Adding effects to a live video stream

Report · Mar 21, 2023

Is there an Adobe product I can use to add effects to a live video stream? Specifically, I want to turn peoples images into silhouettes and then have their movements generate colors and patterns. I think this would be great for dance clubs and exercise studios. Similar to this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwxrXZ8SEWU

Thanks for any info,

Steve L.

Report · Mar 21, 2023

No. You need a VJ-ing software, a pretty beefy computer to run it on and probably a ton of extra equipment like video mixers, a hardware realtime keyer and so on. AE of course can do all that, just not at all in realtime.

Mylenium

Report · Mar 21, 2023

Thanks for your reply. Although I wonder if there's another way to accomplish this since I've seen setups like this at science museums going back to the 70s, i.e. San Francisco Exploratorium, NY Hall of Science. The exhibition in the link below is quite old:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwxrXZ8SEWU

Report · Mar 21, 2023

It's still hardware based. If you have a reasonably sophisticated video mixer with enough channels it can even literally be patched together by cross-connecting the relevant sub-components. Used to happen all the time in the analog days when you accidentally swapped them or plugged them into the "key" ports. Really basic analog signal processing at the end of the day and that was possible even in the 1970s. In fact now everything being digital would probably make it more complicated. Anyway, you can't do it in realtime without some patch cables and some processing unit, no matter the format.

Mylenium

Report · Mar 21, 2023

I used to own one of these: NewTek Video Toaster General Overview Demo on Commodore Amiga

Hardware-based real-time video effects were all the rage in 1992 when I bought mine. I only used it for about eight months and decided it was cheapening the look of the tv commercials we were producing. Kinda cool, but I never looked back.

Video Toaster - Wikipedia

If you want real-time video effects for live performance, you need hardware, not software.

Report · Mar 22, 2023

Hi Steve,

I don't have any specific recommendation for you, but here are some jumping off points...

Unfortunately I don't know of anything from Adobe. Good Luck!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TouchDesigner

TouchDesigner

Resolume

VDMX