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What is MidiVid GPU?

MidiVid GPU is the successor to the popular MidiVid application. It allows you to trigger full motion video and visual effects through MIDI, enabling you to sequence video the same way you sequence audio, or simply play it live.

MidiVid lets you control the playback of full screen video clips and still images on a PC by hitting keys on a properly connected MIDI controller. You can add multiple effects in real time and also affect the way video clips and stills appear on screen using velocity (how hard you hit a note) or MIDI controllers.

MidiVid may be free, but it is commercial quality software created by industry professionals. The source code is the property of Jason Dorie (DJ Midnight), a computer programmer in the video games industry, but has been released for others to learn from. Feel free to use, modify, and incorporate this code into your own projects, commercial or otherwise.

The primary user and director of the MidiVid project is Fred Pradel (DJ Lace), an electronic musician with many years of experience. This program is part of a commercial MIDI performance development project sponsored by VUTAG.

System Requirements

MidiVid GPU is a little power hungry. It requires DirectX 9.0c (Summer 2004) or better. DirectX 9.0c is a relatively small package, and can be found here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/directx/default.aspx You will also need a DirectX 9.0 compliant video card. The NVidia GeForce FX (or better) and the ATI Radeon 9700 (or better) are excellent cards with stable drivers. A Pentium 3 or better CPU is required; A Pentium 4 is recommended.

Note:: This is the base requirement for MidiVid GPU and the plugins that it ships with. New plugins may require hardware beyond this specification.

Capture Requirements

If you wish to use the video capture features of MidiVid, the best choice is a device that supports raw UYVY, YUYV, or YUY2 frame buffer output. The next best formats are IYUV and I420. MidiVid GPU does not currently support DV, MPEG2, or other hardware encoded capture formats. It will likely support these in the future, but there will very likely be a CPU cost to display them. Don't despair, however, as some DV devices present themselves in numerous formats compatible with MidiVid.

MidiVid has been tested with the Dazzle DVC90, and I suspect the DVC80 will work as well. If your capture device does not perform hardware video encoding into MPEG2 or DV formats, it will most likely work with MidiVid. We would be very pleased to hear of successes or failures with capture, as we would like to make this feature available to as wide an audience as possible.

Extending MidiVid

MidiVid GPU uses a plugin architecture for effects and video feeds, meaning that it can be expanded easily. For a list of the plugins in MidiVid, check out the MidiVid Plugins page. If you are a software developer and you're interested in writing your own MidiVid plugins, check out the section on developing plugins.

MidiVid History

The program was originally designed By Midnight and Lace for MIDI based control of digital video at live electronic concerts and Raves. The program was first used commercially in september 1999. On may 7th 2000 MidiVid 1.0 (RC1.08) was first released to the public as freeware via this site. The final version of MidiVid (1.1) was released in June 2000. Robotics control was introduced in Jan 2001 for MidiVid 1.12. MidiVid GPU began development in Sept, 2004 and continues today.