Arkaos VJ: Using the QuickTime Controller Effect

The QuickTime Controller Effect in the “Video Effects” section allows you to control the way the associated video is played:

Play Selection:

Choose the part of the video you want to play by clicking on the “Play Selection” checkbox. This enables you to set the beginning and ending positions of the video stream via the Preview and Slider controllers. Or, you can choose the video to be played from the start of the first loop by selecting “First loop from start.” The next video will then be played according to the selection.

Note: Be careful to set the start position before the end one, otherwise the end position will be avoided.

Speed / Position:

• Speed: You can control the playing speed by setting a constant value in the “Speed Controller,” or by assigning the parameter to a MIDI controller.
• Position: You can control the play position in the video stream by using a MIDI controller.

Speed Direction:

You can choose to play the video either forward or backward by selecting either “+” or “-” in “Speed Direction.” You can also control the direction by using a MIDI controller. The control is binary (0 or 1), so the first half of the controller (0-63) plays the video backward, and the second half (64-127) plays it forward (there is no modulation).

Miscellaneous Settings:

• Loop Sequence: The video is replayed automatically when selected.
• High Resolution Controller: Allows you to use a 14-bit MIDI controller that can generate 16,384 different values (instead of 128 for a normal controller). (Controller ID numbers 32-63 are reserved for sending an additional high-resolution value for controllers 0-31: controller ID32 corresponds to controller ID0, ID33 to ID1, etc.) If your video has more than 128 frames, it allows you to control the video speed and position with much greater accuracy.

Additional Tips for Advanced Users:

You can use your mouse as two MIDI controllers in Arkaos VJ:

• Controller #7 corresponds to a horizontal displacement of the mouse.
• Controller #8 corresponds to a vertical displacement of the mouse.

Also, the video may run less smoothly when played backward rather than forward, depending on the video codec it was encoded in. We recommend using the Cinepak or QuickTime Video codecs for playing video backward.

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