LOR 2 and video's

[pokietech34331]

I am currently sequencing a song with 96 channels, "A Winters Tale" by the Moody Blues. I am using an avi file. I was wondering if LOR2 will output the video as well as the audio and module controls. The reason is I also have a video wall processor that will make a 3X3 (9) screen for my audience to see not only the lights but to see and hear the songs as well. Has anyone done this or am I the first to give it a go. I would post what I have but I don't know how to post video with sequence for all to see.

Cheers

David

Australia:D

[Paul Roberson]

Yes, several of us use video in our displays. S2 has no problems keeping the lights insync with the audio/video it was programmed too

[tboerjan]

Paul is correct, several of us have and continue to work with videos into our displays. Join ConstantlyChristmas; then follow this link for a basic "how to" I wrote and should get you started.... Good Luck!

http://www.constantlychristmas.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4191

[pokietech34331]

Hi E1,

this is what I have done so far The video from u-tube is the one I have downloaded for the video and song. Hope this helps you'all out there

Cheers

David



Attached files a winters tale 2.lms

[Linda]

Oh I would love to be able to do something like that. This is my first year to use the LOR products and don't even know how to sequence a song yet. How expensive are the video processors? I guess if I have to ask I can't afford one!!

[Linda]

I've just joined Constantly Christmas so I can read your "how to" on working with videos, but haven't got the "permission" email so I can't browse any forums yet. Are there different types of video processors one can use to display the video, and how expensive are they? Thanks

[tboerjan]

[align=center]My CC post:[/align]
[align=center] [/align]
[align=center]Synchronizing Videos with Light O Rama’s S2[/align]
With the release of Light O Rama’s latest version of it’s software, it’s users for the first time were given the opportunity to use videos in conjunction with their musical sequences. I should warn you in advance it is not easy or cheap. If you want to do this, one needs a computer with two high quality video outputs, and a relatively “fast” CPU with decent amount of memory because of the extra stuff going on. I would also recommend you may want to turn off your anti-virus and any other non-essential programs while running your shows. If you are concerned about viruses, just disconnect your Internet connection while running your “show”. Lastly, and most importantly, you need to have access to or purchase a video projector. Where I live, in Illinois, it isn’t feasible to have a video projector outside in the winter nor do most of us want it walk away so, I set mine up in an interior room and project onto a Mylar (drafting paper) covered window from the inside of my house (I’ve heard one could use any “milky” plastic with good results, too). I believe you can also project out of a window to a surface, but I haven’t tried that. Last year, I projected Darryl Brown’s DVD Santa onto the screen in an endless loop and my younger and young-at-heart viewers were giddy, enthusiastic and ecstatic! One of my reasons for the change up this year- MTV meets LOR.

To set up S2, go to Edit, Preferences, Video Preferences, Display Videos, then press Select Monitor. Move your mouse on to the second monitor’s desktop or your projector’s screen and “click” on it. That selects the video card that is associated with where you want the “projector” to be. Next go to View, Videos and check Show Videos and lastly Full screen when you are all ready to go. The last configuration is save as the default for the future.

I have been working since last spring trying to incorporate as many videos as I could into my show with varying degrees of success, and have learned some tricks that I thought I would share with others. Not to imply that I’m an expert nor is this the only way to do this, not to re-invent the wheel. Here are some of the things I have found:

First, Ken Good, an Animated Lighting enthusiast, has devoted part of his website to a “video sharing” coop where you can download and/or post videos. This was the source of many of my videos and a couple of my submissions.

Secondly, one can “rip” or capture video form DVDs to get the “best” source material. The legality of this may not be on firm ground, so I am not going into any detail here. You can find many ideas cruising the Internet as how to do this. Once you have it “ripped” I used Moviemaker or other video editing software to put the music with the “video”.

It is not possible to find a video for every song you have done so another option is to generate stills from movies and then use a program like DVDSanta to add audio to the “stills”. This program will generate a slideshow like output that matches the length of your song. This is a huge advantage, because from my experience, videos almost never match up in length to their songs files. Which translates to even if you have the sequences made, get ready to change their length, put in “dead time” at the beginning or end and re-sequence them for the “right” length. One could also use past Christmas pictures of your family or from the Internet for your show. You could even “edit” these pictures with information on top of your show – your name, hours, FM frequency, etc. More on a variation of this later…

S2 also lets one use Windows media player to project its visualizer onto the screen, but personally, I think that this would get old and boring very quickly. I did capture an iTunes visualizer screen with one song I couldn’t find a video for only because the new iTunes 8 visualizer is awesome, I wanted something extra to “show off” that particular song and I am planning to only do one video that way.

Finally, let’s assume that you have a mixture of regular music sequences and some new video ones; now you have some options a) a regular night and a video night c) mixing the two. Now keep in mind, you have to manually turn your projector on and while you are running your music “shows” it , by default, projects your desktop on to the screen, so you probably want to make it “black” so nothing shows up.

Then I got an inspiration! My idea was to try a wallpaper changer with some different “Christmas” pictures. Lo and behold it worked great!!! So you can run your “video” show and when a music sequence starts it changes to the wallpaper mode; flipping through your pictures - again these could be Christmas ones, public announcements, family ones or a mixture. There is a small screen that pops up for a brief moment that I can’t explain, but that is like a minor annoyance for me. Some final suggestions: keep both desktops the same size (or it will mess up the picture sizes), and I chose to change pictures every 3-4 minutes.

I thought I would post this on CC first and get some feedback from this site's members before I post it anywhere else.

Please contact me with any suggestions, ideas and/or comments. Good luck and have a great Christmas lighting season!

[Linda]

The wallpaper changer idea is awesome! Thanks for all your information.

[pokietech34331]

Do you have a web address for Ken Good. I would like to see how and what he has done

Cheers

David

[Linda]

I found this by doing a search on it. Hopefully this is what you wanted. If not, just type in his name in the explorer bar. I found another site too with some of his videos. I'm sending that link too. Hope this helps.

http://www.christmasatthegoods.com/Christmas_Site/Home.html

http://www.vimeo.com/2573846

[Paul Roberson]

You can also try here.