Attach music video to track.

[alstrlvlss]

So heres what I want to do.

I want to take the songs that Have music videos and link them to the mp3+g using the transparent video.
Is there a way to do this without creating a separate mov file to take its place?

I tried searching the forum but unfortunately search terms like: Music and Video pull up too many responses.

Thanks.

S~

[dave]

there's a feature called "launch files", that when a song plays, a file will automatically be launched.

in this way, you can have kjams automatically open a particular quicktime movie (in quicktime player) when a particular song plays.

you can set kJams to always be on top of other apps, even if that app is full screen. i think you can set QuickTime player to always go full screen and play any opened movie.

[DeusExMachina]

You can use my script in the code section to do most of this. It will launch QT7, determine what monitor is being used by kJams for the video window, set that as the QT full screen monitor, and then play the video full screen. The question I have is how do you guarantee that they maintain sync (or at least always sync the same way.

[dave]

[alstrlvlss]

The question I have is how do you guarantee that they maintain sync (or at least always sync the same way.

Hoping for the best actually.
Im a VJ first so I'm always wrangling video files into different formats depending on what im doing.


I'll be sure to check out that script, thanks for the code and the tips!
And Dave thanks for the robust software.

[DeusExMachina]

The problem is, if you have kJams launching an external app to play the video in the background, you have no idea how long it will take to launch the app and start playback, so sync will be unpredictable. That said, you might be able to script actual playback start on both with a script to get them as close as possible.

[dave]

yeah, probably scripting will be the way to go for this.

[DeusExMachina]

The only exception to this would be for "arty" video, where there is nothing that actually needs to sync, like actions in the video, or lip movement. Amorphous backgrounds would work fine as is, but anything where the timing between the words and the video is important, you'll find it next to impossible to guarantee consistent syncing.

Dave, I believe you and I discussed this on a different thread where I first found out about app launching, and asked about making it scriptable. I think this is the exact user scenario I mentioned. That said, not sure it is really that high a priority.
I guess the scenario would go something like this:
link the track to a script rather than to the playback app
the script then takes the name of the track and (somehow, either from a passed parameter or its own db) assigns it to a specific video
the script then launches the linked app, and waits for confirmation that it is launched, and finally
issues playback commands for both.

[dave]

yes, pretty much.

the launched script would immediately tell kjams to pause, then rewind (or cue, if the video will start at the start of music).
then load the video and set it full screen
then start playback in both kjams and quicktime

[DeusExMachina]

For it to work properly, it would have to have the proper video passed to it (does kJams even know the actual video to play?) or there would have to be a separate script for each linked pair, or the script would have to get the name of the playing track, and use a db to figure out which video file to play.

As far as immediately pausing, I think that would only work if the script launched fast enough. Otherwise it would still be bouncing in the Dock while the track was beginning to play.

Any number of other usability issues.

[dave]

yes. kjams wasn't designed to do this. i was just trying to offer a possibility.

alternately, you could check "delay playing until song is unpacked", which would buy you some time.

yes, each song would have a separate script. tedious, but workable.

[DeusExMachina]

So I assume there is no "kCurSong_NAME" or some such, which would get you there.

[dave]

how about this hack:

the command "version" returns a string, the version string. i'll hack it so that it returns the current song name in LTRS format IF it follows immediately after a "get vid window display id" command, like this:

Code: Select all

docommand kScriptCommand_GET_VIDEO_WINDOW_DISPLAY_ID
set songName to version

any other command before "version" and you'll actually get the version string.