Owner HUD 1.4
Following on from the introduction of audio and video media playback in Mesmerizer 1.8.0, Owner HUD 1.4 will add support for these features too. As of Mesmerizer 1.8,0, Audio and Video streams are defined in notecards, with names beginning with either "Audio:" or "Video:". Prior to version 1.8.0, the Mesmerizer already supported notecards to describe images, using notecards with a "Image:" prefix to their names, which allowed for various optional features (e.g. animated images, specifying a non-default alpha). In the near future I intend to support a "Sound:" notecard to allow things like looping, duration, and volume of sounds to be specified.
One significant drawback in the current implementation of the use of notecards to specify media parameters is that the notecards need to exist within the target Mesmerizer. While the existing Installer and AutoInstaller products support uploading of these new notecard types into a Mesmerizer, having to prepare an Installer or load an AutoInstaller means that you can't decide on a whim to play back a media fragment to the sub. Owner HUD 1.4 will address this, by supporting playback of media notecards from the inventory of the Owner HUD, rather than that of the Mesmerizer.
The existing Owner HUD side-panel that was previously used to display textures (typically used to view #RLV images) is now a full media panel, in which images and audio and video streams can be previewed, and if desired, sent to the target Mesmerizer for playback. This allows a hypnotist to load their Owner HUD with a collection of media notecards, simply by dragging them onto the HUD from inventory, and then select and play any of them for the sub.
As before, the media panel slides out from behind the HUD using the small control at bottom left of the HUD. You can choose whether it should slide out to the left or below the main HUD. Once the panel is exposed, clicking on it now results in a new menu, with "Clr Preview" "Image Key", "Media..." and "Send Stop" buttons, as well as (if media is being previewed) a "Send Media" button. "Image Key" supports the original function of this panel - allowing a texture key to be provided and the corresponding image displayed in the panel. The "Media..." button prompts for one of four categories of media (Audio, Video, Image and Sound), and then allows a choice of loaded notecards of the selected type. The "Sound" type is not yet implemented and should be thought of as a place-holder for now.
Selecting a notecard will cause the media to be displayed on the panel, and the "Send Media" button in the panel's menu will now be active, allowing the media currently being previewed to be sent to the target Mesmerizer(s). The Owner HUD offers limited A/V media controls for the preview panel - basically the ability to pause the media, or stop and rewind to the beginning.
The "Send Stop" button simply issues stopv and clear commands to stop any playing media on the target Mesmerizer(s). The "Clr Preview" button clears the preview screen, but does not affect the target Mesmerizers.
As always, Owner HUD features are fully remote-capable (when used with a Communications Hub and Communicator), so media may now be transmitted to a sub wherever they are in SL.
Media notecards are a convenient way to distribute media along with playback parameters. In addition, they provide some features that can aid in organizing and locating media. For instance, all media notecards support a "desc" keyword, that allows you to provide a description of the media. This description can cover several lines, as multiple desc= lines may be used, allowing you to use this to provide a synopsis of the media content. The Mesmerizer's audinfo and vidinfo commands will display the desc fields from a notecard, and the Owner's HUD media panel menu will also display these fields for the currently-selected media notecard (subject to a length limit in the menu header).
CHAOS Media Library
If you collect a significant number of media notecards, it can be tough to find an appropriate notecard to play back. A future product - the CHAOS Media Library - is intended to help with this. It uses a keyword-based system, similar to the Visualizer, and lets you search for media based on combinations of keywords. The Visualizer deals with textures and therefore has to store the keyword data separately; the use of media notecards by the Media Library allows for the keywords to be included within the notecards themselves. A media notecard may contain one or more kwd= lines, each containing a comma-separated list of keywords that apply to the media. These lines are currently ignored by both the Mesmerizer and the Owner HUD, although future releases may at a minimum display them. The Media Library uses them to permit searches - for instance "Find all videos that feature a blonde in latex". The user can then view the individual notecards to read the description, and send promising ones either to the owner HUD for preview, or directly to a target Mesmerizer.
I expect to release the CHAOS Media Library soon after Owner Hud 1.4.
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