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Thread: New open laser frame format?

  1. #1
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    Default New open laser frame format?

    Just something I have been thinking about. Right now the only commonly supported, open format for laser show software to transfer data from one another is the ILDA format.. But I think we can all agree that it has a lot of problems. To name some:

    - No good way of storing full info on title, author etc, just a couple of tiny, fixed 8 byte fields
    - No info on timing (scanrate, frames per seconds etc)
    - No backwards compatibility between formats, some projectors and software etc can still only read legacy format 0 without full RGB data
    - No compression
    - No encryption
    - Ambiguity when separating frames into different projectors/layers
    - No possibility to store audio as well

    This has arguably contributed a lot to the state of the market we are seeing now, with the leading company all but abandoning the ILD format in favor of their own proprietary formats that don't work with any other software, leading to less consumer freedom and less innovation.

    I'm wondering if maybe there is interest in a community effort to come up with a new format to fix most or all of the problems with the ILDA formats. The authors of most of the software used in the scene are members here so we could get it widely supported if we really want to.
    There's the wave format used in f.ex. LaserBoy, which fixes a few of the problems but far from all, and its biggest strength, that it can be played directly on sound cards is maybe less relevant these days now that sound card dacs are less popular.

    Just throwing it out there. It would require quite a bit of work and most developers are probably very busy as is, but I think it would be very beneficial to the community if executed well.

    Bonus laugh: https://xkcd.com/927/

  2. #2
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    Don't forget there is also a LaserBoy plain ASCII text file format.

    http://laserboy.org/forum/index.php?topic=218.0

    One big problem with storing timing information like frames per second or points per second is that it implies that the information is time optimized. There are no standards for optimizing. So how do you deal with that?

    James.
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  3. #3
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    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Grix View Post
    Just something I have been thinking about. Right now the only commonly supported, open format for laser show software to transfer data from one another is the ILDA format.. But I think we can all agree that it has a lot of problems. To name some:

    - No good way of storing full info on title, author etc, just a couple of tiny, fixed 8 byte fields
    - No info on timing (scanrate, frames per seconds etc)
    - No backwards compatibility between formats, some projectors and software etc can still only read legacy format 0 without full RGB data
    - No compression
    - No encryption
    - Ambiguity when separating frames into different projectors/layers
    - No possibility to store audio as well

    This has arguably contributed a lot to the state of the market we are seeing now, with the leading company all but abandoning the ILD format in favor of their own proprietary formats that don't work with any other software, leading to less consumer freedom and less innovation.

    I'm wondering if maybe there is interest in a community effort to come up with a new format to fix most or all of the problems with the ILDA formats. The authors of most of the software used in the scene are members here so we could get it widely supported if we really want to.
    There's the wave format used in f.ex. LaserBoy, which fixes a few of the problems but far from all, and its biggest strength, that it can be played directly on sound cards is maybe less relevant these days now that sound card dacs are less popular.

    Just throwing it out there. It would require quite a bit of work and most developers are probably very busy as is, but I think it would be very beneficial to the community if executed well.

    Bonus laugh: https://xkcd.com/927/
    This has been covered before so if you are interested in how it went you can search this forum and the laserboy forum. Try searching for a thread named "to the laser show companies" or something like that. It is what lead me to create Spaghetti.

  4. #4
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    That's true but there is nothing wrong with starting a new discussion about it.
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  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by james View Post
    That's true but there is nothing wrong with starting a new discussion about it.
    I wasn't attempting to stop the conversation. I just wanted to share what has already been discussed.

  6. #6
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    I am a bit puzzled that wave storage for laser never gained any traction- it's a bit wasteful byte-wise, but that's not a problem since you can store 256GB of info on your
    key ring for less than 50 bucks these days. Wave format allows for the inclusion of blocks of non-audio information that will not interfere with a wave player, and there's
    more than a few lower bits in each 16 bit sample to be allocated for whatever purpose. I've written code for wave and found it very easy to deal with compared to ILDA.
    Last edited by dchammonds; 10-29-2016 at 18:32.

  7. #7
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    The modified wave file format certainly has its merits as a frame set storage format even if you never use a modified sound card to play it.
    Creator of LaserBoy!
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  8. #8
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    Is this the other thread in question? http://laserboy.org/forum/index.php?topic=305.0

    Here's what I am thinking about the timing metadata. Ideally there should be some fields for FPS and PPS, but they can be optional. Because different files may not have the same use for them. For example a single graphics frame don't need an FPS or PPS metric, the user could just play it as fast as his scanners can take, and if the framerate drops, it doesn't matter except increasing flickering. However for other files, like a show synced to music, one of either PPS or most likely FPS is critical to keep the show in sync with the music as intended. That doesn't assume baked-in optimization either, the software is free to adjust the frames by adding, shifting or deleting points to optimize it how it likes based on the user settings, as long as it keeps the playback speed constant. And then there's a third type of file, the ones that do have baked in optimization, maybe that has been designed manually to play very well on a specific set of scanners and would like the file to keep it that way. Then they could specific both the PPS and FPS metadata to ensure that it is played back exactly the way it is. Either way I think most anything is better than no timing info at all, leaving the users to basically guess.

    But the timing issue is maybe less important than some other factors, like encryption. ILDA, wave, plaintext etc is good if you want to share the data openly, but it makes piracy very easy. To get the big boys interested it would be important to have some kind of optional encryption built in so that shows can be shared without the fear of an unintended leak to the public.

  9. #9
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    The thread I was referring to... I think Pangolin chimes in with their feelings in this one.
    https://www.photonlexicon.com/forums...show+companies

  10. #10
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    Also, I think the proposed IDN standard is an attempt to address at least some of these concerns.

    Personally, I gave up caring or having hope about this a long time ago and until the laser software/hardware companies want to work together it probably isn't going to happen. Even the various flavors of LDS (LDS, Dynamics, GLS, LSX) aren't even 100% compatible as far as I know. All of the DACs have different APIs. You can plug in a keyboard or a mouse or a USB soundcard and your computer or media player will use it. But with DACs you have to have the right drivers and the software has to have custom software to use it.

    ILDA could be doing a lot to fix this but instead they are having cruises and laser show contests. Lame.

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