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 Tips and other hints from HippoWire 
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Post Tips and other hints from HippoWire
1.
Some of you may not be aware that Hippotizer has a real-time system monitoring feature. Pressing Ctrl+F3 will overlay this information in the top left hand corner of the main output screen and will provide information on the Hippotizer.
Some of you (me included) may have looked at this information and been unsure of what each counter represents or the possible implications of certain values. Hopefully this article will give a better understanding of these readings.

FPS: Frames Per second. This should be between 60 and 40 as a rule of thumb. Below 40 you may see poor video playback. You will notice this value decreases when the strain on the system increases.

DT: I-----------X------------I------------I
DT stands for Delta Time and shows the time the engine takes between frames to render. Optimal is 16ms which results in full 60fps refresh. Depending on your project and application the X travelling to the right indicates an increase in time between 2 frames. Typically going up to the next vertical line is ok. Beyond that frames will be dropped and this can be quite noticeable.
VIDMEM: Total Video Memory being used. Not 100% accurate due to GFX card memory being very hard to monitor. This reading is a sum of all system sub components listed below it. These are:-

- Hyper FX : Monitors video memory being used by effects
- Vlab Resources: This measures the Memory being used by the input cards.
- VM Allocation Temp: Temporary video memory allocation. Managed how much total video memory is being used.
- MediaPlayer: monitor how much video memory is being used per layer. This is sorted by largest to smallest video memory not by layers 1-8.
- Flex3D Resources: Flex 3D is utilized when using 3D Effects. This monitors the amount of memory allocated and used by 3D Effects.
- PicLoader Resources: Monitors amount of memory being used by static images.
- Others: Anything else that isn’t Layer / FX using video memory.
- Back Buffer: All rendering is sent to the back buffer to be stored for collaboration with effects, geometry, MediaPlayer. Shows the largest amount of memory used on layers or by the output.
- RT: Run Time. How long the engine has been running in seconds.
- D. Out: Amount of data transferred between board and CPU.

There are no hard and fast rules with any of these values. In fact you may find many of them only useful either when comparing two or more systems’ performances or when working in conjunction with tech support. However, if you frequently monitor them, it is a quick way to perform a Hippotizer health check or identify when you might be overloading the server or have performance issues with media.

2.
Hidden beneath all those exciting fast moving effects in your Hippotizer effects library lies a small and often overlooked one called “Alpha Transition” which gets forgotten because every time you try to use it, it appears to just makes the screen go blank ! Well, this effect is actually quite powerful but to make it work you need to use a still image with a greyscale gradient in it. Basically, the alpha transition allows you to mix between two layers using those flashy mixes and transitions that you see in video production all the time.

To use it, load layer 1 with an image or video and put its level up. Next load a different image or video onto layer 2 and put its level up – you should now only see the second piece of media because layer 2 is covering up layer 1 (if you see both then you need to set the mix mode on layer 2 to Sprite). OK, now you need to upload your transition image to the system. The transition image consists of an image containing a greyscale (image going from black to white), this can be created in Photoshop using the gradient tool or you can download readymade alpha transitions from the web. We actually include 50 readymade transitions with every Hippotizer that should be in the Stockmedia/transitions folder in the MediaManager. The general rule is that the black areas will become transparent first followed by the grey areas and finally the white areas.

Now, upload the image into slot 0, bank number 255 which is reserved for masks and transitions. Now on layer 2, select the Alpha transition you desire and put the layer level at 50%, making sure the mask fader is at 0%. You should now see half of layer 1 and half of layer 2 and if you move the level fader of the effect you can transition between the two with a cool effect!
You can use the mask slider to select a different image from folder 255 and you can use the blur and soften controls to smooth the edge of the transition. Have fun!!

3.
Controlling Timelines from within a timeline
Hmmm, Sounds complicated doesn't it? And you may want to ask yourself, "Why would you want to do that?"

Well, for example, it's often much simpler to program a larger projects in smaller chunks by creating a timeline per scene. But once all is complete how do you put the whole show together, so you can cue it easily from one place?

Another example would be that you want something to continue to happen (like for example a layer moving about) but at some point you want to fade out this layer, which needs to be an independent cue. Using the stop command on the timeline you would have to stop the motion, however using a separate timeline to stop this timeline and fade the layer out is much more elegant.

So let's have a look how the later example would work in the real world:.
The task now is to fade this layer out while maintaining the motion, with no jumps in playback or resets. Impossible on a single timeline as you would have to jump to where the fade is located, but quite simple with a second timeline.
Create a second timeline and select only the level of the layer you want to fade out. ex. Layer4.

Create a nice simple fade and run it.
Neat! It now fades out. However you also want to stop the timeline running the loop after it is faded out. First you need to add an ID to the timeline containing the animation. Give the timeline ID 1.

So now the timeline has an ID of 1.
Next add a new pin to the second timeline: The remote control pin for the timeline component:
Click on the track and in the empty field enter: 1->Stop (“1” is the timeline ID we entered before and “Stop” is the command.
Now play the control timeline again. It will now fade layer 4 and then stop the timeline.

Other commands include “Play”, “Pause”, “GoCue(xxxx)” (where xxxx is the cue number *1000). You can also cascade commands with a “;” So: “1->GoCue(2500);1->Play” Will jump to Cue 2.5 and play it. So now you can see it will be quite easy to contruct a master timeline with many complex cues that control other timelines.

3.
This tip is a basic overview of understanding and troubleshooting network connections with Hippotizers and network devices when using HippoNet, PixelMapper, ArtNet over DMX, and ScreenThief.
Some basics;
IP Address: An IP Address is a numerical identifier which is unique to a network device within a network subnet. I.e. Every device on the same network subnet needs to have a unique IP Address to communicate with other devices on that subnet.

Subnet: A Subnet is a distinct logical subsection of a computer network. Devices on the same subnet can communicate with each other without additional devices such as routers or bridges. So for two or more computers to communicate with each other they need to be on the same Subnet.

IPConfig: ipconfig in Microsoft Windows is a command application that can display all current TCP/IP network configurations. To run it, click Start, Run..., and then type ‘cmd’ and then click OK.

At the command prompt, type: ‘ipconfig /all’ and press enter. You will be presented with a list similar to the one below.

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:
Connection-specific DNS Suffix. . : WAG54GS
Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .: Intel(R) PRO Connection
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . . . . . .: 00-0E-35-3E-80-EC
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . . . .: Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . : Yes
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.103
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . . . .: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . . . .: 62.24.139.140
: 62.24.139.139
Lease Obtained . . . . . . . . . . . .: 16 May 2010 17:08:37
Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . . . .: 17 May 2010 17:08:37

There is also other useful information provided by ipconfig.exe for troubleshooting;

Physical Address is commonly known as the MAC address. This address is normally hardcoded to the network card and is unique to that card.

DHCP Enabled, when set to ‘Yes’ the card is configured to request an IP Address from a DHCP server on the network. A DHCP server would provide a unique IP address for that network connection avoiding any conflicts with other devices on the network. When set to ‘No’ an IP Address needs to be entered manually. Before this is done, you need to make sure that the IP address is not being used by any other devices on that network.

Autoconfiguration Enabled, if there is not a DHCP server available when set to ‘Yes’, Autoconfiguration will configure the network connection with an IP Address of 169.254.x.y (where x.y are numbers 0-255) and a subnet mask of, 255.255.0.0.

_________________
Peppe Tannemyr
SSR Beacon DigiGobos®
Sweden retailer of Hippo systems


Tue Jan 04, 2011 8:21 pm
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Post Media Manager Top Tip!
Media Manager Top Tip!
Bringing Media into Hippotizer could not be simpler. Whatever content you import into the Media Manager; the way the software works makes it easy to manage lots of media across many machines.
However, when you are using large amounts of media some additional planning and preparation can really help Hippotizer run under optimal conditions.

1.
When creating your content, before importing it into Hippotizer make sure all the media is the same resolution. Ideally it should be the same resolution as the output, if the media is a higher resolution, the Hippotizer resources are being overused in respect to the quality of the output required
2.
Make your default Bank0, Clip0 media a black screen short clip of PAL/NTSC resolution. This is the default clip loaded by all layers when you start the Hippotizer and when the layer is reset. It is tempting to place a frequently used clip or image in this bank, however placing HD content in this bank will result in all the layers loading up the HD content reserving a large amount of video memory. Under most configurations the Hippotizer will manage to do this, but there will be fewer resources available for the other amazing features of Hippotizer.

_________________
Peppe Tannemyr
SSR Beacon DigiGobos®
Sweden retailer of Hippo systems


Mon Mar 26, 2012 5:16 pm
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