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Home: Isadora: General: Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora?

Vladimir Apprentice Mar 7, 2010, 2:11 PM Post #1 of 8 (3722 views) Shortcut Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora? Can't Post This video is selfexplanatory: http://didzhereffects.com/video_light.php Hello. I am about to venture into a project, in which projection will be done on various surfaces, such as floor, walls and the like. Somebody at the theater suggested using a "Video Head" such as in the video above. I would appreciate any pointers into using such or similar setup with Isadora. The idea is to control the 3d position of this beast, as well as the video itself from Isadora. Comments regarding both hardware (including DIYs) and software, as well as pure speculations, would be appreciated. Thanks. (This post was edited by Vladimir on Mar 7, 2010, 3:09 PM)

hal Master Mar 8, 2010, 9:07 AM Post #2 of 8 (3697 views) Shortcut Re: [Vladimir] Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora? [In reply to] Can't Post Nice what's the cost on that? The DL1 is still out of my price range. I've done a lot of this with manual follow spot operation of the projector, and use of a Mirror which is a lot easier to move so cheaper but limits your moves, and does not work well with a projector with a big lens. The I-cue is what I like to use, with a LanBox to control it. http://www.rosco.com/US/lightingequipment/icue.asp Either way the rig is likely to be DMX unless you are building it from scratch. So use the LanBox to control it. http://www.lanbox.com/ The lanbox has it's own actors, and use the 3D Quad Distort actor instead of a projector so you can correct for the crazy angles you will end up hitting stuff at. Those two actors are pretty much the key to doing it all in Isadora, I used to use a bunch of kludged together software to do it, but now it's all in Isadora. The trick is still recording "cues" it's a lot of adjustments, you've got to store all those numbers somewhere. Scenes don't make sense and doing live moves means scenes don't work well anyway. Snapshots work well, but they are a pain to manage (can't name them, can't delete them.) So I've done it two ways, one is to ship all the data in and out of isadora via OSC and store the cues in a custom cue list, but it's a lot of work to set up and to build your own OSC cueing interface, and if you run live moves it's a lot of data to run over OSC. Or to use snapshots. The trick is to use a user actor to bury actors/values you don't want to store in the snapshots. And then I exposed just the values I want. I also set up a bunch of envelopes inside the actor so that I could always get a smooth transition from current state to new snapshot values. I've been meaning to dig that up to share. I made it pre Envelope++ and want to clean it up, it will be much fewer actors and cleaner using envelope++. -- Hal Eagar - Media Effects Artist http://haleagar.com Director - Digital Performance Institute http://digitalperformance.org ph 917 257 8440 (530) 324-2701

Vladimir Apprentice Mar 8, 2010, 9:53 AM Post #3 of 8 (3691 views) Shortcut Re: [hal] Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora? [In reply to] Can't Post Thanks Hal! It is extremely helpful to know all this can be done in Isadora. I was looking at DIY's and so far found these examples: http://www.instructables.com/...d-Pan-and-Tilt-Head/ http://www.mcmelectronics.com/...p;CAWELAID=220594871 http://tech.yostengineering.com/servoFolder/ Given adequate servo motors it seems something could be assembled under a few hundreds of dollars. I am waiting for a quote for the Video Head above. -Vladimir

vanakaru Master Mar 8, 2010, 1:47 PM Post #4 of 8 (3677 views) Shortcut Re: [Vladimir] Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora? [In reply to] Can't Post We run a test with out lighting guys using scanner mirror head. These come as self standing units now days and could be easy rigged to the projector. Also very reasonable price. You can control these with DMX. My experience was that you need pretty catered and thus limited content that really works. We have a project planned in spring - 'll see how it goes.

hal Master Mar 8, 2010, 2:51 PM Post #5 of 8 (3672 views) Shortcut Re: [vanakaru] Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora? [In reply to] Can't Post That camera mount says 22lbs so a small projector. Not sure what kind of motion or precision you get from it, but if you find out let us know. as for cheap robots and servos, if you just want to move a mirror then they will do, but not move a projector. My favorite cheap servo controller is http://www.lynxmotion.com/Product.aspx?productID=395 I've though about doing a full on DIY mirror head, but I'd use a high end $50 robot servo, and many come with serial control built into the servo directly. Moving something heavy is pretty hard and gets expensive fast, and I to purchase tested equipment if it exists and I can afford it. Also nice is that you can rent and replace i-cues's There is a similar head to the i-cue from metor called the elipscan that is half the price of the i-cue, but it shakes and getting a smooth motion from it is very difficult. I have not seen a servo that could move even a 6 lb projector though, are you hoping to move the projector? -- Hal Eagar - Media Effects Artist http://haleagar.com Director - Digital Performance Institute http://digitalperformance.org ph 917 257 8440 (530) 324-2701

Kingcaffeine Apprentice Mar 9, 2010, 8:38 PM Post #6 of 8 (3629 views) Shortcut Re: [hal] Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora? [In reply to] Can't Post You could look into the Right Arm from Apollo. It's basically the same thing as the video you posted, but it's a one-axis as opposed to the two-point mount. It'll do a small PJ and it's DMX. You could have a light mounted later instead of a PJ. We use 3 at our theater with pretty good results. The Lanbox ought to do the trick for the DMX signal.

hal Master Mar 10, 2010, 11:36 AM Post #7 of 8 (3591 views) Shortcut Re: [Kingcaffeine] Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora? [In reply to] Can't Post Oh that looks cool, relatively affordable @ $2000 (though I'm not running out to get one this minute) http://www.apollodesign.net/Products/View/2852.aspx much greater pan and tilt than you will get with a mirror, and inherently less distortion. 40lbs should handle a desktop projector no problem. includes a 4pin data/power cable you could run a shutter from. are you using this? -- Hal Eagar - Media Effects Artist http://haleagar.com Director - Digital Performance Institute http://digitalperformance.org ph 917 257 8440 (530) 324-2701

hal Master Mar 10, 2010, 11:45 AM Post #8 of 8 (3589 views) Shortcut Re: [Vladimir] Video Head. Has anybody used a similar setup with Isadora? [In reply to] Can't Post A couple more thoughts. The DL1 has some extra features that you might or might not want to add to a DIY system. A shutter, I skip this since I can just point it at the ceiling. Zoom and Focus control I often wish I had control of these to put into my cues, but I'm using cheap projectors with no motors on the lens. I've thought about hacking on a servo to run the focus ring but I've never gotten that far, I usualy choose my most important image, or the middle distance image, and focus to that. If using a projector with motors on the lens it would probably be possible to hack their motor controls. (eg physical plug them into a microcontroler, but they don't generally have position encoders like a servo so it might be hard to hit exactly the same point every time. So it might be less work and better to remove the motors and replace them with your own servo's. but any way you slice it it's a lot of work to add that sort of thing, and it's modifying your projector, and in my case I'm often using whatever projector I've got on hand. anyone hacked a focus/zoom control? Any kits out there that have 90% half solved for you like these DMX Riggs do for the pan an tilt? -- Hal Eagar - Media Effects Artist http://haleagar.com Director - Digital Performance Institute http://digitalperformance.org ph 917 257 8440 (530) 324-2701

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