Looking for Information on TV Graphics Code

Branmuffin Industries

I just finished the chapter 3: Propeller Programming Tutorial in the
Propeller Manual.

The project I intend to build will use a TV screen and draw some
graphics.

I see the TV_Terminal Object and the TV and Graphics objects work
pretty well together, but I'm having trouble getting graphics to draw
to the screen.

Do you guys have any comprehensive documentation on how to use the
Graphics object? Should I begin customizing the TV_Terminal Object to
suit my needs or are there other implementations of objects that use
Graphics and TV objects together?


If I want to use one propeller to generate three simultaneous video
signals and drive three RCA video outs, is there enough RAM for that?
There certainly is enough I/O..

I really appreciate any advice. I've done some cool video stuff with
Stamps in the past, and I'm working on moving over to a propeller.



-Ryan Brandys

CardboardGuru

Wow! Nice project. But you're certainly going to be able to do stuff like that far easier with a Propeller.

The best source for info on how to use the existing graphics and TV drivers, and how to create your own is in the "Game Programming for the Propeller Powered Hydra" book.

Paul Baker

Hi Ryan,

· Steve (CardboardGuru) is correct, great project, and where to look. If you want to avoid paying the money for the book, you can also look at Graphics_Demo.spin, it has a whole host of examples for how to use various functions in Graphics.spin.

· The issue about 3 screens comes down to memory, with the graphics.spin it's normal mode is to double buffer the screen so this ends up using the majority of the memory. Now if you don't mind single frame discrepancies (where a single frame as part of the old image and part of the new) you can single buffer the memory and get 2 full graphics TV output. The other route to go and would work for your application is to used a tile mapped driver, this is where you would have regions of memory dedicated as graphics, but those dead space areas of the display all point to a single empty tile. This way you are only declaring memory for those regions which have actual data. Since your application has static placement of controls you don't have to create some dynamic allocation layer so it shouldn't be extremly difficult. Take a look at Chip's VGA driver demo ESC_Demo - Archive [noparse][[/noparse]Date 2007.04.06 Time 13.34].zip·in http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?p=643397·for an example of a graphics region in a tile based driver.

Good Luck,

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Paul Baker
Propeller Applications Engineer

Parallax, Inc.

RinksCustoms

Damn! hats off to you bro! I almost got a BS2 and an SX Video card to generate a GUI menu system (text graphics and small!)

Any object (providing it's well documented & comented) will provide you with all you need to know about using the particular object. Just click on documentation box and it should display alot of info about the object

I'd like to re-inerate, It has come to my attention that there could be a bit more documentation with the tv and graphics drivers, as i'm banging my head against the wall (put a hole in it) trying to figure out how to set tvparams to work with the resistor DAC starting on pin 4 and getting graphics to write to the screen, i'm doing something wrong, i know this, i just need someone to smack me upside the head and point it out!

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Definetly a E³ (Electronics Engineer Extrodinare!)
"I laugh in the face of imposible,... not because i know it all, ... but because I don't know well enough!"

Post Edited (RinksCustoms) : 7/2/2007 3:14:17 AM GMT