I recently discovered these Java bindings for GStreamer by Wayne Meissner, and started writing an alternative video library for Processing based on them. My idea is to create an alternative for the built-in Quicktime video library, which is difficult to use on Windows because its dependency on WinVDIG, and doesn’t work on Linux at all.
So I came up with this new gsvideo library, in which I will eventually re-implement all the three classes of the built-in video library: Capture, Movie and MovieMaker. The idea is that the new classes, called GSCapture, GSMovie and GSMovieMaker, will have exactly the same API as the original ones.
Right now, there is a working implementation of GSMovie, which implements all the functionality of the original Movie class, with the exception of the frameRate() and speed() functions. These are the available files:
the library package, that you have to place inside the Processing library folder.
the source code of the library (for now, just the GSMovie class)
And then some examples:
video loop: same as the video loop example that comes with Processing
video scratching: video playback determined by the mouse position
multiple videos: same as video loop, but using to video files
The GSMovie class works exactly the same way as the original Movie, i.e.: data is read with the movieEvent() function, the frame is drawn calling image(), etc.
This library needs GStreamer installed on the system. For Windows, you can download binary packages from here. For OSX, I haven’t found any binary distribution yet, but you can try installing it through Darwin Ports, or manually compiling the GStreamer source code. I know that this latter option seems to work fine, but first you need to install a couple of dependencies:
pkg-config-0.22
gettext-0.17
bison-2.3
glib-2.8.6
libxml2
In Linux, GStreamer usually comes installed by default. If not, binary packages are available for almost all distributions. And there is always the option of compiling from source :-)
Update: GSVideo has a new project website where you can find the latest installation packages, examples, API reference, etc.: http://gsvideo.sourceforge.net/
codeanticode 
I absolutly love this idea. This’ll make life so much easier moving forward.
What are your thoughts on having GS* classes inherit from their counterparts? I know it isn’t so, well, correct…but that would allow one to make the switch so easily…and let it work with existing libraries. Maybe?
Movie movie = GSMovie(this, “test”);
Eh? Also, have you started GSCapture yet? Are you open to public contributions?
The problem with having the GS* classes inherit from the buil-in video classes is that there might be some internal incompatibilities. GStreamer and Quicktime have a different way of updating the frame data, and handling all of this from the same object would make the source code quite cumbersome. Anyways, since the API of the new GS classes would be exaclty the same as the built-in ones, all you have to do to move from one to the other is to replace the import line:
import processing.video;
by
import processing.gsvideo;
I haven’t started with GSCapture yet, I know that I’ll have to use the GStreamer input plugins for webcams. In Linux there is a gstreamer-v4l plugin (v4l = video for linux) called Windows or OSX.
And yes, the project is completely open for public contributions, so I would be more than happy to receive comments, bug fixes, contribs to the code, etc
Thanks a lot for your work; I’m heartened to finally see work going into cross platform video in Processing, and yours looks like the most promising effort.
GSMovie is performing fine on my Ubuntu 7.10 installation with GStreamer 0.10.14; no skipping or errors. I’ll do some more testing with different formats and sizes, and will get back to you if I get any interesting results.
Many thanks for you comments and encouragement! I think this project is really exciting, and I’ll try to add as much functionality as possible into the gsvideo library (Capture and MoveMaker classes, etc).
On a related note, Wayne Meissner, the creator of the java bindings for gstreamer, figured out how to compile gstreamer and all the required plugins on OSX:
http://groups.google.com/group/gstreamer-java/msg/b0326e6f71d52530?
so now we’ll be able to test gsvideo on Mac as well.
Wow! I’m really looking forward to having a decent way to create and experiment with movies using Processing on Ubuntu.
Keep up the good work!
Thanks, this is a great step in a nice direction!
Your code works in Ubuntu (studio), but the video doesn’t loop… am I missing something?
Thanks for comments!
The sample program gstreamer5 seems to be looping fine, but I’ll take another look to check if there is anything wrong. What type of file (and how long the video) were you playing when you saw the problem?
In fact there was a bug in the calculation of the playback times that caused movies to loop before reached the end. Hopefully the new version I just uploaded fixes that problem:
https://codeanticode.wordpress.com/2008/02/27/new-version-of-gsvideo/
Hi,
The looping still does not work in Ubuntu Studio.. I’ve tried mov, mp4 and dv.
Did you try the latest version:
http://users.design.ucla.edu/~acolubri/processing/gsvideo/gsvideo-lib-0.3.11.zip
? I’ve been using it on ubuntu 7.10, and looping works fine.
Hi,
I can’t reach the file, is the link broken? or is just me? Anyway, can you send me the library?
Thanks for your work!!!
Hi,
My website is not working well right now, there seems to be some problem with the server. Anyways, you can download the library from sourceforge:
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=225389
HI ,
I just installed the whole library for OS X . . but the performance ist actually slower than using java quicktime or opengl . . why ?
thanks in advanced
Hello,
Some parts of gstreamer and/or gsvideo probably still need some optimization on OSX.
It would be very useful if you can report some numbers comparing the performance both with the default video library and with gsvideo. What video formats are the ones where you observe the biggest difference? Also, what version of OSX are you using?
Thanks,
Andres
Hello,
I’m under Debian 5.0 Lenny amd64.
I’ve a sun-java6-jre from a official repository.
I’ve a libgstreamer0.10.0 version 0.10.19-3 from official repository and i’ve others gstreamers packages too but in a the same version.
When I attempt to launch a sketch like loop.pde (it is the same for others sketches), Processing return this message :
Exception in thread “Animation Thread” java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: Unable to load library ‘gstreamer-0.10’: /usr/lib/libgstreamer-0.10.so.0.16.0: wrong ELF class: ELFCLASS64
Probably your library is compiled in 32 bits mode and cannot load a 64 bits library.
Is it possible to compil your processing library in 64 bits mode on my computer ? If I do, how I make this ?
For multiples reasons I can’t reinstall my system in 32 bits.
Note : I don’t know java but I have programming and compiling notions.
Thanks in advanced.
Eddy.
Hello,
First, make sure that you are using the latest release of gsvideo (0.5, download from here).
As for using gsvideo in 64 bits system, the problem is not with the library, but with Processing, which comes with a version of java for 32 bits. Some people found that installing the libgstreamer0.10-dev package solves the problem (see the comments on this other post).
Another trick is to replace the binaries of java that are bundled with Processing with a 64 bits version, for example openJDK. This blog entry explains how to do it. It is in Spanish, but the idea is simple: first install the package java-1.6.0-openjdk-devel,
then delete the java files that come with Processing by default (rm -R /opt/processing-1.0.1/java) and finally link openJDK to the java folder in Processing (ln -s /usr/lib/jvm/java-1.6.0-openjdk-1.6.0.0.x86_64 /opt/processing-1.0.1/java).
Hello,
Thank you for yours tricks : it is operationnal (spanish is not a problem for me). And i’m entierely open source and free now, it’s cool ;-)
Congratulations : you are speed and great.
Best regards.
Eddy.
Very cool!
I’m trying to make work Video Peggy with your new lib:
http://www.box.net/shared/g4unkuc9op
I just need to test it with the webcam since I’m still using your station.mov
Keep up the wood work, this is amazing :)
I’m happy to know you find the library useful. Please make sure that you are using the latest release available on sourceforge. GSVideo has improved substantially since the time of this post.
hi! this is cool stuff! i’m sure linux can be the no 1 solution for physical computing when people like you keep on pushing it further!
thanks and thanks in advance for all things coming..
:D
just what i need…got some problem for playing my video tracking related code in Ubuntu…
Thanks a lot man :)
You are very welcome! I’m happy to see that the library is useful for Linux users.
Total noob question, but where do I put the source files?
You don’t need the source files in order to just use the library.
If you want to recompile the library yourself (you would need Eclipse and the Java JDK to do this), I’d recommend you use the source repository available at sourceforge:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/gsvideo/develop
But of course, this is not easy thing.
Thank you very much for your work.
The last release (gsvideo-0.6-pre5) works perfectly in Ubuntu 10.04.
your very welcome!
Didn’t have the chance to try gsvideo on Lucid Lynx, so good to know it works fine.
There will be a while until I can release a new version of gsvideo, as I got busy with opengl-related work :-) Hopefully next release will be 0.6 (not more pre/test versions).
Hi, i’m having some problems with the library, first i can’t find all the dependences, i can’t find GLIB. And when i want to run the loop test file this error shows up “UnsatisfiedLinkError: com.sun.jna.Native.pointerSize()”
Saludos desde Venezuela
Thanks
Hola!
What version of gsvideo are you using?
Also, is it gstreamer installed in you system? (it should, since it is ubunbu, but asking just in case)
Saludos
I forget to say, i’m using ubuntu 10.04.
Hola!
The library version i´m using is the one you can find in the link on this post, the one that says “the library package, that you have to place inside the Processing library folder.” I don´t know a way to find out if gstremer is installed, but as you say, its ubuntu, in the sound menu i can see lots of things with gstreamer name, i think it´s already installed. Gracias! please tell me if you know how to solve the problem, this library is a great idea.
ok I see, the version linked in this post is veeery old, please refer to the project website:
http://gsvideo.sourceforge.net/
from where you can download the latest packages.
Downloading!, thanks a lot, i thought this was the main page of the project, i have short time making the linux migration, some things still being misterious. Soon i will erase completely the windows partition!
Salud y anarquía tropical.
excelente, let me know how it goes!
Hi again!
I’ve been testing my USB webcam “Qtec Webcam100” with GSCapture. The camera finally works in my Ubuntu Linux 10.04 (after two days trying) with:
width = 176, height = 144
or
width = 352, height = 288
You can check the formats available writing
luvcview -d /dev/video0 -L in your linux console
Best regards from Madrid :-)
Excellent! And thanks for the tip about luvcview. I just tested on Ubuntu, works great!
BTW, new GSVideo release (0.6 final) is on its way :-) I’ll announce when it is out.
Saludos desde Bogotá!
Hi. your idea is wonderful. I’am having problems running the loop example. Error tray says
** Message: don't know how to handle video/x-svq, svqversion=(int)1, width=(int)160, height=(int)120, framerate=(fraction)2997/125
. I have GStreamer and I don’t know how to fix this.thank you very much for such a great idea
I need some more info in order to be of more help. On what operating system are you working? What version of gsvideo are you using?
Great job!
Any updates on the GSCapture?
PS:It would really come handy.
Mat
Ahh, got it.
Here:
http://gsvideo.sourceforge.net/