How to connect your laptop to your TV

I have gotten several questions about how to watch our NewSpring Web Campus on your HDTV with a group of friends.  Here is a very general guide on how to make that happen:

In order to connect your laptop to your HDTV you are first going to have to get determine what video and audio outputs your laptop has. The following are a list of some of the most prevalent possible outputs.

Video outputs:

1. S-Video


2. VGA


3. DVI


4. HDMI

Audio outputs:

1. 1/8” headphone jack


2. HDMI


3. USB audio output

If you have either S-Video, VGA or DVI outputs these are video only meaning that the audio will have to be run separately.

Most modern laptops circa 2006-present will have a DVI out which is usually supported by many HDTVs along with an 1/8” audio input. If your HDTV and laptop both have this then is probably the most straight forward and cheapest route.

If you are going to use S-Video make sure that your and laptop both use an S-Video cable with the same number of pins either 4 or 7.  Most laptops with S-Video have 7 pin.

Possible options:

1. If your TV has an 1/8” input that can be paired with one of the first 3 video inputs then you can use a 1/8” to 1/8” cable.


2. If your TV has RCA jacks paired with one of the first 3 video inputs then you can use a 1/8” to 2 RCA cable.

If your laptop has a VGA output, but your HDTV does not have a DVI input you can use a VGA to DVI adapter and then follow the above steps.

If your laptop has a DVI output, but your HDTV does not have a DVI input you can use a DVI to composite video adapter or a DVI to HDMI cable.  This however will only provide you with video because even though it is outputing HDMI it is only getting a DVI, video only, feed in. Many HDTVs will not allow you to pair a separate audio input such as RCA or 1/8” source up with an HDMI input which means you will need to have another way to play audio if you want bigger speakers than the ones on your laptop.  This can be achieved by:

1. Hooking up desktop speakers to the laptop via the headphone output.


2. Running an 1/8” to 1/8” cable to a stereo receiver hooked to external speakers.


3. Running an 1/8” to 2 RCA cable to a stereo receiver hooked to external speakers.

After you get the laptop connected you may have to adjust your screen resolution and refresh rate to be compatible with the settings of your HDTV.

This post only attempts to address some of the many combinations of audio/video inputs and outputs available on HDTVs and laptops.

It is also reported that you can watch the NewSpring Web Campus via a PlayStation 3, but since I don’t have one I can’t verify this.  If you would like to give me a PS3 to test this claim, I would gladly do it.

This is a great way to watch the NewSpring Web Campus or NewSpring’s Video On Demand with a group of friends. If you click on the video on either one of these sites it will make the video go full screen.

What I’ve been doing

Ifyou haven’t heard much from me lately, it is because I am transitioning into my new role at NewSpring. My new role in a very small nutshell is producing and directing web media. Currently this means preparing for the launch of our Web Campus (WC or DubC for all you hipsters).
I promise that once we get the WC boat up and sailing, the number of posts and other social networking goodies around here will increase.
Until then, here is a shot of how my office looks now with the WC A-Control in it.

Timelapse with your DSLR

I am pretty excited about trying this tutorial. Up until I found this article, I had been hung up on not having an intervalometer, but now I know I can put my old TI-83 to good use.

Strobist overclocking

In case you missed it, John and I were in Charlotte last weekend for the Southern Short Course, while there we had a little fun overclocking some SB-800s go check out David’s post here.

Dead or Alive Video

There have been quite a few questions about how we did the Dead or Alive video (below, but with added live footage) for the Unleash conference. If you were in the Production Breakout at Unleash you will recall Ken talking how sometimes we pitch video ideas to Perry and our senior management team and sometimes Perry will come to us with a clearly defined idea of what he wants. In the case of the Dead or Alive video he came to us with a fairly complete idea of what he wanted.

See the first notes mainly Shane, our creative arts pastor and my notes (warning legibility is questionable and I started taking notes from the second ideas on the first). Later after talking to Perry a little more, Shane came back with mainly the same ideas, but a few new things.

Lee gave me a reference click of him strumming the guitar and singing the words along with a metronome beat that we send to the in-ear monitors that the band wears while playing in order to keep them on tempo.

I used Handbrake and Mpeg Streamclip to rip the Passion DVD footage into a .mov file. I then took the DVD footage into Final Cut Pro and began to lay down the pieces that Perry had asked for. After getting the key pieces Perry wanted in place, I started finding and laying in the other scenes that were needed in order to convey the overall message that Perry needed. In addition to the Passion footage, I added in the dirt road footage because of the feel and meaning that it added to the piece.

Next, I showed the firest cut to Perry to get his feedback. He was fine with everything except for when the beating started and how long it lasted. Those two things did not fit with the vision that God had given him for this piece. Personally, I liked the first version just fine, but God did not give me the message to preach at Unleash, and therefore I did not know what the video should look like to support that message. As I blogged about previously, it is not about my personal preference it is about reaching people for Jesus and I know that Perry knows that it is not about his personal preference, it is about what God wants. I trust Perry’s leadership and know that if he needs a video a certain way in order to make the point that God has told him to make, then I will create the video in such a manner.

After getting that feedback, I then changed that part of the video, tightened some stuff up and added in the scripture passages that were composited by the talented Ben Coleman.

As a side note, I love the comradery that we have as a staff, if you don’t believe it, check out this snipit out of the reference click from Lee, I was rolling on the ground when I caught that part.

Hopefully, this helps explains how we make a video that Perry has a direct vision for happen. Let me know if you have any further questions.
[qt:http://www.willrodes.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/doa/doa.m4v http://www.willrodes.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/doa/doa-poster.mov 480 286]

Sunday service to web

Yesterday I got a call from two guys at Barefoot Community Church asking about how our process of putting the service on the web. I had been planning on writing this post for awhile, but one thing after another kept pushing it to the back burner.

Let me start out by stating that this is not the only way to this, there are certainly infinitely more ways to go about taking a service and putting it on the web, this is simply the way that we are doing it at this time and it works for us. Yes, capturing to DVDs is not the highest quality nor the most reliable way, but for the sole purpose of rendering out a streaming flash file to post on the web it is a much cheaper alternative to buying 5 Mac Pros or 5 tape decks to capture to. Please note that the settings that I use may not work for you depending on your editing software and your streaming video host’s player settings, so adjust accordingly.

Equipment list:
-Cameras: Sony DXC-D50WS w/ CCU-TX50
-Switcher: Ross Synergy 100 
-DVD Recorders: Panasonic DMR-ES15
-Edit Computer: Apple G5
-Software: MPEG Streamclip, Final Cut Pro, Adobe CS3 Design Premium
-Streaming Video Hosting- Lightcast Media


For other gear download our Production FAQs(.pdf).

Process:

The feeds from our 4 cameras are sent to both the Ross switcher as well as each feed is sent to a separate DVD recorder. In addition to the 4 DVD recorders for the cameras we have one more DVD recorder that recieves our program feed- the same thing that is shown on the screens in the auditorium (it has any kind of DSKs (down stream keys), videos or motionbacks played off the DVRs and any full screen graphics). At the end of Sunday Perry lets me know which message he thought the preaching was best in and Justin lets me know which one he thought the worship was best during. I am glad that I don’t have to make that call because Perry and the band deliver with excellence each and every service.

I then take the program feed DVD(s) from that(those) service(s) and rip the video back off of them using MPEG Streamclip to convert it to a .mov. Here is a screenshot of the settings that I use. This takes on average about 45 minutes per disc and the resulting .mov is usually between 15-20GB. I then take the .movs into Final Cut to edit them, removing anything that needs to be taken out such as transitions that may seem overly long for people not in viewing the service in person. E.g. if Lee has to switch from guitar to piano- if you are in the auditorium even though the lights are down, you can still see him putting down the guitar and moving to the piano, but on the internet you would not be able to tell anything, all you would see is a black screen and may think that the video is over.

Once the video has been edited I then export the service using the Quicktime Conversion option in Final Cut to a .flv using the Flash CS3 encoder. Here is a screenshot of the settings that I use. The final .flv takes about 7 hours to export and is usually between 300-350MB. This is then uploaded to LightCast via their web upload interface.

If you have any questions feel free to contact me either via comment here or via email will.rodes@newspring.cc.

CreativeMYK

Check out CreativeMYK.com it is a new resource of free photos and graphics from Christian Photographers and Graphic Designers- looks promising, plus they are having a contest to win a free iPhone.

Pallet inspired

Yesterday Kelly and I cleaned out the garage in order to get rid of some extra stuff we had laying around and better organize the stuff we wanted to keep. We have a few yard tools that don’t fit on the rack that I had previously made so we needed another one. I got inspired by a landscaper’s trailer that I saw going down the interstate a few weeks ago. The guy had taken an old pallet and turned it upright and bolted it to his trailer in order to hold his shovels and rakes. Thus I built the holder above. Ridiculously simple to build and quite easy to use.

Where’s the ball?

Screenshot of a piece I am building for the children’s area at NewSpring. The whole piece will be posted once it has aired.

(Click the screenshot for a couple more teaser shots.)

Car camera mount

When you try to order something and it doesn’t come in when you need, then you have to improvise…the footage from this will be for an upcoming piece at NewSpring.