P2P Audiovisual Guide

How-to make, promote and find people powered media

Beginner's Guide

Tools and Platforms - How-To - Theory - Tour 1: Indie Film Maker's (Editor's) Tour - Tour 2: Online Audio, Media Publishing & Online Media/Art Communities Tour

How-To's

Image/Video/3D - Audio/Video Players: iTunes/iPod/iPhone - Zune - Players Supporting Ogg Vorbis - Rockbox: Open Source Jukebox Firmware - (Pro) Video Tutorials - (Pro) Audio Tutorials/Information - FLOSS Manuals: *special recommendation* - how-to for open-source tools - Web Building Tutorials - DVD/PVR/P2P TV/IPTV - Streaming/Webcam - Annotation/Subtitles/Tagging

Resources

Useful Software: Audio/Video Players/Aggregators, Web TV and Codec - Audio/Video/Image Editing and 3D - Audio/Screen Capturing - YouTube Tools - Telephony (VoIP)/Video Calls - Media to/from Mobile Phones/Digital Movie Distribution - Related Links/Resources: Video Production (Wikibooks) - Movie Making Manual (Wikibooks) - Filmmaking (Wikiversity) - more... - Related Online Articles - Related Blogs/Sites - P2P Related Media - The Directory

How-To/Info/Sources

Animation

2D/Traditional Animation

Pencil is "an animation/drawing software for Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux. It lets you create traditional hand-drawn animation (cartoon) using both bitmap and vector graphics. Pencil is free and open source." This programme is easy to use and ideal for beginners or young people. Professionals may find it usefull for creating animatics. See also the User Manual. (www.les-stooges.org)

Synfig "Two-dimensional animation has long been the domain of proprietary software. That changes with the introduction of Synfig, a free software/open source tool for producing feature-film quality animation with fewer people and resources." (www.synfig.org)

KToon is "a 2D Animation Toolkit designed by animators (Toonka Films) for animators, focused to the Cartoon Industry. This project is covered by the GPL License using G++, OpenGL and QT as programming resources from KDevelop as the development platform. By now, KToon is only available for Unix systems but we expect to make it works on Windows systems too someday." (ktoon.toonka.com)

Computer Generated/Code Based Animation

Processing is an open source programming language and environment for people who want to program images, animation, and interactions. It is used by students, artists, designers, researchers, and hobbyists for learning, prototyping, and production. (...) Available for GNU/Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows." See also the Learning resources. Worthin noting is also the list of Related Initiatives on the main Processing page, though not all projects listed are open-source ones. (www.processing.org)

Pure Data "PD (aka Pure Data) is a real-time graphical programming environment for audio, video, and graphical processing. (...) Pd is free software and can be downloaded either as an OS-specific package, source package, or directly from CVS." See also the Pure Documentation. (puredata.info)

Not stricly for animation but related:

Arduino is "an open-source electronics prototyping platform based on flexible, easy-to-use hardware and software. It's intended for artists, designers, hobbyists, and anyone interested in creating interactive objects or environments. (...) The microcontroller on the board is programmed using the Arduino programming language (based on Wiring) and the Arduino development environment (based on Processing). (www.arduino.cc)

Video

Video/Movie Editing and Video Captioning are two resource pages from "Shambles in S.E.Asia (The Education Project Asia)" aimed at teachers and educators. (www.shambles.net)

Possibly of interest to open-source developers:

Lumiera "a Free/Open Source Non-Linear Editing (NLE) application project for Linux developed by the CinelerraCV community. It was born as a rewrite of the Cinelerra codebase called Cinelerra3 but it is now an independent project with its own name. Lumiera is still in an early stage of development. It is not usable yet." (lumiera.org)

Related Video blog:

GVFX - Gnu Video FX "is a project for creating TEMPLATES of 3D transitions, filters, etc." using free and open-source software.

Related Video article:

Video Editing with Blender looks at the open-source blender built-in VSE (Video Sequence Editor) from a user's point of view - note that some points made in the article refer to how things were before the blender 2.46 update in May 2008 (eugenia.gnomefiles.org, 20.04.08) - this article was also discussed on Slashdot. (tech.slashdot.org, 21.04.08)

Related Articles

Film 2.0: The Open Video and Story Remix Platform (indiworks.wordpress.com, 20.06.08)

Want to Make an Open Movie? Recommended read for anyone thinking about making an open-movie, be it an animation (as discussed in the article) or a live action project. (andy-dolphin.blogspot.com, 26.08.07)

Selling/Buying

Microfinancing Music With Calabash (blog.wired.com, 02.04.08)

How-To/Info/Sources

Image

For how-to use the free and open-source GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) see the GIMP User Manual (www.gimp.org) - available in a variety of languages including English.

Audio

For and introduction to the free and open-source sound editor Audacity see the Audacity Wiki (audacityteam.org) including the Tutorials page.

For getting started with the free and open-source digital audio workstation Ardour see the official Ardour Manual (ardour.org) or this Ardour 2 Tutorial (www.out-of-order.ca).

A full introduction to audio mastering/mixing offers Tweak's Guide to the Home and Project Studio (www.tweakheadz.com) including a how-to for putting together a home recording studio "that rivals professional studio sound".

Video

An introduction to the free and open-source DV video editor Kino (Linux only) give the FLOSS manual's Kino pages (en.flossmanuals.net). (Note: use the orange, left hand menu for site navigation!)

The free and open-source Blender (3D app) also features a simple yet powerful NLE that may be used in a professional production environment (due to current limitations possibly more useful for shorter lengths projects) - see the Using VSE (Video Sequence Editor) pages from the BlenderWiki (wiki.blender.org). (Also see "Previous" and "Next" at the bottom of the page for more.)

Related online articles:

Open source video editing: what we have now and what we need (www.linux.com, 10.04.08)

Life after Final Cut Pro (indiworks.wordpress.com, 07.04.08)

iPhone

Pwnage - it’s here, folks (theiphoneproject.org, 02.04.08), iPhone DevTeam Releases Pwnage (www.iphone-hacks.com, 03.04.08) and iPhone Dev Team Pwnage Tool Released! Broken WiFi Fixed! (ipluspwns.com, 03.04.08)

Related online article:

The iPhone SDK and free software: not a match (www.linux.com, 15.04.08)

Forums/Help

The Show in a Box Forum is focused on finding solutions for presenting video in WordPress. (showinabox.tv)

Streaming

Flumotion "is a streaming media server created with the backing of Fluendo. It features intuitive graphical administration tools, making the task of setting up and manipulating audio and video streams easy for even novice system administrators. Flumotion is released under the GPL."

Useful Software

Top 100 of the Best (Useful) OpenSource Applications (ubuntulinuxhelp.com, 28.02.08)

Related Articles

Death of the sitcom frees up 2,000 Wikipedias worth of cognitive capacity (www.boingboing.net, 27.04.08)

Ubuntu man Shuttleworth dissects Hardy Heron's arrival (www.theregister.co.uk, 22.04.08)

P2P Related Media

Belgian Integral Philosopher Michel Bauwens' Vision by Akasa - "Michel's VISION Statement Movie represents the essential principles of his Peer to Peer Alternatives" - 5 min. - www.youtube.com

Selling/Buying

Brad Sucks Digital Download Store "I needed a cheap, DRM-free digital download store so I wrote this quickly over a few days. Then I thought it'd be useful for other artists. It was created to sell music but any files will work. ... I'm giving this store away for free to help other artists sell their stuff online." (www.bradsucks.net)

1,000 True Fans "Other than aim for a blockbuster hit, what can an artist do to escape the long tail? One solution is to find 1,000 True Fans." (www.kk.org, 04.03.08)

How-To/Info/Sources

Audio/Video

8.5 GB of Free, CC-Licensed Samples from the OLPC Project, and OLPC Music Tools (createdigitalmusic.com, 26.03.08)

The Digital Artists' Handbook "is an up to date, reliable and accessible source of information that introduces you to different tools, resources and ways of working related to digital art. (...) The focus of this Handbook is on Free/Libre Open Source Software." (www.digitalartistshandbook.org)

iPhone

The iPhone Project is aiming at offering "the most valuable resources for iPhone users, available. From a repository, to open source software, a forum, and a wiki (...)." (theiphoneproject.org)

iPhone Hacks welcomes readers "to the source for all iPhone Hacks." (www.iphone-hacks.com)

The iphone elite dev-team site is about "Replacing what Apple left out." See also the project's page on code.google.com. (www.iphone-elite.org)

Ziphone is "From Zibri with love" and "ZiPhone 2.6b had 3.000.000 downloads!" (www.ziphone.org)

iPlusPnws "was created to provide information about iPlus and related iPhone applications." The download page offers iLiberty, iPlus and Ziphone among other iPhone related software. (ipluspwns.com)

iPhone Linux features iBooter an "interactive Apple Bootloader (iBoot) Console for the iPhone and iTouch. Support for WinXP/Linux/MacOSX 10.5.2". (iphonelinux.org)

iPhone Dev Team Portal notes that "The information, statements, articles, and releases here are official. They have the approval of the combined Dev/Elite teams." but "This site and its contents are in no way affiliated with, endorsed by, or supported by Apple Inc." (iphone-dev.org)

On the iPhone (iphonejtag.blogspot.com) is the blog of pioneering iPhone hacker George Hotz (en.wikipedia.org).

Annotation/Subtitles/Tagging

dotSUB.com is "a browser based tool enabling subtitling of videos on the web into and from any language" (dotsub.com)

Media to/from Mobile Phones

movino allows to "Broadcast LIVE video from your mobile phone over 3G or WiFi onto your website. Or use your phone as a bluetooth webcam in Mac OS X. Free and Open Source." (www.movino.org)

OpenMoko is "the Worlds First Integrated Open Source Mobile Computing Platform". For more see the OpenMoko Wiki. (www.openmoko.org)

Zannel Launching Mobile Microblogging API (mashable.com, 28.02.08)

Gaming

The Wii Owner’s Toolbox: 100 Cool Things to do With Your System (www.virtualhosting.com, 04.03.08)

Related Articles

21.03.08 BluRay's BD+ DRM broken (www.boingboing.net)

13.03.08 The Digital Tipping Point: an open source documentary (blog.p2pfoundation.net)

12.03.08 iPhone 2.0 Unlocked, Runs All Apps "In other words, true carrier and applications independence. And for a long time." (gizmodo.com)

Publishing

Plumi "is a Free Software video sharing Content Management System based on Plone and produced by the EngageMedia collective. Plumi enables you to create your own sophisticated video sharing site; by adding it to an existing Plone instance you can quickly have a wide array of functionality to facilitate video distribution and community creation." (blog.plumi.org)

Show in a Box "is a package of free video-centric themes and plugins for WordPress, made by and for independent web video creators. All of these tools are open source and ready to be tweaked to look as good as your video content does." (showinabox.tv)

Selling/Buying

Bid4Vid "We connect businesses with independent video producers in an open, secure marketplace to get high-quality videos made at an affordable price." (bid4vid.com)

Vlogging Project

Semanal "One video per week for all of 2008" (semanal.org)

How-To

Video Production Basics

The blip.tv Learning Center "is designed to give those who are new to Web show production a head-start on learning the art, and give experienced producers some tips to help improve their craft." (blip.tv)

Tutorials/Help

What is the Audio/Video Edition of NGO-in-a-box? "The Audio/Video edition of NGO-in-a-Box is a toolkit that lowers the entry level for NGOs, non-profits and media activists wanting to use audio and video for social change." (av.ngoinabox.org)

(Pro) Video Tutorials

AwkwardTV is "dedicated to finding additional uses for the Apple TV by (legitimately) enabling its Potential Capabilities, and is a place for the community to share ideas, discoveries and solutions." (wiki.awkwardtv.org)

Hackint0sh Projects and Hacks: AppleTV, iPhone, iPod Touch and more (www.hackint0sh.org)

Building a video remixing web-site using Annodex - note: this is not the actual tutorial, only the "Talk Details" (linux.conf.au)

Build Your Own Video Community With Lighttpd And FlowPlayer (Debian Etch) is a tutorial in three parts (www.howtoforge.com)

(Pro) Audio Tutorials

10 Tips for Editing a Podcast in GarageBand (www.voiceovertimes.com)

Useful Software

FFMPEG2THEORA offers user friendly solutions for encoding video to the free and open-source Ogg Theora codec (no licensing fees for commercial use in contrast to other proprietary formats) (wiki.transmission.cc) - for OS X users specially interesting seems the Simple Theora Encoder (direct download link) (www.v2v.cc).

Media to Mobile Phones

Open Handset Alliance "Together we have developed Android™, the first complete, open, and free mobile platform." (www.openhandsetalliance.com)

Related Articles

25.02.08 Introducing P2P-Next, a European Union Internet Data and TV Standard (iptv.tmcnet.com)

22.02.08 Adobe cripples Flash video with DRM (www.boingboing.net)

31.01.08 Video Vortex Conference 2008 (1 of 2): Open Source Ways Of Producing, Distributing And Promoting Online Video (indiworks.wordpress.com)

25.01.08 Video Publishing: Fair Use and Copyright Analyzed - Recut, Reframe, Recycle - Robin Good's Latest News (www.masternewmedia.org)

23.01.08 Internet Video Publishing: A Beginner's Guide (www.masternewmedia.org)

21.01.08 An Open Source Media Definition to judge the openness of Open Movies (blog.p2pfoundation.net)

21.01.08 Wikifying video production (announces collaboration with Kaltura) (www.boingboing.net)

01.01.08 20+ Resources For Homebrew Games (mashable.com)

Related Blogs/Sites

Transmission "is a network of citizen journalists, video makers, artists, researchers, programmers and web producers who are developing online video distribution tools for social justice and media democracy." (www.transmission.cc)

P2P Related Media

The Future of Ideas (2001) by Lawrence Lessig is about "The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World - to buy or free .pdf, 368 pages (www.the-future-of-ideas.com)

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The Aim

This section, maintained by Valentin Spirik , will focus on the how-to and technical aspects of producing, finding and distributing audiovisual content using the new autonomous media infrastructure.

This is a Wiki - if you, the reader, have information that you feel is missing and want to share: get involved and help building the P2P Audiovisual section!

The Wiki Text and The Directory

The Wiki text that follows tries to give the reader an overview to the the audiovisual P2P net by filtering the vast amount of available information by asking questions like "Is this useful, can it be recommended - is it somehow in the interest of either the majority of people or a neglected minority?" (Instead of being a link or site that first of all promotes the interests of e.g. a company.)

The Directory (entries currently listed underneath in "Articles in category 'Audiovisual'") on the other hand tries to collect related sites and links of all sorts - including commercial services - where the criterias mentioned above might or might not apply. Over time however a critical evaluation of the individual entries can be done.

General Hint about Web Services and Software

Just because a web service has a pretty site or because a particular software is open-source does not mean that it is useful for everyone. Especially in the Web 2.0 world there seems to be a certain tendency - maybe out of sympathy for a P2P related project - to over-hype a service or a software project. While this Wiki tries to point in directions that hopefully are useful, the reader's own critical judgement is encouraged when exploring unknown territory or installing and using new software.