Help with creating a visual metronome

240 views
Skip to first unread message

Seablade -

unread,
Oct 12, 2022, 5:42:21 PM10/12/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
So a friend reached out and is doing a gig (Already in progress of course) where they have an audio click, and need a visual click instead output over video.  I have more of this working in my QLab file,
Screen Shot 2022-10-12 at 5.39.03 PM.png
Pretty much I am using a liveAverageLevel query to query the current level of an output, and using that to change the name of a cue currently.  I also have one set to change the opacity of that same cue, but that doesn't seem to be happening.  I have the background cue firing a red slide (So I can tell it is working) and the foreground is a white slide, but I never see the white slide.

Any thoughts as to what I am running into?  I have a feeling I am being stupid, but fan't quite figure it out.  Thanks!

Also while I am here, is there a way to set an OSC cue to an infinite duration?  I mean worst case I can always set it to 99 hours and not worry about it, but just curious if there is a better way.

     Thomas Vecchione

Seablade -

unread,
Oct 12, 2022, 5:43:42 PM10/12/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
I forgot to mention, the name changes as expected with the appropriate value.  I also set the range of the liveAverageLevel to between 0 and 1 just in case it was a value out of bounds thing, but no difference.  I am using 0 and 10 in the screenshot because the click is not full scale obviously but I suppose I could just as easily just raise the output level.

    Thomas

Seablade -

unread,
Oct 12, 2022, 7:07:27 PM10/12/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
Well I managed to get it working instead of using opacity, using scale.  This combined with a basic script cue to actually change the scale actually gets relatively close, but the problem is the ballistics of the meters are a bit to slow.  Is there a better option than liveAverageLevel to look at that might have more precise ballistics?  My problem is if I go below .3 delay I get a 'bounce' trigger where the meter hasn't yet gone below the threshold to come down.  I am going to keep tweaking to see if I can improve but curious for other's takes.  Thanks!

Screen Shot 2022-10-12 at 7.03.29 PM.png


micpool

unread,
Oct 12, 2022, 7:15:19 PM10/12/22
to QLab
opacity is expecting a float  argument between 0.0 and 1.0 

By enclosing the OSC query in quotes you are sending a string (which you actually  want to do for name, which is expecting a string)

This will work

/cue/Foreground/opacity #/cue/Click1/liveAverageLevel/1 0 1#

You can increase the value of the second argument to a higher value e.g 10 to get the opacity level higher with a less than full scale click

Mic


Seablade -

unread,
Oct 12, 2022, 7:26:31 PM10/12/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
I knew I had to be doing something stupid, thanks Mic!

   Thomas

--
Contact support anytime: sup...@figure53.com
Follow QLab on Twitter: https://twitter.com/QLabApp
User Group Code of Conduct: https://qlab.app/code-of-conduct/
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "QLab" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to qlab+uns...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/qlab/be53283d-342b-4932-add9-6d1792e85a92n%40googlegroups.com.

micpool

unread,
Oct 12, 2022, 7:28:26 PM10/12/22
to QLab
With a short sharp  click sound  it should work as expected

MIc
Metronome.mov

Seablade -

unread,
Oct 12, 2022, 8:08:07 PM10/12/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
Which it of course does (With a slight about 1/10 of a second delay).  Easily accounted for as the metronome is not tied to the video.  Already sent it on to the client to use in rehearsals tomorrow and tell me if they are happy with it or not.  Thanks again!

Of course the UI gets a bit sluggish in response while running this, I wonder if anything can be done there, but responds to keyboard quick enough so I am not but so worried about it.

I like this solution as you can even still put the video they will be playing to under the foreground and it will overlay the flashes on top of the foreground.  Wouldn't take to much to possibly create a streamer like interface as well if needed I don't think, but realignment for the delay gets tricky.

    Thomas Vecchione

Andy Dolph

unread,
Oct 13, 2022, 12:05:34 AM10/13/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
Is there a reason that the click track and the the visual metronome can’t just be rendered out as a video file to play?  I did that as a way of feeding cues for live sound effects for a silent movie - Qlab played 2 copies of the movie in sync, one on a monitor for sound effects (with streamers for cues) and one to the projector for the audience.

On Oct 12, 2022, at 8:08 PM, Seablade - <seab...@gmail.com> wrote:



Seablade -

unread,
Oct 13, 2022, 9:06:21 AM10/13/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
On Thu, Oct 13, 2022 at 12:05 AM Andy Dolph <acd...@gmail.com> wrote:
Is there a reason that the click track and the the visual metronome can’t just be rendered out as a video file to play?  I did that as a way of feeding cues for live sound effects for a silent movie - Qlab played 2 copies of the movie in sync, one on a monitor for sound effects (with streamers for cues) and one to the projector for the audience.


Yep, because there is no video file, or more correctly because there is no video file of the metronome.  This is about creating one from the audio when there isn't time to go through and manually create a visual metronome video like I would like. 

Short version of this (And I will hear today if the solution Mic helped me with will be acceptable to the maestro) is that a friend working for a symphony was given the video file, and an audio click track for a movie commissioned by the symphony.  The maestro doesn't want to use an audio click track, but there is no video click, so one has to be made.  If I had time, I would go through and create one much like you described, but obviously this is not a process I can do in an hour.  This was an interesting challenge, and other than the stupid mistake I made above, hopefully not to bad.

In the end the audio is being completely silenced (Or rather run to an output that is not routed anywhere useful so that the meter still works, as required for the solution above) and the visual metronome is being displayed on a monitor for the Maestro.  Which is actually good because it allows for the video to be delayed to compensate for the processing delay in creating the visual metronome on the fly like this.

      Thomas Vecchione

Seablade -

unread,
Oct 13, 2022, 9:10:18 AM10/13/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
On Thu, Oct 13, 2022 at 9:06 AM Seablade - <seab...@gmail.com> wrote:
On Thu, Oct 13, 2022 at 12:05 AM Andy Dolph <acd...@gmail.com> wrote:
Is there a reason that the click track and the the visual metronome can’t just be rendered out as a video file to play?  I did that as a way of feeding cues for live sound effects for a silent movie - Qlab played 2 copies of the movie in sync, one on a monitor for sound effects (with streamers for cues) and one to the projector for the audience.


Yep, because there is no video file, or more correctly because there is no video file of the metronome.  This is about creating one from the audio when there isn't time to go through and manually create a visual metronome video like I would like.

Also I should note that this also allows them to customize the actual metronome to their liking.  For instance what I sent to them flashes the full screen white (Over a black background) but replacing the background with video is simply replacing the file in the video cue, and changing the metronome itself, for instance to be a grey circle as in Mic's video, is replacing the the image in the foreground cue.  Makes it pretty flexible honestly, and other than the GUI sluggishness I mentioned, not bad.  Considering I am halfway across the country from them, the easier I can make it on them the better of course.

    Thomas Vecchione

Andy Dolph

unread,
Oct 13, 2022, 9:24:01 AM10/13/22
to ql...@googlegroups.com
Got it, that makes sense

On Oct 13, 2022, at 9:10 AM, Seablade - <seab...@gmail.com> wrote:


--
Contact support anytime: sup...@figure53.com
Follow QLab on Twitter: https://twitter.com/QLabApp
User Group Code of Conduct: https://qlab.app/code-of-conduct/
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "QLab" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to qlab+uns...@googlegroups.com.
Reply all
Reply to author
Forward
0 new messages