VJ Gear: Content Creation

I have about 5 other assorted video camera's. One is a 12 year old, slimline Canon UC1, 8mm, but the tape mechanism has long since broken, so I couple this with a remote video transmitter, and use it strictly for remote live feeds. The rest are all small $100'ish lipstick CCD's, that I put in various places: hang one from overhead, looking down on the DJ's hands on the records and mixer, one wide angled on the DJ on stage, and the rest (if I use them at all), in fixed positions around the dancefloor.

Lately it seems like I am using my laptop for just about everything. I didn't have native video capture, so aside from PCMCIA firewire possibilities, I needed a USB video capture unit. I originally bought one of those new ATI units, but for whatever reason, it kept locking up my system, and after several hours of time wasted, I returned it and got a AVerMedia AVerTV USB. I've been really happy with other AVerMedia products, like my external scan converter, over the years, so I was looking forward to seeing how this unit would perform.

I somehow thought that USB capture units all just did fairly low resolution (320x240, 352x288, etc), but was pleasantly surprised to find this unit does 640x480, even on my Acer P-500/192 laptop, and doesn't choke. One note, to do these decent resolution capture with no dropped frames, I have to capture uncompressed video, so that means having a good amount of HD space free. I use virtual dub, afterwards to go to sorenson, or divx, or whatever. You can use the onboard compression options, but in my experience (at least on my machine, which is fairly low-spec), you have to choose 320x240 in that case.

I've seen these units going for $62 new on ebay recently. Consider one!

One of My current hacked up Heads. Colour CCD's for EYES, DSM CANAL Microphones for Ears. Feeds to custom multiplexing circuit. Uses Field sequential interlacing: Right eye (odd scanline), left eye (even Scanline), or can alternate full frames. HMD has integrated demultiplexer to provide proper disparity and convergence perception. Audio is recorded binaurally for ultra-realistic spatial 3d sound. IF HMD's aren't used for viewing, and large arena display is preferred, a few options are available, the usual being polarized dual projections. or imagery can be rotoscoped and fed to RGB laser, and used with Chromadepth (tm) glasses. I used to do 3d interactive installations exclusively, but now due to time constraints, reserve it for occasional gallery installations. A large library of commercial 3d footage, both computer generated and live is available for sale or hire.

Mini edit stations reconfigure themselves as equipment gets plunked down after each weekend gig. 2/3 VCR's are computer controlled via media-motion & Premiere to facilitate batch capture and recording. As of mid 2001, I'm attempting to do away with VCR's altogether, and try and keep things strictly digital (vj loops on my laptop), however, I still use a VCR to capture or record.