I will examine some of the commonly used open source alternatives to common multimedia software.  They probably aren’t full replacements for hardcore professionals needing the flexibility and reliability of big time software, but they could work perfect for the right situations.

Audio 

I’ll start this list with what I know best, Audio.  The obvious go-to choice is Ardour.  I’ve use it for a few tasks such as simple multitrack recording and editing out pieces of a song creating a seamless and shorter song for a clients dance number.  It seems to be able to perform most tasks that I require out of Pro Tools and could be a viable option for those doing things such as tracking live bands or recording music not relying heavily on virtual instruments or effects.  Ardour lacks MIDI support (coming in version 3, you can already test the beta if you desire) and isn’t as effects oriented as DAW software such as PT or Logic.

For those interested in more more plugins and analog emulations, a very good, but commercial piece of software based on Ardour is Mixbuss by Harrison Consoles.   It is available for Mac, Windows and Linux and a can be tried for free. This article is mainly about free software, but if good commercial options are available on Linux, many artists would be willing to pay the money for the flexibility of being able to use their OS of choice.

For those looking to do only MIDI sequencing and notation, Rosegarden is a good option, and it can also be used in conjunction with Ardour and the Hydrogen drum sequencer via JACK.  JACK allows all this software to be connecting using internal software audio and midi cables, allowing for very flexible software setups that can be recalled using simple scripting.  Basically a type of ReWire available for OSS.

For those looking for an Ableton live replacement, Bitwig Studio  is coming out with a great looking offering capable of traditional audio editing too in the near future.  No timeline yet, but the features are worth getting excited about.  A current option for those interested in chip style 8 bit sounds is the tracker Renoise.  The most exciting thing about Renoise is it’s advance scripting that allows it to be used with multiple controllers and have very advanced user created additions.

I also would like to quickly mention two open source effects that I’ve had good experience with.  Rakkarack is a great guitar effects processor and Bristol Synth is a vintage synth emulator with dozens of hardware emulations.  Both are a little rough around the edges but provide great options for people exploring creating sounds on Linux.

The biggest issue I’ve found in using Linux for recording is finding an audio interface that works.  I currently have a Digi 003 which does not work on Linux.  Firewire support in general seems to be spotty, but some of the more recent USB offerings from companies like Presonus allowing up to 18 tracks  seem like viable options.  For desktops, PCI cards from companies like RME are also a good option, but are pretty pricey.

Video

For video, the lack of options is actually pretty disappointing.  Options even as flexible as the simple Apple iMovie are pretty lacking. There is an impressive option on the horizon however, Lightworks.   Lightworks was professional software for a long time and many feature length major movies were edited on it. They are currently in the process of opening up the source code and porting to Linux and Mac.  You can try it out on windows now and the Linux version should be available soon.

While many huge companies already use linux for  animation, the large server banks and millions of lines of custom code required for movies like Shrek 3 are out of the reach of most freelance animators.  However, there is a great option for average Linux users, Blender.  While Blender can be intimidating at first, there are many tutorials that can get you up and running quickly.  The video below was found on YouTube and made with blender and some of it’s add-on scripts.

Graphics

When it comes to image editing, there is no question that Linux is able to handle just about any task using the GIMP.  Using the gimp, I have been able to accomplish any image editing task I’ve needed over the last 5 or so years.  Simple cropping, contrast adjustments, image rearrangement and pasting layers on top of one another and logo creation.  RAW file support and other features are available through 3rd party plugins. More serious professionals might have need for features I can’t imagine, but I can’t recommend enough that everyone try out the GIMP for free before running out and spending hundreds on software like Photoshop.

Summary

In conclusion,  there are a great many professional tools available to Linux multimedia creators, and many more are still to come.  While every option might not be a complete replacement for standard commercial software yet, in the right situations, freelance professionals can save some money and increase their flexibility by working on free open source software(FOSS).

Google has a great set of tutorials for learning the objects and layout types available for creating simple android GUIs.  XML is used to layout exactly how GUIs are supposed to look and act.  After recently doing my resume in LaTex, it seemed very straightforward after looking at the examples.  Anyone familiar with HTML or any other markup language should pick up pretty quickly.  I also would like to point out that there is a graphical way to edit and build the GUI very similar to interface builder when programming for iPhone.

The best way to learn is go through the tutorials, but also, try starting a new project and create an interface with a lot of random objects using the graphical tool.  Then, analyze and edit the resulting .xml file.  This helped me get a better hands on understanding of exactly what was happening.  Thanks to Google for having such great documentation!

The best way to start is by following the instructions available here: http://developer.android.com/sdk/installing.html .  The whole process was pretty straightforward and I only had trouble when installing the Eclipse ADT plugin.  The issue was a URL in the software sources for Eclipse had the name of the old version instead of the newest (Indigo, 3.7).  Renaming the URL solved the problem and the few other minor errors were easily solved using Google.

The obvious first task when programming for a new language or device is to get a “hello world” of some kind running.  Google is very helpful in this respect and have a great into to starting a project and how Android apps generally work: http://developer.android.com/resources/tutorials/hello-world.html.  The program was easily tested in a AVD (Android Vitrual Device).

The key difference between my experiments in iOS and Android programming is how easy it was to move this simple program right onto my device.  Google provides very straightforward instructions that worked on the first try: http://developer.android.com/guide/developing/device.html#setting-up

I hope these links helped anybody just getting starting with Android programming.  Have Fun!

When my dad was offered a broken Sony Trinitron(Sony KV-30HS420), I was very excited to attempt a repair to revive an otherwise perfectly good HD TV.  The guy giving the TV to my dad found an online guide that offered a possible way to fix the 6 or 7 blinking LED error code the TV was experiencing.

http://k0lee.com/2011/05/fixing-a-sony-wega-with-6-or-7-blink-code/

The link comes from Lee Devlin, and his site reminded me a lot of my own, with a great collection of guides on a variety of technology.  I’m happy to report that his repair instructions were spot on, and the pictures in the guide proved very helpful.

Ordering the chips needed for the repair went great.  The online store was located in Evansville, Indiana and the order shipped quickly.  After receiving the chips, it was a simple case of opening the TV, removing the board, unsoldering the chips, soldering in new sockets and replacing the chips.  The whole process took about an hour and the hardest part was moving the 150 lb TV on and off of it’s stand.

If you run into a small error with some of your own gadgets, I encourage you to do some research online and put some simple repair skills to use.  By finding guides like Lee’s or some of the information I hope this site offers, it should be easy to keep your old electronics alive.

I’m happy to report that after some simple troubleshooting, I was able to get the two channels running perfectly.  After playing around with the grounding scheme some, I was able to get both channels operating at very high gain levels with no noise.  Above you can see my mobile recording rack where the preamp has been since I completed it.

I’ve used this preamp on just about every recording since finishing the kit and would recommend FiveFish products to anyone based on audio quality alone.   It also helps that they have great support for a DIY kit and helped me troubleshoot the few issues I did run into.

The competition for this semester was a robotic egg hunt.  Robots got 1 point for bringing a pastel colored egg back to their base and -3 for a brown egg in their base.  You can see our robot (designed by myself, Michael DeVeau and Mostafa Farag) running a test to bring back pastel eggs below.

For more details about the robot design, construction and more videos, please keep reading after the break.

The main platform for the robot was built upon the MIT HandyBoard.   This convenient package provides a microcontroller, battery and charger, easy sensor and motor interface, and easy computer interface with an IDE that uses Interactive-C (C with some custom libraries for motor and sensor control).  A similar system can be created using an Arduino (As a separate group I was involved in did when designing a robot for the IEEE SouthEastCon Robot Competition).  However, by the time you add motor shields, custom interface shields, a battery and other features built into the HandyBoard the cost is pretty similar between the two.  The physical robot construction was done using the Lego Mindstorms kits (we’re Electrical Engineers, not mechanical) and this allows quick and flexible prototyping.

Our design used a differential drive robot with a two bay system with lift gates to gather the eggs to read and differentiate between more eggs at a time than a single gate.  The robot drives around the course randomly, avoiding obstacles by using an ultrasonic sensor.  As an egg rolls in front of the gate, an IR sensor determines the egg color.  If a pastel egg (+1 point) is detected, the gate is lifted and the egg is captured.  If a brown egg is detected (-3 points) , the robot backs away and turns to the side to seek out new eggs.

To return home after a set time, our robot uses a wall following system that drives it slightly to the left until an IR sensor sees the wall.  Once this occurs, the robot uses a PID controller to follow the wall until the light sensors facing down towards the playing surface and ultrasonic sensor determine that the robot has arrived in it’s home base.

A head to head test against another robot can be seen below.

In the final competition, our robot was defeated in the first round after mistakenly believing it was home when it sensed the other robot near it as the wall of it’s home base.  Despite this, the class was very fun, and a great learning experience for both autonomous robot programming and the physical construction and kinematics of a robotic system.

First of all, I’d like to thank my roommate, Adam Hall.  He’s amazing at projects like this and basically did most of the work while I stood around trying to be productive sanding and spray painting.  He also is responsible for the great pictures of the finished project, the pictures of the process were done with our phones while working.

I won’t bore you with a step by step walkthrough, since this project is simple enough you should get a good idea just from looking through the picture gallery below.  I’ll give the materials used and a disjointed jumble of tips that we encountered and leave you to figure out how which details work best for you.

Materials: 3″ PVC, thread-rod (slightly longer than PVC), 8′x 12″x 2″ board, 4 washers, 8 nuts to fit on thread rod, spray paint of chosen color, wood finish of choice, 60 lb bag of sand to fill PVC (probably only used 40 lbs worth), silicon caulk to keep sand from falling out the bottom (out design prevents much more of this than many others on the internet by sinking the PVC 1/2″ into the wooden ends).

The price can range from around $25 to $40 depending on how many materials like wood stain or caulk you have on hand.

The pictures and captions should help clear up the rest.

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Outdoor festivals present a unique set of challenges for running live sound. Check below the break for a list of a few things I learned.

1. Be Prepared for Weather.  Outdoor concerts can have all types of weather.  For shows in the heat, make sure to leave rack spaces empty for airflow to prevent power amps from overheating.  Also bring plenty of towels, and large tarps or trash bags to cover gear when/if a rainstorm hits.  During the three days of worldfest, we experienced the two hottest days of the year, and the last day was cool, but had intermittent rainstorms throughout the day and had to do the final stage breakdown in the rain.

2. Setup the Stage for the Most Common Configurations.  Most acts will want 1-4 vocal mics up front, as well as a few instrument mics and direct boxes.  By leaving the most commonly used mics setup (shure sm57′s and 58′s should give a decent sound for just about any instrument) and with basic EQ and monitors levels set, you can quickly get each band playing and fine tune throughout the set.  This is essential to get each act playing the maximum amount of time, because most acts show up late, take a while to setup, and want to start playing NOW.

3. Monitor Mixes (Think like a musician).  The biggest complaint about monitors is that the vocals are not loud enough.   By setting the vocals high in the monitors (still shy of feeding back, obviously), as well as instruments with little to no onstage volume like keys, backing tracks or direct acoustic guitars, you can keep the band mostly happy as you add things throughout the show.

4. Protect Your Territory.   Outdoor festivals have a lot of foot traffic, so make sure to set up the proper physical barriers and signs to keep people from trekking through your mixing area.  Also block off the areas around the stage and any equipment storage area.  Consequences of not blocking of your area well?  We had a girl walk behind the stage during our biggest headliner, and plug her cellphone charger into the same powerstrip the musicians amps were plugged into!  We also had small children playing hide and seek and climbing around our power panels and cords, dangerous for both them and the equipment. Make sure to protect your stuff from people, and protect people from themselves.

5. Be Prepared for Anything.  This goes without saying but it’s good to remember, you never know when a mic or direct box might go down, so always have a ’57 on a stand, a mic cable and a spare instrument cable/direct box out and available to easily patched in between songs in case something goes down.  This eliminates a lot of really awkward time that might be spent digging for a mic and untangling a cable when the audience just wants to hear music.

6. Let the Small Things Go.  In a single band show in a club with a nice system already set up, it is very easy to get nit picky about specific EQ, monitor levels and the perfect mix, but at a festival where the key is getting bands up and playing as quickly as possible, a different approach is necessary.  By letting go of small things that would normally be extremely bothersome, you can take care of most of the big issues more quickly.

Hopefully these tips, along with a lot of caffeine and patience should help get you through running sound for a multi-act outdoor concert.