Vezér talks OSC

I've been quiet for the last couple of weeks, but this not means nothing happened around Vezér. First of all, I did a presentation at LPM Rome - if you were there I hope you enjoyed ;) - and already made a couple of enhancements for that event - see the new screenshot on the website. I started working on OSC support in Vezér right before the event, so Vezér now talks OSC as well as MIDI.

Why OSC? MIDI is not enough?

Good question. There are many advantages and disadvantages with both MIDI and OSC. MIDI is really easier to setup, you just need to "learn" the outgoing MIDI signal from Vezér in your favourite - vj -  software, but with OSC you need to set up IPs, and ports, sometimes your computer's firewall too, but there are two reason why I found OSC support is a go:

1. Better resolution. With MIDI you have only 128 integer values, which is not enough for smooth movements, but OSC can use float numbers.
2. Almost assign-free setups. Some softwares like Modul8 and Resolume have built-in OSC namespaces for controlling stuff, so with OSC is possible to skip  the "assign/learn" procedure.

OSC Track Preferences

To be honest, adding OSC support gave me a lot of headache, because OSC tracks needs to have a lot more preferences than MIDI. Not just the output settings, but the track type, because with OSC you can use different data types with different minimum and maximum values. So I came up with the idea to put the OSC**track preferences icon inside the value field - because this related to the value - which has this little preferences window where you can set track's value type - float, integer, boolean - and you can change the minimum and maximum** values.

OSC Namespace Presets

During my test session with OSC I found setting up the same OSC namespace and value preferences time to time is really a time waster, so I tried to make this process easier in a re-usable way, which results in a preset system. With this, you can save and load the OSC tracks namespace and value settings, organise them to different groups and share or backup the preset group files as well. Vezér will come out with a couple of OSC presets for both Modul8 and Resolume to make your life easier, but you'll be able to extend those as well.   That's all for know, folks. Because the unexpected amount of work with OSC I have to delay the release to July, but don't worry, you can take your hands on it soon ;)  

I'll share more information about Vezér in the next couple if weeks, till then, have fun ;)