classicamiga.com Forum http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/ Classicamiga.com Forum - Dedicated to everything Amiga. en Thu, 04 Jun 2026 13:45:12 GMT vBulletin 60 http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/images/misc/rss.png classicamiga.com Forum http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/ <![CDATA[Music AI generated music - what's the point?]]> http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6280-AI-generated-music-what-s-the-point?goto=newpost Sun, 31 May 2026 11:21:10 GMT We have had computer generated music since the early days. I remember in the 80s being able to type a single line of code in the Acorn BBC Micro... We have had computer generated music since the early days. I remember in the 80s being able to type a single line of code in the Acorn BBC Micro and it generated and played unique music. That was impressive.

But we are now suddenly seeing completely AI generated artists, bands and songs. But they are not always being that open about them being AI generated. A good example is a band called Iron Chant. Stated as Dark Viking Rap. Not sure I would term it Rap at all, but when I first heard it I quite looked the style, but it felt autotuned and a bit off. The music videos show clearly AI generated Nordic viking scenes features what is portrayed as the 2 band singers, a man and women. The 2 singers are also ahown in recording studios singing the songs to portray them recording the songs.

But you dig a bit into the band Iron Chant and its all fake. As far as I can tell the artists don't exist. They likeness is mirrored across all their music videos, but it seems their vocals and entire look is AI, as is the whole of the music.

So what's the point? What do you think of AI generated music? It's very clever, I will grant it that. But when I listen to music at home, in the car, or on headphones is to listen to the singer and the musicians. If you are listening to what you know is AI generated music what is the point?

The one place I can see it working and being OK is in video games. Playing a game and AI generating music that fits your actions and the moods of the moment would work really well. But I'm never going to buy into listening to completely fake AI generated artists and music. You are listening to a voice that doesn't exist.

Another big example of AI generated music was a KPop band. That is again completely AI generated singer's and music, and they combined it with 3D cartoon looking band members. But that was even madder because they went on tour and fans paid to watch holograms of the AI singer singing on stage. The world has gone mad! ]]> General Chat Harrison http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6280-AI-generated-music-what-s-the-point Adobe - strange software direction and bad customer support http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6279-Adobe-strange-software-direction-and-bad-customer-support?goto=newpost Sun, 24 May 2026 14:07:46 GMT Adobe was traditionally a Print based software company. Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator have always been the professional software for image... Adobe was traditionally a Print based software company. Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator have always been the professional software for image editing, illustration and anything 2D image related. They then expanded into video editing with Premiere and After Effects. 2 brilliant packages that still remain good.

I remember back in the 90s everyone wanting a copy of Photoshop, and every other graphics package being directly compared to it,

They however missed the start of the Internet revolution and this is where their main rival Macromedia came in. Initially a Multimedia software developer, with Authorware and Director, they then acquired Flash and developed the webdesign software Dreamweaver, and the serverside Coldfusion solution. In addition they had their own alternative to Illustrator, called Freehand and developed a Vector and Bitmap internet development image editing and animation package called Fireworks. This was all developed into a complete ecosystem where you could work in Dreamweaver and instantly multitask between the other packages to live edit and work on a project. It was heading in a great direction. I used to go to their seminars where they would showcase the latest software and then give you a tutorial on how to use it.

Adobe then bought out Macromedia in 2005 and it has been a downhill decline ever since.

First they ended Freehand as it was a direct competitor to Illustrator. I really like Illustrator but actually prefered Freehand, especially if you were working on vector work for the internet. It was just better. Shame but no unexpected as no point continuing with 2 similar packages.

Next we lost Flash. This was killed off more by Apple than Adobe. Flash did have it's issues, because after Flash 4 it started to get a bit bloated and it was hard work to compile the projects small enough for slower internet connections, but also to maintain compatibility across so many web browsers, OSs and platforms. Apple took a dislike to it with security excuses, but I think it was more that they were not in control of the software and the Flash projects and saw them as programs they were not in control of. So they started to actively block it, and with a big parket for their software being Mac at the time Adobe had no option but to end Flash. A lot of designers were employed as Flash developers at the time so a lot of jobs vanished over night.

And since the demise of Flash we still don't have anything that can really replace it. People go on about HTML5, and yes you can do lots with that, but nothing like Flash. Flash was designed with the graphic designer and animation as the core user, and the programmer as a bonus. Now to achieve anything anywhere near to what you could easily do in Flash you have to be a coder. But they are not always that creative. Flash being timeline based was intuitive from a visual aspect.

We then have Director. This remains my most loved interactive graphic design software. It was brilliant. And it was the cornerstone of Macromedia. It was timeline based, with it's own full programming language called Lingo that was fully formed and you could do anything with it. But the programming language combined with the visual timeline and stage (screen). It made far more sense when you would making a multimedia interactive presentation than anything that has come since. You coupe place code on each frame to activate when than frame was reached, you could attach code to individual elements on the stage (screen) to be triggered when interacted with, and you could create more global classes, functions and variables just like any other programming language. I could probably still build a complex program and project if I wanted as I was a Director graphic designer and developer professionally for nearly 10 years. Director was a main industry software to make Interactive CDs and DVDs, DVD frontends, Kiosk interfaces and anything else interactive and multimedia you can think of.

But for some strange reason Adobe never really knew what to do with Director. It had internet functionality built in with Shockwave, which could compile projects similar to Flash, that would load into a browser using the Shockwave plugin, similar to how Flash worked. It was far more advanced with the ability to add more advanced video and audio, but the resulting presentations were far bigger. But Directors core use was for interactive presentation. Kiosks, business presentations, learning tools etc.

Macromedia also had another similar product called Authorware which was designed specifically for e-Learning and training interactive presentations. It used a drag and drop icon approach similar to node editing in more recent 3D and video post production applications, instead of a proper programming language. Similar to the Apple Mac Hypercard, but more advanced, and the oldest software Macromedia had. It was discontinued before Director.

Director itself continued for a lot longer, with the last major release being version 12 and official support ending in 2017. I hadn't used to professionally since about 2012 so I'm still interested in getting hold of the final release just to have a play. Sad it's long gone now though.

A key package that did continue was Dreamweaver. I used, and still use it for web development. There are lots of alternatives, many free, but I've used it since it came out so just know it, But Adobe have now also stopped development of Dreamweaver and it's in maintenance state now. And Adobe don't have any alternatives to Dreamweaver for web development.

We also lost Fireworks in 2013. This was a specialist web development package, combining vector and bitmap art. It allowed you to prototype a website, then chop up the art into a grid to create web optimised slices and interactive hotspots, and export it into Dreamweaver as a functioning website template.

So in less than 10 years Adobe ended pretty much all the software they aquired from Macromedia. It makes me wonder why they bothered, other than seeing them as a direct competitor and threat to their business. It's almost like they didn't really know what to do with the Internet and interactive side of design.

And Adobe have been ending a lot of their other software that was web design orientated. Most of what is left focuses now on mostly the traditional print and video markets. You also still have Audacity for audio, which is a very good and advanced software package. But I'm not sure why they have seemingly abandoned web development and interactive production. It is the forefront for the design industry these days. Instead they will just be back to being the cornerstone of the software that is used to develop assets for the wider design community.

Well, at the moment. With their very expensive subscription model these days many are looking at alternative solutions. With the free Canva Affinity being a serious direct replacement for Photoshop, Illustrator and Indesign and DaVinci Resolve being a free professional solution to replace Premiere and After Effects it doesn't give much justification to carry on subscribing to Creative Cloud. This just leaves Adobe Audacity as one of the best audio production softwares and Lightroom as a quick image organising and processing tool for photographers. But there are good alternatives for those too.

Has Adobe finally reached the end of the road? ]]> PC - Windows, Linux, Mac Harrison http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6279-Adobe-strange-software-direction-and-bad-customer-support Adobe ripoff subscription model http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6278-Adobe-ripoff-subscription-model?goto=newpost Sun, 24 May 2026 13:44:20 GMT I've been using Adobe software since the mid 90's, so 30+ years. I'm a huge fan of Photoshop, Illustrator and After Effects. And since they switched to the monthly subscription (Creative Cloud) 15 years ago I've subscribed as I need a legitimate copy for my work.

I've always used the Teacher and Student discount (due to my wife) so it was ?22 a month for the whole collection of software. But at the start of this year they suddenly charged me ?65 per month and the teacher discount was cancelled. It seems they have removed primary schools from the program.

So I decided to cancel the subscription, but this is where I hit a big issue. I couldn't!

When I went to cancel they said I was in a yearly contract and would have to pay the remainder of the year to the date I took the contract out. I did a monthly contract so it could be cancelled and never remember agreeing to a yearly contract 15 years ago! So if I cancelled I would of had to pay the remaining 6 months but the account and access to the software would instantly be cancelled! Very devious business model! Legal? They get the rest of the money regardless and lock you out.

So I decided to was better to just pay the higher monthly cost until I reached the month when I took the subscription out originally, so at least I had access to what I was paying. This next June payment seemed to be the end, so I tested cancelling again but it still states I would need to pay ?99 which doesn't add up. So I decided to bite the bullet and just pay it to cancel as I was worried they would roll the account over into the next year and start asking for hundreds again and I couldn't be bothered to argue the point.

These monthly subscription models are getting stupid now and the companies are getting over greedy. But Adobe seem to be one of the worst. I used the time I had left on the Adobe subscription to explore alternatives and and test them out. The timing of Canva Affinity being launched at the end of 2025 came just at the right moment as this is more than good enough to replace Photoshop, Illustrator and Indesign. And DaVinci Resolve replaces both Adobe Premiere and After Effects, along with a few other things. And the great thing is all this software is completely free.

I think Adobe's greed will mean the end of their dominance in the next couple of years. ]]> PC - Windows, Linux, Mac Harrison http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6278-Adobe-ripoff-subscription-model Are there any upcoming games you are looking forward to? http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6277-Are-there-any-upcoming-games-you-are-looking-forward-to?goto=newpost Sat, 23 May 2026 14:57:48 GMT There are a few games already out I'm waiting for discounts, but I couldn't think of anything due out that I'm looking forward to.

Anything coming that looks good?

I do have a huge backlog of games still to play. Just picked up Star Trek Voyager Across the Unknown in the PS5 sale. ]]> Console Gaming Harrison http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6277-Are-there-any-upcoming-games-you-are-looking-forward-to Broke my hand http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6276-Broke-my-hand?goto=newpost Tue, 19 May 2026 13:51:37 GMT Ok, this is kinda shit :mad: Attachment 1568 (http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=1568) Hurt myself 2 weeks ago,... Ok, this is kinda shit :mad:

IMG_5090.jpg

Hurt myself 2 weeks ago, thought it would heal by itself, but it didn't, so I decided to go to see a doctor. Well, the hand is broken, would not have thought, but here we are, right hand, cannot really do anything.

Next week Thursday I will go to Finland but I already know that it's not gonna be nice.

Worst of all, not only can I not work on my collections, or play any games, but I also cannot drive my new car, wtf!! Was lately just driving around for 1 hour every day, just to enjoy and get used to it. Dammit.
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]]> General Chat Demon Cleaner http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6276-Broke-my-hand Children not listening to music? A lost culture? http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6275-Children-not-listening-to-music-A-lost-culture?goto=newpost Sat, 16 May 2026 11:47:50 GMT I have noticed teenagers today don't seem to explore and listen to music like we did growing up.

In the 80's we would listen to the Sunday Top 40 charts and tape all the songs we liked. Watch Top of the Pops every Thursday night. And we would spend ages on a Saturday in the record stores looking through and discovering new albums and artists. But our parents would also be playing music all the time at home and in the car, even if it was just the radio. It's why I liked the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Abba and many others from before I was born.

I'm always listening to music. At home, in the car, walking the dog. My son however never really listens to any music. We have an Amazon Echo in every room of the house, including his, linked to Spotify to he could listen to almost anything, but instead says the only music he likes is the background music in games. Never really that interested in music genres or specific songs or artists. He has headphones and I gave him my better older Sennheiser BT ones when I bought new ones, but he hardly ever uses them. At his age I had already bought my first HiFi.

Anyone else with children finding the same thing?

Half the problem ironically is everything being instantly on demand, and the lack of dedicated stores for music these days. It used to be a social thing. You would meet up with friends and go into the record store, chat and discuss music and recommend things to each other. Lending albums or making tape copies for them. I discovered a lot of the music I like this way. Kids today have lost that whole culture.

Actually having to buy an album (or video game or film) made you take it home and actually listen to it. Look at the album cover and the inlay and spend some time actually listening. Now they just skip through songs after a few seconds because they have become disgardable. And album art is almost a dead artform too.

I know kids do listen to music. A lot have huge headphones on all the time being antisocial. But what are they listening to? Generic manufactured pop like Swift it would seem looking at listening figures. Very sad.

I did try my best with my son. He was subjected to rock, blues, metal, 80's music in the car every day since a baby. And he does secretly like some of it. AC/DC and Queen especially. But that hasn't made him explore himself. Just turning 14 is he maybe still not quite into music? I was definitely younger, but at school all my friends were really into metal, rock, 80s, New Wave, Punk and all had guitars and learning to play. That doesn't seem such a think now either.

We give our son music lessons from an early age too as my wife is very musical, being able to play Saxophone, Flute, Oboe etc.. He started with Violin and persevered for a few years before his tutor said he wasn't really that interested. We aid he could give it up but had to pick another instrument to try as he is naturally talented musically, just not that interested. He can read music and sing the tune just looking at the sheet music f.ex. He picked the piano and had lessons with that for some time, but after the first year in secondary school asked to give up. At least he had the opportunity, and has come away able to read music, and can play to some level on violin and piano, so has some skills for later in life if he wishes.

And when we die, like vintage video games, is there the danger older music is going to be discarded and no longer really listened too either? You go to concerts and it's mainly people over 30.

There is hope with Youtube and so many cover bands and music reviewers exploring older music and hopefully introducing it to their followers. I hope anyway. Maybe that is the new alternative to the record store and friend recommendations. ]]> General Chat Harrison http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6275-Children-not-listening-to-music-A-lost-culture Lost professions and skills - Technical Drawing http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6274-Lost-professions-and-skills-Technical-Drawing?goto=newpost Sun, 10 May 2026 14:43:08 GMT My son is in year 9 of secondary school at the moment and has been doing perspective drawing and some other types of technical drawing. But just on... My son is in year 9 of secondary school at the moment and has been doing perspective drawing and some other types of technical drawing. But just on a sketchpad with a ruler. He's quite good at art and drawing, which he gets from us as we are both artists (but he isn't that interested).

This got me thinking about Technical Drawing. In the 1980s when I was at school it was a separate subject. We had rooms full of proper technical drawing boards with parallel motion bars for use with drawing tools. This was my favourite subject at school and I continued this on to A-Level Graphical Communication.

I have forgotten a lot of the techniques we were taught at the higher level, especially the architectural drawing ones such as calculating the load on a roof and things like that, but still like to do Orthographic drawings, Orthographic projection and 3D 2 point perspective drawing. I still have an A9 drawing board with parallel motion and also used to use an airbrush a lot, but not recently. I should get back into that.

I was talking to my son about this and he said they don't have drawing tables like that in school any more. This got me thinking about the core skills you learn doing technical drawing that lead into a lot of professions. It's really useful for 3D programs as the skills you get from orthographic drawing translate directly to 3D modelling, Architects and engineers also use such drawing skills (mostly computer bases these days).

So is the skill of manual technical drawing dead professionally now for those at school? Is it becoming a lost profession?

What other skills and subjects are lost or no longer taught in schools? ]]> General Chat Harrison http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6274-Lost-professions-and-skills-Technical-Drawing Octopath Traveller http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6273-Octopath-Traveller?goto=newpost Sun, 10 May 2026 14:31:31 GMT The first Square Enix Octopath Traveller came out years ago in 2018, initially on the Switch, and then ported to every other platform. The retro... The first Square Enix Octopath Traveller came out years ago in 2018, initially on the Switch, and then ported to every other platform. The retro SNES RPG inspired look reminiscent of old Squaresoft Final Fantasy games always appealed to me, as it does for any long time JRPG fan. But I do think some are put off by the pixel art retro style.

But for some reason I had never played them until now. There have so far been 3 games in the series: 1 and 2, and a prequel called 0.

I recently picked up the first game on the PS4/5 in the sales and had a quick go and so far really like the style. A mix of the 16bit retro feel, but with some modern textures and special effects, plus full voice acting. And these games could
take quite a few hours if you consider the Octo part refers to 8 playable characters which you can replay the game right through with each.. although you do meet and interact with the rest regardless of the character you are playing.

Has anyone else played any of them?

I nearly bought it on Steam so I could play handheld on the Steam Deck but decided I wanted to play it on the TV. Plus I have a loyalty to buying Squaresoft games on the Playstation as they feel at home there. ]]> RPGs Harrison http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6273-Octopath-Traveller LTO Tape http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6272-LTO-Tape?goto=newpost Sat, 09 May 2026 06:49:42 GMT DSC06764w.jpg

I thought I'd make a topic about my LTO 4 tape drive since we all love storage :).

I'm doing a lot more video than I used to and keep running out of space. So I decided to get an old tape drive. LTO4 is quite an old generation of the LTO tapes (it was introduced in the late 2000s), and holds 800GB per cassette (the latest versions store 10s of terabytes). This is a very useful amount for the kind of data I have.

LTO 4 machines are quite cheap now on the second hand market (I think I paid about ?60 for mine). Old stock and second hand tapes are quite cheap. I've just got some second hand ones from a recycler for about ?2.50/each - half of them had only been used once or twice and the others had been used more but have plenty of life left in them.

How do I know that? LTO cassettes have an RFID chip inside them which contains the manufacturer, serial number, date of manufacture, as well as how many times it has been loaded into a machine, how much data has been written to it, and how much has been read from it. A good way to figure out at a glance what sort of condition a tape is in.

Tape is actually very easy to use in Linux. The SAS interface cards and the tape drives are "plug and play" as the drivers and control software are built in to Linux. The 'mt' command is used to shuttle around the tape. The 'tar' command is used to archive files and record them on to the tape. The commands can be a bit of a mouthful when you're starting out but they're quite easy once you've got the hang of it.

Tar can be used to archive an entire large HDD and span it across multiple tapes - it will simply prompt you to insert the next tape when one is full - ideal for backups. But it can also be good for storage - so if you want to archive some large files from a camcorder, you can make multiple tar files on the tape - one file for each project, then just write on a sticky label which file is which :).

The only problem is speed. The tape drives themselves are quite fast. They can slow the mechanism down to accommodate a lower data rate if needed, but there is only so slow it can go. If you are loading large files (video, disk images, photographs etc) off an HDD, the computer can read these very quick, and the tape drive can record them very quickly. But if you have thousands of tiny files (e.g. text files), the HDD cannot load these up quickly enough, and the tape drive will have to stop and start. This necessitates the use of a memory buffer which makes the commands a bit more complex, but again, once you've figured it out, it works quite nicely.

I've had this setup for about a year now and it works very nicely, and is very cost effective. The second hand equipment I have combined with an assortment of tapes works out at about ?10/TB.

But when you think about it, it really shows how amazing hard drives are. In the photograph, there is about 15TB of storage space. That's about 10 miles of half inch tape! An HDD would store that on just a few small platters :).
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]]> PC - Windows, Linux, Mac Stephen Coates http://forum.classicamiga.com/forum/showthread.php/6272-LTO-Tape