Engadget just wrote about this new projector from Norwegian company Projectiondesign which is a new take on video projectors. They are separating the lens from the lamp and the fan connecting the two units with a liquid light guide. Read all about it at Engadget!

Futuremusic writes that Denon has just announced DN-X1600, a digital DJ mixer with built in USB sound card, 4 MIDI layers and Roland’s V-link. The V-Link enables you to control some of Roland’s video equipment like the effects of the V-4 and V-8 mixer, linking them to the tempo of the music. Futuremusic claims that the V-link is the hottest feature of Denon’s new mixer. Any VJ who has played around with the effects on the V-4 and the V-8 knows how cheesy they are. So if this is the hottest feature of Denon’s new mixer - I’d say it’s not so hot. If you link poo to the tempo, it will just become rhythmic poo.

Instant Broadcasting System is a software solution for receiving and mixing several video streams from cellphone cameras and broadcasting it live on a screen and/or to the internet. It’s an academic research project from Mobile Life in Stockholm under the lead of Ph.D student Arvid Engström. This project has been going on for about two years and I’ve been helping out on and off during these two years. The software has gone through a few name changes during the project. I’ve written about it here before under the names WeJ and Swarmcam.

The solution has two components - a Symbian application that is running on a Nokia N60 cellphone and a Max/MSP mixer application that is running on Mac Pro. During this demo we’ve been using 3 cellphones but the system can for sure do 8, probably up to 15. Each input takes a lot of CPU to process so you need a powerful computer to do it. The program has been tested on a MacBook Pro but it hits the ceiling pretty fast. And another problem with having many inputs is that it’s hard to overview all the preview windows. The cellphones streams the video over wifi or 3G to the computer. The resolution of the video is 320×240 at a top frame rate of 15fps. This isn’t very exciting but with Turbo 3G already here (in Sweden at least) and 4G at the doorstep we can expect much better image quality. Some new phones have a better codec for video compression which also gives better video quality. The software on the phones will be able to run on other Symbian enabled phones as well as the Androids. The iPhone has had it’s video functionality under lock, but since the recent release of the Bambuser app it seems like it would be possible to cover the iPhone too.

The interface has gone over a huge overhaul and finally got some design to it. A quick run trough:

In the left column you have a preview window and output settings as well as audio settings, you can broadcast audio from one phone a the time.

The middle column is the home of the A and the B unit as well as the preview windows for each camera. You can see four preview windows but we were only using tree for this demo. Below are the image settings for the A and the B bus as well as a the “Backchannel” which is a system for communicating with each camera person. The A unit of the mixer hosts the cellphone camera streams. You switch stream with the number keys or by clicking the preview windows. The B side hosts the more artistic side; pre made clips from the video bank and loops (recorded from the live streams). You can crossfade between the A & B as well as mix them through blend modes.

The right column has the video bank on top and the loop module underneath. You can feature either the loop module or the video bank as well as mix them together with blend modes. A nice thing with the loop module is that it has a recording buffer. This means that when you hit rec, it actually starts the recording back in time making sure you don’t miss the action. The in and the out point of the loop can be adjusted and you can save the loops for later use.

The interface could be controlled by a midi controller. We have had the Novation Nocturn mapped for this demo.

So would I use this software for VJ-ing? No, not at the moment. It sure is an interesting technology but over wifi and 3G, the image quality just isn’t quite there yet. I am however very curious to see if Arvid will add more VJ features like beat matching and on-the-fly midi mapping.

This installation at Heineken’s Green Room Sessions party at Malmen, Stockholm, is a was a group effort. Jakob Grandin, head of Grandins Flying Circus asked the Vidiots to set up a triple screen video installation displaying film and photography from a number of artists. One wall displayed a slideshow and the other two video. Every 8th second a strobe went off the movies and the slideshow changed.

The gear used in this project was 3 projectors, a Triplehead2go and a Macbook Pro running Modul8 (VJ software). A Modul8 module, that was programmed specially for the occasion by The Midi Thief, sent a midi signal to a DMX light board causing the strobe to flash and the video plus slideshow to forward to the next piece.

Contributing artists:
Curator – Tony Cederteg
Left wall – Ruben Broman
Middle wall – Mathias Sterner
Right wall – Nakkna

All work and no play makes Mikey a dull boy. I’ve been busy with work and not been able to post for a while. Got some half finished articles just waiting to make their way on to the blog. But some news just magically produce themselves. Like this one: The *Spark Defuser mixer by Toby Harris is one step closer to getting into production. And you can help by showing your interest so that Toby can esitmate the price better and get to the next step. Read all about it here!

To be a little bit more objective about it than in my last post: This is not an entirely new subject and it has been talked about before. That’s why some VJs wern’t too excited when they heared of Toby’s project. Read more about it in this recent thread and this old thread on VJ Forums.

But still, considering the decent price and all the features I say I’d probably buy the mixer.