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Last night, I did a workshop on multi-layered video for livestreaming for the gang at TE-MPO. It was basically a tutorial on producing livestreamed audiovisuals that look like this example, which is taken from a recorded livestreamed performance by Charles Shriner and I.
https://youtu.be/mV6NdQOH2XE
My notes for the presentation are below. They offer a way to create video accompaniments for live improv shows that look like the one above. You can see more work like this in my YouTube channel.
Neither the notes nor my presentation went into much detail on what
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So, I got a little obsessive. This is the first of a couple of posts on the challenges of setting up a performance rig that incorporates both iThings and hardware synthesizers -- particularly older hardware synthesizers. I’m basing it on problems I ran into with the “semi-portable” rig that I use for out-of-town collabs, and as one part of my home studio. My rig uses a Focusrite Scarlett 18i20 to perform inbound and outbound digital/analog conversions, an iConnectMidi4+ for connecting iPads, and a Linux-based laptop computer used mostly for routing but occasionally as an e
I play solo and in a number of collaborations. Here's a small selection of my favorite tracks, and links to CD/digital releases, SoundCloud tracks, and the like.
Visually, this is a complete jumble of competing, differently sized embedded players that won't play nicely together. Enh.
Solo tracks
https://soundcloud.com/tom_bruce/live-set-from-the-electrozone-2017-12-20
https://soundcloud.com/tom_bruce/i-sit-at-the-piano
DFLT
CD available from Bandcamp here.
https://soundcloud.com/user-378881296/universe-of-whirl
https://www.youtube.com/watch
Do I have what it takes?
If your computer and internet connection are underpowered, streaming will work badly, or not at all. And, there are a couple other things you’ll need. Here’s our guide to finding out if you have what it takes to run a streaming performance we can all enjoy -- because, y’know, if you take the time and set it up right, we’ll be able to see and hear it just as you intend it to be seen and heard.
Believe us when we tell you that your life will be a lot more pain- and anxiety-free if you work through this list and through ALL of our se
Whether you’re a newbie or an experienced streamer, a methodical approach to setting up and testing your gear will save you considerable time and trouble, and help to guarantee a successful show for you and for the community.
We suggest that every artist very carefully test their gear in advance. That should be the last step of a step-by-step process in which you carefully and deliberately do everything you can to make sure that your rig is working correctly, one thing at a time. We describe that process here.
We suggest that for confi
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This is something I need to get up to speed on myself. Here are a few resources that may be helpful:
Tutorial from Epiphan, a hardware encoder maker. Covers the basics (hardware encoded or not). https://www.epiphan.com/blog/how-to-live-stream-for-beginners/ Something similar from Restream: https://restream.io/blog/streaming-setup-what-do-you-need-to-stream-live-video/ Geek-o-rama: https://computer.howstuffworks.com/internet/basics/streaming-video-and-audio.htm Another basic one: https://www.boxcast.com/blog/how-to-start-live-streaming
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Howard Moscovitz and Bill Fox asked if I’d post something about getting started with JamKazam, software that supports group jams over the Internet. I've rattled on about it elsewhere in this blog, but I thought it would be useful to put all the essentials in one place
The first question people ask -- especially if they know anything about the Internet -- is, “How can this thing possibly work? Given the limits imposed by the speed of light, you can’t possibly overcome the latency in the network and get any kind of synchronization.” If the speed of transmission ov
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[Note: this post has been substantially revised since it was first published -- JamKazam is now issuing frequent updates, and one of them broke the method was using when I first wrote this. To be fair to JK, that's probably because one part of it was never exactly right, but skated by. What follows has been updated so that it, y'know, works.]
I spent a day and a half last week trying to figure out how to get audio to route from JamKazam to OBS for streamcasting. Getting JamKazam's video into OBS was simple; it's just a window-capture of the JamKazam video window, an
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The tl;dr on this: I had a bunch of iPad gear go out from under me on Saturday night; I tried to figure out how to prevent a recurrence; there’s no sure means of prevention, but there might be some best practices. Read on if you want the details ;).
Well, dammit all to hell.
So, Saturday night I did about 25 minutes of what was supposed to be an hour-long set with my pal Karl Fury. That 25 minutes was broken into two parts -- about 15 minutes at the beginning, and 10 at the end, with the middle 35 minutes being either inaudible or all-too-audib
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I have been thinking about a tech post on tempo synchronization for a while. I’ve concluded that there’s no way to write something that’s universally helpful. It’s possible, though, that some of the stuff I’ve come up with might help somebody else, so here’s my best shot at it. Some assumptions:
You want to work with iPad-based instruments and hardware synths simultaneously. You don’t want to spend a lot of money on high-resolution master-clock hardware. You aren’t going to have a heart attack if the timing is off by .00000000072 ms. (If you doubt that there is anyone
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