@digithree said:

Hi, I'm pretty new to pd but understand many of the concepts as I've been a written language programmer for quite some time.

I'm wondering if anyone knows a way to stream or grab video from other applications / programs running on a system for mixing with other videos in pd? I can mix videos, got those examples to work and have been playing with them.

However I want to mix in video from a program called IBNIZ (http://pelulamu.net/ibniz/), which is a live visual/audio coding lauguage. Any ideas?

I found this and it seems like it's up the right alley but not specifically to do with streaming / grabbing video from programs, right? http://puredata.info/community/conventions/convention09/zmolnig.pdf

Thanks for any help in this,
d3

Hi d3,

It’s great to see you diving into video mixing with Pure Data! Grabbing or streaming video from another program like IBNIZ and mixing it in PD can indeed be tricky but is definitely possible with the right setup.

To grab video from external programs, you might consider the following approaches:

Screen Capture to Video Stream:
Use screen-capture software to stream the output from IBNIZ as a virtual webcam or a video feed. Tools like OBS Studio can help capture specific application windows and broadcast them as an RTMP stream or virtual camera. Then, you can bring that stream into PD using external libraries like GEM or Ofelia.

Direct Integration:
If IBNIZ has an option to output its visuals to a shared memory buffer or as a video stream, you could capture that directly in PD using plugins or extensions that handle video input.

External Tools:
Another possibility is using middleware like FFmpeg to convert the IBNIZ output into a format that PD can read. For example, you could use FFmpeg to stream the visuals to a local server and then access that stream from PD.

Feel free to share updates or questions—I'd love to hear how your project progresses!