Real DMD support available

[freezy]

Hello,

The last few weeks I've written a nice abstraction layer for real DMDs, meaning we can do all kind of neat stuff while supporting pretty much every DMD used for virtual pinball out there (that is, PinDMDv1-v3 and PIN2DMD). Two weeks ago I was playing around with Pinball FX2, and now, thanks to NoEx, we added support for the Pinball Arcade.

The project is called "DMD Extensions", it's free and open source and you can read all about it here.

In short, if you have a cab with a real DMD and you're playing TPA or Pinball FX2 on it, you probably want this.

Enjoy and thanks again to NoEx for his brilliant grabbing code.

 

[freezy]

It comes also with a virtual DMD that renders like this:

So even if you have a monitor for your DMD, this probably looks nicer than the upscaled DMDs of TPA and Pinball FX2.

 

[Locksley]

Gotta check that out!

 

[mpad]

Yeah, even desktop people should check this thing out.

 

[relaxation]

I was thinking about making score/DMD masks for OBS so they look better but this looks promising

Tallying them up we've got..
front-end for launching the game
VR patch
custom cameras
BAM (Better Arcade Mode)
xbox controller emulation or wrappers for analog nudging from controllers/keyboards or accelerometers
real DMD support

gosh what ever could we be missing

 

[Jeff Strong]

Great work on this.

 

[relaxation]

Just so you're aware [MENTION=591]freezy[/MENTION] the public_UI open beta test wasn't compatible, switching back to release worked but they plan to release that new ui stuff soon.

Watching them side by side on OBS, the DMD ext app does fine on static screens but can be a little behind on animations. A simple animation like scrolling names in the credits will need a quicker response

I think the quick inverted animations are also too fast.. I'll upload some examples.
http://webm.land/w/Fewi/ <-BEST VALUE blinking, also on LAH the slow scrolling names look jumpy

I'm also not able to get OBS to see the virtual DMD window that was launched from the command line

The app also didn't work from going table to table, trying to switch back n forth between modes didn't fix it. example

 

[freezy]

Yeah, we currently need to adapt the memory address for each version of the TPA executable. I think NoEx is looking into this.

You can change the smoothness by changing the frame rate. Although I don't think more than 25 will have much impact besides hogging the CPU, as far as I know PinMAME runs at 25 fps.

dmdext searches for the DMD data in memory when it's started or when it sees TPA started. Once you quit TPA, you'll need to re-launch dmdext as well because the memory location will change on next startup. Just changing tables should work though.

What's OBS?

 

[relaxation]

OBS, Open Broadcaster Software

A software for taking video sources like whole screens, windows (video games) or cameras (real tables), still images, slide of images, text, etc and its all mixed as a 'scene' setup by the user to either record local or streaming it through a service like twitch.

So instead of two video sources, one on the games DMD and another zoomed into the table I'd like yours in the DMD spot, currently I can do an 'inner window' capture on the app version but can only make that be so big.

Perhaps my issue was running dmdext and the app at the same time, it appears to work from table to table this time.

think of it this way, it could make as nice eye candy for a youtube upload feature like those on Golden Tee or other arcade cabs that'll upload to youtube.. for those who want to keep records of their pincab play.

*another note: okay the virtual dmd window and probably the app display the right information but it seems to be OBS thats not recording it correctly. So all the flashing on Last action heros display is there, I also did some dracula skill shots (fast paced DMD reliant) and it seemed sync'd up. Besides the slow scrolling text, still updates in uneven steps**

**I'll try increasing fps like you said and see if OBS does it right.
naw, a table like hurricane with a quick text scroll that slows down for it's mystery award is pretty jarring (when not recording, just playing)
using:dmdext mirror --source=pinballarcade --fps 60 --virtual-stay-on-top

 

[freezy]

If anyone's interested, real DMD support is working again thanks to NoEx. So if you're a PinDMD1,2,3,PIN2DMD owner, give it a spin and let me know how it goes.

 

[codinghorror]

Great work!! I use it in --mirror mode and it's fantastic!

 

[L33]

Fancy trying this myself...just a bit worried I may be out of my depth...sounds like it might get technical I bought a dmd ages ago and never got round to installing it for obvious reasons...but very tempted now.

 

[Pike13]

I posted this question in the Camera mod sub-folder but I thought I would try here as well...

Using the latest 1.4 build of DMDExt, and outputting to a virtual DMD (on the same cab shown above by codinghorror), I can't seem to get the height value I'm giving it respected. It will always scale the height to a fourth of the given width. I'm using this command:

dmdext mirror --source=pinballarcade --destination=virtual --virtual-position 2360 0 790 470 --virtual-hide-grip --fps=30

Does the height parameter mean anything when mirroring to a virtual DMD?

If someone knows of a more appropriate avenue of communication to the developer, I can go that route as well. Thanks for any advice anyone has..

 

[mpad]

Sorry, but you could try over at VP forum or at VP universe, the dev freezy is active there...

 

[Pike13]

Thanks. Being new to the scene, seems like there are quite a few places to go with everything I have going on in my cab: here, the ones you mention, the PinballX forum, Steam, etc.

 

[freezy]

Sorry, not sure why I didn't get notifications for this thread. Try the fix I've posted here.

 

[Pike13]

Thanks! The latest build did the trick.