Page 1 of 1

the battle of the inputs

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 7:03 pm
by mia
What I'm trying to do is play three digital sources (camera, computer, and dvd player) at the same time; but I don't just want them superimposed; I want them to fight each other, hopefully creating a lot of visual noise, but with luck one of the channels would once in a while send a stronger signal, allowing for a clear picture here and there, or even a shadow of an imprint. It would be the battle of digital impulses. See what happens. The only ideas I have , being more of an analog guy than a tech wizard, would be to:
a. splice the output wires of all inputs together by hand (just twist the wires and then input this into a projector). or
b. take all the sources and put them through an audio mixer and output as one. This would obviously be my preference since the different sources would all have their own visual volume control (the audio side (live gig) will go through a different process.
But before I try this and potentially burn out several pieces of equipment, has any one tried this sort of thing? Is there a way of doing with videocube, or does there exist such a thing as a video mixer than instead of just superimposing pictures/film, allows them to mix into a free for all pixelation fight? Any ideas at all would be of great help.

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 8:03 pm
by cheveria
Try EDIROL V4.
i think it will answer your questions.

Re: the battle of the inputs

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 8:09 pm
by technomorph
video electonics do not mix the way you are thinking ab out.


You'll have to create your own via creative mixing or creative programming.

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 3:00 am
by mia
:( So technomorph what would you suggest as a starting point? My gig is in 10 days, unknown to me until yesterday. I need help obviously, this is not really my field.On top of this it's got to be live; I can't sit at home for 150 hrs making a dvd; that would defeat the point of the theatrical event. So it has to be a fairly simple solution (and cheap). I presume you are telling me the impedance, ohms, volts, whatever, are on completely different scales than audio, yes?
What to do?
please think; and I thank you ahead of time.

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 3:24 am
by mia
cheveria,
I looked at their preview of edirol v4 but again its about superimposing pictures onto each other. They obviously have software that keeps each input clean. I really would prefer a less sophisticated program, whereby the individual inputs would have to fight for hierarchy through their strength of signal; and when it's a close contest with no clear winner, the result would be pixelated garbage (hopefully colourful) . I'm trying for a random/chaotic effect.
Any other ideas?
thanks, mia.

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 8:34 am
by sigmasix
if you want a noisy result, "pixelated garbage", why don't you create your own videos in after effects, make some loops (even with found footage if you'd like) with different lightness and ambiance to be able to then mix it with a triggering software like... MODUL8 8) 10days are short if you start from nothing, but if you start today you will for sure come up with the expected result

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 9:11 am
by VJnutcracker
How about playing around with video feedback, set a camera up to look at your preview monitor and feed the signal back into modul8, adding freeframe effects like "wave" will give you a weird messy smudged effect which you can then make sound reactive or change colours.
Trigger your clips using "slide show" module set on random.

Of course you'll have to rip your dvds to hard drive movs first

Posted: Wed Apr 02, 2008 2:14 am
by mia
sigma6, vjnutcracker:

appreciate the help but no, that's not what i want. No pre-recording (that would be like madonna lip-synching) . It must be live, since the rest of the music/circus will be. Also the idea of electric impulses having to battle each other for dominance is as interesting as mixing 2 ant farms; I think it's crucial.

thanks.

Posted: Wed Apr 02, 2008 10:55 am
by sigmasix
I don't understand why ist it less "live" than using dvds... Obviously you don't use modul8, with it you can mix 10 different layers together and also use live camera input. The only difference with what you want is that you mus rip your dvd's first in order to play it in modul8. You can also add pre effects ina after effects but the mixing work is stil live...

And if you want to do it the analog way, the V4 does it fine, or the vixid

Posted: Wed Apr 02, 2008 1:15 pm
by vanakaru
I think what we say is that electric signals will not fight for dominance in reality. To the best you will get just a video noise if any. But you can mimic this by using suggestions here with M8.
And why not to try to connect the video outs and see what happens. If you blow your equipment with this experiment there is a valuable lesson learned right there.

Posted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 9:06 am
by VJnutcracker
Sounds like you need an old video synth and some circuit bending fun rather than Modul8

Posted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 8:24 pm
by technomorph
mia wrote::( So technomorph what would you suggest as a starting point? My gig is in 10 days, unknown to me until yesterday. I need help obviously, this is not really my field.On top of this it's got to be live; I can't sit at home for 150 hrs making a dvd; that would defeat the point of the theatrical event. So it has to be a fairly simple solution (and cheap). I presume you are telling me the impedance, ohms, volts, whatever, are on completely different scales than audio, yes?
What to do?
please think; and I thank you ahead of time.


Your problems:

10 days
not my field
live
you won't sit at home prepping anything
simple
cheap

start with those issues 1st, before you worry about any technology issues.
If you don't have the above figured out, then nothing anyone says here is going to help you.

That's why there are folks on this list who do this type of thing professionally.

nope

Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 7:54 pm
by tolchok
Well, the way a video signal works would render it impossible to do what you desire, unlike audio, a video signal has a sync burst at the start of the signal (you can see this by looking at the signal through your waveform monitor (if you have one). All three of your signals (let's say all of them are composite RCA or BNC outputs) and simply overlapping them through by twisting them together is not gonna work as you will send the sync out of whack, and all you will get as a result is lines flipping through the screen (sort of like scan lines).

Video is not audio, it will not work in a audio mixer, nor will it respond to simple Y connectors, try a video mixer, or do it in post. I've been working on sets for 5 years now, and trust me when I say that there is no easy way to mix 2 signals, in video everything costs something, be it work or equipment
________
FREE JOOMLA THEMES