Video Solution / Advice

[air@icubed.com]

I have been asked to help my Church setup a video solution. My occupation is in the IT field but no means in this realm. What they basically want is to be able to install a TV (or monitor) in both the nursery and the foyer that will be the same feed with messages before and after service (more than likely something like a power-point slide show) and then when the service starts they want to have a live video feed of the service to both monitors and also have the live feed recorded to the HD so a DVD of the service can later be created. I can handle the hardware end as far as setting up a dual screen and then getting a video splitter for the second monitor to feed both locations. I need some advice as to what software (preferrably MAC) would be able to capture the video and also show the live feed on the second monitor while the main screen can be used by the user in the A/V. Sorry for the long, complicated post, any help would be much appreicated...

[Soopafresh]

Look at something like this for the camera capture.

http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/

You didn't mention what type of video camera. Model # and brand would be helpful.

[air@icubed.com]

Thanks for the information. I will check out the link you posted. Also, I really don't know if they have a camera, but if they do I'm sure it is just something they picked up at Best Buy.

[Steve Stepoway]

I did basically the same thing at my church a few months ago. We needed to be able to feed live video of the sanctuary, power-point from computer, and playing a DVD to the nursery, and also feed the computer output and DVD player to screens in the sanctuary. Also be able to record the live video feed from sanctuary, as required.

I'd suggest that you look strongly at getting a DVD recorder for that task. I think it will make your life simpler. We have a cheap 13" TV as its monitor so we can see what's actually going into the recorder, and another 13" TV to monitor the nursery video feed (so we knew for certain what was going in there). A couple of cheap audio/composite/S-video distribution amps and 1x4 A/V switch boxes and we were set.

We're actually feeding the sanctuary screens via VGA, and have a little box we got from B&H that converts composite/S-video to VGA (easy to find VGA->video encoders; this goes the other direction and was a little harder to find).

Make certain that all your equipment is fed from the same electrical circuit to avoid ground loops. Those can be an absolute nightmare to track down. I know from painful experience.

Steve