GLMixer Preference

GLMixer Preference

Preference panel can be accessed from the menu 'Preference', with the gear icon in the toolbar, or by pressing F12 key.

You can restore default values for each panel with the Default Values buton. Restore default values for all panels with the Reset all button.

Place the mouse over the parameter to display a brief tooltip. Place the mouse over the (i) icon to display an extended tooltip.

Render - OpenGL Rendering

Select a category of resolution

In GLMixer, the graphical rendering is done in an internal buffer and displayed on the output window. The aspect ratio is defined in each session (4:3, 3:2, 16:10 or 16:9). This panel let you choose the resolution category indicating the buffer size for each aspect ratio.

• for optimal visual quality, choose a buffer resolution category matching the resolution of your external monitor
• for optimal performance, choose a buffer resolution category adapted to your graphics hardware

Rendering Performance

Choose a comfortable display frame rate according to the limitations of your hardware. On computers with high-end graphics cards (e.g. nvidia or ATI), favor high FPS and leave all options enabled. On computers with low-end graphics cards, try reducing FPS and disabling some options until rendering seems stable.

See the Performance Improvement section for more information.

Output - Display and Recording

Output window

• Frame rate for the output window can be set to a fraction of the rendering frame rate: this can save performance when working in studio mode where the output display is not important and you only need a preview: this way, the rendering and recording can still be done at a high frame rate.
• Fullscreen monitor can be selected: plug a monitor and open the preference panel to select it as default for full-screen mode. Preference is saved for next time.

Recording

See the Video Encoding section for information on the Codec, Quality, Frame rate and Buffer size.

Automatic saving in a folder allows defining a specific location for your recordings:

• Automatic folder OFF : a file dialog will popup after stopping the video to ask where to save the video (NB: the temporary file stored in the system hard drive will be moved to the selected location: the operation of moving it to an external location can be slow for large files)
• Automatic folder ON: a file will be created and labeled automatically at the given location (path + glmixervideo + date ) . (NB: make sure the location is on a drive with high bandwidth for writing: recording on a network drives or USB sticks might not work).

Source - Default behavior

Source default properties

• Name prefix is used to give a name to a newly created source (e.g. new media source with video "myvideo.avi" will create a source labeled "Sourcemyvideo").
• Aspect ratio can be fixed by default: in this case, scaling a source (Geometry view) will maintain the aspect ratio.
• Blending mode specified here will be used by default when creating a source

Dropping options

After being created (or drag'n dropped from the system into GLMixer), a source is then dropped into the workspace:

• Play immediately after drop will trigger the 'Play' action of a source immediately. Otherwise, the source will be awaiting for the user to hit play.
• Scaling of sources is applied to match the scale and aspect ratio of a source in order to fit the rendering area.

Loopback source

• Recursive frame rate defines the update frequency of loopback sources: low fps can give a saccadic effect of loopback.

Video Source (media files)

• Time as frame numbers : the display of time for videos is in frame number instead of duration (H:mm:ss)
• Maximum buffer size can be set to adjust the amount of RAM used for decoding a video: this allows setting a limit according to the amount of RAM available. For example, if your computer has 1GB free RAM, and you have 10 videos in your session, set the max buffer size to 100MB.

Input - User interface

Mouse (or stylus) buttons

There are six actions that you can perform with the mouse buttons in the workspace:

• Tool: apply the currently active tool on the clicked source(s): grab, scale or rotate.
• Tool individual: same as above, but ignore the selection / groupping of sources.
• Navigate: hold and drag the workspace to navigate into the workspace area (does not affect rendering).
• Drag: hold and drag the target zone of the workspace (in pink): e.g. move the rendering window in the geometry view.
• Select: select or deselect the clicked source (the other way is to draw a selection area around the sources)
• Context menu: popup the context menu of the clicked source or on the background.
• Zoom: zoom in the clicked source.

For each of these actions, you can choose which mouse button is used, and the modifier keys associated (CTRL, ALT, SHIFT). To do so, simply place the mouse cursor on the action to configure, and press the mouse button & modifier that you want to use.

The Context menu on background can either be for displaying zooming action or for changing cursor.

Mouse wheel zoom

• Speed can be adjusted to zoom in and out with the mouse wheel
• Zoom to cursor position means the zoom action will also navigate into the workspace

You can try these options by placing the mouse cursor in the test area on the right.

System - General options

System

• Allow only one instance : kill all currently running instances of GLMixer when starting the program. Useful to limit ressources usage, and delete all pending processes if the program crashed.
• Restore session on start: loads the last running session when starting the program.
• Save session on exit: save the session state when exiting the program (i.e. File/Save and do not ask).
• Custom file dialogs with video preview: depending on the operating system, the dialogs for openning files do not always show a preview of the videos. The custom file dialogs of GLMixer have a video player to test a video before openning it.
• Custom update timer: depending on the operating system, the update timer used for refreshing the display (see Render) is not always precise enough to maintain a stable FPS (e.g. 30 FPS is not possible under Windows). The custom timer is more precise, but uses more CPU.
• Maximum number of undo levels: Set the limit to amount of operations to rember for undo (CTRL+Z). Zero means disable Undo.

Interface

• Anti-aliasing: smooth render of lines in the workspace.
• Display timer: Shows a clock in the preview area indicating the time since session was openned.
• Display framerate: Shows an indicator of the frame rate in the upper-right corner of the workspace.
• Mixing transparency style: in the mixing view, the transparency of the sources is represented by a semi-transparent grid. This parameter allows adjusting the size of this grid.
• Mixinv icon size: in the mixing view, all icons have the same size. This parameter allows adjusting the size of the icons.