VU Meter Plugin

About The Plugin

The VU Meter plugin is a simulated analog VU meter visualization plugin for CL-Amp. It is intended for entertainment purposes only.

By default, it looks like this

but you can use your own bitmaps to change the appearance to something like this for example:

The outstanding example above has been provided by Mario Buchichio (moldava@chasque.apc.org). You can find Mario's graphics in the Samples directory - the files moldavaVU_back.jpg and moldavaVU_front.tga.

Requirements

BeOS 5 or higher. It may or may not work with earlier versions.
CL-Amp. It has been tested with version 3.6.

Installation and Use

Installation is pretty simple, just copy the plugin vis_VU Meter to the CL-Amp Plugins directory. Then, in CL-Amp, open the Plugins window (ALT-P or from the right click menu) and select the Visual tab. You should see an entry called A VU Meter. Activate the plugin and you're good to go.

If CL-Amp is running when you copy the plugin, you will need to restart it before the plugin will show up in the Visual Plugins window.

Once running, you can drag the window anywhere you like using the left mouse button. The right mouse button brings up the menu, which gives you quick access to the meter preferences and lets you close the meter. Aside from that, you just watch it.

Preferences

The preferences panel lets you control the needle movement, and the foreground and background bitmaps.

Performance Tab

Needle Rise/Fall Velocity: These sliders determine how fast the needles move toward the current signal value. The velocity values, along with the dampening value, control how quickly the needles respond to a change in the signal.
Lock Needle Velocities: If checked, it locks the two velocity sliders together so that rise and fall velocities are the same.
Responsiveness: This is essentially a frame rate control. Setting it on the "More" responsive side produces higher framerates, and higher CPU load. Setting it on the "Less" responsive side gives you less of both.
Dampening: The VU meter displays an averaged RMS value over time. This slider controls the time period used for the averaging. The resulting effect is to dampen the needle movement.
Gain: Increases the signal strength used to drive the needles.
Defaults: The Defaults button resets all values, including the default bitmaps on the Appearance tab, back to the factory fresh settings.

Appearance Tab

Background Image

Use this to set the bitmap which will be used as the background image of the meter. If the default background is selected, this is disabled. See the Bitmap Notes below for details about the bitmaps.

Foreground Image

Select a foreground bitmap. This bitmap needs to have transparent areas so that the background bitmap and needles can be seen. If the default foreground is selected, this option is disabled. See the Bitmap Notes below for details about the bitmaps.

Needle Color

This button brings up a color selection window, which lets you change the needle color.

Use Default Background and Foreground

If checked, the default background and/or foreground are used instead of any bitmap you selected.

Use White as Transparent

If checked, any pure white (red=255, green=255, blue=255) in the foreground image will become transparent. There are several reasons for using this instead of using alpha transparency. First, if you just want a transparent area, the meter will render faster using this instead of alpha. Second, not all graphics formats and editors support alpha. Remember that only pure white is replaced, close doesn't count. If your foreground image has alpha, then do not check this box or the alpha will be ignored.

Bitmap Notes

Bitmaps must be 100 pixels high, and 300 pixels wide.
The foreground bitmap can either use alpha, or can use white to designate transparent areas. Either way, there needs to be some transparency so the background and needles can be seen.
The needle base points are at (74,95) and (224, 95). The needles are 80 pixels long and move from -45 to +45 from center.
There are some example bitmaps in the Samples directory. TicMarks.tga is a sample background, and the files Orange.tga and Purple.jpg are sample foregrounds. Orange.tga usese alpha, while Purple.jpg uses white as transparent. There is also a file named outline.tga that shows the needle movement areas. These aren't intended to be great works of art, just examples. For some attractive bitmaps, Mario Buchichio's bitmaps are also included in the Samples directory.

Etc.

Send bug reports, etc. to: Blue_Agave@worldnet.att.net
Thanks to Claes Löfqvist for writing CL-Amp.
Thanks to Mario Buchichio for contributing his graphics talents.
The software, vis_VU Meter, and the accompanying documentation and images are, unlesss otherwise noted, copyright 2000, Craig Schimmel, all rights reserved. All files may be used and distributed freely for non-commercial use, provided that all original contents are included in the distributed package in unmodified form.

The files moldavaVU_back.jpg and moldavaVU_front.tga are copyright 2000, Mario Buchichio.

The software is provided "As Is", there is no warranty of any kind.