Clusterable, accelerated and cloud-fit video server, both pre-assembled and in kit form. Welcome to a hackable vision mixing video server that is designed to support HD/SD/HDR/UHD out-of-the-box.
A contribution to the democratization of professional video and graphics production.
With phaneron, you have all the pieces necessary to use a gaming-style PC - with a multi-core CPU and a competant GPU - to build multi-layer, multi-channel video servers using Node.JS. Or why not go virtual - with a vGPU - in the cloud? Entirely configured in software, choose from:
- producers - file (via FFmpeg), stream (via FFmpeg), live SDI (via Blackmagic), HTTP(S) (from another phaneron) and ROUTE (from another channel)
- processors - mix and composite video, all written using GPU-accelerated floating-point maths
- consumers - outputs including SDI (via Blackmagic), files (vai FFmpeg), streams (via FFmpeg), HTTP(S) to another phaneron
All the bits that need to go super-fast are written as native bindings - such as to FFmpeg/libav - or exposed as editable OpenCL functions. You can write your GPU acceleration from within node source code! An extensible library of accelerated functions is provided for broadcast applications, including:
- colour space conversions - YUV to RGB and back, BT.709 to BT.2020 and back, support for Adobe RGB, apply gamma functions
- de-interlacing - turn 1080i50 inputs into 1080p25 or 1080p50 on the GPU, and vice versa
- bit packing and unpacking - floating point to/from 8/10-bit raw, including the v210 bit-packed format commonly used on SDI cards
As an example of what could be hacked together with this server, a subset of the CasparCG AMCP protocol has been implemented.
The endgame for this serer is illustrated in the diagram below.
From the bottom up:
- hardware - use PC grade hardware, real or virtual, x86 or ARM, your choice of NVideo/AMB or Intel (good luck) GPU, dedicated hardware
- operating system - Windows, Mac OS or Linux
- native libraries - for fast processing, memory management and asychronous non-blocking multi-thread processing
- node modules - exposed as Node.JS modules using Promise-based APIs
- stream plumbing - plumbed together using reactive streams with redioactive, including across the network via HTTP/S (and RDMA in the data centre)
- controller - its just Node Javascript code ... so can be combined with any other node package, including an AMCP controller, OSC, mqtt, websockets, GraphQL, etc..
- frontend - build web tools or installed applications, with examples of access to raw RGB for ultra-low-latency local preview and MJPEG for wider-area output
Can it do 4k/8k - we'll let you know once we've finished testing it.
All contributions to building out this vision are welcome.
From the greek for visible or showable, we interpret the machine-based phaneron as a way to represent audio/visual worlds, real or fantasy, as filtered by sensory input. Use this phaneron to tell a story, paint a picture, or convey emotion.
Install a recent version of Node.JS - v12 or v14 are being used in development. Also, make sure git is installed and note that we prefer to use yarn as a package manager - although npm should also work.
Install the Blackmagic drivers - even if you don't want to use Blackmagic hardware. Yes - we know - we're working on it.
Make sure your system can build native modules using node-gyp. Check the prerequisites for your platform.
Phaneron uses beamcoder and naudiodon - check the prerequisites for your platform.
Set a system-wide environment variable UV_THREADPOOL_SIZE to a value greater than the number of CPU cores available, e.g. 32.
Clone the github project:
git clone http://github.com/Streampunk/phaneron.git
cd phaneron
Install the dependencies and build this typescript project (substitute npm for yarn if you prefer):
yarn install
yarn build
To run the example AMCP client, start a phaneron with:
yarn start
Take a note of the OpenCL accelerator - is it using the expected GPU? Are there any other error messages?
At the prompt, try to play a file on channel 1 layer 1. As an example, the AMB file provided with CasparCG:
AMCP> PLAY 1-1 AMB
If you have a Decklink card installed, you should see the file playing.
Details of how to import * from 'phaneron' and do stuff!
tbd
Phanaron implements a subset of the AMCP protocol documented here
The commands currently supported are as follows:
Syntax:
LOADBG [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]} [clip:string] {[loop:LOOP]} {SEEK [frame:int]} {LENGTH [frames:int]} {[auto:AUTO]}
Loads a producer in the background and prepares it for playout. If no layer is specified the default layer index will be used.
clip is a full path to a media file which will be parsed by available registered producer factories. If a successful match is found, the producer will be loaded into the background on the specified video_channel and layer.
loop will cause the clip to loop.
When playing and looping the clip will start at frame.
When playing and loop the clip will end after frames number of frames.
auto will cause the clip to automatically start when foreground clip has ended (without play). Note: only one clip can be queued to play automatically per layer.
Examples:
>> LOADBG 1-1 M:/MY_FILE.mxf
>> LOADBG 1-1 M:/MY_FILE.mxf LOOP SEEK 200 LENGTH 400 AUTO
Syntax:
LOAD [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0} [clip:string] {"additional parameters"}
Loads a clip to the foreground and plays the first frame before pausing. If any clip is playing on the target foreground then this clip will be replaced.
See LOADBG for additional parameters
Examples:
>> LOAD 1-1 M:/MY_FILE.mxf
Syntax:
PLAY [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0} {[clip:string]} {"additional parameters"}
Moves clip from background to foreground and starts playing it.
If additional parameters (see LOADBG) are provided then the provided clip will first be loaded to the background.
Examples:
>> PLAY 1-1
>> PLAY 1-1 M:/MYFILE.mxf
Syntax:
PAUSE [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0}
Pauses playback of the foreground clip on the specified layer. The RESUME command can be used to resume playback again.
Examples:
>> PAUSE 1-1
Syntax:
RESUME [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0}
Resumes playback of a foreground clip previously paused with the PAUSE command.
Examples:
>> RESUME 1-1
Syntax:
STOP [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0}
Removes the foreground clip of the specified layer.
Examples:
>> STOP 1-1
Syntax:
CLEAR [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]}
Removes all clips (both foreground and background) of the specified layer. If no layer is specified then all layers in the specified video_channel are cleared.
Examples:
>> CLEAR 1
...clears everything from the entire channel 1.
>> CLEAR 1-3
...clears only layer 3 of channel 1.
Syntax:
ADD [video_channel:int]{-[consumer_index:int]} [consumer:string] [parameters:string]
Adds a consumer to the specified video_channel. The string consumer will be parsed by the available consumer factories. If a successful match is found a consumer will be created and added to the video channel. Different consumers require different parameters, some examples are below. Consumers can alternatively be specified by updating the config class in the index.ts file.
Specifying consumer_index overrides the index that the consumer itself decides and can later be used with the REMOVE command to remove the consumer.
Examples:
>> ADD 1 SCREEN
>> ADD 1 DECKLINK 1
Syntax:
REMOVE [video_channel:int]{-[consumer_index:int]} {[parameters:string]}
Removes an existing consumer from video_channel. If consumer_index is given, the consumer will be removed via its id. If parameters are given instead, the consumer matching those parameters will be removed.
Not yet implemented
Syntax:
MIXER [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0} FILL {[x:float] [y:float] [x-scale:float] [y-scale:float]}
Scales/positions the video stream on the specified layer. The concept is quite simple; it comes from the ancient DVE machines like ADO. Imagine that the screen has a size of 1x1 (not in pixel, but in an abstract measure). Then the coordinates of a full size picture is 0 0 1 1, which means left edge is at coordinate 0, top edge at coordinate 0, width full size = 1, heigh full size = 1.
If you want to crop the picture on the left side (for wipe left to right) You set the left edge to full right => 1 and the width to 0. So this give you the start-coordinates of 1 0 0 1.
End coordinates of any wipe are allways the full picture 0 0 1 1.
With the FILL command it can make sense to have values between 1 and 0, if you want to do a smaller window. If, for instance you want to have a window of half the size of your screen, you set with and height to 0.5. If you want to center it you set left and top edge to 0.25 so you will get the arguments 0.25 0.25 0.5 0.5
x
The new x position, 0 = left edge of monitor, 0.5 = middle of monitor, 1.0 = right edge of monitor. Higher and lower values allowed.
y
The new y position, 0 = top edge of monitor, 0.5 = middle of monitor, 1.0 = bottom edge of monitor. Higher and lower values allowed.
x-scale
The new x scale, 1 = 1x the screen width, 0.5 = half the screen width. Higher and lower values allowed. Negative values flips the layer.
y-scale
The new y scale, 1 = 1x the screen height, 0.5 = half the screen height. Higher and lower values allowed. Negative values flips the layer.
The positioning and scaling is done around the anchor point set by MIXER ANCHOR.
Examples:
>> MIXER 1-0 FILL 0.25 0.25 0.5 0.5
Syntax:
MIXER [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0} ANCHOR {[x:float] [y:float]}
Changes the anchor point of the specified layer, or returns the current values if no arguments are given.
The anchor point is around which MIXER FILL and MIXER ROTATION will be done from.
x
The x anchor point, 0 = left edge of layer, 0.5 = middle of layer, 1.0 = right edge of layer. Higher and lower values allowed.
y
The y anchor point, 0 = top edge of layer, 0.5 = middle of layer, 1.0 = bottom edge of layer. Higher and lower values allowed.
Examples:
>> MIXER 1-10 ANCHOR 0.5 0.6
Syntax:
MIXER [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0} ROTATION {[angle:float]}
Modifies the angle which a layer is rotated by (clockwise degrees) around the point specified by MIXER ANCHOR.
Examples:
>> MIXER 1-0 ROTATION 45
Syntax:
MIXER [video_channel:int]{-[layer:int]|-0} VOLUME {[volume:float]}
Changes the volume of the specified layer. 1.0 is the original volume, which can be attenuated or amplified.
Examples:
>> MIXER 1-0 VOLUME 1.5
(c) 2020 Streampunk Media Ltd
GPL v3 or later.
License chosen is because the beamcoder library is linked to phaneron and uses a static build of FFmpeg that is GPL v3 or later.
Note: Technically, phaneron could be linked with a version of FFmpeg that is not GPL. Practically, this has associated maintenance, takes time and has a cost.