we assembled three small Ventuz Projects to demonstrate the new features of Scene Management/Layout Scenes and ScenePorts.
Hopefully this makes some things clearer and gives you new opportunities to build greater projects in less time.
We appreciate your feedback in our forum.

And here is the download link.

ScenePort Examples Project

This Ventuz Project demonstrates some of the use cases for the new ScenePort node. Read the annotations in the Ventuz scenes (01 .. 03) to get some details about the functionality of the scenes.

Screen Setup 3×2

This Ventuz Project demonstrates the Scene Management setup for a video wall of 3×2 screens.  The total resolution is 5760 x 2400.
The video wall if fed by three Ventuz machines. Each machine renders one third of the complete scene. Use the Stage Editor (Ctrl-F12) to switch between the Preview (Design) and Production Layout scenes. Read the annotations inside the Layout scenes for further information.

Screen Setup 4×1

This Ventuz Project demonstrates the Scene Management setup for a video wall of 4×1 screens.  The total resolution is 4320 x 1920.
The video wall is fed by one single Ventuz machine. Use the Stage Editor (Ctrl-F12) to switch between the Preview (Design) and Production Layout scenes. Read the annotations inside the Layout scenes for further information.
The Preview and Production Layouts differ in principal because the Design is 4 times 1080 x 1920 but the production machine has to render 4 times 1920 x 1080 in a horizontal span mode. This is necessary because 2 DualHeads2Go have to be used to split the graphics card output in two further fragments.

Best Regards

Michael Taraschweski, Ventuz trainer from INCAS. No clue what he is doing there but if looking up some picture details we find 4 HD screens, a radarTOUCH,  Matrox TripleHeads, a wrapping of an ATI board, water and two oranges….

The oranges reveal that there will be something BIG… Hopefully the black screens are just the screensaver and not the result of his work

Michael

The “Eyevis DVI EDID emulator” (we don’t know any device name or model No.) emulates the selected/programmed EDID to the attached PC computer (emulating a DVI display) for continuous video output, even if the attached display is disconnected or powered down.

These emulators become very helpful if you want to test or setup your configuration whitout the output devices being present or if you want to switch displays without loosing the DVI signal from the source. Because most computers will deactivate the DVI output when no device is attached to it.

The EDID emulator allows the user to set up any DVI output resolution, regardless if the used device supports these resolutions or not. Most PC or DVI sources are reading the EDID of the attaced display and then limit the selectable output resolutions of the graphic card. The EDID emulator will solve this problem.

The Eyevis EDID emulator does not use presets in conjunction with a switch. In order to program the emulator, you’ll need the eye-ddc device. The eye-ddc is able to read the current EDID from the emulator or display and write the modified EDID onto the emulator or display (if the display has an EDID that is not write-protected).

UPDATE: It is not officially released yet, therefore please contact Eyevis for further information, availability and pricing.

Our internal working title of this version was “The SM-Version” where SM doesn’t mean what you might think… it simply means: Scene Management

Why did we change the ‘old’ scene management?

In the previous versions of Ventuz the scene management had several problems and insufficient features. Also, the ability to split several parts of a show into smaller pieces, what scenes were initially meant for, did not fulfill the requirements. The previous approach of the “Scene Reference” didn’t help that much. The main issues were:

• Asynchronous load of scenes was not possible. The renderer stopped while loading sub-scenes.
• Multiple instances of the same scene in memory couldn’t be handled properly (remoting)
• Nested scenes were not exported correctly.
• Reference scenes couldn’t be edited on-the-fly. You only were able to open another instance in the Ventuz Designer, edit it and “Save & Reload” the scene into its referencing node.
• Blocking a scene reference didn’t really save performance, because the entire logic inside still kept working (like animation, movers, etc)

What’s new?

• The Scene and Slide Reference nodes have been replaced by the Scene Port and Slide Port node.
  A Port node can hold a scene and is able to render the scene as it was “inside” the hosting scene. Hierarchy nodes like Axis, Color, etc can affect the sub-scene.

  

• The main features of ports are:
  • If a Port is blocked by its Blocked property or by another parent node (alpha, switcher, etc) the scene gets inactivated and the internal scene logic is turned off. The performance saved on CPU is fantastic!
  • A Port can reference a scene by its name (URL), but also can reference a scene from memory. The remoting is able to load a scene and assign it later to Ports. This technique will allow us to switch or cycle scenes between ports in later versions of Ventuz.
  • A Port can be “locked”; that means the remoting or the new Stage Editor (see below) is not able to change the scene-to-port assignment. You can either lock a port by checking its “Lock” property or simply bind the File property to a data source (e.g. URL node or Excel)
  • Ports can load scenes asynchronously (in background). A “Progress” value from 0% to 100% informs the hosting scene about the load progress. The Port also provides a “Loaded” and a “Failed” event  to trigger certain stuff inside the hosting scene (like a fade in/out animation)

• Every Scene can have an unlimited number of Scene Ports to “host” sub-scenes. We call the level of nested scenes the Scene Level. The scene level you usually work with is “Level  1”, the next lower level is “Level 2” and so forth.
• Every Scene Port has a name (the normal node name) and an ordinal number starting at zero. This number is used to address ports within a scene via remoting. It is also important for “Layout Scenes” (see below)
• If you open a scene currently assigned to a port, you can edit it on-the-fly! This makes modular work really easy!
• Within the Ventuz Designer you can edit the exposed properties of a scene. A real “inter-scene-communication” does not exist yet. This will be the next step of development (see below)

The new Stage Editor

When working with nested scenes and remoting, you easily could lose the overview of which scene is rendered where. That’s why we developed the new Stage Editor (Ctrl-F12):

This Editor allows you to see all scenes in memory along with their available ports. Scenes can be loaded by the Ventuz Designer, by a Scene Port or by Remoting. The editor is again a tree view like you already know from the scene hierarchy editor. Drag&Drop makes it easy to assign scene to ports and track assignment changes via remoting. The scenes currently opened in the Designer as well the current scene are visually marked in the Stage Editor.

Inside the Stage Editor you also can switch and select the Layout of your current project (see below). It also allows you to temporarily change the MachineID for your local machine for testing cluster setups. Both features (layout and ID switches) are also accessible via keyboard shortcuts.

The editor is quite simple and has no “hidden” key shortcuts for special operations. Only Drag&Drop and the toolbar on top! Click and Double-Click on Scenes and Ports start some logical actions… try it out!

Advanced Layout Scenes

The new Scene Management allowed us to implement a very powerful new feature called Project-Layouts or Master-Scenes. A Layout is a scene loaded with your project before your first “user-scene” on Level 1. Layouts are placed in “Level 0” and can be used to create complex scene setups like multiscreen, stereoscopic, cube-projections, layering, etc. The big advantage of using layouts is that you don’t need to mess around with this setups anymore! Let Ventuz create Layouts for you (future versions) or let your Ventuz-Guru create the stereo-setup. You simply place a single sphere in your Level 1 scene – that’s it.

In the past, the “guru’s” created the “scene head” and provided a blank scene to the actual content designers. The new Layout concept separates the idea of layout, content and sub-content!

Layouts are simple scenes holding at least one unlocked scene port, preferable port ordinal 0 (the default port) is not locked. A layout scene is a normal scene:  you can use all nodes, externalize properties and insert layout related content.

The possibilities of layout are massive:

• A split layout with two ports (left and right) by using two relative viewport nodes splitting the screen in two parts.
• A layered scene layout: imagine three ports, background, content and overlay!
• An effect-layout making a standard glow and mirror rendering!
• …

Configure the layouts in the project settings dialog by accessing the new “Layout” config page:

Create a layout setup by selecting “new”. Enter a layout name and select the actual layout scene file. The fields “description” and “icon” can be used to help a user of your layout to work with it.

A very important feature of a layout is to override the actual rendering and screen settings of your project. In the D3D Overrides tab, you will find a small checkbox on every configuration group. If you check that box you can setup new values for each particular layout:

Imaging you setup a multi-head projection with two Ventuz machines with two outputs each. In such a case you could create a “preview” layout showing you the entire 4-screen-stripe, a “production” layout showing the actual content of one Ventuz machine depending on the machine ID (left or right).

Export Scenes and Projects

Inside the Ventuz Designer all layouts of a project are loaded in memory to allow the user to switch between them whenever (s)he wants. The Ventuz Presenter/Runtime only loads one layout and doesn’t provide the ability to switch layouts during production!

If you export scene / projects to archives, please notice the following

• Export a scene to VZA (Ventuz Design Archive)
  VZA exports stores the current open scene of the Designer into an archive including all nested scenes and their resources. Resources can be deselected in the resource dialog during export.
• Export a scene to VRA (Ventuz Runtime Archive)
  VRA exports does the same as an VZA export, but all exported scenes are written in runtime format (.vrs – Ventuz Runtime Scene). All required resources are included as well.
• Export to VPR (Ventuz Presentation)
  A Presentation export does not export the currently opened scene anymore! It actually exports the current layout setup, which means the current active layout with its complete current port assignment! So don’t forget to select the correct “production” layout before exporting a VPR!
  If you need to add more scenes to your VPR, you can use the Resource Linker node to embed more scenes in your presentation. The main-scene, could decide which scene to load during runtime!
• Export to VZD (Ventuz Director)
  A Director is a special form of the Ventuz Project file allowing the Presenter/Runtime to startup. If you export a Director the current active layout is “marked” to be the “production” layout of that Director. You also will be asked to export the current layout as a Runtime Archive VRA with the difference to the normal VRA export that no nested scenes are included in that export.
  A change to the Ventuz Presenter/Runtime allows to “auto-import” Ventuz Runtime Archives even if they are “beside” the director file instead of being stored in the AutoImport folder, because this folder might not exist on the first startup.
  The new auto-import also imports all found VRA files before (!) actually initializing the renderer and layouts.

What’s also new in R5.20

• There is a new “Rectangle Rounded” geometry node. Check it out! It’s powerful for borders and frames, but also for rectangular soft shadow. Have a closer look to its texture mapping options.

  

• The Render Target Node has been extended to select “Project” for its Multisampling Quality. In that case the Project settings are used, probably overwritten by the layout setting.
  The RT can also perform a “Render-Once” mode. This mode can be used to render textures of content which doesn’t change (pre-compose) or generate thumbnails of your sub-scenes!

Roadmap for Ventuz 2008

1. Interface Containers
   This feature will allow you to define a bind for properties, methods and events at a container without (!) having any content inside that container. The actual container-content defines the actual functionality by exposing properties, methods and events. As long name and type of those “interface members” matched the containers definition (hull) this members get bound.
   This technique will allow you to change container content (by drag&drop) without the need to re-bind the outer communication!
   The same technique is used to “talk” to nested scenes as well. Your master scene could call the “Start” method on a port. As long the nested scene exposes a “Start” method, the trigger will do what you expect. Ventuz becomes really modular!
2. Symbols
   The mechanism of “externalizing” properties will be enhanced that way, that other properties in your stage (bulk of nested scenes) can access these externals. You can create real “variables” or “parameters” or exchange information across all scenes without the need to bind them!
3. Remoting SDK
   The new Scene Management required a revision of the entire remoting as well; otherwise the new features weren’t accessible at all. The new Remoting server is already running and exposed to .net-Remoting, but not officially “released” to be used.
   The old remote interfaces (CLI, Vertigo, OSC, .net remoting 1.0) have been adapted to the new remoting layer and should work as they did before, without accessing the new layout feature!
   The upcoming SDK will provide the ability to implement your own remoting interfaces. The CLI, OSC and Vertigo remoting will get a new version each to make to new features (ports) usable for them.
   Another important reason why we changed the remoting is that the importance of cluster remoting came in focus faster than we thought. Therefore the new remoting allows asynchronous execution of each command. All commands can be scheduled and queued by assigning a timestamp (cluster-clock). The Cluster-HUB will be part of the remoting SDK for synchronizing the external control of multiple Ventuz Machines in a Ventuz-Cluster.

Don’t worry to test the R5.20!

Due to the massive changes in the Ventuz core, content saved with R5.20 can’t not be loaded in any lower version anymore: Scenes, Projects and all Archives

R5.20 has been tested for weeks and some customers are already producing with it. Our latest exhibition shows (Best Of Events, Dortmund and Integrated Systems Europe, Amsterdam) were build with that version without any problems.

Anyway, big changes popup new issues. Areas where issues could appear:

• Export of VPR Presentations and other archives
• Remoting, especially VertigoXMedia and OSC, async callbacks
• Launch of very, very complex nested scenes with nested async loads

Our current development focus is on releasing the R5.20!

The reason why we have a “Release Candidate” is to give our customers the chance of influence on issue as soon as possible!

If we do not get feedback from your side we consider this version as “accepted” and will release and support it as usual. So, please don’t hesitate to download and install R5.20 RC1

We appreciate your comments and bug-reports!

Your Ventuz Development Team!

DOWNLOAD R5.20 RC1 HERE!

But see for yourself:

We expect to see more of them in the near future!

If you have anything to share, feel free to add it there and don’t forget to tag it VENTUZ!

Same with Flikr

If I missed something of the Web 2.0 that contains more Ventuz stuff, let us know!

This hasn’t changed and will not change, but we also know that not everybody was happy with this answer. Our intention was to give you the chance to take whatever you like, to buy from your local hardware supplier or stick to the partner you always worked or made good experiences with. The second reason was to distinguish ourselves from competitors who bundle their software with hardware. And last but not least, we are software experts but no hardware gurus.

But hardware is a very important part and we lost a couple of deals simply because we did not commit ourselves to any particular hardware configuration. Therefore, it was one goal for 2010 to find a solution for that.

We tested a couple of hardware-manufacturers and configurations during the last couple of weeks.

It took a couple of attempts until we found a partner who understood what we do, who listened to us and delivered an exceptional piece of craftsmanship. It was a little bit like finding the lid for the pot.

Our choice: XI-MACHINES, a small premium workstation manufacturer who’s primary focus is to combine quality, functionality, power and quietness. The boys are really living for this! Their pretty impressive reference list contains companies from both the professional and broadcast market, containing companies like AUDI or the philarmonic orchestra of Berlin and Vienna.

Together we created the VBOX which is available from now on. The website to order will be online soon! If you need a VBOX now, please call us or drop us a line.

The basic workstation contains latest technology like Intel’s Core i7 CPU, Tripple Channel memory or hot-swapable HDD’s built into a 4RU chasis. The workstation is ultra silent due to special noise canceling modifications, temperature controlled fans etc. The quality is impressive and the VBOXs are leaving the XI-MACHINE workshop only if they have passed their extensive 36 hours system stability test.

All in all, you can continue buying your stuff wherever or from whoever you like, but if you don’t feel like building it yourself or buying it from a source you don’t know, just have a look at the VBOX.

We wouldn’t stick our head out if we weren’t so proud and 100% satisfied with our newest baby.

After the test-baloon at the more or less local broadcast fair “Medientage” in Munich in October, we climbed the ladder and reached international grounds, even though the fair was still held in Germany.

To summarize it quickly….. Two very busy days and lots of great feedback.

We’ve been showcasing 7 interactive scenes on a 3 x 6 NEC LCD wall controlled by “RadarTouch”-Laser. Loading of the different scenes was managed via a holographic screen. On top of that, we had 4 awesome Eyevis cubes displaying Ventuz functionalities and one brand new VBOX for hands-on.

First impressions for those of you, who have not seen Ventuz on an exhibition yet!

Honestly, to our great surprise there were four other booth’s which were using Ventuz! And mostly companies we didn’t even know were our “customers”. One of them was using Express and never popped up on our radar. But they even came to our booth with their customers to show them the power and abilities of Ventuz. Looks like the concept of taking over the world by making Express freeware works out!

One example of another booth was Mediafloor (Pro customer)

The next chance to meet us on fair grounds is next week in Amsterdam at the ISE. There you can find Ventuz at the Eyevis booth. CU there!