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Hi Susan,

 One day (or less) Software demos are pretty useless. Get both software
installed, get the basics from the vendor (i.e. open, deconvolve, 3D render,
color combine) some Z-series, make some measurements, save them), then try
out the software for at least two weeks. One month is better. Preferable to
"try before you buy" than to do a "conditional purchase order", since the
former does not require dealing with purchasing.

  Since you are in a core facility, an excellent test is that after trying a
software for a week, you should try training someone else on "the basics" -
i.e. a non-computer geek biologist. Being on the "teaching side" of the
learning curve is a great test of whether you want a software package in
your facility.

  If both packages end up being equally good, pick the one that gives the
bigger multi-copy discount, since it would be nice to standardize on one
analysis package.



Best wishes,


George
p.s. As pretty as the images are from my microscopes, cameras, confocal
scope, etc., once the image gets saved to disk the dominant software
post-acquisition is simply Adobe Photoshop. Of course it has its own
learning (teaching) curve too.



George McNamara, Ph.D.
Childrens Hospital Los Angeles - Image Core
4650 Sunset Blvd, MS 84, SRT 1016
Los Angeles, CA 90027
323-669-2548 voice
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-----Original Message-----
From: Garfield, Susan (NIH/NCI) [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Monday, June 09, 2003 10:25 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Software advice


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I received this request and I'm forwarding it to the list since I haven't
used Volocity (only seen a demo).  I was hoping that some of you might have
more experience with Volocity and Imaris and could comment.  Thanks in
advance for your advice and/or suggestions.

"We need a 3D soft ware to support our confocal microscopy. From Jim
Hostetter of Improvision I understood that you have the soft wares of
Volocity and Imaris. Recently I had the two companies give us demonstrations
of their products. As you know demos are sometimes different from the use. I
would very much appreciate if you can give us some comparison
(advantages/disadvantages) of the two soft wares.

The Best!

Haixin Xu  (Ph. D)

Biological Sciences/UMBC"

===================================
Susan Garfield, Manager
CCR Confocal Microscopy Core Facility
Laboratory of Experimental Carcinogenesis
Center for Cancer Research, NCI
Bld.37,Rm 4134(office),Rm 4137(confocal lab)