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UPSTAGE USER MANUAL

1. avatar tools palette NS BIB on em access drawing tools palette BW dep cicer access audio tools palette pew o 11 00 wa f Welcome to UpStage lt avatar text chat window avatar name helen text input field backdrops props SS moonprop L Mum 05 m pre o Read upstage org nz The Wardrobe top right hand corner is a scrollable list of the avatars that have been assigned to this stage The Mirror the square beside the Wardrobe shows the avatar you are currently holding with its name in the rectangle under the mirror There are tools below the Mirror and image galleries for backdrops and props along the bottom of the stage area Players see a smaller text chat window than the audience 18 9 ON STAGE PLAYER TOOLS Logged in players have access to a range of on stage tools not visible to the audience which enable the real time manipulation of preloaded media and live elements on the stage HOLDING AND MOVING AN AVATAR The avatars assigned to a stage appear as small icons in the Wardrobe To hold a particular avatar click on its icon in the Wardrobe use the arrows to scroll up and down the Wardrobe The icon will disappear from your Wardrobe and appear in your Mirror the square area to the left of the Wardrobe This shows you which avatar you are currently holding A greyed out icon in your Wardrobe means that another p
2. 6 25 Note that in the Player view of the stage an strip along the bottom of the backdrop will be obscured by the Backdrop and Prop Image Galleries but as these tools are not seen by the audience it is recommended that your backdrop extend below that strip TIP it s a good idea to look at your stage in audience view as well as player view you can do this while you re working by having it open in two browsers one where you are logged in and one not Backdrops can be created as png swf gif or jpeg as with avatars and props png or swf will give the best quality results Note that png files should NOT be interlaced when saving If you are using gif or jpeg upload a test backdrop to see if it s going to be good enough and remember to delete unwanted images When uploading a series of backdrops for a particular show it s a good idea to give them names that begin with the show name so that when it comes to assigning them to the stage they are displayed together in the list This applies to props and avatars as well FILE SIZES 46 File sizes are limited according to your user permissions superusers can upload up to 2 MB per file admins can upload up to 1 MB per file however this is still quite big and in general you should try to keep your files small The larger the files you upload and the more graphics assigned to your stage the slower the stage will load Performance after loading may also be affected altho
3. already have everything you need to use UpStage Obviously faster processors and higher RAM give improved performance but UpStage has been designed to work on relatively low spec client machines A broadband internet connection will give the best performance but UpStage performs surprisingly well over dial up The main disadvantage when using dial up is that the load time for each stage is longer You may need to allow up to 15 minutes to load a stage depending on how many graphics are on it Once it s loaded the real time interaction and overall performance of UpStage is not dramatically worse on dial up than on broadband UpStage has been designed to run on a wide range of clients using the Macromedia Flash Player plug in version 7 or above It should function properly in all standard browsers such as Firefox Safari Internet Explorer and Opera Linux users may need to install gsfonts and gsfonts xil see the section Troubleshooting for information about this FIREWALLS UpStage will function through most but not all firewalls depending on how the firewall has been set up If you install your own UpStage server it will ask you to specify which ports you want to use the defaults are 8081 and 7230 You will need to ensure that your users have the correct ports open 10 The Open UpStage server uses ports 8084 and 7230 7233 therefore these ports need to be open if you are trying to access this server through a firewall Th
4. this must be done in the avatar edit screen fromthe Workshop The audience can also type into the text chat but their text won t be spoken out loud and only appears in the text chat window not on the stage As the audience doesn tlog in there are no names connected to the audience chat If you aren t holding an avatar your text will appear as audience text i ve got something to say You can make your avatar think by typing colon before the text Your text will think therefore i am appear in a thought bubble over a the avatar but won t be spoken aloud It will appear in the text chat window in blue and with curly brackets around it see image below To make your avatar shout type before the text Your text will appear in a red outlined bubble over the avatar and in the text chat window as red capitalised text It will be spoke dan this is how we speak in UpStage aloud and the avatar s voice is ir N dan and this is how we think subtly modified upwards in pitch dan AND THIS IS HOW WE SHOUT LISTEN UP EVERYBODY AVATAR VOICES UpStage uses the Festival Speech Synthesiser and MBROLA to generate text2speech audio for the avatars voices lt 22 When you upload a new avatar you will arrive at the avatar s edit screen where you can select its voice from a dropdown menu To change the voice of an avatar that has previously been uploaded you can acces
5. It is available under dual licensing a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike 2 5 License and GNU General Public Licence GPL The initial development of UpStage was funded in 2003 through the Smash Palace Collaboration Fund a joint initiative of Creative New Zealand and the NZ Ministry of Science Research and T echnology In 2006 the UpStage project received funding from the Community Partnerships Fund of the New Zealand government s Digital Strategy to develop UpStage version 2 UpStage V2 was also supported by partners CityLink MediaLab and Auckland University of Technology Currently UpStage is supported by CityLink who provide free server hosting and traffic and Auckland University of Technology who provide teams of final year computer programming students to work on the ongoing development of the software The UpStage team and user community are very grateful for this vital support This is the user manual it provides general instructions for using UpStage version 2 1 it is divided into 6 sections Introduction Audience Players Media Management Creating Media Appendices o 0000 O Open sessions are held regularly in UpStage providing training in the basic use of UpStage and how to create cyberformance For dates and times for the next open session visit www upstage org nz and join the UpStage Announce list If you are looking for technical support including instructions for installing the UpSt
6. Tuner Controls E Flip Horizontally JPEG Quality o b Video Format Properties Stream Format Video Format Compression Video Standard Frame Rate 10 000 Flip Horizontal Color Space Compression RGB 24 Dutput Size 160 x 120 Evocam configuration 29 h Refresh Status Items Recording Configure Location ftp upstage org nz filename jpg Example ftp ftp yoursite com webcam jpg Username username Password PA Server Refresh Status Items Recording pu Refresh 9 Every 2 seconds O When motion is detected M Upload image to server Uploading v Send image as email O Save image to folder 3 O Archive image to folder J meee C Use Secure FTP Allows EvoCam to securely upload to SFTP servers Your username password and webcam image are encrypted during transmission C Use Passive FTP Allows EvoCam to upload to FTP servers from behind a firewall If you receive Connection timed out errors try reversing this setting Not used for SFTP servers M Use Temporary File Uploads the image to a temporary file and then renames this file to the name specified in your URL when the upload is complete M Stay Connected Leaves the session open so that EvoCam doesn t need to log in to your server each time an image is uploaded Ca
7. UpStage Adding a new avatar e lt gt eos kl a L1 http upstage org nz 8084 admin new avatar Xi v J Gly tive time zone Q Creating a new Avatar Home Stages Workshop Log out Pick a name and upload the file The file should be in swf flash gif jpg or png format Name Number of frames i m Your user status is Super Admin Your file upload limit is unlimited Filename 1 Browse or choose a video stream Choose from existing streams in the media video dirctory Select E Name for video avatar ok gt If you are creating a new web cam avatar you will first need to set up your web cam with FTP access to your UpStage server see the Webcams chapter for details and recommended software Once your image or video stream is ready follow the link from the Workshop to Add a new avatar and find your filename in the drop down list of available video streams Choose a name for the avatar then click OK Go back to the Workshop and follow the link to Manage Avatars and you will see a list of the stages plus unassigned this is where you will find your avatar before you have assigned it to a particular stage It will also appear in the list of avatars uploaded by you when you are in the Manage Stages section allowing you to assign it to a particular stage Note that there is no limit to how many stages one avatar or other medi
8. a sort of curtain that appears over the stage while it loads the splash screen has a bar to indicate how far through loading the stage is as well as a welcome message which you can edit and the name of the stage Stage a dynamic web page where you can place and move avatars props and backdrops to create a performance Stage tools tools visible on the stage to logged in players but not visible to the audience that enable the players to manipulate media on the stage in real time Text chat an input field and text chat window where avatars speech and audience text appears and is visible to everyone the text chat window can be scrolled up and down to read text that has been entered previously Tools the buttons sliders and icons that allow logged in players to manipulate media 51 Wardrobe the interface through which players can select avatars on a stage an alphabeticised and scrollable list of the icons and names of the avatars assigned to that particular stage Whispering silent text communication between logged in players that is not visible to the audience Workshop the back stage interface where logged in Players can upload graphics view existing graphics create and manage stages and manage players 52 21 COMMANDS When you are on stage there are a number of commands you can type into the text field to do certain things a 1 a 2 etc a0 asize b 1 b 2 etc b 0 details help i
9. appropriate web cam software you will need to configure it to send the web cam images to your UpStage server Following are the settings you will need Host URL of your UpStage server username set by your UpStage administrator password set by your UpStage administrator filepath filename jpg Port 21 or other set by your UpStage administrator Before you begin to upload your web cam image to UpStage check the pixel size bearing in mind that images increase in size when they are uploaded as avatars to UpStage If it is 320 x 240 or larger it will take up half the stage or more and impact on the speed and performance of UpStage for everyone We strongly recommend using a web cam FTP application that allows you to scale your image to any size You will need to set a trigger that tells the application how often to take a new image we recommend 2 3 seconds as any faster is likely to be faster than the image can travel from your computer to the server and out to the other players and audience Once you have configured your web cam and are sending a live stream to your UpStage server you should be able to find the filename of your web cam stream in the list of available video streams in the Add a new avatar section of the workshop You can then create an avatar using that stream and assign it to a stage in the Manage stages section Use it on the stage as you would a normal avatar Passive or active You will need to set
10. connected to your choice of browser please contact us If you are having browser problems we recommend the following e ensure that you have at least version of the Flash player installed close your browser window open a new window and log in again If you still have problems after doing this quit your browser application and restart it STAGE WON T LOAD If the stage fails to load properly and the splash screen remains over the stage with the message Couldn t load all images this could mean that there is a corrupted image assigned to the stage The first thing to do is try reloading as it could just have been a blip in the data flow either use the reload button on the splash screen or use the back button in your browser to return to where you can from and dlick on the link to the stage again If this doesn t work you may need to remove a rogue image from the stage If you had just assigned a new graphic to the stage before you encountered this problem then that is most likely to be that one that s causing the problem Try unassigning that image from the stage and see if it will load If you don t know which image it is you may need to take everything off the stage and reassign them one by one or alternatively delete the stage and make a new one FONTS LOOK BAD If an swf file has been saved as low quality in the original file it can force the whole stage to appear low quality This can be changed by righ
11. don t know what size you want Once you have reduced it to the required size adjust the document size to match Fromthe File menu choose Export Image Put the jpeg quality up to 10096 and save the swf file ANIMATED AVATARS AND PROPS UpStage supports both animated sequences and Flash movie clips When you put sequenced frame by frame or motion or shape tweened animation onto the stage it will appear static with the image in the first frame a 1 To change to other frames of the animation type a 2 a 3 etc To make the avatar animate type a 0 If you have saved your swf as a movie clip animation it does not need any commands it will automatically loop and can be used on stage either as a continuously looping animation or as a series of still avatars that are swapped using the a command as above Props and backdrops can also be animated using Flash But bear in mind that Flash animations can end up as larger files which will increase the time it takes to load your stage To create an animated sequence follow these steps Firstcreate a series of png files as above and give them numbered filenames OpenFlash and fromthe File menu choose Import and navigate to the first png file Flash will ask if you want to import the series say yes This will create a frame for each image e Going to each frame in turn click on the image to select it a border appears around it in the Insert menu choose Convert to sym
12. for different screen resolutions and sizes and different sizes of browser window The aspect ratio is 7 3 see the backdrop diagram below The recommended size for the original file for a standard sized avatar is approximately 100x100 pixels obviously you will want bigger and smaller ones but this gives you somewhere to start In order to test the size of your avatar you must upload it assign it to a stage then lookat it on that stage the same applies to props and also for backdrops if you are working out what is going to be obscured by the chat window It can be a time consuming process getting your graphics to the size you want so it s a good idea to make a couple of samples first and then base the rest of your graphics on those once you have got them the size you want this applies to both props and avatars If you upload avatars that are not the right size please remember to delete the unwanted files otherwise the server and Workshop interface get clogged up with unwanted media CREATING PNGS The png file format is recommended for avatars and props rather than gif or jpg as it allows for transparency and gives a good quality image Files can be saved in png format in most graphics applications In the File menu choose Save As and look for the png option Do NOT interlace the file when you save it CREATING SWFS Although UpStage itself is open source and we ve done everything we canto make it cross everyt
13. mid high slightly strangulated male slow X German English w German accent middle somewhat slow and drawn out emb de7 X German German male German emb_en1 high X English soft mid range male voice emb_fr1 en low X European low amp lecherous mid high male voice sounds like he has emb fr4 en high slow X European trouble speaking low soft female voice with slight European emb_hu1 en slow X European accent emb nl2 X Dutch mid low male mid low male voice with slight European emb_nl2 en X European accent emb_pl1 X Polish mid low calm female mid low calm female with European emb pl1 en X Polish accent emb ro1 en X emb_sw1 en fast X Swedish mid low male speaking quickly emb_sw2 en high slow X Swedish mid high female with European accent high X X Computer boyish computer monotone rms faster X American rms nitech X American Deeper than roger clear little bit emphatic roger X English Thin proper sounding not deep slow X computer gets slower amp lower very good for effects slt cmu X American Flat slightly muffly slt nitech X American Flat a bit clearer amp stronger than slt cmu ADDING MORE VOICES You can install additional speech plug ins on your own server to extend the range of voices available to the avatars As long as you don t mind messing around with the sourcecode a little bit it s not difficult Patricia Jung explains how she did it for Linux using UpStage V1 note that this is now several years old Just ad
14. stages walk throughs and other players avatars props video and backdrops open public sessions are held Download the UpStage V2 Manual for more detailed instructions The manual is currently being updated to include the new V2 01 features Complete list of stages Note as of 4 May 2008 we have upgraded to UpStage V2 01 The media in the workshop is now organised according to who has uploaded it This may mean that media you have previously uploaded is temporarily inaccessible From here you can N V2 01 Stages As of 4 May 2008 we have upgraded to V2 01 This includes Set up a new stage Setupanewstage enhanced on stage tools and an Manage an existing stage select players avatars props and backdrops improved workshop with media that will be used on a particular stage rename a stage and edit its organised according opa description and delete old stages uploaded it and which stages it is assigned to Avatars gt We are still updating the manual Adda new avatar upload a new image or add a web cam stream to include V2 01 features Until Manage avatars create and edit groups of avatars that can be assigned to that is available the latest a stage rename avatars assign voices to avatars delete old avatars version of the manual is V2 22 July 2007 2 9MB PDF Audio Before you delete Adda new audio file upload an MP3 Manage audio rename audio files delete old audio files Is it yours to delete Backdro
15. TING 50 20 s GLOSSARY Here are definitions for some of the terms that are used in this manual Please let us know if something is missing Audience people present online at a performance but not logged in The audience can participate via the text chat but do not have access to the same tools as the players Avatar a graphical icon that can be held and moved around the stage by a player and that can speak Backdrop a graphic which fills the stage behind any avatars and props that are placed on it A backdrop can also extend behind the text chat Chatters the online audience are often referred to as chatters as they contribute to the performance via a text chat function Cyberformance live online performance where remote players and or audience use internet technologies to come together in real time Drawing functionality that allows real time drawing directly onto the stage Foyer the home page of an UpStage server where the audience can come to see what s on and where players can log in Mirror the square on a stage that shows a Player which avatar they are currently holding Palette eg drawing palette or audio palette a set of tools for a particular function Player a logged in participant in a performance Players have access to on stage tools which allow them to manipulate avatars backdrops and props Prop a graphic which can be held by an avatar or placed on the stage Splash screen
16. UPSIAGE USER MANUAL Published 2013 10 25 License None INTRODUCTION 1 2 BACKGROUND 3 PROJECT TEAM 4 TECHNICAL INFORMATION VERSION 2 1 USER MANUAL WWW UPSTAGE ORG NZ 2 s BACKGROUND UpStage is a web based venue for cyberformancell the real time compilation of digital media into live performance by multiple remote players for an online audience and sometimes an offline audience as well People anywhere in the world can participate in live performance events by using standard browser software to access UpStage without having to download and install additional software and without needing to know anything other than a web address The concept for UpStage was developed by Avatar Body Collision a globally dispersed cyberformance troupe whose members have been experimenting with online theatrical performance since 1999 and together as Avatar Body Collision since 2002 UpStage was born from the desire to reach a wider audience and to make it easier for audiences and performers alike to participate in live performance via the internet The software combines the different elements of cyberformance graphical avatars web cams audio images text chat and who knows what else in the future into a single interface The audience simply directs their browser to the web address at the appointed time to watch and participate in the cyberformance The UpStage server application is open source and free to download
17. a can be assigned to Manage Avatars This screen lets you access information pages for all the avatars on the server grouped according to the stages they have been assigned to plus an unassigned category for avatars that have not yet been assigned to a stage Click on a stage name or unassigned and then on the name of an avatar to go to that avatar s edit screen 40 a E n oo UpStage editing alien mali Ss 506060 lt gt exo in EL S COL ht 7upstage org nz 8084 admin edit avatar a7YbvRDY swf xXx v JC tive time zone Q Home Stages Workshop Logout Name alien mali Voice crunchy T8 Test string This is what i will say if you ask for a test Test selected Voice E type None medium file a7YhvRpYswf dateTime 15 05 09 02 06 PM url media a7YhvRpY swt description height None width None web thumbnail missing png voice crunchy uploader helen thumbnail name alien mali You will see a thumbnail image of the avatar information about the file and a dropdown list of available voices You can change the name of the avatar and its voice and test the voices to see what they sound like PROPS Props function in a similar way to avatars but they can t speak and you must be holding an avatar in order to hold a prop When an avatar is holding a prop it appears on stage at the top left corner of the avatar If another p
18. access the Workshop they can t upload media Guest log ins are usually used in introductory workshop situations to prevent people from uploading media before they know what they are doing 33 15 CREATING AND MANAGING PLAYERS From the main Workshop screen under the heading Players you create new players and manage existing ones You must be a superuser to add new players manage players other than yourself or remove players Changing your password If you are not a superuser the Manage Players link will only allow you to change your own password If you have been given a generic password it is recommended that you change this to something more secure and memorable when you first log in Add a new player e A Create a log in for a new da g A es player and set their a permissions Adding a player e Act this gives access Pick a username and password to the on stage player r tools but not to the Leal Workshop interface A 3 e Administer this gives access to the on stage Player permissions player tools and the This player can Workshop interface V Act you want this e Add or Remove V Administer Change stages avatars etc Players this is the Add or Remove Players including you super user who can _ok do pretty much k xu Ma leon anything The status of the player also regulates the uploadable file size e Act no access to Workshop Admin 1 MB Superuser 2 MB However file
19. age http upstage org nz 8084 please do not delete anything that has been uploaded by someone else But also be aware that we operate a Creative Commons policy so your media may be borrowed by others No one should use someone else s media in a performance without the original creator s permission ON STAGE LINKS Active hyperlinks can be created by typing a URL into the text chat window eg http www upstage org nz Use right click or ctrl click to use the link which gives the options to open the link ina new window the same window or to copy the link Sometimes it s useful to have a graphic on stage that provides a hyperlink to another stage or a different web site The way to do this is to create a swf image with an ActionScript button containing the following code on release getURL http desired url self This could be an avatar or a prop that is placed on the stage at the time that you want the audience to follow the link MORE FLASH TRICKS If you are experienced in using Flash and Actionscript you can do a lot more with it in UpStage most but not all interactivity that can be achieved in a web page using Flash can be achieved in UpStage The purpose of this manual is not to teach you how to use Flash but there are some relevant tutorials on the UpStage web site which you may find helpful 47 48 1 An open source equivalent plug in Gnash has recently become available but it is a media p
20. age server please refer to the SourceForge trac and the developers mailing list For further information and updates please visit www upstage org nz The UpStage User Manual has been edited by Helen Varley Jamieson in collaboration with Vicki Smith and the UpStage community and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike 3 0 Unported License i Cyberformance uses internet technologies to bring remote performers together in live theatrical events www cyberfo rmance o rg 3 PROJECT TEAM The UpStage project was initiated in 2003 by Avatar Body Collision who are Vicki Smith Leena Saarinen Karla Ptacek and Helen Varley Jamieson The project continues to be managed by Helen Varley Jamieson and Vicki Smith For more information about the Colliders please visit www avatarbodycollision org The UpStage application was originally written by Douglas Bagnall who has a background in open source development of online projects and is also a digital artist His artistic work includes the development of a film making robot and a cloud classifier visit http halo gen nz At the end of 2010 former AUT student Paul Rohrlach joined the team as a developer and server administrator and in 2011 Francesco Buonaiuto became our volunteer documenter Many other artists are involved in the annual UpStage Festival and we have a growing team of open source developers who are supporting the maintenance and d
21. alleries use the colour picker that is below the list of usernames Click on the colour you want it will display in the box below the colour picker and click Save Background Colour This change is only visible to players as the audience do not see these tools and the main reason for wanting to do it is if your performance has backdrops that go behind the backdrop and prop galleries and make it difficult to see and select the icons Note that in the future it will be possible to change other background colours here too including the chat window and the background colour for the entire web page behind the UpStage stage 4 gt http upstage org nz 8084 admin edit stage 101010 Background colour for Backdrops and Props Pane MET H 2 _ Save Background Color Stage Backdrop Debug Messages This will print Debug Stage Messages On the backdrop of the stage C Turn Debug Messages on off Save Reset stage This will put the stage back in its original state ruining any performances that are currently under way C Reset the stage reset hi sono S0 aa A aR RSOaA a ORA RR eoe 40e v Home Stages Workshop Log out Debug messages Click the check box Turn Debug Messages On Off and click the Save button alongside it The main reason for doing this is programmers wanting to find bugs however it has also been used deliberately during performances Reset To reset the stage click t
22. ar everything in a particular layer If you are trying to draw a curved line and finding that it appears as sections of straight lines you are moving your mouse faster than UpStage can keep up with try drawing slower for smoother curves 24 If you want to draw a completely straight line hold the shift key down while you draw the line 25 12 1 AUDIO Prerecorded MP3 audio files can be uploaded and played in UpStage Click on the yellow audio button to reveal the Audio Palette Audio files assigned to the stage will appear in a list on the right with musical notes indicating music tracks and sfx indicating sound effects Use the green arrows to scroll up and down if there are more than six tracks assigned to the stage Click on a track 2FAQ tara sfx 2FAQ tara Al and its file name will appear in one 57 fx dog of the three slots where you can tomwaits 1 bn a Sfx 2FAQ bryn start pause an stop individual stop E o tracks set looping 5to7 and control the pause loop volume with the EEB o 31 t You can stop all sfx 2FAQ esme tracks at the same time using the stop all button Click on the blue act button to return to the avatar tool palette Your avatar can still speak and move when you have the audio palette open KNOWN ISSUES At the time of writing November 2011 the list of files in the audio palette is displayed
23. at window in a webcam avatar COMMANDS Audience members can use a number of commands in the text chat these are instructions typed into the text chat input field after a for example asize 8 or another number this changes the font size of audience input text to 8 the default size is 4 on that computer This is useful for people with visual impairment and if the screen is being projected for a group audience psize 8 or another number this changes the font size of player input text as above info gives some information about UpStage Players have a lot more commands available to them see the chapter on Commands for more information 15 PLAYERS 7 LOGGING IN 8 PLAYER VIEW 9 ON STAGE PLAYER TOOLS 10 SPEECH AND TEXT CHAT 11 DRAWING 12 AUDIO 13 WEBCAMS T LOGGING IN Players log into UpStage to create and present performances They do not need anything other than a browser with the Flash player plugin to do this Note that audience members do NOT log in to UpStage their view of the stage is different to that of logged in players Players watching performances by other players are advised to log out first so that they experience the performance as it s intended to be viewed without the distraction of the on stage player tools There are two levels of player log in player only and admin The player only log in is used for guests and new users and gives access to the on stage player too
24. ble and spoken text The text is blue inthe chat window typing before your text will make your avatar shout The speech bubble outline and the chat text is red 53 22 a TEXT2SPEECH VOICES UpStage s speech is generated by the Festival Speech Synthesiser developed at the Centre for Speech Technology Research at Edinburgh University http www cstr ed ac uk projects festival An avatar s voice is selected from a dropdown menu when adding a new avatar and changed in the Manage avatars section see section 3 2 3 T here are currently about 100 voices on the UpStage server http upstage org nz 8084 if you are setting up your own UpStage server please see the technical documentation regarding installing voices VOICES CURRENTLY AVAILABLE ON UPSTAGE The voices currently available with UpStage have a filenaming system that describes what kind of voice each one is Some of the voices speak English in a foreign accent some speak English in various English accents and some are designed to speak other languages The software defaults to a male voice but we have endeavoured to make female versions of most voices You can test the voices on the Avatar Edit screen by selecting different voices from the drop down menu and entering the text you want to test The format is e or emb native language en modifications For example e de speaks and reads German e en speaks and reads English e en fast fl speak
25. bol the border will change to a thin blue line then resize Modify Transform remembering that avatars and props will increase in size by about 2 3 times when uploaded into UpStage Once the images are all reduced to the required size adjust the document size to match if your images are not all exactly the same size make sure you have made the document size as big as the largest image Fromthe first frame and with the image selected the blue line should appear around it go to the Insert menu and select Create motion tween To checkthat the tweening has happened go to the Control menu and hit play your sequence of images should play Fromthe File menu choose Export Movie put the jpeg quality up to 10096 and save the file Sounds can be embedded into Flash movie clips but it takes a bit of trickery to be able to control the sound When using Flash to create animated avatars and props be sure to check the the frame rate and whether it is set up to loop If the frame rate is for example 24 fps and itis setto loop the image will reload 24 times a second regardless whether anything else is changing on the screen Making your still flash pictures run at for example 1 fps and or switching off looping will ease the load on everyone s browser Very slow animation for example tweened over 40 or so frames and looping will cause the least strain and can create some very effective movement UpStage doesn t cope with mo
26. ckdrop on stage the command is b 1 b 2 etc and b O to animate the frames AUDIO You can upload MP3 files and assign them to a stage Up to three audio tracks can be played at simultaneously on a stage more than three can be assigned to a stage Uploading a new audio file From the Add new audio link in the Workshop navigate to your MP3 file on your hard drive Name it and select either Sound effect or Music then click OK to upload Manage audio This screen shows the list of audio files that have been uploaded You can delete files or click on the file name to edit its information you can change the name or the type of file sound effect or music 42 CREATING MEDIA 18 CREATING GRAPHICS FOR UPSTAGE 19 CREATING AUDIO FOR UPSTAGE 43 18 CREATING GRAPHICS FOR UPSTAGE Avatars backdrops and props for UpStage can be created using standard graphics applications such as Gimp PhotoShop Fireworks and Flash The recommended formats for your original graphics files are swf or png Vector based images will appear much cleaner than pixel images such as gif and jpeg as they are resized to match the dimensions of individual screens and browsers You can use gif and jpg but your images will lose quality note backdrops are fine as jpegs Avatars and props will appear on stage approximately two to three times larger than the original file This is because the stage is not ina fixed size window it allows
27. d another entry in the VOICES section in Upstage upstage voices py like txt2pho mbrola det usr local mbrola pipefilt usr local mbrola preproc usr local mbrola Hadifix abk usr local mbrola Rules st usr local mbrola txt2pho p usr local mbrola data usr local mbrola mbrola usr local mbrola del del fest know it looks awful but this is only because the command is an awful chain consisting of four commands with a couple of options each and the relevant path pipefilt preproc txt2pho mbrola 55 56 It does some preprocessing like exchanging all appearances of z B with zum Beispiel then hands the resulting text over to txt2pho and to mbrola As long as your command or command chain takes text input from the standard input and outputs the result as sound in raw format on the standard output chain Unix stuff ask me if you haven t heard about it you can put whatever you like in between the and the The above mentioned awful command chain will work when one has installed the txt2pho frontend it uses the del female mbrola voice and you can choose it in the web interface using the name del The only problem with this kind of reconfiguration is As config py isn t a nice configuration file but a python script one needs to know at least that python is very picky about vertical alignment It s extremely important that your new voice entries have the same amount of w
28. ese ports are open by default in most private internet connections but some organisational networks will close any unnecessary ports 1 AUDIENCE 5 AUDIENCE VIEW 6 AUDIENCE CHAT 5 AUDIENCE VIEW Audience members enter UpStage by following a web link from an email or another web page and participate in the performance via the text chat Audience members do not need to download or install any additional software as long as they have a browser with the Flash player plug in Audience members do not log in and therefore do not have access to the same on stage tools as Players do A splash screen covers the stage while it loads preventing the audience from interacting until the stage is fully loaded Once the stage has loaded the audience will see any graphics that have already been placed on the stage they will see and hear the performance and they will be able to participate in the text chat The audience view of the stage is shown below the text chat window is at the right with an input field at the bottom and up down scroll arrows on the right top and bottom corners The rest of the screen is the stage where the visual action of the performance takes place Sila Vie Vds Ve Hoy tomas Wadow Walp Pet a Q nan 301018 Foyer 13 6 s AUDIENCE CHAT Audience members are also known as chatters because they can interact with the performance by typing into the text input field at the bottom right of the
29. evelopment of the software Since December 2004 the UpStage server has been generously hosted by Citylink Thanks to Anne Philpott we established a relationship with Auckland University of Technology which has seen teams of final year software development students working on UpStage as their major project since 2006 The AUT UpStage teams to date are 2012 13 Scott Riddell Gavin Chan amp Craig Farrell 2012 Benjamin Qin and Daniel Han 2011 12 Nessa Baterina Karena Goh Corey Robb 201 Heath Behrens and Vibhu Patel 2010 11 Mohammad Al Timimi JR Malonzo and Henry Goh 2010 Tom Choi Paul Rohrlach amp Craig Farrell 2009 10 Natasha Pullenster Nicholas Robinson and Shaun Narayan 2009 John Coleman and Vishaal Solanki 2008 09 Shaun Nesbitt Wendy Wen Candy Yang 2008 Aaron Barnett 2007 08 Alan Crow and Tony Wong 2007 Endre Bernhardt Lauren Kilduff amp Phillip Quinlan 2006 07 Beau Hardy Francis Palma Lucy Chu and Wise Wang Many other people have contributed to the development of UpStage through encouragement advice user testing feedback and simply believing that it was possible The project team thanks every one of you If you are interested in being a part of the development of UpStage you can join the developer list https lists sourceforge net lists listinfo upstage list If you would like to be kept informed about events in UpStage you can join the announcements list https lists sou
30. he check box beside Reset the stage and click the reset button alongside This clears all the text from the text chat window and returns the stage to its default state note that it does NOT unassign the media that has been assigned to the stage but it will restore any changed avatar names to their original name If you change the voice of an avatar that is assigned to a stage it is necessary to reset the stage in order for the changed voice to take effect If you need to reset the stage during a rehearsal for some reason remember to warn everyone that you are doing this as they will be thrown off the stage The stage will automatically reload but it can be disconcerting if you aren t expecting it and is definitely not a good idea to do during a performance unless specifically you want that effect 38 17 UPLOADING MEDIA Before you begin uploading your media to UpStage please read the section of this manual Creating Media Media graphical avatars props and backdrops and audio files is uploaded to UpStage via the Workshop interface We are currently developing a new interface as the current system was not designed for the numbers of artists now using UpStage and has become quite cumbersome We ask for your patience while we wait for the new system to be ready Unless you are a superuser media uploads are limited to 1MB per file this is to help avoid the uploading of unnecessarily large files which will mean that s
31. hing it is ultimately delivered to the browser via the Flash Player plug in because of this the most successful graphics format is swf To create swf files you need the Flash application note open source applications that convert other formats to swf are beginning to be available if you know of something that works well please let us know Please note that the following information is by no means a comprehensive Flash tutorial If you do not know how to use Flash at all or if the following steps are not clear to you we recommend that you look on the web for a Flash tutorial The basic steps for producing a single frame avatar or prop using Flash is as follows 44 Start with a png file in which you have clear cut your image and givenita transparent background Keep the png image at alarge size around 500px square for a standard sized avatar is a good guide as much larger will result in an unessarily large swf file but a smaller file will start to lose quality Open Flash and fromthe File menu choose Import navigate to your png file and import it into Flash Clickonthe image to selectit a grey border appears around it e Inthe Insert menu choose Convert to symbol the border will change to a thin blue line Thenresize it Modify Transform remembering that avatars and props will increase in size by about 2 3 times when uploaded into UpStage Around 100 pixels is a good size to begin with if you
32. hitespaces at the beginning of the line as the other voice entries The reason it took me so long was TTS failed completely and utterly in making the German festival extensions for use with mbrola voices http www ims uni stuttgart de phonetik synthesis festival_opensource html work Then tried txt2pho with mbrola http www ikp uni bonn de dt forsch phonetik hadifix HADIFIXforMBROLA html http bogmog sourceforge net document_show php3 doc_id 34 has a nice installation description ignoring festival and this worked at once 23 TROUBLESHOOTING UpStage is a work in progress it is being maintained and developed by volunteer programmers which means that things happen but sometimes slowly and sometimes things break as we go We welcome input from anyone who has the time and skills to work with us on the development of UpStage please visit the SourceForge site for more information and join the developer s list If you encounter a problem that isn t listed here or that you still can t find an answer to please check the FAQ page on the UpStage web site maybe there s an answer there e visit the bug tracker on SourceForge to see if it s something that we re working on if it is please add comments as more information can help to find a solution e contact the UpStage team we will try to help BROWSER PROBLEMS We are constantly monitoring browser compatibility so if you experience problems
33. in a random order This is not very helpful if you have a lot of audio files assigned to one stage as you have to scroll up and down to find the file you want We hope to have the list alphabeticalised in the next release v2 4 1 There is also a known bug with being unable to stop a looping track if after you have set it playing and looping you fill up the other two tracks and then add a fourth The fourth track will replace the first looping track but it won t stop it Stop all will also not stop it The only solution is to reload the stage This bug has been lodged on SourceForge and we hope to fix it soon but in the meantime the workaround is to be careful not to select a fourth track when the first one is still looping 26 13 s WEBCAMS Players wanting to use live video in UpStage will need to have a web cam and a separate application that allows the player to FTP their video to the server as motion JPEGs WEB CAM FTP SOFTWARE FTP freeware or shareware is available for the major operating systems Theoretically any web cam FTP application should work however the following software has been researched and tested for compatability with UpStage Please note that this is by no means all the available software and as time passes there will be more and better options The main features that we have looked for in web cam FTP applications are ease of use free or cheap with no advertising on the image the ability to resi
34. l it from the other player The top box will draw on the top layer obscuring avatars The next two layers will let you draw amongst the avatars and the bottom layer draws behind the backdrop avatars backdrop Click on the eye to hide or show your drawing Click on clear to erase the all the drawing from that layer Note that it is currently not possible to erase only part of the drawing in a layer The slider in the layer box controls the transparency of what has already been drawn in that layer move it to the left and the drawing in that layer will become more transparent move it all the way to the left and it will vanish completely T his is useful for fading prepared drawing in and out The colour picker at the top has three sliders letting you adjust the colour of what you re about to draw Move the sliders to change the hue and the new colour appears in the square to the left of the sliders The slider immediately below the colour picker controls the transparency of what you are about to draw use the slider in the layer box to change the transparency of something you ve already drawn The circle and slider below the transparency slider control the size of your brush Move the slider to the right and the circle will increase in size indicating how big it will appear on stage Move it to the left to make it smaller tito s gonna Currently it is not possible to erase other than to de
35. layer browser plug in not a graphics application and at the time of writing appears to be unfeasible for using with UpStage as in its current state it is incompatible with many of UpStage s features We are also looking into HT ML5 as a possible future solution 19 CREATING AUDIO FOR UPSTAGE As well as sound created in real time by avatar voices prerecorded MP3 files can be uploaded to UpStage and played via the Audio palette in the on stage player tools Prerecorded audio could include music sound effects human voices etc At this stage ONLY the MP3 format works a third possibility for adding audio to your performance is to embed audio in a Flash animation if you have the skills and ability to do this A IMB file size limit for audio uploads is in place on the UpStage Open Server 8084 this is to ensure that the server doesn t get unnecessarily filled up with enormous files and that stage load times are not too long and tedious for the audience Remember that when the audience enters your stage all of the media you have assigned to the stage will be loaded to their computer before they arrive at the stage therefore the bigger the files the longer the load time There are many ways to create convert and compress MP3 audio files we recommend that you refer to other manuals for more information on this if you are not familiar with it 49 APPENDICES 20 GLOSSARY 21 COMMANDS 22 TEXT 2SPEECH VOICES 23 TROUBLESHOO
36. layer clicks on the same prop it will appear to be passed to the second player s avatar Invisible avatars are useful for placing props on the stage appearing independently of the visible avatars Uploading a new prop Props are created in the same way as avatars and should be still images in png or swf format see Section 4 for recommendations about creating graphics for UpStage From the Workshop follow the link to Add a new prop and navigate to the appropriate file on your hard drive Choose a name for it and dick OK to upload Manage Props This screen shows a list of available props grouped according to the stages they have been assigned to you can change the prop name and delete unwanted props BACKDROPS Backdrops can be still images in jpg gif png or swf format See the section Creating Graphics for recommendations about creating backdrops for UpStage Uploading a new backdrop From the Add a new backdrop link in the Workshop navigate to the appropriate file on your hard drive Name it and click OK to upload 41 Manage backdrops This screen shows a list of available backdrops grouped according to the stages they are assigned to you can change the backdrop name and delete unwanted backdrops Multiframe backdrops Multiframe backdrops work in the same way as multiframe avatars see section 4 Graphics for more information about creating multiframe backdrops To change the frame of a multiframe ba
37. layer is holding that avatar Once you have an avatar in your Mirror click on the stage area and your full size avatar will appear there Click in another place and it will move there Tools The Player tools are the set of buttons below the mirror and the green arrows in the mirror These arrows allow you to move your avatar in front of and behind other avatars on the stage Fast Slow t courtesan This button controls the A Y avatar movement fast n suitcase causing the avatar to jump to where you click and hen slow causing it to glide there The button shows fast stop name drop the action that the avatar will change to when next clicked for example if your avatar is gliding the button will show fast Click on it to change to fast and the button will become orange and say slow P 01 A 00 Stop When your avatar is gliding in slow mode click on stop to stop it at any point in its trajectory Name This button will hide or show your avatar s name on the stage this is particularly useful when working with invisible avatars When you first hold an avatar the default state is for the name to be showing so dick on name before you place the avatar on the stage if you don t want the name to show Draw This button changes the function from acting to drawing displaying the drawing tools palette instead of the avatar tools See Section 3 10 for more information abou
38. lery and it will remove the prop from your avatar If another player clicks on the same prop that you are holding it will be transferred to their avatar CHANGING BACKDROPS The backdrops assigned to a particular stage appear as small icons in the Backdrops Gallery at the bottom left of your screen Roll your cursor over the icons to display the name label so that you can accurately choose the backdrop you want If more than 8 backdrops are assigned to a stage arrows will appear at either end of the bar to allow you to scroll through the backdrops which are displayed alphabetically rain Click once on the icon to place the backdrop onto the stage click the icon a second time to remove it Multiframe backdrops can be used in the same way as normal backdrops to change the backdrop s frame type b 1 b 2 etc in the text input field Type b 0 to make the backdrop animate through its frames 21 10 SPEECH AND TEXT CHAT To make your avatar speak type into the text input field below the Chat window bottom right of your screen and hit enter if there isn t a blinking cursor line there already you may need to click the mouse there Your text will appear with your avatar s name in the text chat window as well as on the stage beside your avatar unless you have not put your avatar onto the stage It will be spoken aloud in the voice selected for that avatar note that you cannot change an avatar s voice on stage
39. ls but not to the Workshop The admin log in gives access to the Workshop as well meaning that the player can upload and edit media and create and manage stages Having a player only log in helps to reduce the incidence of inexperienced users uploading unuseable media For the UpStage Open Server 8084 players can log inat http upstage org nz 8084 or at http upstage org nz 8084 admin Once logged in they will find themselves in the Foyer a customisable landing page that provides links to existing stages and to the media management tools Players can change their own passwords and edit other information in their profile 17 8 PLAYER VIEW Players log into UpStage to create and present performances They do not need anything other than a browser with the Flash player plugin to do this Two levels of logging in as player only which gives access to the on stage player tools described above or admin which also gives access to the workshop Once logged in they have access to the Workshop area where they can upload and manage the media to be used on stage and to the on stage tools that enable them to manipulate media for a performance The player view of the stage is different to the audience view ae swaray o e ps uw ER Q http upstage org nz 8084 stages swaray vi Gl Google a 6 mirror gt stage avatar layer arrows apron wardrobe BYLeaps avatar name gt helen p
40. mstream configuration r Filename A ieee Sedis part aa SS FTP Settings I filename f None overwrite JPEG El Hostname upstage org nz Append timestamp to filename Port n 3 C Number sequentially Username username Maximum sequence number 1000 3 Password e p p Image decoration Action T Use passive FTP Your message F Save to disk F FT Put timestamp in image F FTP to server Select color A Select font F Execute command 30 Interval i M vj seconds minutes Cox eme 31 MEDIA MANAGEMENT 14 THE WORKSHOP INTERFACE 15 CREATING AND MANAGING PLAYERS 16 CREATING AND MANAGING STAGES 17 UPLOADING MEDIA 32 THE WORKSHOP INTERFACE Once you have logged in to UpStage you arrive at the Workshop from where you can either proceed directly to the Stages to rehearse or perform or choose from a range of administrative options These options allow you to create and manage Stages and Players and upload and manage Avatars Props Audio and Backdrops P 000 Upstage Workshop o e tf w sac http upstage org nz 8084 admin v i G r Google Foyer Stages Avatar Body Collision UpStage Log out Welcome to the UpStage Workshop Stages From here you can go use the links to the right to go to a stage for rehearsals and Swaray Stage where performances or use the Workshop links below to create and manage
41. nfo nick license psize whis per or wh displays a different frame of an animated or multiframe avatar animates a multiframe or animated avatar asize followed by a number will adjust the size of the audience text in your chat window note this only affects your own screen the text size will not adjust for the audience or other players the default size is 4 Audience can also use this command to adjust the size of font in their browser displays a different frame of a multiframe backdrop animates a multiframe backdrop lists the usernames of all players and the number of audience members who are present on that particular stage gives you a list of some of these commands shows information about UpStage including which version of the software you are using allows you to change the name of the avatar you are holding type nick newname provides information about the dual GPL and Creative Commons license psize followed by a number will adjust the size of the player text in your chat window note this only affects your own screen the text size will not adjust for the audience or other players the default size is 4 Audience can also use this command to adjust the size of font in their browser allows you to communicate with other players without the audience being aware the whisper command is explained in Section 1 5 typing before your text will give you a silent thought bubble rather than a speech bub
42. nto the performance is the projection of chat text and its subsequent capturing and re presentation as a web cam image 14 Belonging Form one line please Single file Stand clear Mind the yellow line No drugs weapons or vegetables are allowed Have your passports open at the photo page Madame Passport EH 4 Officer Form one line please Single file Stand clear Mind the yellow line No drugs weapons or vegetables are allowed Have your passports open at the photo page Madame Passport Officer Form one line please Single file Stand clear Mind the yellow line No drugs weapons or vegetables are allowed Have your passports open at the photo page Madame Passport Officer Form one line please Single file Stand clear Mind the yellow line No drugs weapons or vegetables are allowed Have your passports open at the photo page Madame Passport Officer Form one line please Single file Stand clear Mind the yellow line No drugs weapons or vegetables are allowed Have your passports open at the photo page Madame Passport frontiers Officer Form one line please Single file Stand clear Mind the yellow line No drugs weapons or vegetables are allowed Have your passports open at the photo page Madame Passport The screengrab above is from Belonging Avatar Body Collision 2007 and shows the representation of text from the ch
43. ote that deleting a stage does not delete the media assigned to that stage Manage edit an existing stage To manage edit a stage click onits name Note that if you edit a stage while there are other people onit the stage will automatically reload for them UpStage will try to stop you from doing this with messages warning you that other people are using the stage you canoverride these messages It is courteous to do this only when the people on the stage know that it s going to happen AAA Editing an UpStage stage c Stage link go directly to stage Caution adjusting the stage will reset It for 1 current users Stage name Full Name swaray Splash Message The Svaray stage is used for open walk throughs and svarays Show media uploaded by O marena D eyese O patihe D danac O gloriajw 3 dsitverman Cj helena unassigned wesleyant O p O pala C3 fredrik Cj antoinette olo O weseyanis C tebryce Cj ash weg O douglas Cj metiors C marichka tamiko C westeyan9 C wesleyans Assign media to a stage Select the stage you wish to edit then follow these steps 1 select which users media you want to see by clicking on the check box by the username and clicking the Display Media button 2 below the Display Media button click on the username or the signto expand the list of media uploaded by that user 3 selectthe media you want to assign to the stage by clicking inthe check bo
44. ps You must NOT delete something if it s assigned to a stage Make sure Adda new backdrop upload a single image or multiframe backdrop you uncheck it on the Manage Manage backdrops rename backdrops delete old backdrops Stage page before you delete it Props But please do delete your 7 unwanted graphics 4 Adda new prop upload an image US Pacific Mon 03 20 NewYork Mon 06 20 UK Mon 11 20 Amsterdam Mon 12 20 Belgrade Mon 12 20 Brisbane Mon 2t The Workshop screen is an HTML page and can be manually updated by an UpStage administrator to include direct links to the stages you are currently working on and notices for other players using this UpStage server as shown in the above screengrab in the right hand column The text links at the top and bottom of the page are also customisable this screengrab shows links to the Foyer http upstage org nz 8084 the Avatar Body Collision web site http www avatarbodycollision org the UpStage web site http www upstage org nz a log out link and Stages The Stages link gives a list of all the stages on this UpStage server from which you can click on a stage name to enter that stage You can also see how many players or audience are on each stage Guest player log ins allow access this list of stages not the whole Workshop interface From here guests can click on a stage and have full access to the on stage player tools but because they don t
45. rceforge net lists listinfo upstage announce 4 TECHNICAL INFORMATION UpStage is a server side application T his means that it runs on a web server and the users of UpStage players and audience access it via a web browser you do NOT install UpStage on your own computer client If you have access to a web server and wish to install your own customisable version of UpStage please refer to the installation manual and other support available on the SourceForge site Upstage is written in Python using the T wisted framework for event driven asynchronous networking It doesn t require Apache or MYSQL or anything else The client is written in pure Actionscript and is compiled using Mtasc so there is no requirement for Macromedia software other than the Flash player plug in on the client computer Words typed in by the players are converted into speech using the Fesitval speech library eSpeak and MBROLA and streamed to the dients as MP3s The server runs on Debian Linux but should easily convert to other platforms Python and T wisted are cross platform but there is a line or two of shell scripts that tie in the speech synthesis The software has been worked on since June 2003 and contains some 8000 lines Please visit our SourceForge site to find the latest stable version and installation documentation CLIENT HARDWARE amp SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS If your computer has a browser with the Flash player plug in then you
46. s the edit screen from anywhere where you can click on the avatar name e g the Manage avatars screen or the Stage edit screen Once you have changed the voice you will need to reset the stage s itis assigned to for the change to take effect Note that changing an avatar s voice will change it on all stages that the avatar is assigned to therefore you should not change the voice of an avatar that is not yours or that you think other people may be using on another stage See Section 5 5 for more information about available voices descriptions and how to add more SAVING THELOG The text chat is automatically saved by the server and can be viewed by adding log to the end of the URL in the address bar of your browser e g http upstage org nz 8084 stages walkthrough log You can then either select Save as from your browser s file menu or copy and paste the text into a text file Resetting a stage from the Stage Edit screen in the workshop will permanently delete all of the text fromthe chat log WHISPERING Players can whisper to other logged in players this lets you communicate with your fellow players without the audience hearing or seeing it You can whisper to an individual player a number of players or to all logged in players present on the same stage as you You can also whisper to players on other stages but you must use their usernames and there is currently no way to whisper to a player who is in
47. s English quickly in a female voice e en wm speaks english in a west midland accent Other accents in the e en series are n for north sc for Scots rp for RP r for rhotic which means it pronounces the r in words like church emb_afl speaks and reads Afrikaans emb afl en speaks English in an Afrikaans accent emb de4 en low slow speaks english lowly and slowly in a german accent We are in the process of compiling descriptions for all the voices following is the information so far Voice Male Female Accent EnS Description awb_cmu X Scottish Soft slightly muffled awb_nitech X Scottish Clear not very deep bdl_cmu X English A little bit quavery Firmer than bdl_cmu a bit higher but bdl_nitech X English clearer bud X NZ Deep calm clb_nitech X NZ Robotic soft crunchy Crunchy good for witches amp effects default X NZ Smooth young e_en fast f1 X NZ fast boyish 54 e en r f3 X NZ fast boyish e_en wm slow X Australian nasal drawl boyish nasal drawl computerish amp like a e en wm slow f3 X Australian learner reader reading e eo X foreign emb_de4 X German German neutral German male mid range clean English wGerman emb de4 en X German accent pimp s voice low amp lecherous English emb_de4 en low slow X German w German accent emb_de5 X German German slow low somewhat distorted voice slow high somewhat distorted voice emb_de5 en X German English w German accent emb_de5 en high
48. s of this size would not normally be necessary the larger the files the longer a stage will take to load Please refer to the Graphics section for further information about file sizes Manage players If you are a superuser you can e create new Player log ins change any Player s username password and permissions delete Players From the Workshop click on the link Manage Players and select the Player you wish to manage from the list of Players Make the desired changes and click ok 34 16 CREATING AND MANAGING STAGES Stages are web pages on which UpStage performances take place An UpStage server can have any number of stages and media uploaded to the server can be assigned to multiple stages You can also be in more than one stage at a time simply by having different stages open in different browser tabs SET UP A NEW STAGE To create a new stage click on the link Set up a new stage and give your stage a name This name will appear in the list of existing stages It won t be accessible to audience members until you make it public in some way for example create a link to it from the Foyer put it on your own web site or email the URL to your target audience but it will be visible to logged in players and can be accessed for rehearsals or closed performances The URL for a stage is http yourserverURL stages stagename for example http upstage org nz 8084 stages swaray You can create a link directly
49. screen This text appears in the text chat window amongst the Players text Player text is slightly darker and larger than audience text and identified with the avatar s name Audience text is grey silent and anonymous ee West Side Story La gt 0 hup upstage org nz 8082 stages westsidestory e far E lt suspect1 gt yes she had a fight with mrs baker Politizi and when was that suspect1 the other day hello mrs baker Politizi why was that suspect1 i dont know you will have to ask her lt Politizi gt ok thank you i will go talk to mrs baker Politizi hello mrs baker The screengrab above from West Side s Story 101010 UpStage Festival shows audience and player text in the chat The audience chat has a life of its own Often at the beginning of a performance audience members will ask where other people are physically located and have conversations between each other During the performance the audience can respond to and commentate on the action of the performance embellish the narrative or provide a counterpoint Obviously every audience is different making every performance significantly different sometimes an audience may be very quiet but at other times very chatty REPRESENTING THE CHAT Audience text can also be used by players within the performance such as repeated or responded to in the performance Another effective incorporation of audience chat i
50. t clicking on a Mac ctrl click on the stage and selecting Quality from the menu that appears If Low is selected change it to High and you will see that the fonts now display properly 57 However this will only correct the problem on your machine your audience may not know how to change the quality A better solution is to work out which image is causing the problem delete it and resave the original file as high quality LINUX FONTS If you are using UpStage on Linux you may find that fonts are not appearing on stage This problem is fixed by installing additional packages a apt get install gsfonts gsfonts xfl and http www macromedia com shockwave download download cgi P1 Prod VersionzShockwaveFlash amp P2 Platform Linux amp P3 Browser Version Netscape4 untar gzip a close all browsers run the installer see installation instructions on the url above OTHER PROBLEMS UpStage is a work in progress and it is an open source development We use SourceForge to track bugs please visit http sourceforge net projects upstage to see what bugs and features we are currently working on The UpStage web site www upstage org nz has FAQs and notification of any immediate or temporary problems Please check there if you are experiencing problems If you have any other problems or suggestions please contact us and we will endeavour to answer your questions and solve any bugs 58
51. t drawing Drop The drop button will remove your avatar from the stage and put it back in the Wardrobe so that you are no longer holding it If you want 19 to leave your avatar on the stage while you operate another avatar simply select the new avatar from the Wardrobe without clicking drop Clear Use clear to remove all unheld avatars and props from the stage Audio This button displays the audio tools palette See Section 3 11 for more information about using audio Player Audience counter Below the control buttons a counter keeps a live tally of the number of players P and audience A present on stage at any time T yping details will list the usernames of the players and the number of audience in the chat window Operating Multi frame or Animated Avatars Avatars that have been created as swf animations or uploaded as multiframe avatars allow you to change the avatar while it is on stage Animated Avatars Created as swf files these avatars will animate in the Workshop Wardrobe and Mirror When placed on stage animated squences will appear as a still image in the first frame of the animation Type a 0 to start the looped animation and to display a different still frame type a 1 the default a 2 a 3 etc Flash Movieclips will animate on loop without typed in commands You need to create these as movies in Flash see Section 4 4 for more information Multi frame Avatars These work in a similar
52. tages take longer to load Players with superuser permissions can over ride this limitation AVATARS In the Avatar section of the Workshop you can upload new avatar images and video streams delete unwanted avatars listen to available voices and change an avatar s voice Uploading a new avatar Avatars can be e still images in jpg png or swf format e multi frame avatars animated swf files e motion jpegs from a web cam A single avatar can be composed of all png files or all jpg files or a single possibly animated swf file Multi frame avatars can have a maximum of 10 frames images all of which must be the same format either png or jpg T here are a number of tricks that will help to achieve the best avatars see the section on Creating Media for tips on creating graphics for UpStage Once you have created your avatar in a graphics application click on Add a new avatar in the Workshop give it a name every avatar must have a unique name UpStage will add a number if you give an avatar the same name as another avatar and browse to the file s on your hard drive Click OK and the file s will be uploaded to UpStage and you will see the avatar s edit screen This is where you can select a voice for your avatar see the chapters on Speech and Text Chat for more information about the voices available on UpStage and the appendix on T ext2Speech Voices for information about how to add more voices 39 ee
53. the FTP upload to passive or active not passive mode according to the configuration of your server We have recently had issues which suggest that this setting will also vary according to your client computer s platform with the new 2010 UpStage server we have discovered that Fwink on Windows needs to be in passive mode to work whereas Evocam on Mac and Camstream on Linux do not work in passive mode and need to have this option toggled off If you are having trouble with web cam FTP the first thing to try is toggling passive mode Fwink configuration 28 Fwink Settings File Transfer video Capture Text Effects Overlay FTP Settings Timing FTP Server Capture an image every 2 zi Seconds User Name username disable Timer o Start Fwink when I log on Directory to my computer Password eecccece File Name filename jpg Save To File 1 use a dial up modem C Save images to a file Use Passive FTP necessary for some firewalls Dossiers Fwink Settings EJE Fie Transfer Video Capture Text Effects Overlay Device Settings Resize Captured Image Crop Captured Image video Device standard Size Enable Cropping TEME HON Nec Small 160x120 y Left Custom Size To 0 Video Source Width 80 Height 60 Width 320 Height 240 Image Processing TV
54. the Workshop and has no stage open Note that you can have multiple stages open at the same time in different browser tabs or windows and you can have the Workshop open as well as a stage or stages Typing a whisper command incorrectly displays a how to message in your chat field If messages are not delivered to users due to misspelling a username or a user not currently being online the whisper bounces and informs the sender what went wrong in the chat field Commands To whisper to all users on the wh Message urrent stage Note whisper works exactly the same as wh but obviously it s easier to just type wh 23 11 DRAWING Clicking on the draw button in the control panel reveals a different set of tools the Drawing Palette You can be still holding an avatar while you are drawing and can speak but you won t be able to move your avatar on stage Clicking on the act button will return the Wardobe Mirror and Controls so that you can operate your avatar Drawing allows you to draw EO directly onto the stage in one of four layers the EN layers correspond to the mo four boxes on the right hand side of the drawing O Lo palette Click on the red pencil icon to select a layer to draw in The black act border shows which layer P 02 A 00 you have selected a pale blue border indicates that another player is holding that layer If you select a layer with a blue border you will stea
55. to a stage fromthe Foyer or fromanother web site by editing the HTML just as you would create a linkto a web page Pr lt gt 0 http upstage org nz 8084 admin new stage Setting up a stage Home Stages Workshop Log out Enter a Full and Short name for the new stage The full name will appear in the title bar of the browser when people are viewing the stage The short name will be used in the url Name the Stage Full name Short name for url no spaces Create Stage Home Stages Workshop Log out MANAGE STAGES From the Workshop click on the link Manage an existing stage you will see a list of stages and if any players or audience are on a stage it will be shown here numbers of players audience to the right of the stage name This is where you can e assign and unassign avatars props and backdrops for an existing stage e rename the stage e edit the splash screen message for a stage e change the background colour for the backdrops and props galleries useful if you have props or backdrops that are mostly white and difficult to click on with a white background e make the debug messages display on the stage useful for programmers trying to trace bugs e reset the stage e delete unwanted stages Delete a stage 35 To delete a stage select the check box beside the stage name scroll to the bottom of the list and clickthe remove selected stages button N
56. ugh so far it seems that the most noticeable impact is during the initial loading of the stage What is a reasonable file size for your original graphic This is very hard to say as it s completely different for a small static flat graphic prop which may be only 1K and an animated flash backdrop or multiframe avatar which could be over 500K And a stage with a single large graphic may load faster than one with many medium sized graphics If your original files are larger than 500K check whether you can resize them and save them again to a smaller file size Remember that screen resolution is only 72ppi so there is no need for your originals to be ata higher resolution DELETING GRAPHICS It is important to delete unwanted graphics in order to keep the workshop area manageable This is done through the Manage avatars Manage props and Manage backdrops screens Check the box beside any images that you want to delete then scroll up or down and click the delete selected button You cansee on these screens whether an image is currently assigned to a stage if you try to delete an image that is assigned to a stage UpStage will ask if you are sure that you want to delete it If multiple groups are using the same server you should not delete anything unless you are sure no one else is using it for example your own test graphics that you no longer want If you are working ona server that is used by various people such as the Open UpSt
57. vie clips nested within the frames of a Flash animation but it is possible to import Quicktime movies into Flash and then export as a swf You will need to experiment with file sizes and perhaps remove some of the frames fromthe Quicktime movie in order to keep the size down Once again this manual does not pretend to provide a comprehensive Flash tutorial Please look on the web for more detailed information on using Flash BACKDROPS As long as the original image is 380x240pp or larger a backdrop will fill the UpStage screen including going behind the text chat window The text chat window has a white background in order to ensure that text is always readable even over busy backdrops but this means that the area at the right of your backdrop is covered by the chat window You may wish to create a backdrop that has a blank area on the right where the text chat window is to ensure that important parts of your backdrop are not hidden behind the chat window The proportions of the whole image are total width total height 10 6 2 width of stage area width of chat area 7 3 minimum width height 380 240 pixels This diagramillustrates the proportions of the stage and chat areas bear in mind that everyone s screen size and browser window size can be different your backdrop will stretch to fill the space 7 Stage area eg height 500px width 800 px of which 560px for stage and 240 px for chat background
58. way to the animated avatars but are created by uploading a series of still images in png or jpg format rather than using Flash Changing Your Avatar s Name nick bob To change the name of the avatar you are holding type nick newname in the text input field at the bottom of the chat window You will see the name underneath your mirror change and when the avatar is on stage the new name will appear below it unless you have used the name button to turn off the name The new name will also appear in the text chat window before the text your avatar speaks When using invisible avatars you can make words float around the stage by showing the name and using nick to change the visible word on screen Up to 9 characters will be visible on stage if you have a longer name it will all be visible in the text chat HOLDING AND PLACING PROPS The props assigned to the stage appear as small icons in the Props Gallery at the centre bottom of the screen When you roll your cursor over the icons a name label appears allowing you to distinguish between similar or very small props If more than 8 props are assigned to a stage arrows will appear at either end of the bar to allow you to scroll through the props which are displayed alphabetically You must be holding an avatar and be on stage to hold a prop Click on the prop icon in the Gallery and it will appear at the top left of your avatar Click again on the prop icon in the Gal
59. xes beside the thumbnails note that media uploaded as swf will not display a thumbnail image but you can identify it by its name clicking on the name will take you to that media s information screen so that you can be sure itis the media that you want then click Save changes 4 after clicking Save changes the screen will refresh telling you that the stage has been updated and giving a direct link to the stage near the top of the screen The avatars backdrops and props you have assigned to the stage will now appear inthe Wardrobe and Image Gallery of that stage see Section 3 3 36 eee Editing an UpStage stage c http Jupstage org n2 8084 admin edit stage swaray Lz O guests O sedis O agnieszkat O peos C pem O emt O marcela Display Media Sae change oso tamiko Avatars Props Backdrops Audio M sse El aaz Cj Ofhtro sfx 00 aplauz_ Q pur Q O8intro Cj sfx 01 not know O P hee Q zapatas 2g wx sfx O3 knocking LJ Qia a bays O oq dtakerais 28H 2mm boxes O f os pitsoance O mtes O W ace Cj sfx 06 UpS avatar goddess infobunny a Change name and splash screen message From the Edit Stage screen you can also edit the name of the stage and the splash screen message that will appear while the stage is loading Type the new text in the appropriate places and click Save changes Change background colours To change the background colour of the backdrops and props g
60. ze the web cam image to custom sizes any special effects are a bonus Please scroll down this page for screenshots showing how to configure the applications listed below Recommended Webcam FTP Software Windows Fwink Fwink version 0 9 95 beta is free has no ads allows customised sizing and has some special effects including text messages and overlay images http lundie ca fwink Mac Evocam EvoCam is the ultimate webcam software for Mac OS X Use EvoCam to publish a webcam with streaming video view and record video from network cameras and video servers create timelapse movies or use it as part of your home security system with its configurable motion sensors these are just a few of the things you can do with this easy to use yet incredibly powerful webcam software Evocam is not open source and it s not free but it is pretty cheap but at the moment it seems to be the most reliable and featured packed webcam ftp app for Mac It has useful features such as customisable sizing of the window and a variety of effects http www evological com evocam html Linux Camstream CamStream is a tool for webcams and TV grabber cards that allows for streaming video from multiple video sources lt can save and or upload FTP timed snapshots It provides a GUI frontend to control the video devices http freshmeat net projects camstream Web Cam FTP Configuration 27 Once you have chosen and installed the

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