HYDRA
~[INFU x Hydra]~
“Why? What?”
I knew about Hydra for quite a while now, but I never dug into it properly, so I signed up to do VJing at WoodChip with it without having anything prepared yet hahah
Hydra allows you to easily code your own visuals:
You want red square on the screen? sure!
shape(4) // generates shape with 4 corners
.out(o0) // outputs this to canvas o0, the first default one
// <- indicates comment, so no code gets activated
Here it is but on the website, try it! [CLICK ME]
Sorry, this works only in Chromium-based browsers, like Chrome, Vivaldi, Opera etc
You want it to rotate? go for it!
shape(4)
.rotate(0,1) // initial rotation 0, constant rotation 1
// if too fast, try 0.2 or something like this!
.out(o0)
Copy code above here, replace one on the website and activate whole code with CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER, in general any errors will be pointed out at the bottom, usually it’s when you forgot “.” or “)” somewhere hah
Want the square to be bigger?
shape(4,0.5) // 2nd value here controls the size, 1 is whole screen, 0.3 is the default when no value is used
.rotate(0,1)
.out(o0)
You want to kaleidoscope it? okay, before or after rotation?
shape(4,0.5)
.kaleid(2) // try values different than 2!
.rotate(0,1)
//.kaleid(4) // or here, effect will be different
.out(o0)
I think Hydra can quickly make sense to people not even understanding coding: once you know you should do ".effect(value,value)" you know how to put everything else you see in the [manual], and if you don't understand something, put it in hydra & mess around with it to get some results, which is great!
The level of knowledge required to start is low, and by just messing around you get tons of "happy lil accidents" or "I dont get it but it looks cool!" kinda thing!
“Your 2nd setup?”
This is my 2nd VJing setup, and maybe my final one?
Long story short: I used to have hardware analogue rig with video mixer, 2 small raspberry pi’s with controllers, and a video synthesizer… also VJing eurorack rig but it came to a point where it’s more expensive than entire party I’m performing at so I only took it out once…
It was a shame, I loved VJing but moving around with huge packed and delicate suitcase just wasn’t really nice
BEFORE
AFTER
I got it in 2020, so this version might not be available anymore, but there’s others from the same company!
I also used full-size keyboard, and a wireless mouse;
On the lil monitor on my laptop I had notepads open, copying or checking code as needed;
on 2nd monitor I could see what’s being displayed on the big screens/projector, which was Hydra!
And now, instead of connecting things with cables and pressing effects on my video mixer I need to code that, but it's still similar because I don't need to fully understand what each thing does, just enough to know stuff like "oh I can now do this and it's gonna look cool!" With my analog setup, I was limited by cables and machines I had, but with Hydra I can do as much as my laptop can handle - I might not be able to reproduce the analogue feel, but the shapes and effects are here!
Setup
- Each person had something unique, sometimes simple, sometimes active, I tried to represent each artist somewhat okay
- I had media folder with script that activated python fileserver, appropriately modified so my browser takes the images no problem! (videos didn’t work tho, it’s okay)
- I activated this script through typing “cmd” into my folder address, and then doing “python3 Serv.py” inside terminal
- I also had a camera that was there just to pick up sound, and I was adjusting the volume of mic inside Windows 10 settings
“Can I see the code u made?”
Yes sure you can! All the projects can be viewed as they were done live!
Download [this] entire repo, unzip it somewhere, open terminal inside that folder and start up the Serv.py (this is important, otherwise images won’t be loaded!)
For some projects, I also got “new” versions, that I decided to do after heavily modifying some of the codes, so you can see what happened by the very end of some sets!
How I created each person’s set?
- Crystal Dragon got squiggly line inspired by [Neon Genesis Evangelion internal Shinji's Ego Monologue], and she even sang Evangelion’s theme song! I also had text added, I’ve been mostly silly stuff, “is violin chiptune?” “wow great voice”, and gosh it was fun when she started singing Titanic song and I wrote “Let that sink in” XD
I don’t think single pic can show the depth of what’s going on but here’s one:
- I had a general bubbly idea for 8NB’s set, but I’ve been also delivered pictures a day before set happened! I managed to cook something simple that utilises the pic, but no text over it, maybe for the better, it was very busy projection! Cool thing that I figured out was commenting out “.colorama(0.8)” in topmost object(o0) between songs so contrast of entire thing goes down, giving the illusion of downtime between songs!
That’s second pic of 8NB set - 1st one was above when I was showing my laptop setup ^
- Dma-Sc received simple pixelated goodness during his set I tried to kind of replicate demoscene feel, and text made a comeback, it was probably less organised, I think in the end it was fusion of 2 other projects I had but I still think it fit very well with his energy!
- pouale has this pirate bunny logo which I used plentifully, and I thought to myself “I haven’t done roundish kaleidoscopes” so I made black and white one, and it kinda gave me idea of trying to do hypnotic, like “drink water”, or “be gay, do chiptunes”
- for ****&c I had no custom graphics, and I had no clue what kinda music they gonna play, other than fast!
I had like a background kaleidoscope thingiebop going with a vertical shape moving left and right, showing inside itself what’s beyond it, but as the sent went on it became more chaotic, so I used lots of feedbacking to get this kinda glitchy smearing effect, together with some trippy 3Dish look, single picture doesn’t show what I mean hah
- I used 2 pics from Disposable Planet, and I also tried to make some sort of planet in the middle of the screen, while using bit of feedbacking rotation in order to give this kind of feeling of stars and galaxy!
- h0ffman as a demoscene legend and rotating cube connoisseur, I tried to go for those demoscene vibes, have plenty of rotating cubes, but in the middle of the set I kind of made this somehow 3d-ish look, code was similar to what ****&c had, so I kept it going! From images I only used his ascii art made by ne7, and blended it with all the other crazy viz going on!
- DYST presented me an interesting challenge: dark shamanic ritual music, how do I make respectfully looking viz for that? I settled for kind of dark and organic looking slow visuals that were slowly showing and hiding image he sent me to use. I didn’t do much during his performance, I believed that was the good way of solving things
- L-Sync was the last set of the day, unfortunately delayed, and there’s only so much coffee and lack of sleep I can take, so after I’ve set up the basics, and his image and slick metallic looking viz were going, I enjoyed myself in his set hahah
- Next day, by special request, I’ve done also VJing for 64mula! I spoke with Toni/Barracuda, and he said "Madness, we dwell in it", I forgot exactly why, but we both liked the sentence so much, and I was doing some trippy poetry I suppose;
Experience
TL;DR: it's great innit
Longer answer:
- Having normal keyboard and not cramped position was very helpful in order to not break my fingers (lil finger especially);
-Mouse is also a must - I do mostly keep it off-screen, but sometimes I lose my cursor ;
- I love text library but updating the code meant that sometimes my browser just gave up and I had to refresh the page - no big deal, sketchy shit is part of the fun lol;
- Text makes VJing a very personalised experience, I thought to myself "Sure those kaleidoscopic shapes are cool but they don't mean much", whereas with text I could give more meaning to the performance, reacting to what audience is up to, or commenting on sketchy shit happening;
- I’d absolutely positively gladly do it again! I enjoyed every second of VJing with Hydra, and I’ll gladly continue to do so!
Finishing words
- Thanks to Les, Sumez, and Steph for your pics that I could include on this page;
- Thanks to all the artists involved for letting me publish the code and media used! Appropriate credits for media is gonna be placed on the repository;
- Thanks to [boggo] for teaching me few tricks on chill Pastagang meetup;
- Thanks to [bornach] for helping me out with python3 local file server, without you I wouldn’t be able to use artist images!
