Here's a post that's hidden away in the 3rd Party Plug-ins topic... I figured I'd repost it as a topic to make sure people see it. I think it's quite beautiful.

-Fathead

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Biscuit: component name: Bubbla
component type: General / Visualization
requires: foobar v0.7 (and a decent opengl compatible graphics card)

download:Bubbla 0.1rc1 (compiled on 2003-09-29)
website:http://webpages.charter.net/gl_ext_biscuit/bubbla

publishable email: gl_ext_biscuit@charter.net

desc:
a visualization for foobar,
inspired by vis_test and Milkdrop, and other things.
it transitions between 9 hardcoded effects,
but this is early in it's life, eventually there will be more,
and user-defineable ones. also, it's appearance
can be changed a good bit from the preferences.
it's still in early development, and lacks a number
of the planned features. but it should be relatively stable

Please email me if you use this, at let me know
what bubbla version, what foobar version, gfx card, and os...
a few people have had display problems,
and I'd like to get an idea what's working and what isn't.
thanks!

-- gl_ext_biscuit

sounds interresting, but none of the links (except perhaps the email, havent tried that yet) actually works...

I cant even reach the host http://webpages.charter.net/ ...

Huh? I just tried all the links and they work fine. I downloaded the dll from the link provided without a problem.

Hmmmm... I suppose it's possible that it's an internal host for charter customers only...

Nope. We just ssh'd to uga.edu and loaded it up over lynx without any trouble. Your ISP/DNS could be having issues... I'll try to find a work-around.

Try this out... I resolved the name for you to its IP. I tested it, and it works for me, even from 2 outside locations.

http://209.225.8.65/gl_ext_biscuit/bubbla/..._vis_bubbla.dll

-Fathead

the only logical answer here must be that I block that IP. gonna check if It's in peerguardians blocklist...

yes indeedy, this is one of the many ranges blocked: 209.225.0.0-209.225.95.255

Well.

I've got some excess web space. I hope assurancetechnologies.com isn't in a blacklisted range.

htp://www.assurancetechnologies.com/bubbla/foo_vis_bubbla.dll

Fear my under-used webspace!

that would be:

http://www.assurancetechnologies.com/bubbla/foo_vis_bubbla.dll

oh and this is a good start on the vis front. It is good to see that there are now (at least) two people working on vis plugins. Also the fact that you are working from apparently opposite ends of the spectrum (woops! pun) - one is high resource fancy looking DirectX, to be optimised; and this seems to be low resource OpenGL rough start to be made flashier later

Nice work, hope to see it develop further..

thanks for the thread, Fathead... shoulda done it myself, if I'd thought of it

just wanted to add for anyone who's trying it out,
be sure to play with the settings in Preferences>Visualizations/Bubbla,
it can be made to do a few different rendering styles.

also, the '9 presets' i mentioned aren't currently selectable
individually, but if you watch it long enough, it will fade randomly
between them (takes about 30 seconds, but it's framerate dependant...
though 0.1rc2 will fix that part.. it should be out by the end of the week)

if you're having performance issues, try lowering 'grid mapping size'
in the preferences... it'll be less accurate/pretty, but faster. and don't worry:
i have not yet begun to optimize.

otoh, if you've got fps to spare, hit alt-enter for fullscreen goodness.

@GL_EXT_BISCUIT :

This plugin does this:



it steals the desktop and windows beneath it and does nothing

my specs are this: windows xp, foobar .7, ati radeon 9000

It doesn't like mono files. Try using the mono to stereo DSP.

oops... sorry about the mono file thing.
due to my lazy coding of the alpha version,
I only implemented the code for 2 channel audio.
i'll make sure to support mono in the next version.

@ fathead : thx for the mirror

@ GL_EXT_BISCUIT :

very promising plugin

my setup :creative geforce mx420, latest detonator drivers (45.23) winxp sp1.
I guess you've locked it @ 30fps max, since thats what it's holding at quite stable.
The distorting is nice also.

Edit: damn, why does the window close and reopen when you ie REW/FF in the tune. it's more than a little annoying. I can accept that it's done when you change tune, but now on ff/rew. Also the vis-window steals focus when it reopens.

the 30 fps lock is foobar, actually...
goto the main visualization prefs in foobar, it's set there.

the window handling code is basically a bastardization
of foo_vis_test and one of my old projects...
it'll be rewritten at some point (i hate it too)

also, I just realized I left dumb default preferences for the dll,
they don't show off what it can do at all.
for anyone who wants to see the full effect,
try the following settings for a good starting point:
fade value: 75%
render style: 'continuous stereo difference'
render order: 'imprint,distort,render'
mapping grid size: 32

next release, i'll make these the default values.

Nice work so far. I'm glad to see work being done on a vis.
Just thought I'd let you know that it works well for me on GeForce FX 5200 with 45.xx drivers.
AMD 2500+ Processor
SB Live! Value

ah

the bug is i was using 4ch sound

There's a slightly new version of Bubbla at both links above. The default settings are now such that prettiness happens. I hope that people have been messing around with the configuration settings in the preferences area so that they can see the full glory.

thought i would post some screenshots of nice effects on bubbla (0.1rc2):

Great looking and very promising.

However, I have two minor requests:
1) Can you change font used in preferences to Tahoma, to look like other stuff in fb2k Preferences?
2) Can you change window title of the visualization window to to Bubbla visualization or something like that, instead of those weird characters?

Spectrum Balance and Bias sliders are too tall and are overlapped on the bottom by their group boxes. The effect is only visible if you disable themes. You just need to reduce their height to match the Fade slider.

nice work...

got a couple suggestions:

make it work with other than 2 channel sound... 4 channel shouldnt be too hard right? (really most of the time the front and back are identical anyways)

maybe just make it use the 2 front channels?

also is there a way to have it show the song name on a hotkey or on the switch of a song? (kinda like milkdrop.... sorry, but milkdrop is the mother of all plugins imho, but this is certainly getting there, seeing that milkdrop doesnt work with foobar)

anyways just my 2 cents

later

Unfortunately this plugin and kode54's wonderful foo_osd seem to interfere slightly with each other..

I usually run my machine at 1024x768 72Hz. If I change Bubbla to full screen, it changes my output to 1024x768 60Hz (my monitor goes black for a second then tells me it has changed mode). When foo_osd next displays it's stuff, my monitor acts like it has changed resolution/frequency (goes black for a second and reports the resolution and frequency) but it is reporting the same 1024x768 60Hz. It seems that foo_osd wants to use the windows prescribed frequency (what I would consider correct behaviour) but Bubble is forcing 60Hz instead (I would consider this incorrect).

I am using WinXP and an Nvidia GeForce4MX 440.. Any ideas?

foo_osd and DirectX/OpenGL do not mix. Song title display will have to be added to the visualization.

That's a shame .. oh well. It just prompted me to set up another keyboard shortcut (toggle the OSD autopopup) which I didn't have set up before..

Refresh Force?

i had this problem too until i disabled windows styles (control panel>system>advanced>performance>Settings>Visual Effects>Scroll to bottom and un-check "use visual styles on windows and buttons")

im sure not everyone wants to do this though

I use Windows Classic style and have the Themes service disabled, and I see "Bubbla" in the window title bar, but six squares in the taskbar button.

/me 2, geting around 50 fps with this new machine as well. (in fullscreen mode)..

Have you checked the foobar visualization settings? It caps the FPS at some limit. The default is 30. If yours is set way high, and you're still not happy with the fps, then post your system stats and Biscuit will look into it.

Could be related to some charset stuff.

Thanks, that fixes the frequency change problem. foo_osd still doesn't really work with bubbla, it flashes, but at least I don't have to remember to disable it when I use the viz.. As kode54 says, they aren't compatible so I'm not expecting a fix or anything, just reporting what happens

The new defaults are great btw, much much better than the ones you originally released it with

I'm pretty sure this isn't a bug report, because lots of other things don't run in OpenGL as well, but I haven't been able to figure out the problem.

When I run Bubbla I get a pop-up that says: "Can't Create a GL Rendering Context".

Does anyone have any advice onto how I'd be able to fix this? (and hopefully, lots of other OpenGL problems)

Computer is:
800MHz Athlon Thunderbird
Abit KT7-R
512MB PC133
Nvidia Ti 4600 w/ latest official Nvidia drivers (from their website).

Very nice. I've been waiting quietly for some visualization plug-ins trying not to be flamed by foobar2000 lamers. I'm a big fan of milkdrop, but it's a shame it's not compatible with foobar.

Good work man.

Greenrift... Do *any* openGL applications work on your machine? It sounds like you're having a lot of trouble. We've tested it extensively on GeForce4's, so I'd be surprised if it was a problem with Bubbla. Resolve the rest of your openGL issues and see if Bubbla works.

I think that there will be a new version of Bubbla released any day now. He's just got to tweak a few things.

it's obvious that Bubbla will eventually turn out to be better than Milkdrop.

to me it is.

Doctor "Seeds", is it?

Or is it Doctor "steal-everything-from-the-sacred-planet-red-Mars?"

It's Seeds.

Then how do you explain this?

how dare you!

We're waiting.

dude try to chill...

its not like he is being paid for his work

actually, he is being paid for his work.


paid in lots and lots of blood and Quinn guts slopping around all over the place.

0.1rc2 released; thread continued here.

It's a good thing the mess hall has a drain in it so we can wash those guts down it.

nothing wrong with visual plugins - just because I personally think that a constant seekbar, buttons, or these kind of visual things are complete waste of space and CPU cycles does not mean that I make any negative comments on people that want to have them. Those kind of comments and attitudes are disgustingly close minded and foolish, no one is forcing you to use them unlike some other media players.

Visual plugins are only as much of a waste of CPU cycles as playing mp3's or ogg's in the first place. It's just another form of sensory stimulation. Some people want to add that second sense into the mix, that's all. If you don't want to, then you don't have to download it. Everybody wins! Wooooo!

I listen to a lot of trance music, and having ultra weird crazy ass visualization adds to the experience. I can understand that if you only listen to rap or rock music, visualization is not very appealing.