showstack / software / watchout
WATCHOUT
Multi-display media server software that composites and plays video across many synchronised outputs from a timeline. Long established in corporate, museum and large-format projection work.
Protocols it speaks
| Protocol | Direction | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| art-net | in | Documented as ArtNet Input for external control of WATCHOUT. |
| osc | bidirectional | |
| ltc | in | Handled by the LTC Bridge component. |
| midi-show-control | in | |
| psn | in | |
| ndi | in | NDI sources can be used as video inputs. |
| dante | bidirectional |
What to watch for
Windows only. Both the production application and the display servers are Windows software, so a Mac-based crew has no path here.
A real system needs a minimum of two licence keys, one for the production computer and one for each display computer. Only a keyless production machine with no outputs attached runs unlicensed.
WATCHOUT 7 is a different architecture to WATCHOUT 6 and the user guide carries a separate WATCHOUT 6 protocol section for backwards compatibility. Do not assume a v6 control integration drives a v7 system unchanged.
Typical use
- Multi-projector blended shows in museums, visitor attractions and corporate events
- Timecode-locked video playback across many outputs
- Large-format canvases split across a cluster of display computers
Sources
- Dataton WATCHOUT current version and licensing — Dataton primary
- WATCHOUT License Keys — Dataton primary
- WATCHOUT 7 User Guide — Dataton primary
Understand the mechanism
Something wrong, or missing?
Known gaps on this entry: price_model. If you can source one of them, that is a ten minute pull request.
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