HDMI in, scaled down, HDMI out.

[ericwesley]

Alright. This one has me stumped. I have a client who has some video walls They want to not only do all the xLights blinky-flashy & singing faces & etc for holidays, but they want to watch football on these video walls too...

Now the video signal coming out of a DirectTV box is (at least) 1920x1080 pixels, but the video screens will only total about 500x100 pixels. Yeah I know it's crazy and I know the detail and image fidelity is out the window. Regardless, my marching orders still stand.

Is there any way to have HDMI input to the Pi and then downscale the image from HD down to the tiny 500x100 and then output it over the Pi's HDMI via the Virtual Matrix output?

Is the Pi even capable of such a task with or without the FPP software??

[CaptainMurdoch]

@patdelaney may be able to offer some help.  He did something similar using a USB3 video capture device using the master code branch of FPP and the latest FPP Video Capture plugin.

[patdelaney]

You would still have to use FPP and create a 500x100 virtual matrix. For the HDMI input I had 2 different HDMI to USB Capture devices. I had them from another project.

https://www.amazon.com/U-TAP-HDMI-Simple-Powered-Capture/dp/B01LXKKT0E/ref=sr_1_5?crid=2RPLY3QTL1XDV&keywords=utap&qid=1651793053&sprefix=utap%2Caps%2C271&sr=8-5

I also tried this device
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09F2MV8C4/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Once you get FPP running, you will need to download the Video Capture plugin (Content Setup -> Plugin Manager)

In the Input/Output Setup -> Other
Create a Virtual Matrix 500 x 100
This screenshot shows what I have set up

After that Go to Status/Control -? Command Presets and create 2 presets (Feed On and Feed off)
Here is the setup the on preset (note that you would select the capture device in the camera drop down, mine wasn't connected when I wrote this)

Here is the setup for the Off Command Preset

Thanks should be it, but I'm not sure it's going to yield the quality that they may be expecting.

Let me know if you have any questions.

[patdelaney]

Video off effect setup
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Video on effect setup
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Matrix Setup image
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[Kensington Graves]

IMO, by he time you get done with all the hacking, it may be easier and cheaper to buy an X series sender from Colorlight.  CL has the iSet software that allows for customization of the output size when using the X series boxes, which combines a sending unit with a video processor.  From the training videos I've seen, it does pretty much exactly what you want  You can get an X2 delivered by DHL for around $350, which is just as cheap as the HDMI thingy Pat linked.

[ericwesley]

Pat

I got the Video Capture plugin up and running with a $20 dongle. When I go to the FPP Command Editor, I don't see an option for Video Capture in the drop down list. Only fill, bars, text and all the WLED effects. I'm running FPP v5.5.

(Full WLED FX integration is awesome though!)

Also, is there a way to capture the whole input resolution and then scale it down to the size of my Virtual Matrix? The only thing I can do right now is crop and set an XY offset.

I am well aware the quality will be absolute garbage to the point of worthless. But I still have to convince my boss & the client of that. And that's usually by them seeing it with their own eyes.

[dkulp]

The FPP Command method stuff requires using FPP 6/master branch stuff and the very latest FPP Video Capture plugin.  If using FPP 5, the instructions would be very different, and I'm not even sure if it works at all with 5.

[ericwesley]

Awesome! I have successfully upgraded to the master branch, updated the plugin and now I have scaled the video to my wimpy 450x120ish size and I must admit, it's not a completely unusable image!

What happened to the plugin page? Does the plugin now automatically handle the incoming resolution & refresh?

And also what about sound? Can the Pi route the incoming USB audio out of the headphone jack? Or will an HDMI video/audio splitter piece of hardware be required?