Hello,
I am currently in the process of researching a technical solution for a audiovisual design I have been asked to provide for a theater production in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA this January. I have talked the set designer and the director into considering projections as a source of light for a number of scenes in the play and they liked the idea so much that I am now in the somewhat tricky position to actually make it happen. I have never worked with vvvv, my experience with computer based projection systems has largely been limited to solutions from Green Hippo or Dataton, fairly limited but easy to use applications for designing projections. Mainly for cost reasons these solutions are not an option for this production as the bulk for the budget would be dedicated to the purchase of projectors and playback computers.
The basic design idea presents itself like this:
The entire stage floor is to be covered with one continuous projected image and there is the wish for some projections on the proscenium wall as well. At a conservative estimate we would need a total of of at least six projectors to just cover the floor and another two to cover the proscenium wall. Since the projection rig also doubles up as lighting package we would need to add another four projectors to cover a wider range for the actors to perform in, while maintaining a continuous image on the floor. Makes sense?
Anyway most of the projected material consists of video clips and still images. I need to be capable to make a fairly seamless image on the floor while being able to have certain specific projectors project little circles of light in addition to that image. Alternating (ideally cross-fading) between different video files would be a requirement as well and the ability to loop the clips might be a nice plus.
As some of you might be able to tell, my way of approaching this project is largely influenced by the technologies I have used in the past (drag and drop solutions for the most part), but I am open to take up a challenge and learn something new if it seems realistic that it will achieve an acceptable result for the project at hand.
In short: Am I fooling myself believing that this can be done with vvvv in the amount of time available and with a comparatively small budget. Could anybody talk me through the possibilities and limitations of this application and does anybody would want to give me a little crash course in vvvv if I decide to go with this.
I already had a brief exchange with Max about this but I thought I submit this idea here to see if other people in this community might have some ideas on the subject.
Thanks for your help
Hey,
of course I strongly ecourage everybody to take such interesting projects into this forum.
a few thoughts:
overlaying a realtime generated graphic (light circles) onto video streams is kind of easy with vvvv. (as with most such tools).
obviously, your machine needs to be ablt to play at least two video streams at once to do cross-fading. If it manages to do so, the fading itself won’t cost you much cpu. see for example catweasels awkward-o-tron.
perfectly synchronizing video playback across a boygroup of pcs is not absolutely trivial, but there have been users here that succeeded even under challenging conditions (HD resolutions, looping video, etc). check out tonfilm-VideoSync
there are numerous tricks here on the forum about improving video access speeds. see faq AV
considering the angle under which the audience will look at the projections, you may be able to live with rather low resolution video. It would be worthwhile to calulate the required resolution based on the acuity of the human eye (which is said to be ca. 0.35 arc-minutes per pixel). How wide is your stage? What content is the video going to have? Real footage or synthetically generated stuff?
smaller video skips better than larger video
one machine with multiple outputs gives better sync than many machines connected via ethernet.
therfore, try to connect 6 projectors on one PC, have all viewports run in span mode (e.g. 6 x 800x600) and try one video with an aspect of 24:3 (say, 2400x300) scaled by 200%. If this runs on your machine, you get the sync for free and save the money for 5 PCs.
6 Projectors on one pc? yes, with the TripleHead2Go from Matrox or with the Gigabyte Quad Royal.
low-res consumer projectors (800x600) are orders of magnitude cheaper than professional-grade material. I absolutely don’t mean to advocate unprofessional equipment. But you can get 2000 lumens for ca. 400 EUR. or spend 15000 EUR on 7000.
check out MultiScreen (ex9 Spanmode) and MultiScreen (EX9 Dualview) and their help patches: Soft-edge projections in a box.
Hi Max,
did anybody ever tell you what a blessing it is that people like you exist?
Anyway, thanks for your reply. Let me answer a few of your questions first:
Most of the content is animated still imagery, at this point a lot of childrens drawings (colored pencil on black).
I was originally planning to redraw the images in a vector graphics program like Illustrator, animate the resulting image in After Effects and render the whole thing as a high resolution video file. That would have been my usual work flow in the past since I never before worked with an application like vvvv. If it is possible to convert Vector graphics into a format that vvvv can animate directly I would consider that a far more interesting option though. There is also some photographic material and potentially some live video (which could be prerecorded if that turns out to be to complicated).
-the downstage playing area of the stage (its a thrust stage as you might have seen in the sketch) is about 18ft x 14.5ft (ca. 5.5 x 4.5 meters). Throw distance from the ceiling to the floor is about 16ft (4.8 meters). In the downstage area the projection also doubles up as lighting. The upstage area behind the proscenium is about 9ftx16ft and at this point it is merely a visual continuation of the image downstage. From above the whole thing presents itself like this:
http://www.lolalux.com/images/BirdsEyeProjecton.jpg
(the starry sky on the upstage wall and the floor projection in the L- shaped portion have been cut. Instead there should be some projections on the proscenium wall)
I am grateful for your suggestion to use one powerful computer to feed a large number of projectors rather than using a dedicated computer for each projector. I have two questions though:
-What have been the experiences in using two TripleHead2Go on the same computer, and does the “span mode” only allow to line projectors up in a single row or can they be stacked in multiple columns (3x2 for instance).
-Has anybody been crazy enough to try to run vvvv on a Mac Pro with four 7300GT under Windows XP? Theoretically it should be possible to get eight VGA outputs out of such a setup, not to mention that if four TripleHead2Go where installed the number of total outputs could go up to as many as 16. My fear though is that it could be a driver nightmare. I was just curious though, I don’t care one way or the other what hardware I end up using as long as I can make it work.
On that last note I am still somewhat nervous though. It seems very promising to work with vvvv for this show, but I am worried that I might not get up to speed enough to assure the successful programming and installation of this setup. I would either need somebody in the Berlin, Germany area who is going to help me with the preparation for this show starting in the next two weeks, or somebody in Cincinnati, Ohio at the end of January beginning February to help me program it on site. Is anybody available? I’ll try to pay as much as my budget allows me to (which isn’t all that much to begin with, but nothing is ever written in stone so please let me know if this interests anyone and I will try to accommodate your fee expectations as much as possible).
the low-budget-clause could convince me…i will contact you per mail.
to answer only one thing of many:
does the “span mode” only allow to line projectors up in a single row or can they be stacked in multiple columns (3x2 for instance).
actually i am not sure. but it doesn’t really matter for vvvv which can place “virtual camera views” in any fashion you like and output that in any order to the physical graphiccards outputs.
i have never heard of anyone with a mac pro and multiple GPUs.
that doesnt mean they dont exist.
driver nightmares do happen. Multihead stuff is still a messy issue especially when you go for exotic resolutions or refresh rates(say, 1400x1050, latest fad in the beamer scene, or 1368x768 - stupid TFT TVs).
the triplehead2go is not supported well by matrox, and they basically don’t take the blame for anything. I’d consider it ‘experimental’, and we’ve had unresolved situations when we gave up on it. But it has worked for others.
if your projection will double as lighting, be aware of the funny effects in the blend area between 2 projections - you will have a split cone of light, one half going left, the other to the right. Will look unusual on people standing there.
5x4 meters isn’t so big at all. You might be happy with a single projection (via a mirror so you don’t need a wide throw lens), and if you don’t get enough lux out of it use two or more projectors in tandem, with the same image on them by way of a VGA splitter or “clone mode” of your GPU.
Hi Max
I agree that one projector might be okay to cover an area of 4x5 meters, but such a setup would make for a very inflexible and therefore monotonous lighting of the performers. With a wide angle lens and a 5 meter throw you would only light an area of about 3 x 2.50 meters, at a hight of 1.80 of the ground (the assumed average hight of an actor), which is just not enough room to play in. If you split the same area into four segments you already cover a much wider play area for the actors. If then you use two projectors to cover each of these segments and place the projectors in such a way that they project from two opposite angles you might manage to have a fairly homogeneous lighting coverage of the entire area.
As for the funny effect due to the splitting of the image it would indeed be necessary that the lighting circles were not affected by the split while the image was. Is that possible? Can you setup vvvv in a way that eight projectors display a continuous image while an overlay of white circles or squares only affects each projected segment individually?
The resolution of the projectors is unlikely going to be anything exotic, already for cost reasons, 800x600 or 1024x768.
It looks like I might just end up being crazy enough to try the Mac Pro setup with four Geforce 7300GT, since at least on paper it appears to be a rather cost effective and flexible solution (no PCI ports though which is somewhat limiting for live video integration, I tended to have excellent results with the Osprey cards using other applications if anybody cares to know)
I am looking forward talking to Joreg, he was kind enough to offer to meet.
If this is the place to do it I will continue to report on the progress of this project here to share the experience as much as possible.
then you use two projectors to cover each of these segments and place the projectors in such a way that they project from two opposite angles you might manage to have a fairly homogeneous lighting coverage of the entire area.
sure, but or course it will also be spotty in 1.80 height. But you know the implications already anyway.
Can you setup vvvv in a way that eight projectors display a continuous image while an overlay of white circles or squares only affects each projected segment individually?
If you are doing no edge blending, you got that effect already. If you do make edge blending and want objects to hover on top of the black ramp, you’ll have to work with nested renderers to avoid seeing double at some point. (first render the background to a renderer with edge blending, then render your lighting circles in a non-segmented coordinate system). (hope this is understandable without illustrations)
It looks like I might just end up being crazy enough to try the Mac Pro setup with four Geforce 7300GT, since at least on paper it appears to be a rather cost effective and flexible solution
if youu have the computer already, why not! Otherwise I’d recommend to try a pc with the quad royal board. - presumably cheaper & perhaps still place for your capture card.
If this is the place to do it I will continue to report on the progress of this project here to share the experience as much as possible.
sure you can - most people check out the vvvvorums first - but for a more structured approach you might also do it on your @Justrupppert, or even start a project page in its own right from there. This is a wiki after all!
