If you’re already in holiday mode, sapped by the shortest day of the year (at least if you’re in the Northern Hemisphere), and looking to kick back with some audiovisual stimulation, this should do the trick. (I know it appeals to me, after 15 hours crossing the Atlantic yesterday.)

The radio show Solid Steel regularly features AV mixes; this one comes via DK and the label Ninja Tune. On the superb German electronic site Partysan:
‘Cymatic Frequencies’ an Audio Visual mix by DK

It harkens back to the heady days of … 2010. And it makes use of VIDEO-SL, the a/v-savvy video plugin for Serato covered earlier this week:
VIDEO-SL, Video for DJs, Turnablists: $99 Deal, CDM Giveaway, and How it’s Used

Description (full tracklist on Vimeo):

We start where we ended the last AV mix with the anthemic ‘Hyph Mngo’ by Joy Orbison and a few choice words from Sun Ra. We continue in a future vein with the Eliphino Remix for Kidkanevil, Maddslinky given a Toddla T lick, and the heavy ‘Work them’ by Ramadanman.
Then it’s a Ninja Tune trio and a Big Dada double, James Blake floating over the Altrice remix of Caribou, before turning up the bass to 11 for Bassnectar. The beats stay heavy as we skip through George Lenton and the Jamie XX remix of Gil Scott-Heron, an ‘old skool hip hop’ trio, mixed with RackNRuin and Vent for extra dance floor punch, and it’s a D n B finish with the DJ Marky remix of ‘Wile Out’ by Zinc, Sunny by James Brown tweaked by Featurecast and we end on the sublime Flying Lotus remix for Andreya Triana.

VIDEO-SL is the video plug-in for Serato’s Scratch Live, extending the turntablist / virtual vinyl metaphor from sound to the realm of video. Once loaded, you can manage video clips and control them with vinyl or CD as if they lived on records, a clever rendition of something that would technically be impossible (or at least difficult) in the non-digital world.

Ed.: A reader notes that in fact there are encoded “video vinyl” records; I’m not sure the behavior, however, would be the same as audio – that is, what’s unique here is treating the vinyl video signal as exactly analogous to audio on a turntable. Maybe there is a way to do that, though, if someone can enlighten us.)

You can manage, mix, add loads of effects and transitions (many audio-responsive), for instantaneous audiovisual DJing. The only catch is you need some specific elements in your setup: a computer with a capable graphics card, and a copy of Serato with a Serato-capable interface from Rane. (Clarification: An early version of VIDEO-SL worked only with the Rane TTM-57 SL mixer. Now, you can use a number of Rane mixers and interfaces, and via a supported Rane interface, a non-Rane mixer. There’s also now MIDI support for performing from any MIDI controller you choose.)

But for Serato users with that setup, adding video powers just became a no-brainer. The software is on sale through the end of December for only US$99 (half off the usual price). And if you don’t have a hundred bucks but do have the rest of the setup, CDM can get you one of a couple of copies we’ve got for free. So we can be equitable, just write in comments a brief explanation of why you deserve to get the freebie and what you’ll do with it. If we find an answer compelling (hint: promising to help us share what you do with it on CDM would be a big help), we’ll announce you as one of the winners.

If you’re curious what all the fuss is about, see the video at top, in which French gentleman Joachim Garraud shows you around how he’s using Serato and VIDEO-SL on tour.

Free loops from that project: http://sera.to/-bx9

Invasion Box 2011:
http://sera.to/-bxd

More on the product (including requirements):
http://serato.com/video-sl
Download a free demo

MixEmergency is a little-known Mac visual app, but it’s got a passionate following. (How do I know? I get excited shouts from them every now and then.) With so many options for live visuals, what would inspire such enthusiasm? Simple: MixEmergency, in addition to some powerful features, can integrate with real-time scratch moves from Serato Scratch Live. Serato is not officially associated with MixEmergency, and yet the app does a number of things Serato’s own VIDEO-SL app does not, without the burden of requiring specialized hardware.

Inklen has posted new features in videos for 1.5 (bottom) and 1.4 (top). Recent updates have brought faster video export, lots of plug-in enhancements including album art (ideal for your record label’s next party when the VJ calls in sick), and extensive Quartz Composer effect and transition support. I’m not quite sure this would steal anyone away from VDMX or Resolume just yet, but the interface is nicely streamlined, and for people looking to add visuals to a Serato audio DJ rig, this looks utterly terrific.

Since I’m not the target audience and haven’t used it, I’d love to hear more from some of those enthusiastic users. Why did you select this tool, and how do you use it — and got any reels of your work to share? Let us know.

http://www.inklen.com/mixemergency/

Oh yeah, and if you’re tired of carrying turntables around, you can replace them with the iPad via Tonetable.
http://www.inklen.com/tonetable/

Scratch Yourself Stupid from digital funfair on Vimeo.

Can you do exciting things with video inside Ableton Live using Max for Live? Yes, you can.

It’s just a proof of concept/demo, not really a polished performance, but Digital Funfair has revealed with his Max for Live work how you might scratch incoming video and not just audio. Using a webcam input, he’s able to keep a buffer of incoming video and scratch that with the vinyl. He promises to share this lovely work with fellow Max for Live owners.

There’s more: at bottom, he takes the Buffer Shuffler concept from one of the included Max for Live devices and re-imagines it with video in place of audio.

For people doing this sort of audiovisual work, naturally, this is all pretty big news. It does the sort of things we had previously seen with the VIDEO-SL plug-in and Serato. You could do all of this in Max (or a similar environment) and dump Ableton Live entirely, but because in this case having beat-synced samples is important, Live is indeed quite useful.

Requirements: you need a full copy of Ableton Live (not LE), an add-on of Max for Live, and the Ms. Pinky vinyl and software. Ms. Pinky is really the cheap part: $80 buys you two records and the software, including the necessary Max external. You do not need a copy of Max/MSP and Jitter (normally $595), but if you have a Max 5 + Jitter license already, you have a major added advantage. With just Max for Live, the output of the Jitter window is disabled while editing, which means you have to patch, lock the patch, try it out, unlock the patch, edit the patch… you get the idea. It’s quite annoying, but it seems to be a matter of Cycling ’74 making sure sales of Max for Live don’t entirely cannibalize sales of Max. If you do have that Max 5 and Jitter license, the limitation is removed.

I did a Q&A with Ableton pushing a little further about what Max for Live is, what their intentions were, and what to expect; I’ll run that on cdmusic next week.

Now, let’s buffer shuffle – again, just a demo, but quite promising:

Quick Demo of Video Shuffler – my MaxforLive Device from digital funfair on Vimeo.

The competition – and it is competition for your Ableton Live integration time, because now Serato and Live, including VIDEO-SL, can work together:
Vinyl Scratch Animation: Turntable-Controlled, Interactive Cel Animation with Ms. Pinky

Visual Turntablism: Jaymis Live with Sampology on Serato Video-SL

Hands-on Review: Serato’s VIDEO-SL for Visual Vinyl Turntablism

Or you can run Max for Live and Live and Serato at the same time, too, but then you may in fact be a bit mad.

Thanks for the tip, Mudo!

More on Gavin Morris, the artist:
VJing, The Game: The AV Arcade Table, Powered by VJAMM
Ableton Live + Isadora: Slicing, Syncing Audiovisual Tutorials

And his official site, with lots more projects:
http://www.digitalfunfair.co.uk/

Jack Lykins sends us a really amazing video he assembled using Ms. Pinky, the vinyl control system, and its included Maxi-Patch Max/MSP/Jitter patch to control animation interactively. We’ve seen vinyl triggering and controlling video, of course – as on the Serato VIDEO-SL, previously reviewed here. But there’s something about Jack’s style of “narrative” animation on the turntable that’s really compelling.

Hope to see more of this setup.

Previously:

Hands-on Review: Serato’s VIDEO-SL for Visual Vinyl Turntablism

You’ve already seen what Sam can do with Serato Video-SL (as reviewed previously on CDM), so instead I’d like to share with you my new favorite Herovision video. Featuring Vader’s 501st Legion (and the Dark Lord himself making an appearance on stage) playing, what else, but the Dark Lord Ozzie’s Black Sabbath – Paranoid.

Herovision + The Empire: Black Sabbath – Paranoid from Herovision on Vimeo.

Sam and I will be preceeded on stage by Yahtzee (of Zero Punctuation) and Matt and Yug (of Australian Gamer), who will have a screening of their show Game Damage, and then talk about games rather a lot.

Using web production studio Mogulus, the stream will be viewable at 6PM AEST (8AM GMT, 3AM New York) on the CDMedia channel, and there’s a countdown (so you can check the time) and embedded player at Herovision.

It’s a well considered approach, and becomes intuitive fairly quickly. What especially jumps out is the audio parameters integrated in each of the above areas, alongside the video parameters. Adjust some blur on layer one. Add a little distortion to the squawking bird on layer two. Adjust the brightness. Pan the audio to the left a bit. This has been especially designed for people who wish to play with audio and video simultaneously. One cool facet of this is the way that any audio and video parameters can be linked to the same on-screen controller, enabling a mouse or midi device to control both audio and video at once, and enabling highly synchronised and customised audiovisual effects.

Resolume Avenue Review on Skynoise.net

I have a followup gig to the Game On set with Sampology coming next month, and will be taking that as an opportunity to give Res-Ave a spin in public.

Recently I was able to collaborate with Sampology, a local turntablist, for the last Game On night of 2008. Sam used Video-SL to put together a gaming-themed AV set, and I added a selection of security cameras and mixed it all together with the Vixid.

Sampology at Game On – AV Turntablist Set (Part 1), and Part 2.

This performance was fantastic fun, and Video-SL really shines when piloted by a skilled turntablist. The addition of video to this kind of set gives audience members another sense to help them understand what all that frantic action behind the turntable is actually creating, as they have visual cues to go along with the audio for juggles, scratches and other esoteric DJ techniques.

MixEmergency is a new attempt to expand the DJ techniques into the visual realm in a single, integrated environment. And once again, Serato is the backdrop.

We saw Serato’s own Scratch-Live, which provides digital vinyl control in Serato, when dj rndm gave us a detailed hands-on earlier this year. The VIDEO-SL focused on vinyl control of video and integration with the TTM-57SL Rane mixer required for the product. MixEmergency is a bit different: here, visualizations and MIDI are the centerpiece in place of video and scratching. (They’re there, but they’re not the main draw, according to the developers.)

Features:

• QuickTime video mixing and scratching
• Quartz Composer visual compositions, taking advantage of QC’s 3D and image-processing / generative capabilities
• Visuals react to play position and velocity of media, and audio and video signals
• Custom layer and transition effects, frame bending, image and text layers
• Drag and drop preview and playback, drag and drop of folders
• Assignable MIDI control (including MIDI in QC compositions), and support for Scratch LIVE control

MixEmergency Product Page

The software is currently in public beta, Mac-only. The full version will cost US$179 (the demo is watermarked and doesn’t support fullscreen output). As with a number of recent Mac apps, you need a MacBook Pro or other Mac hardware with dedicated graphics. Happily, 10.4.10 works — 10.5 isn’t required.

So who is this for? A lot of the push has been for giving DJs visuals easily — with the danger being potentially eliminating VJs or dumbing down visuals, which isn’t really good for anyone. (See Jaymis’ rant about that direction.) But I don’t get that sense here. In fact, the ability to create custom visualizations means DJs could commission visuals from a VJ and tour with them. The developers actually tout collaborative performance controls and VJs working to design and perform with reactive visuals alongside the DJ. Integrating the two could encourage that kind of collaboration, as dj rndm and Robotkid discovered in our VIDEO-SL review. On the other hand, many VJs will remain happy in their existing environment. But it’s nice to have more choices.

If you try the demo, let us know what you think. I expect we’ll see this are continue to grow and mature.

We’ve seen visual vinyl, via the video stylings of Serato’s VIDEO-SL plug-in. But here’s a more literal approach: stick the camera on the turntable. Via a multi-camera setup, Cut Chemist and DJ Shadow are doing that with their honest-to-goodness, scratching turntablist sets. I especially like the camera up close on the turntable itself — something instrumentalists might try, too. (Well, maybe you want to stop somewhere … no endoscopies during your performance, please, unless you’re an avant-garde performance artist or something.)

More on this sort of thing soon, but there’s something to get the thought process going. Thanks, Jaymis!