After twenty years or so of music software, you’ll often find that what you need to do is creatively satisfied by what’s available in pre-built tools. But video is often another matter: even if a VJ tool does what you need some of the time, there are times when you need something that doesn’t exist (or even something simpler, to perform a specific task). You might not be ready to invest hundreds of dollars in Max/MSP/Jitter to do that, of course. Enter Pure Data, Max’s free, open-source cousin. Like Max, it lets you quickly build custom tools by visually “patching” objects on-screen — ideal for modular video tools. But unlike Max, it costs nothing, it runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux, and because of the rich Pd community and a good relationship with the Max community, it has some tricks of its own.

Beau, aka DJCypod, writes to share his excellent video tutorial on building a simple 2-way mixer in Pd. Beau, if you ever need a second career, I think you could do relaxation recordings; I felt my blood pressure dropping. Next time I have students getting nervous about Pd or patching, I’m sending them to this video. (Well, and also because it’s really easy to follow.)

Totally beginner-friendly, so newbies will get rolling fast. And as a long-time Max user, it served as a nice introduction for me, too.

Pure Data Video Mixer: YouTube, Internet Archive

You’ll also need the Pd Extended Release; see our previous story

I’ll be building some Pd software mixers this month, so I’ll be sure to report back! (Any requests, or tips from those of you who know Pd better than I do?) Now, if only I could easily integrate Processing with Pd, as you can with Max. (At least Pd does have Java support of its own.)

If you’ve been intrigued by all this talk of Quartz Composer, the free visual creation software that ships with Mac OS X 10.4 and 10.5, here’s your chance to actually learn how to do cool stuff with it. Our friend Momo walks us through a basic tutorial on simple 3D and audio processing, which you could easily apply to more complex ideas. With QC support in the upcoming VDMX5, you could drop this into a VJ set with traditional clips, as well. We’ve got step-by-step instructions, plus a video. Let us know if you create anything wild with this as its basis.

Quartz Composer: Lighting 3D Cubes and Moving them with Audio Input from momo_the_monster on Vimeo.

In this Quartz Composer tutorial, We’re going to make a 3D cube that responds to our voice.

First we start up Quartz Composer. The icon will be different depending on whether you’re running OS X 10.5 or 10.4.

From the File menu, choose New Blank (or simply ‘New’ in Tiger).

Visualists have a wide range of skills to cover. After you’re done figuring out how to create and edit content and turn it into a performance / live installation / whatever, then you have to deal with the technicalities of projectors?

Basic calculations for throw distances are pretty straightforward: a 3:1 throw ratio, for instance, means you need 3′ from the projection surface to get a 1′ image. But that’s before you throw in all the variables: what are the specs of the projector you’re using, what’s the lens, what’s the setting of the lens, what size image and throw will provide an image that’s bright enough for the job, etc. So, while there are various calculators online, by far, my favorite is this fantastic interactive calculator at Projector Central:

Projection Calculator Pro [Projector Central]

Video artist Maya Ciarrocchi turned me on to the site (thanks, Maya)! It’s useful for two reasons, even if you’re decent at arithmetic. First, it’s got an extensive database of obscure projectors attached to it, so you’ll prepared for whatever you run into. Second, it has adjustable sliders so you can try what-if scenarios.

Won’t be long before I put all of this to use. Wednesday, I leave for Pittsburgh and the Hazlett Theater, where I’ll be in residence for a week and a half installing a custom show for choreographer Grisha Coleman, written in Processing and Java. I expect this will be a trial-by-fire for me as far as projector setup and installation, with one computer display and five projectors, all in unusual locations. I’ll be sure to report back on what I learn, including what I learn the hard way.

How about you: got a preferred method for researching projectors and projector setup? Got some killer spreadsheet for your throw distances? Let us know in comments.

The tour with Bobby Flynn is hotting up now. Over the weekend we had two shows: In Brisbane and the Gold Coast, which meant that I spent about 8 hours of my weekend setting up and tearing down my rig, aligning projectors and screens, running cables, and running around. The tour map currently displays 16 gigs down Australia’s east coast, and we will have another 35 or so joining them over the next week or so as dates are finalized. The cardboard box protecting my V4 during transport has already torn, and I’m sick of plugging and unplugging cables. So I need to get this stuff cased up, for the protection of my hardware and my sainity.

The current list (left to right, top to bottom):

• Wii - for pre-show warmups and after hours fun. Need to organize a wireless sensor bar.
• Behringer BCD2000 - Ghetto, but functional.
• Behringer BCR2000 - less ghetto than the BCD2000, and more functional.
• Numark AVM02 - Reviewed here.
• Samsung 940n 19″ LCD Monitor
• Lacie 200GB External Drive - Several years old, so should probably be replaced
• Macbook - Main Laptop. Running VDMX, Max/MSP/Jitter, Ableton Live etc.
• Thinkpad - Backup laptop. Running Ableton Live, Max/MSP/Jitter, Processing etc.
• Korg Kaoss Pad Entrancer - Video/Audio effects unit.
• Edirol V4
• Small Form Factor PC
• Voxson portable DVD player/monitor

I received my Arduino today, and in preparation I’ve been saving up some Arduino/Wiring/Processing links of interest to a newbie physical-computerer.

If you haven’t Arduino’d before, here’s Todbot on why it’s a rocking little microcontroller. Tod also tells us how to make an Arduino Breadboard Shield, for quick circuit prototyping.

You should probably familiarise yourself with the Arduino Board, then have a look at ARDUINO meets PROCESSING - physical computing and computer graphics site: Projects containing the basic physical interactions mediated by an Arduino board.

The Arduino meets Processing project intends to make it as easy as possible for anyone to explore the world of physical computing. All you need is an Arduino board as well as the Arduino and Processing software, which you can download on their project websites.

Some of the pages seem a little incomplete, but it contains basic circuit information and code for: Pushbutton, Switch(es), Tilt Sensor, Accelerometer, Potentiometer, LDR Light Sensor, NTC Temperature Sensor, Joystick, Ultrasonic Sensor, Piezo Element.

Of course the Arduino Tutorials page has loads of examples. Of major interest to VJs may be:
Blinking LED.
Dimming 2 LEDs (RGB colour mixing).
LED Driver makes use of an LED Driver in order to control an almost endless amount of LEDs with only 4 pins.

Both Peter and I have Arduinos now, so you can expect things to be getting a little more physical in the future. Don’t be scared, we’ll be gentle.

If you take digital photos and care at all about your signal, then you should own, or be planning to own, a digital SLR camera.

Of the stuff people don’t understand about DSLRs, the easiest to explain and see is dust. You change lenses, some dust gets in and lands on the sensor, each subsequent photo displays that piece of dust. Whether you can see it or not it’s effecting your images.

Despite my love of artistic challenges, eventually I got sick of framing my photos so I could crop out the dust, so I decided to have my sensor cleaned. I visited my friendly local camera suppliers and was informed that they would send my camera away for several days and charge me AU$80 for the privilege. Their alternative was a range of ludicrously priced cleaning solutions, costing on average around 20% of the camera’s purchase price. Thanks, but no thanks.

A little googling led me to Copper Hill Images’ CCD/CMOS Cleaning Tutorial pages. The procedure seemed relatively straightforward and only a little scary, so I hunted around and found an Australian supplier for the Copper Hill products. For AU$20 more than the price of a single commercial sensor clean I purchased the Ultimate DSLR Care Kit (US$51.95 on the Copper Hill Site), containing a Basic Sensor Cleaning Kit, Lens Care Kit and SensorSweep.

I’ve had a bit of a personal technological apocalypse over the weekend. There’s a post coming, but in the meantime here’s a couple of things which have caught my eye while catching up on my RSS subscriptions:

Cinematical has a great collection of resources titled: How to make a Short Film.

DVGuru points us to apple’s instructions on importing Motion projects into After Effects, and feeds my Stop-motion obsession with video and production notes from a Sydney-produced filmclip - YUNYU - Lenore’s Song:

Also rocking the stop-motion (in an origami kind of way) is The Format - The Compromise

Neither of those are featured in Stylus Magazine’s top 100 Music Videos of All Time.

HowTo: Electronic design on a budget - I’ve got some more solder-based projects coming up, so this is an interesting read.

It doesn’t surprise me that so many discussions of technology have to do with tools rather than “art.” Odds are, you know what art you want to make — it’s the tools that may or may not help you get there. On that note, I want to point to an interesting chat I’ve been having with subbasshead on the forums:

Best tool for QT random frame playback/output?

Jitter is an excellent tool for doing what he wants to do here; it’s perfect for creating custom video patches that do what you like. My focus lately has been on building all my VJ apps in Jitter, not to impress anyone, necessarily, but because even for simple playback they do everything I want and nothing else.

Subbasshead comes across one of my favorite sets of Jitter sample patches to play with, the “Jitter Recipes” by Andrew Benson. Andrew’s name is all over the Jitter example content, too. (Speaking of which, I find a lot of people don’t actually know how much example content is included in the Jitter install. Aside from the tutorials, there are folders full of example patches in the [Max folder] > examples > jitter-examples folder. Many of these cover topics you won’t find elsewhere in the documentation. I wish some of them had better contents or were more simplified, but they’re useful nonetheless. Andrew has been taking these the extra mile in updated recipes online:

Jitter Recipes Book 1
Book 2
Book 3

If you haven’t checked book 3 since May (I hadn’t), you’ve missed two new patches, including an homage to the legendary Video Toaster. (Ah, Video Toaster.) Some of Andrew’s crazy results are pictured above.

I promise we’ll have some ready-made video tools covered here on CDMo, too, but for those of you adventuring into Jitter, we’re here to help you make sure those escapades are rewarding.

GRL and Eyebeam have posted a new instructable on portable projection, with advice on projector output, projection surfaces, car and battery selection, and how not best to overload your inverter, causing it to shoot flame inside your rental van.

Outdoor digital projection in urban environments is a great method for getting your content up big before the eyes and in the minds of your fellow city inhabitants. This tutorial comes out of trial and error and it works. But please be careful. Helpful comments on safety and alternative methods are encouraged. The majority of this tutorial is aimed toward using a 2500 lumen projector (or smaller)