The VideoLAN Forums

Could vlc make a video mosaic streaming or playing?

Yes, but:
-It's a bit tricky,
-Required the latest development version
-It's very cpu intensive

You should search in the vlc-devel mailing list archive for mosaic.

hth,

a sample vlm configuration file to make a mosaic:
and the VLC command line to launch it what it basically does :
take image_orange.uyvy as the background image
take 3 network streams as input
mix the video
add 1 audio channel per original network stream (or more if the original stream had more than one channel)
stream the resulting image/audio to a multicast ip address with an sap announce

Thanks, I´m going to test it now.

to generate the background image here is what i use: (you need it to be uyvy ...)

convert the original image (bmp, png, jpeg ...): test the image: test using the image in VLC:
(convert and display comme with the "imagemagick" package in linux debian)

This is what i´m looking for and runs well, thanks.

Is the use of an image as background mandatory ?

And another question: I read here http://wiki.videolan.org/index.php/Mosaic#Appendix that ffmpeg was
necessary, can someone confirm this ?

(I am trying to make a mosaic on Windows )

you can use another video stream as a background image.

ffmpeg isn't allways necessary, just highly recomended since it encodes/decodes most of the video codec you will use.

Ok thanks for the info.
It works ;o)

here's my working config :

Don't we have to connect to the vlm via telnet?

Well, I got the last example running, but now I tried to set an image as background. What could be wrong with the following code:

new channel1 broadcast enabled
setup channel1 input "scrubs.avi"
setup channel1 output #duplicate{dst=mosaic-bridge{id=1,height=150,width=250},select=video,dst=bridge-out{id=1},select=audio}

new channel2 broadcast enabled
setup channel2 input "psilodump.mpeg"
setup channel2 output #duplicate{dst=mosaic-bridge{id=2,height=150,width=250},select=video,dst=bridge-out{id=1},select=audio}


new background broadcast enabled
setup background input fake:
setup background output #switcher{files=C:\Program Files\VideoLAN\vlc-test\new.uyvy,sizes=500x300,command=1}:transcode{sfilter=mosaic,vcodec=mp2v,vb=1000,scale=1}:bridge-in{delay=400,id-offset=100}:duplicate{dst=display}


control background play
control channel1 play
control channel2 play


I'm startin the vlc as you recommended, and I'm not getting any error but no display either.

are you using vlc 0.8.2 ? the --vlm-conf option doesn't exist in 0.8.1

Yes I'm using the newest version. And I succeeded in arranging 3 videos, but putting the .uyvy-file as the background-image did'nt show anything at all.

Btw., I don't really know, what the switcher-module and the bridge-in is. I'd like to understand everything, but it's kind of complicated and the documentation lacks some good examples.

Anyway, thanks for any kind of suggestions.

the switcher module is in fact being deprecated (even though its all new). In latest versions, you can do :

vlc fake: --fake-file image.png

That is quite simpler then the switcher solution. (And you just need a png or jpeg file ... )

the switcher module basically takes a list of image and makes a video out of them.

the bridge module takes several elementary streams and groups them.

I've added a small diagram to the wiki page to explain how the differents bricks fit together.

Thanks man! I will post again in case of success.

This fake: command is not working.

new channel1 broadcast enabled
setup channel1 input "one.avi"
setup channel1 output #duplicate{dst=mosaic-bridge{id=1,height=150,width=250},select=video,dst=bridge-out{id=1},select=audio}

new channel2 broadcast enabled
setup channel2 input "two.mpeg"
setup channel2 output #duplicate{dst=mosaic-bridge{id=2,height=150,width=250},select=video,dst=bridge-out{id=2},select=audio}



new background broadcast enabled
setup background input fake: --fake-file="C:\VLC\bg.jpg"
setup background output #transcode{sfilter=mosaic,vcodec=WMV2,vb=1000,scale=1}:bridge-in{delay=400,id-offset=100}:duplicate{dst=display}

This is not showing anything, but loading massive stuff into memory.
I'm really frustrated right now, because I can't find my mistake.
And I still think, that some modules are not documented at all.
This one gives just too little information:
http://wiki.videolan.org/index.php/VLC_ ... -line_help

the --fake-file option needs to be passed to vlc on the command line, not in vlm

the switcher module is in fact being deprecated (even though its all new). In latest versions, you can do :

vlc fake: --fake-file image.png

That is quite simpler then the switcher solution. (And you just need a png or jpeg file ... )

crached down with no message, just:

[00000078] main module debug: using packetizer module "rawvideo"
/X/bin/mosaic-vlc: line 8: 2623 Killed vlc -vvv --vlm-conf /X/bin/mosaic.vlm.conf --no-audio --no-sout-audio --color -I telnet --vout X11 --v4l-chroma "I420" --mosaic-width 800 --mosaic-height 600 --mosaic-keep-picture --mosaic-rows 2 --mosaic-cols 2 --mosaic-position 1 --mosaic-order 1,2,3

You should try this instead :

Can I view picture localy with out transcode?

sure :

No! Not fake.
How to view mosaic localy with out transcode?

oh ... you need the transcode to do the mosaic. What you don't need to view it localy is the standard (or std). Just replace it with :display

wou wou wou
1. I want to view mosaic localy on my display
2. Whow to view it with out transcode? I try to remove vcodec, but vlc process freezing with this way

you can't do a mosaic without transcode. (but you might want to try to transcode to raw data ... but i don't know how that works. never tried it)