Here is a video showing MediaMaster 2.0 in Express version, it’s the developer’s beta that was demonstrated at the Prolight+Sound in Frankfurt last month but it will give you a good idea of what it will look like. We were triggering video loops with an LSC DMX desk and with a small Korg Nano MIDI controller.

ArKaos MediaMaster may be the latest baby in the ArKaos video software family but it carries in its DNA all the best features of its ancestors’ different evolutions. These evolutions have always been triggered by users requests, by the different experimentations we made and by the goals we wanted to reach in terms of performance..

A few years ago when we decided to rewrite our core Engine, our goal was to get the best out of current and future computer architecture. So we designed the Engine to allow very creative layer blending with HD video loops by balancing the load between multi-core CPU’s and GPU’s. This was MediaMaster 1.0, then version 1.2 added very cool frame blending and audio support.

So we’ve been mainly focusing our resources on the Engine fluidity to achieve an optimal pixel flow and did not spent too much time working on the interface functionalities. This does not mean we did not care about that aspect but we’ve been really too busy with our hands dirty with pixel processing in order to build a perfectly stable and fast Engine that would become a solid base for further features and developments.

But we’ve also been listening to users feedback from everywhere, whether it be online  - on the support portal, in the forums and on our social networks – whether it be in real life - at trade shows worldwide or through a round of meetings and design sessions with lighting designers and resellers that we organized in January.

In other words, we were virtually behind you – yes, you! :) – looking above your shoulder at how you’re working with MediaMaster and how you’ve been using ArKaos VJ DMX in the past so we can understand how to make future versions working exactly the way you like, the way you need.

That’s how we came to realize that a typical lighting designer needs something like a Swiss Army Knife for video. No gig is twice the same; some days you just need to do a little bit of MIDI triggering, other days you may want to use a few DMX sliders to automate a small theater play, and once in a while you have that big tour with some heavy automation through a huge lighting console. Sometimes you may even have to work on a small corporate event where you will just trigger video loops from your computer keyboard..

Well you can do this all with MediaMaster 2.0. and even better, for those of you who never do the “big tour with some heavy automation through a huge lighting console” stuff, it will come in two versions; the Express that will be something like a 8 tools Swiss Army Knife with just the essential and the Pro that will be more like the full-featured 12 tools Swiss Army Knife.

In MediaMaster 2.0 we’ve implemented a very efficient Simple Mode as default for the Express version (which, by the way, will also be available in the Pro version). This mode is based on presets, for example if you are doing LED Mapping over your video output you will be able to create a preset defining your LED wall and easily recall it for many cells. Later on, if you edit this preset you will see the modification applied instantly to all cells using it without the need to re-edit all your show.

The main advantages of this new Simple Mode over what you had in VJ DMX are:

• the preset system makes it very quick and easy to use
• it allows triggering visuals with DMX, MIDI and any computer keyboard
• it makes use of MediaMaster‘s advanced media management system
• it benefits from the performance of the new video Engine (frame blending, audio support, etc…
• 64 patches of 64 cells are available to store visuals and effects
• everything is saved into the Media folder (content, patch information, show setup, ..) making it easy to move your files between computers

We are now close to the final release and we expect to start some public beta testing in the days to come, so stay tuned!

Meanwhile, the Marketing is working on the official communication, writing the press release and all the stuff they have to do, which will include announcing prices and offers for VJ DMX users, but we can already announce that we will offer free upgrade to MediaMaster Pro 2.0 to all current MediaMaster 1.x users.

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