Visual patchers love the fact that they can create sophisticated stuff just using on-screen patch cords. But when you want to go beyond the capabilities of the default set of objects — and for solving certain problems more elegantly — code is the way to go. Code your own objects, and you get the best of both worlds. So the news that vvvv is adding a facility for easily creating your own objects (or "nodes" as they’re called in vvvv-speak) is good news, indeed. (Jitter and Pd have similar extensibility, though having looked at what’s necessary to write a Jitter object, you may or may not want to … go there. This does look quite a bit easier, for simple tasks, at least.)

Phl shares some additional resources in comments on our previous story, so I want to make sure you don’t miss these.

sourceforge site with the first plugins (go to code -> svn browse)

VVVV Plugin HowTo

Plugin Forum for more questions

Note that you can use any language you like. I do like the open source SharpDevelop they mention here. For any of you who think Windows doesn’t have a fledgling open source community of its own, think again — perhaps because of the glut of working Windows-based programmers, there’s actually quite a lot going, arguably more than on Mac. And C# is a nice language for this kind of task.

Seriously, let us know if you build anything; we’d love to see it!

The free (for non-commercial use), Windows-only, insanely-powerful visual/multimedia patching environment vvvv just got a killer feature: the ability to make your own "nodes" (what are called objects in some other modular tools).

It’s actually pretty easy to build, too, and the developers have some templates for you. This is way up the list on my summer projects. You can do matrix transforms, as well, so 3D / GPU-based video processing gets very interesting, along with simpler manipulations of color, string, and number values:

The latest vvvv version offers developers an interface to write their own nodes for vvvv. A plugin is basically a .dll file, that can be drag&dropped into a vvvv patch where it appears as a node. If its stored in vvvv’s plugins directory, its even available in the node list.

vvvv gurus, if you give this a try and make something interesting, let us know:

vvvv40beta16 release with plugin interface [Results in Reverse blog]

Its been an opportune few weeks for visualists in Europe, with a spread of three festivals all with their own take on the field. Here’s a quick tour through the eyes and itinerary of one *spark.

• Late at Tate: The AV Social; 4th April
• NODE08: Forum for digital arts; 5-12th April
• Mapping: VJing and Audio-Visual Festival; 10th-20th April
• Vision’r: Festival VJ; 17th-20th April
• Resolume 3 & Freeframe 1.5
• On the horizon: Visual Berlin and Live Performer’s Meeting

Cat hit up the Amoeba Dance comments with a link to Sanch TV’s work in vvvv.

Apart from some smooth motion and subtly textured shapes, Sanch is also collaborating on an AV act “Va”, with quad-screen visuals:

Whether in three-dimensional videos or paper sculptures, artist Martin Böttger manipulates organic, fluid geometry like a child with blocks. An artist working with Maya, vvvv, and Processing, his work demonstrates that even simple elements can yield a variety of creative products.

“Transformer” is an intentional nod to the robots and movie — with good reason; Martin seems like the type who could design you a robot that changes into a truck:

Or, I should say, vim, vigor, vivaciously vivid vertex vitality, vivisected for your voraciously voyueristic viewing in vvvv.

VertexNoise[take2] from desaxismundi on Vimeo.

This beautiful work comes from French-based desaxismundi, who’s also on Flickr. I’m always struck when similar, elemental techniques can yield unique results.

vvvv, for those who don’t know it, is a cult-hit software application for Windows. Like Max/MSP/Jitter and Pd/GEM, it uses virtual patch cords to create modular setups for visuals (video and 3D). But unlike those OpenGL-based packages, vvvv is built around Windows and DirectX. That doesn’t matter so much — what’s important is that vvvv has some unique strengths of its own, and a passionate following pushing its capabilities to the bleeding edge.

vvvv group @ Vimeo

The Wi-Fi link on the Nintendo DS makes it possible to harnass the game unit as a software controller, made more appealing by the DS’ two screens and touchscreen/stylus. In one very cool student project at the University Of Applied Science Hagenberg, a three-person team (Matthias Zauner, Ralph Windischhofer, and Martina Karan) has developed a homebrew app enabling the DS to function as a VJ controller:

ndsvisuals Project Page (with movies, screenshots, and all the technical resources used)

Via the Create Digital Noise forums and the vvvv user gallery, which has too many cool projects to ever cover — enjoy!

An open wi-fi library lets the DS transmit via TCP and UDP, which enables the use of multimedia software on your computer; this could be easily applied to Processing, Flash, Max/MSP/Jitter and Pd/GEM, or various other options that can handle the data. In this case, the creators chose the superb, free interactive visual package for Windows, vvvv. That enables many features, like:

1. Showing an overview of footage on the DS screens, arrangable in sequences via drag-and-drop with the stylus
2. Color, opacity, blends, and blend modes
3. Stylus scratching!
4. 2D cross-fader controlled by stylus
5. Plug-in support for your own vvvv patches (very cool, for custom control)
6. Use of vvvv patches and video files