....cont...prev...Q...I need the minumin req.notebook pc capable of displaying the imaging to cleints. Also while on the shoot,tests can be viewed.As most work will be indoors I need "wide angle" capability to avoid having to take too many shots. Kaidan seem to offer what I need in the tripod and accessories, but then the confusion reigns as there are far too many varied opinions on cameras, associated software and the expectations and final results....which I needless to say I have no tangible benchmark.In no department do I find clear winners when using all comparisons! Too my mind the AMPEG cam looks very attractive and besides some 30 min or so of video capability, has lots of memory for phot storage, as well as PCMCIA slot for transfer to pc.Never see it recommended though! Is final image quality compromised?? Finally, which software would be the most efficient and deliver quality? Panavue is highly rec.at a 5* website,yet no-one else ever mentions it! Photovista very popular but dosn't do QTVR which is essential,so no good ! Then there is the en route ,apple's Qtvr authoring (pricey) ,panaworx and others promoted here and there. My ballpark budget is $800 for camera ; $300 accessories & software and $1700 for laptop. Any recommendations for online stores in the Far East or in US who specialize in this combination as a package and ship internationally would be greatly appreciated. Hopefully I will get my ducks in a row once the experts on this forum have responded and to them who do take the trouble in helping me target the correct choices,I wish you well and hopefully you will be the recipient of some goodwill or even the LOTTO very shortly! THXIA

-- Tracy Cummings (tracy2k@england.com), March 29, 2000

Answers

Tracy,

Just a thought:

If you are really picky about displaying quality shots, then you might arrange to hook up a CRT to your laptop while at your client. The reason is because while most laptops now have 24bpp, no flat panel made faithfully reproduces all the colors a CRT does (it's more like 18-20bpp depending up brand) Do the comparison yourself to see if it is important to you.

-Rob (rkyanko@home.com)

-- Robert J Kyanko (rkyanko@home.com), March 30, 2000.

CRT

Abbreviation of cathode-ray tube, the technology used in most televisions and computer display screens. A CRT works by moving an electron beam back and forth across the back of the screen. Each time the beam makes a pass across the screen, it lights up phosphor dots on the inside of the glass tube, thereby illuminating the active portions of the screen. By drawing many such lines from the top to the bottom of the screen, it creates an entire screenful of images. In plain English....

An external monitor (they type that is commonly used with a full size desktop system. A CRT can usually be used with any laptop through the laptop's external monitor port. Use of an external monitor is very common with a port replicator or docking station.

-- a.n. other (dic@tionary.com), March 30, 2000.

Bluntly your best choice of camera is either the existing Nikon 950 or forthcoming 990. The reason for this is that no other camera really allows you the choice of lens types that the Nikon series does (for its price). Moreover with the Coolpix series you can attach fisheye lens that in tandem with free software from http://www.fh-furtwangen.de/~dersch and Photovista can be used to create fully spherical images.

QTVR has pluses and minuses it offers great image quality if file sizes are 1mb + however is on a par with Livepicture at smaller file sizes - some may argue it is inferior with 500-600K or smaller files. It also relies upon folks having a plugin, many people do have Quicktime on their machines but not the browser plugin. QTVR also only allows cylindrical panos whereas with some fiddling Livepicture will create spherical panos.

I have no experience with Panavue, however at least with Livepicture you can try it out for free and suffer only the indignity of hallmarked images for as long as you fail to register it.

Regards Michael

-- Michael McKelvey (Michael_McKelvey@excite.com), April 01, 2000.