hot. It will produce bubbles and a toxic outgassing.) Push a dimple in the Plexiglas. Place it above a rotating Lumia wheel, and adjust the distance between the Lumia wheel and the dimple to taste.
    "There are painters who transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others who, with the help of their art and their intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun." Pablo Picasso

  3. #143
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    [QUOTE=Greg;351273]Adam: I'm happy to participate in abstract (cycloid) related discussions, though travel may not be practical.[quote]

    Where are you located? And would a trip to North Carolina be in the cards for early August, 2020?

    SELEM typically draws 50 + laserists from all over the country each year. Abstracts have been a growing topic of discussion for several years now, with at least 4 different abstract consoles present at SELEM last year. (We had multiple Z5 consoles, the Radiator prototype, Jason Salt's custom rig, and his father's original analog equipment too.) We also had at least 3 examples of custom abstract software on display (Laserjuice, Maxwell, and Aron Bacs' home-brew abstract software.) And I think a few of the mod synth folks had ILDA-output hooked up this year as well.

    Point being: I'm sure you would find a number of kindred spirits who share your affinity for timeless laser effects like these. Ask anyone here on PL who has attended SELEM in the past and they'll tell you: it's an awesome event that you don't want to miss.

    Adam

  4. #144
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    Default DOGN code running on 6500 family processor

    The archaeologically interesting few bytes of source code that originally generated digital offsets in the 6b is now running successfully on a Commodore 64.

    When spoken of these days, the C64 is commonly considered a marvel for having so LITTLE memory. However, in comparison to the DOGN hardware, a useful 64k addressing space is vast.

    The two platforms make different (from each other) use of zero page, so some instructions in the ported code use a different addressing mode than in the original, but the logic that delivers the output is identical. Why a c64? The purpose of seeing this code perform on something that is as close as possible to native hardware, aside from the obvious, is that the performance may then be compared to the same code running in an emulator called cyc, previously discussed. Cyc is a package of abstract cycloid generating and 6b emulation tools, about which more information is coming.

    In these photos, the POPCRN routine is visualized in two ways on the c64: as a bitmap showing a run of random hits, and as a movable object block whose position follows the output.

    Interesting to note is that the easiest way to strobe these routines on the c64 is by settig an IRQ vector, at which point the routine is called 60 times a second, and the machine otherwise functions nominally. This results in the possibility of scrolling code listings and the blue block popping around at the same time, as seen in the photos.

    Interesting to note also, is that the output contains not just good pseudo random numbers, but randomly interspersed trains of coordinate pairs that don't change. The effect is that the laser dot spends time in one location, then goes off and a burst of several other positions go off in short order, very much like real popcorn. This subtlety in operation was overlooked in the first implementation of the emulated code.

    As previously discussed, there are great licks in the DOGN code that can be preserved. I am still in hopes that a kind party may allow me to continue this preservation effort by permitting me a look at the rom dumps which were reported to exist.
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails POPCRN_C64_3.jpg  

    POPCRN_C64_1.jpg  

    POPCRN_C64_2.jpg  

    POPCRN_C64_4.jpg  


  5. #145
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    That is so cool! I love what you did to visualize the offset output on the C64! Any chance you'd be open to sharing the ASM listing?

  6. #146
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    Thanks! Sure, I'm always happy to share any code I have written on the c64. HOW to share it though, is another matter. Last time (about eight years ago) I gave two unpublished games I wrote to an archive maintainer, I mailed a 5 1/4" floppy. The code is a < 20 block file that assembles and runs under Fast Assembler, which is a short type in program from a magazine that adds ML capabilities to BASIC. I include that on any disks I send.

    I just put the PNGPNG routine into the c64 and that works great as well. A couple of discoveries: the ping pong effect is rather slow at 60 polls per second, so the DOGN speed must have gone higher than this. Also, the output has the dot bouncing as if the boundary is at 127 instead of 0. This confused me when I ran the code in the cyc emulator, but I can now see what is going on. I interpret this to indicate the output was used as a signed byte rather than an unsigned byte.

    Next to go in is the third of the four precious DOGN routines I have the source for: the MOTION routine which I was not successful in obtaining output from in the emulated port of the code.

  7. #147
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    Here is a big photo (2272 x 1704) I found online (possibly here) a few years back, of the 6b card cage. I think I can identify the diode logic board which I believe Brian described as "field configurable with a soldering iron." Chime in please, experts.
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails card_cage_6b.jpg  


  8. #148
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    Actually that's a mark 4 card cage. Laser Images upgraded a bunch of Mark 4 machines with Mark 6 control panels and called them Mark 600s. In the Mark 6 the diode logic board was in the optical head. By the way, I ran across the box I packed up months ago to send you last Friday and stuck it in my trunk. I'll get it to FedEx today...
    "There are painters who transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others who, with the help of their art and their intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun." Pablo Picasso

  9. #149
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    Great info, thank you, and good news about the box. Fingers crossed.

    I am happy to report that the MOTION routine is finally working on the C64. It appears to match Ron's prediction made earlier in this thread:
    "fly from the center to a random point outside." It is so rewarding to see these routines in action and go "Oh, I remember that!" This will be a challenging routine to port to the emulator because it makes subtle use of the less commonly used processor flags, but now it can be studied in operation, so the previous issues I had with emulation will be resolved.

    The last routine is the brownian motion one, which already works on the emulator. I can report a positive indication that the ROM dumps may become available to me after all. Very much in hopes of this, as my fingers are itching to use the Supermon tool on the c64 to disassemble the hex and peer back in time into the heart of the classics and
    resuscitate these cleverest of licks, to be made available for use by the community through the cyc emulator.



  10. #150
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    Default Agree with Brian

    Yes, definitely Mark 4. Another clue is that ALL the cards are wire wrapped and that the scan-amps are in the same cage. The Mark 6 moved the scan amps to the lower regions of the projector rack, just above the laser PS. All the data, demux, and other cards remained in the lower rack in the console. And those are all the old old scan-amps (I like the zip-tie card pullers!) I don't remember the cage being mounted vertically, but I didn't start as a Laserist until 1978, so it may have been changed by then in my projector in San Francisco.

    Ron

    Quote Originally Posted by Greg View Post
    Here is a big photo (2272 x 1704) I found online (possibly here) a few years back, of the 6b card cage. I think I can identify the diode logic board which I believe Brian described as "field configurable with a soldering iron." Chime in please, experts.

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