View Full Version : video displayed on multiple screens?


Alec Wheeler
January 10th, 2010, 11:23 PM
apparently I'm doing an awful job searching, cuz I'm getting nothing

I am currently in pre-production of a Mothers-day Musical that my church is putting on. The kids will be doing a live game show with short videos between each mini-game.

my goal for this is to display the videos using three projectors/screens, configured left-center-right. so to speak. as for the content, it will probably be kind of a flash style animation, but I was wondering if I could get different things to happen on each screen. for instance, could I have a character talking on my left screen, and then "walk" to the farthest screen?
If this is possible, how do I set my computer up for this? I am a few weeks away from purchasing a new video card- ATI 5750 or equivalent. from what I understand, it is possible to hook up three monitors. I've only ran multiple monitors by using the Windows display options. using that way, I can only really use one monitor at a time, even though two are available. is there a program that I need to have two real displays?

and on top of THAT, I'm editing in Adobe Premeire elements. is that a limiting factor? would it be something where my editing screen aspect ratio needs to match the ratio of the three screens lined up together?

any help is vastly appreciated.

Giroud Francois
January 11th, 2010, 01:55 AM
the best is to purchase the matrox triple head box (analog vga or digital DVI as per your needs). The box is configured to be seen as one display, while outputting on 3.
for video it is ok, you can choose 3x 800x600 (equivalent to one 2400x600 screen).
You can then edit any content at that size (flash or video) and play it.
you do not need a special display adapter, just check matrox requirement for the best adapter in the case you would purchase a new one.
I used this box on a core 2 duo E8600 and played fine uncompressed 3072x1024 video (3x1024x768) with a low end nvdia GT8500

Alec Wheeler
January 12th, 2010, 06:39 PM
so in order to have different action on each screen, I would need to create my video in a 2400x600 (or similar) aspect?

I wont need the adapter because the card I'm getting will output three channels. I'm already getting the card, not specifically for this project.

Burk Webb
January 12th, 2010, 06:43 PM
This is probably overkill but Watchout does what you are talking about:

Dataton (http://www.dataton.com/#/watchout/)

You may be able to rent a system in your area. Possible church discount????

Giroud Francois
January 13th, 2010, 03:22 AM
i do not know your card, but usually when you got a multiple display one one or several card, the media player is not able to play over several screen. with the matrox it can.
you have to try. Open an avi file and try to play it across all the screens of your card.

Andrew Dean
January 13th, 2010, 04:14 AM
propresenter is what the big megachurches use for the multiscreen live content screening. Not sure if you were just playing back a video across three screens, or if you needed to do text and such. If so, propresenter is pretty amazing. (although i think it might be mac only.. but it is savvy with the matrox triple head, so you can span or split easily during live presentations.

just an idea. doesn't sound like its really what you are looking for, but its similar enough i thought it worth mentioning.

Alec Wheeler
January 14th, 2010, 11:58 PM
thanks for the info. as the project gets underway I'll be sure to relay how I pull off the end result for peoples reference