Video loops

Another major technique we use is video mixing. We have somewhere between 6 and 12 battered old TVs which we stack up in odd shapes, and use two or three video players to feed them. Sometimes different feeds go to different TVs, and sometimes we put all the feeds into a vision mixer before the final result is broadcast to stage. These days our bag of tricks now includes large-wall video projection. For instance, at Greenbelt festival 2005, we had seven projectors filling almost all the walls of the New Forms [one] venue.

Our library of video footage is extensive, and includes loops we have painstakingly made via animation techniques, frame-by-frame manual video editing, and more recently digital non-linear editing. We were asked to produce a `Fine Art' video at Greenbelt 1994, and spent much time late into the night in a cold tent doing just that. At the same festival in 1996-7 we video-mixed live for Blue Amazon, and since 2000 have provided video for worship every year. We've also mixed live in York Minster, Ely Cathedral, Lambeth Palace, and numerous other venues large and small. For more info and examples of what you can do with video, see the Alt.W.FAQ

Digital Video

We have recently realised that, although we still use them (see below), VHS tapes are going the way of the dodo, and most people are now either using DVD or outputing direct from a Mac laptop. So, we have put together a collection of 50 digital clips (in QuickTime .mov format) for use in worship, available right now (from November 2005), for sale as a CD-ROM. All proceeds from these sales will go towards funding students to visit Palestine, putting money back into building peace in a local economy that has been almost totally destroyed by violence.

As tasters, we have made some smaller video loops available for free download off the web, also in QuickTime (.mov) format. They are free but donations are also appreciated. Here they are.

Visions - Loops 2 is a collection of 50 digital video loops, supplied on CD-ROM in QuickTime (.mov) format, for Macs and PCs. None of these loops were on the first collection (below) in VHS format - they are all new. You can buy it exclusively from us, cost only twelve pounds including postage (£13.25 if shipping outside the UK). Send UK cheques payable to "Visions", to our usual address. We also accept electronic payments via Paypal. Anyone with a credit card and email address can use it. Buy CD-ROM now: Sorry, sold out!

Chatting to various people at conferences a few years ago, they said that they desperately needed video resources. Back then we thought, how about a collection of 12 or so 5 minute VHS video loops, with permission given to copy and edit the footage for worship? You can copy the loops to the length you require, or cut bits of different things together. Well, we produced a VHS tape, and it is still available from us by mail order, now at the reduced price of six pounds including postage. (Cheques payable to "Visions", send to our usual address.) We accept electronic payments in UK pounds or US dollars, via Paypal, but please note that postage costs are greater to the States. We will supply either the UK format (PAL), or American NTSC, depending on where you live! (Note: UK-version now back in stock!)

Anyway here are some very tiny "tasters" of the sorts of things we have put on the video. They are all animated gifs and we've put one on each page to make things easier to load and look at.... Remember these files may take some time to load up so be patient!