VinylVideo
May I introduce you to VinylVideo - probably the least commercially viable new product I've seen in quite some time, and yet I was compelled to buy one. It's half art project, half tech demo and 100% bizarre.
In a world of smartphones and more smartphones with the occasional smartphone, the not-at-all-smart VinylVideo has the power to stand out from the crowd and capture my attention. Thank goodness for oddballs and tech tinkerers - they're the ones that keep things interesting.
Here is the official website http://vinylvideo.supersense.com and there are other links in the youtube video description text box.
UPDATE
I’ve been advised by Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog in the comments that the Raspberry Pi wasn’t powered via usb - it’s powered via the GPIO pins. So I've gone back to do another re-edit to reword the section where I stated the opposite (we’re up to version 5.0 now). Anyway while I was there, I also took the opportunity to tidy up a couple of other bits (snips of fractions of a second) and also add in a section where the video is being played back from my main Denon turntable as per the request from Lance Boudreaux. A request that also got a heart/thumbs up from someone else - so that’s two people who wanted to see this. You can see this new section at around the 14 minute mark.
I hope this extra work results in more interest on youtube - my recent videos haven’t caught the attention of a wider viewership, despite them being well received by those who saw them. Fingers crossed this one is odd enough to get picked up by a popular tech or music website as I could do with scoring a hit, I’m starting to feel like I’m making Nicolas Cage movies.
Comments (62)
I really sympathise with you, Mat. When your channel was more a hobby than a career, it didn't matter if you made a video just because you found the subject interesting. Now it's your sole source of income, you are obviously slanting the content to get those important views, likes and subscribers - and of course patrons. This isn't necessarily dumbing down, but trying to please more and more people with every video you make, must be becoming almost as stressful as a nine to five office job. Working from home, doing something you love is of course rewarding, but having to keep watching all the stats must be wearing.
I do still try and make videos about the things that really interest me, but you're correct, I am very conscious of which videos have underperformed. More often than not they've been the ones I liked the best. I try and make a mixture of more economical, less complicated videos, and others that take longer and cost more. I suppose these are my passion projects. If I were just going for the money, I could drop the passion projects and only make the cheaper simpler videos as they often seem to bring in the same revenue and views as the more elaborate videos. However I like to keep myself interested, have some fun and experience new things even when it's at the expense of views and income.
Just catching up here. I'm with you, Mat, this is way more interesting than the latest iSomething. You might like 'Slow Scan TV' which radio hams use to send pictures over audio. There won't be a video in it, but you might find it interesting.
I've heard about slow scan - but I'd guess it would be too complicated/expensive/time-consuming to get into. I haven't looked into it but I'd imagine there are some good channels that cover Ham radio.
Bonkers, but I love these people who think " I reckon we could.." and go and do it.
Hi Mat, Have you tried playing back that recording you made on Audacity into the VinylVideo decoder to see if it recreates the video? Or maybe record it onto one of your many audio tape formats. I would be surprised if it doesn't work.
I too was certain until I came to the end of the video that Mat would dub this audio onto a compact cassette, 8-track, or something else fun and analog. Or go the opposite direction and try them as MP3s (wonder if the compression would break it) or WAVs on an iPhone!
I absolutely love this idea. What a crazy format.
Funnily enough yesterday I tried recording the audio to a couple of formats - a chrome tape on a Sony WM-D6C and a DCC in the 175 you repaired. The video wasn't as 'good' on either - but the DCC edged it. I may make a quick video for patrons only about this if I can find the time.
Unusual? Yes. Insane? Perhaps. Bizarre? Absolutely! Even so, there's still something fascinating about the images. Like a childhood dream. Great job Mat- thanks very much for sharing that (and thanks to you as well, Randy).
Let's all try and send the YouTube release of this video to all of the Gizmodo's and Wired's to see if we can garner some interest and exposure from them. I imagine if a bunch of people tweet links to them, they would at least check it out and possibly even do an article on it.
Good news. Hopefully this will result in a bit of a bump in new viewers.
Epic, this is exactly the kind of oddball content I enjoy!
10th Dan hipster is the perfect description. I guess 11th Dan would be Tefifon video. I’m sure the decoder could decode it if only someone would produce Tefi cartridges in with the appropriate data on them....
This is wonderful - thanks Mat! The video quality from a 7" vinyl disc is not at all bad, considering. Broadcast tv used to look and sound like that in the 1960s as far as I can recall. Great work as always, Mat.
This is fun! Thanks for sharing.
I know right! I'm fascinated by this. I wish there was more content because I could see myself getting a setup to play with.
I would really like to see how the turntable in your hi-fi plays the vinylvideo disc since the literature says that differences in record player quality shows up more pronounced in video than in audio. I imagine the picture would be quite different with less noise.
I've updated the video with a demonstration of the video being played by my Denon turntable now - it starts at around 14:00
This is amazing! How did you find out about this format?
It was down to a helpful viewer - Randy Riddle.
Man... I wish I could be half as passionate the creator of this is about their product with ANYTHING. Awesome vid!
John Logie Baird had his Phonovision system in 1928 or so, although it didn't work well enough to be commercialised. More successful were a couple of enthusiast recordings of off-air 30-line television in the early 30s, recorded onto home disc cutting machines. Now there's an obsolete format..
Did you get a chance to mess around with the playback speed of the record while the video was playing? I'm assuming that since there is a calibration phase, it would be able to correct for small differences in record speed by a little extra buffering.
I didn't - however here's some relevant information from the manual (available from here: <a href="https://supersense.com/downloads/VinylVideo/VinylVideo_User_Manual.pdf" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://supersense.com/downloads/VinylVideo/VinylVideo_User_Manual.pdf</a> ) VinylVideo® records normally run at 45 rpm. However, try playing one at 331⁄3 rpm – it will work. If your turntable has Pitch Adjust, you can even try playing around with it. VinylVideo® can follow speed changes, as long as they are occurring not too abruptly. However, just like any video system, VinylVideo® must be able to “orientate” itself and locate certain important features within the signal – the beginning of a video frame, or the beginning of each scanline. Therefore, starting playback from scratch (“initial synchronization”) is only possible at more or less exactly 45 or 331⁄3 rpm. And while we’re talking about it, unfortunately scratching is not possible. Many DJs would expect to scratch the record manually back and forth and watch the video image move along, or warp itself in reaction to the DJ’s movements. There are systems that make something like this possible, but they are of a completely different nature than VinylVideo®. They employ special records that contain only a relatively simple time code, nothing more. When the DJ scratches, the system is still able to recognize the simple time code and control any external video or audio source accordingly. With VinylVideo®, however, all of the video and audio information comes directly from the groove. When the DJ scratches back and forth, only a very tiny part of the information from one single video frame actually moves past the pickup needle. From this information, a complete image could never be constructed, and the decoder would even have no chance at all to find out which scanline of the image has just been delivered, and at what speed (or direction). A system like VinylVideo® simply cannot work with DJ scratching – if it could, it would be cheating (like using intermediate digital memory and playing back from there, not live from the record). Faithful reproduction of video signals places special demands on the carrier medium and playback equipment. Vinyl records and turntables were not invented for video and always distort the signal in a characteristic way that is rather insignificant for the human ear, but becomes very noticeable when the signal is viewed as video. Furthermore, great variations are possible between different turntables and pickup systems. Therefore, the VinylVideo® unit is capable to calibrate itself to the exact properties of any particular playback setup, to ensure the best possible viewing experience in each case. There exists a good example to illustrate what is going on: Some of the best and most expensive home video tape recorders could be automatically calibrated for different kinds of magnetic tape formulation. In the case of VinylVideo®, the calibration aims to compensate e.g. for the typical distortions that are due to the different geometrical shape of cutting stylus and pickup needle, and the frequency response of the whole playback system.
That's intriguing! video and audio, packed together as a digital signal in what was intended to be an audio carrier. I wonder how far you could go with that. Digital Compact Cassette uses a 384kbps data stream (encoded in MPEG 1 layer 1). Hmmm that gives me an idea for a project... :-)
According to the promotional material it's supposed to be analogue - but it all get a bit confusing for me when it's being 'decoded' by a computer.
We need to celebrate the weird and unusual sometimes - this product as you say is more like an art project but I am fascinated by it. Like you I am bored by incremental smartphone wars.
... especially given how small the increments are now.
You could do that with a Raspberry Pi!
You'll probably need to replace the caps, though ...
VinylVideo could be called the $2000 update of Polavision ... but lacks the washed-out color of the 1977 original. Also reminiscent of Pixelvision video.
UPDATE - I've just swapped out the video with a slightly tweaked version. The odd tiny nip and tuck here and there. UHD/4K is still processing, but the 1080p is available.
upload a version at 225kps like the exhibition you reference in 2003!
So modern CED kinda? Will watch later
Very cute project! BTW, the files shown in the snap-shots are available here: <a href="https://supersense.com/downloads/VinylVideo/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://supersense.com/downloads/VinylVideo/</a> - you might want to add that to the description. As far as I can tell the actual application is proprietary so that link just sets-up the environment it runs in.
Yes I thought I'd seen the source code somewhere - but with so many things going on I tend to lose track over time. I'll add that into the links - thanks.
Very neat! And there is an interesting title for me as Holger Czukay and his band Can are great 🤘🏻
Ok. I still wonder why anyone decided to to this in 1998. Bad audio, bad video, hey! Let’s do it!
And if you want to forestall some comments on "why change what works" regarding using a Raspberry Pi — the reason to change it would be because Pis are not sold as a component for integration in a commercial product and so you have no guarantees of its continued availability, functioning exactly as previous batches, or reliability in edge cases. These reasons of course do not apply to something as low-volume as this product.
I'm going to leave that part in as if I were selling perhaps fifty of these at most and it was a choice of trying to find a Chinese manufacturer to make a custom circuit for me - who would probably want a minimum order of a thousand, or buying a box of Raspberry Pis - I know what I'd do. I've seen too many Kickstarter horror stories about how things can go off the rails as soon as you involve manufacturers.
I expect the reason for the visible herringbone pattern (and the way it sounds played back as audio) would be the regularly-spaced video frames in the signal — each one is almost the same as the previous, but has variations, and there must be some kind of "beginning of frame" sync signal to keep the video aligned with the disc playback speed. So the groove has a strong repeating pattern. (If the video had a higher frame rate the pattern would be finer.)
That makes sense.
Well, I have to admit it's a fascinating device, albeit completely useless. I'd be more interested in the technical details of how it is stored on the record. For example, I'd love to see an audacity screenshot of the recorded audio from the audio/video side of the thing. If it does less than 30 fps (or 25 fps in PAL region) then that means it has to have some sort of framebuffer. No big deal today, but if this came out int he late 80s originally then that means they had to have some pretty expensive hardware in there.
It was more late 90s than 80s originally - but I'll find the sample I recorded earlier and get a screenshot for you, perhaps I'll even add it into the re-editied version if it looks intersting.
Ahhhh that old school Sony monitor. Those were the days... hours in the studio waiting for my buddy to finish his (analog) edits.
I found those videos EXTREMELY creepy. I can totally see this as some haunted house set up where they claim the records are HAUNTED and contain video messages from the past or something. Great job!
Interesting idea. It's almost too bad that there's no real use for it except to demonstrate that it's possible to store analog video on vinyl. Let's see how long it takes for someone to put digital video on a record (similar to a datasette). You could probably put an HD signal on there. Of course that wouldn't be "cool". ;)
Funny, I never imagined you being the kind of person to wear tight skinny jeans and drink Mexican spiced latte. :) Too bad everything in this world isn't built and packaged like this product!
I really appreciated the beautiful packaging, art work and very nice steel box. A labour of love.
As do I - I fear this one may be far too arty for most of the youtube audience who seem to be happier arguing over the almost imperceptible differences between Samsung Galaxy something vs iPhone X something. Meanwhile there's one guy over in Vienna putting his heart and soul (and solder) into a bizarre low-fi gadget. I suspect that most comments will be along the lines of - "wow a Raspberry Pi - I bet I could build one of these for $30" (but instead I'll probably just keep eating these Cheetos).
Colour me surprised. It may be low-resolution, it may be low-frame-rate, but it still works.
Your vid description describes it perfectly. The 10th dan hipster did make me smile but you make a fair point for the mad world that is YouTube comments.
I should mention that I'm going to re-record the spoken outro, as I'm not particularly happy with the way it flows. I'm anticipating that there are people who will think I'm using the term Hipster in a derogatory sense even though I'm just using the dictionary definition. So the version that goes live on Monday will be slightly different at the end - but that's it.
Deliberately using old media in ways they've not been used? Sound about right for that particular term nowadays. I don't think anyone's going to be using "aesthetic" in the comments, either - not enough neon lights and LCDs for the 80s retro fans here.
I was just thinking that, instead of a cult film director, we might see this in sort of sci-fi movie in the near future, playing in the background like it was a common thing then. Something dark, perhaps the Blade Runner prequel.
Another fascinating format discovery! Completely unnecessary for pretty much everyone else, but I can picture in my head right now a cult film director putting a 3-4 minute horror movie short on VinylVideo, perhaps as a bonus item relating to a bigger project or something. The retro sleeves are a great touch too.
Wow. Almost tempting, but there's nothing of interest to be out on the format, even as a novelty.
I was hoping for a few tracks I'd recognise - none of these are really up my street.
Thanks Mat.
The tv standard was almost a british mechanical standard, saw a documentary about that recently
Cheers Matt looks like interesting!