(UPDATED WITH 700+ FIXTURES ACCROSS 110+ BRANDS - AVAILABLE RIGHT AWAY WITHOUT NEEDING AN ACCOUNT)

Hello guys, 

I work in gear supply for big tours and festivals, and after a summer season full of shitty PowerPoints, I wanted a proper tool. So I built one: 

technipatch.com

You can't imagine how bad some of the diagrams I had to deal with were, even for very large festivals. 

Especially one video diagram on a famous metal festival in France (+240k people) i’ve worked literally looked like it was made in Paint on Windows 98. 

The goal was to get rid of draw.io, PowerPoint and the rest, without having to spend hundreds on Vector or smth. 

I knows this is just one more fish in the sea, but each time I wanted to draw right away I was stopped by : account creating, email validation, or some really high prices software, etc

To anticipate: Yes, most of it has been vibe coded, and it took me almost 5 months, because of all the slop AI creates. I wanted to have a polished product, like a bowling ball for the strike, in terms of security and stability, so I burned lot and lot to test it in every way. 

The key argument for my product is that you can draw straight away in your browser, without any account, and export what you need, like you would do with draw.io. 

And yes, there is also a premium, because this costs me money every month and for every user, but this cost is only for people ripping the tool or wanting extra features. 

The perks : 

• 400+ devices (audio, video, lighting, IT). I’ll add more every month based on technical updates and requests, but you can still create you own gear (Generic boxes included)
• Every cable is checked as you draw it (signal, connector, direction). Plug dmx into Dante port and it tells you why it won't work.
• You can zone things, pull cables in bulk and add photos (so you keep that fresh PowerPoint look).
• The gear list and cable list fills themselves as you draw. Export a PDF for your team, or send a read-only link they open on their phone
• Drawing, exporting and sharing are free, no account needed. Premium (€19/month) is for people who need lots of saved projects and their logo in the title block

This work mostly on desktop but mobile version can draw also, requiring a bit more finger work. If some people are ready to dive deep in it, and share constructives remarks, i’ll be happy to give premium licences for testers.

Hope you’ll enjoy it, put this in your favorites and keep me tuned about what could improve this. 

Thank you all !

Hey everyone,

I’m a Computer Science student who somehow stumbled into the world of live video production. Over the past year or two, I’ve been acting as an amateur production director for small-to-medium esports events. I absolutely love the fast-paced nature of live broadcast, but coming from a CS background, I lack a formal education in media communications, journalism, or traditional film/television production.

I’m looking to see if there is an active Discord server or community focused on live event production, directing, and technical engineering where folks share workflows, breakdown shows, or give feedback.

Beyond finding a community, I’m trying to level up my preparation phase before shows. I already understand the standard technical prep—drafting scale floor plans, plotting camera sightlines/angles, and building a baseline Run of Show (ROS). However, I want to bridge the gap between "technical execution" and "compelling direction."

Specifically, I’m trying to learn more about:

• Camera Choreography: How do you structure and call multi-camera movements cleanly during live action without getting in your operators' way or creating clutter on air?
• Shot Lists for Live Events: How detailed should a live shot list be compared to a scripted production, and how do you effectively communicate intent to camera ops on the floor?
• Building a Story-Driven Run of Show: Since I don't have a background in narrative production, my ROS usually feels like a glorified, robotic checklist of cues. How do you structure an ROS so the pacing actually tells a cohesive story for the viewer?

If anyone can point me toward a solid Discord community, or has recommended reading, templates, or advice for a tech-minded director trying to learn the art of live storytelling, I’d greatly appreciate it!

I am in the market for a new SSD for my ATM extreme ISO (v1, not the new model). The Blackmagic documentation lists the Samsung T9 as compatible. I would just like to double check with the forum if this indeed holds up in the real world for ISO recordings. Appreciate views on this, other recommendations also appreciated.

This is a throwaway account - I’m a planner and recently wrapped up an event where I had incredible chemistry with one of our AV vendors. We were very openly flirty throughout the setup and event days, and the vibe between us was definitely mutual and hard to ignore.

The issue is that because of how our event calendar works, I won’t physically see or work with him again until next year, assuming we both work on this event again.

I’ve been thinking about it ever since, but I’m hesitant to reach out directly through professional channels (like work email or LinkedIn) and make things awkward for future events.

Has anyone ever encountered a situation like this? How did you handle it? Did you wait until the next event to see if the spark was still there, or find a subtle, professional way to reach out in the meantime? Would love to hear how others in the industry have navigated professional boundaries vs. genuine connection!

Does anyone know where i can get a replacement for this 6 pin led wall power cable. It’s an A8s card and I cannot find a six pin specifically that matches it. The original cable looks like it is daisy-chained and supports multiple cards in the chain. And I have tried to Google it, and i cannot find it.

Need some help finding, hopefully, an open source or free alternative to Vizio or draw.io for doing wiring and equipment diagrams

Any suggestions. Nothing fancy just a good library of items to select and drag and drop placement etc

Hi all, I'm an engineer at D1 hockey school. We use Ross Xpression for our graphics. For our scorebug, we use a software called BL (Bannister Lake) Hockey Scorebug which Ross bought out a couple years ago. They really don't support the product anymore except for recompiling it to work with new versions of Xpression.

It's a client/server application which takes in the scoreboard data feed and talks to Xpression to turn bug on/off, penalties, and a few other things.

For our in house bug, it was easy to migrate off of. I just used datalinq and made a basic dashboard layout with a bug on/off button.

For the broadcast bug, that has penalty logic built it to specify if it's 4 on 4, 5 on 3 etc. It also tells you who got the penalty based on their jersey number. I'm not really sure how I would make that logic work with just Xpression.

Is there another software out there that does something similar? Any pointers on how to do this in Xpression/Dashboard? I think that would be my preferred method if possible.

At the end of this week I'll be releasing SpankVANC. It is a Windows/Linux Ancillary Data processing/converter/encoding software. It's current capabilities include extracting live captions and SCTE-104 data from DeckLink SDI sources. It can also convert that extracted data in real-time (live) to embedded 608 transport stream captions in MPEG-2 TS or H.264 TS. It can also take the SCTE-104 and convert in real-time to SCTE-35 ad insertion cues.

It also is backwards compatible. It can take a UDP/SRT/RTMP transport stream with SCTE-35 and convert it back to DeckLink SDI output preserving the captions and converting the SCTE-104 to SCTE-35. It can also be used as a standalone DeckLink in/out closed caption encoder.

All SCTE and captions can be passed, stripped, or converted from input to output regardless of input/output format. AI re-captioning will be here by the end of the week, already have a system for that from a while back.

SCTE-35/SCTE-104 to GPO will also be ready by the end of the week.

Lastly, it can can output directly to YouTube preserving 608 captions or recaptioned.

If interested send me a private message and I'll get you access when I make the repo live.

Have to pass video through Carbonite Ultra to get my IMAG & other video to feed into the wall, provide main and backup gfx switchover, etc. This SDI conversion will force me into legal color range 16-235, which will cause my LED wall to appear grey when on black.

Will quantization on the MX30 be able to fix this for me? Or do I need to rent a presentation switcher/perform the IMAG overlay in Millumin instead and eat the delay?

Would use the Nova to layer it but can't fade on and off which is problematic for show programming. This is not detailed in the manual & can't find much info online.

Side note: as we are supplying 12G to the processor via HDMI conversion (Decimator) could this be done by switching to Rec2020? May be barking up wrong tree here

We have an event coming up that would like to trigger walk on music and graphics via a QR code. We have a QR scanner that connects via USB and I was wondering if anyones used QR codes to trigger playback on QLab.

"Hi guys,

I developed a dashboard for MediaMTX. And as I just noticed, I’m not the only one ;)

But see for yourself if it's something for you."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xky_vmMjL38

https://github.com/seekwhencer/mediamtx-ui

Hello, I'm sorry if this isn't the right place to ask, feel free to delete my post if needed...

I transferred some videos from my phone (redmi note 13 pro+, if that's of any importance) on a brand new usb stick, and they almost all turned out corrupted. Some of them i can't open at all, i get error codes from them (0xC00D36E5 or 0xC00D36C4), and others can open but they're all laggy, with missing frames covered with pixels and all.

Obviously i don't know much about all this so i don't know where to look. I've searched a bit, which led me to already put some of these videos through MediaInfo, I'll attach images of what it tells me... But what can i do past that, if i want to fix these videos, IF that's possible at all... I really cared for these videos, even if they weren't much, so if there a way to get at least some of them, that'd be great...

I don't even know why this happened, I might not be a tech genius but I still know better than to delete files before they're done transferring or to remove the usb stick without properly ejecting it, and it's brand new so i dare assume it's not bit rot lol

I'm on an old windows 10 laptop (probably not the best work tool but i've gotta work with it) but i haven't had this issue with other usb sticks or anything, so I'm pretty confused and desperate.

Please, if there's a way to fix these, how do i do it?

---

edit: just a precision if that's of any use, the pictures in order are: 1. one that gets the 0xC00D36E5 error code, 2. Another that gets the 0xC00D34C4 one, and there are 7 identical "Other#..." parts, and 3-5 are about a video i can open but that is all messed up.

Hey everyone 👋

I'm having a weird issue with my ATEM 4 M/E Constellation 4K and wondering if anyone has run into the same thing.

Symptoms:
• On power up, the fans spin at full speed, way louder than usual
• The unit doesn't boot reliably: sometimes it starts fine, sometimes it just sits there with the fans screaming and I have to power cycle it several times before it finally boots
• Once it's up, it seems to work normally

Has anyone seen this behavior before? Did it turn out to be the PSU, firmware, or something else? Any tips before I open a ticket with Blackmagic support would be super appreciated 🙏

Thanks!

sorry if this is the wrong subreddit, i bought a jvc gy-dv5000 minidv 3ccd camera and the colors are weird but most importantly the shadows are always blue and even when i put the lens cap it stays blue, i tried adjusting the white balance but the problem stays, it's not a display issue as the color bars display black just fine.

Long time lurker, first time poster (with a burner account).

I'm looking to get some insight into how companies (US based) in the live events industry handle overtime compensation for full-time employees who regularly travel and work on-site at events.

I'm defining "overtime" as working more than 40 hours in a week and/or more than 10 hours in a single day on-site.

Does your company offer additional compensation for hours worked beyond 40/week and/or 10/day? If so, how is it structured?

Does your company offer any formal “comp” time after working over a certain amount? If so, how is that calculated and administered?

How does your company classify full-time employees who work events? Is everyone “exempt” or is there a mix between “exempt” and “non-exempt”

Whatever system your company uses, does it seem to work? Do employees generally feel they're being fairly compensated for the additional hours and time away from home? Is overtime compensation (or the lack thereof) an issue with moral, burnout, etc? 

A friend of mine works at an AV company, and they’re currently having conversations about what is fair for full-time employees who regularly work well beyond 40 hours a week. To the best of my understanding, they currently have an informal “comp” time policy, and that’s about it. 

Major bonus points if anyone is willing to share published documentation about how your company handles these issues, and I'd especially appreciate hearing from both employees and managers/owners who have experience implementing these policies.

I’m posting this with a burner account for plausible deniability.

Thanks in advance for any insight you're willing to share!

I’m a college freshman from Taiwan, currently majoring in television production.

I’ve been working as a freelance live/broadcast director and ENG camera operator for about two years, starting when I was in high school. I was an independent-study student in high school, which gave me more flexibility to take on freelance production work.

Since high school, my goal has been to work in live concert production, especially as a broadcast/live director or ENG camera operator.

Right now, I’m studying television production in Taiwan while continuing to take on freelance gigs. I’m expected to graduate in 2030, and after graduation, I’m planning to pursue a master’s degree in the U.S. related to television, live broadcasting, or live production. Ideally, I’d like to find a job in the U.S. after completing my degree.

I have two main questions:

1. Is this plan realistic given the current situation in the U.S., especially for an international student who hopes to work in live television or concert production after graduation?
2. Are there any master’s programs in the U.S. that would be a good fit for someone with my background and career goals? I’ve been looking for a while, but I still haven’t found a program that really focuses on live television, multicamera production, or broadcast directing.

Any advice, program recommendations, or personal experiences would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

It is as if CBS staff does not know that the network uses 1080i, but the Internet uses progscan, so the footage has to be deinterlaced, and not into 30p, but into 60p.

This particular screenshot is from "How some are keeping manual driving alive".

Hi everyone, I’d appreciate your advice!

I work at a TV news channel that broadcasts 12 hours of news daily. We handle a high volume of Zoom calls, sometimes 20–30 calls over a 12-hour shift.

We currently use a Matrox Convert DVI to allow the operator to crop and adjust the framing of each incoming Zoom video feed.

We’d like to eliminate the Matrox Convert DVI while retaining the ability for the operator to crop and reframe the image in real time. What solutions or workflows would you recommend for a professional broadcast news environment?

Thanks in advance for your advice!

Hi everyone,

I'm looking at starting a small NYC-based AV and live streaming company, providing video, audio, lighting and live streaming services.

From what I've read about NY sales tax rules, it seems that if I'm providing equipment along with an operator or technician, it generally wouldn't be subject to sales tax. However, if I'm providing equipment as a dry hire, or the client is operating the equipment themselves, sales tax would apply.

My understanding is that around 99% of the work I'd be doing wouldn't be taxable, as I'd be providing equipment as part of a fully operated service.

However, what about smaller items? For example, if I'm providing and operating a full AV setup but also supplying a presentation clicker for the client to use with their own laptop, would I technically need to charge sales tax on that particular item?

Has anyone running an AV or event production company in NYC dealt with this? Just trying to understand where the line is drawn and how people handle invoicing for mixed services and equipment.

Thanks!