REOPENING PANDORAS BOX

While it may be a decimal point upgrade, the new Pandoras Box software version 5.7 from Coolux offers a lot of meat for the AV production community, with new features taking the projection and video-mapped LED system to a fully-fledged production tool.

Venue Sites

One of the interesting additions is the new Venue Sites facility, used for visualising complete stage, installation and show setups in real time using 3D models. Instead of just offering a standard 3D mapping approach for pre-visualisation, you can now use a real-time compositing environment as a complete whole to simulate video projectors virtually, using a light projection approach. The ability to seamlessly switch from one Venue Site to another makes comparing different design scenarios very easy and helps to save time and costs. You can also test and play around with the simulations of complex media installations so you could, for example, set up a spherical projection or a soft-edge projection without having to use real projectors in the process.

New Text Input

The new version also includes a completely re-designed text editor. Different font styles can now be used within a single text asset. Automatic horizontal and vertical scrolling capability is now included, and you can use and add an unlimited amount of text to a continuous text stream.

Audio Routing

A new audio feature makes it possible to input ASIO sound as well as HD-SDI embedded audio, opening up a new world of real-time media compositing. You can route, delay and record ASIO inputs, and sound data can be used on ASIO tracks and programmed to the timeline, including different delays for different output signal chains. Audio inputs can now be arranged on any Pandoras Box timeline, or can alternatively be triggered via external commands.

Pixel Accuracy

A range of helpful improvements for a Pixel-Oriented Workflow have been integrated to reflect the Pandoras Box’s true pixel accuracy. You can now decide to scale all content to the native resolution, even across several machines and across different resolutions. Pixels can be entered directly into the interface in order to position layers and cameras, and these settings can then also be applied directly by creating a new project without any further user action. The upgrade makes it easy to set up and use split pictures, and also aids the communication flow between operators and content designers who are used to thinking in terms of pixel values.

Coolux will present Pandoras Box Software Version 5.7 at IBC in Amsterdam this month along with various hardware products including the Pandoras Box Broadcast Server systems.

Source: media release

Coolux: www.coolux.de

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