Graphical Overlay for Go Screencasting

shapenaji · #1

Hi folks,

I'm looking for a program that I can run on top of my desktop that will allow me to sketch A LA MSpaint transparently. So that I can draw on top of a live game.

My idea is to present a screencast of games which would be accessible to players who know very little about the game, to purely present the big picture.

Basically, I need something akin to what the American Football commentators use in analyzing instant replays. I thought I found a program that would do what I want (Called "Sketch it"), but it runs on top of the layer that livestream records.

I have this argument that go is unique among board games in that it can be viewed by a lay-person purely visually ("Now black controls these regions, white controls these regions, black is building up a presence here so that he may invade in either of these two directions")

I feel that this would enable a large number of spectators of the game, without having to take them through learning the rules. (Though they might become interested enough to learn the rules afterward)

Anyone know of any programs that might meet my needs.

BobC · #2

If the board is viewed as a web page try..

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/deta ... hjfa?hl=en

shapenaji · #3

BobC wrote:

If the board is viewed as a web page try..

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/deta ... hjfa?hl=en

Very neat, but unfortunately doesn't work with any of the servers, all are separate applets...

hyperpape · #4

It's not ideal, but you can use it with eidogo.

shapenaji · #5

hyperpape wrote:

It's not ideal, but you can use it with eidogo.

True, the goal however is to make it so that I can review games live. For example if we have a tournament in a public place, I'd like to have a video screen up that people can look at with the general analysis of the game as it progresses.

A JSON enabled eidogo would work too...

BobC · #6

even better, it can be used with jgoboard..

http://static.jgoboard.com/sgf.html?url ... husaku.sgf

example here:

http://markup.io/v/wn67yg8n33pb

shapenaji · #7

It's good, I would need some way of relaying the sgf realtime though.

It also has a ton of useful little brushtypes (arrow being one of them)

actually, the only real problem I have with it is that there seems to be no way to close it so I can go back to using the buttons on the webpage... looked through the documentation... nothing is screaming at me..

hermitek · #8

What OS do you use? On Linux there's plugin for compiz, on Mac is something called Magic Pen and for MS Windows there's ZoomIt.

shapenaji · #9

Thanks Hermitek, that's exactly what I'm looking for.

Now, if I can just get the score estimator to always display and update.

I'd like to use the annotations to discuss tactics, surrounding the current territories every time might get arduous. I can always point out to the viewers exactly how the score estimator is wrong. But it would be a useful tool.

daal · **#10**

shapenaji wrote:

I have this argument that go is unique among board games in that it can be viewed by a lay-person purely visually ("Now black controls these regions, white controls these regions, black is building up a presence here so that he may invade in either of these two directions")

I think so too, and I recently made a similar suggestion in a thread about introducing go to new players.

BTW, I'd love to watch your demonstrations. Any plans to record them for posterity and put them up on the net?

shapenaji · **#11**

daal wrote:

shapenaji wrote:

I have this argument that go is unique among board games in that it can be viewed by a lay-person purely visually ("Now black controls these regions, white controls these regions, black is building up a presence here so that he may invade in either of these two directions")

I think so too, and I recently made a similar suggestion in a thread about introducing go to new players.

BTW, I'd love to watch your demonstrations. Any plans to record them for posterity and put them up on the net?

Well, actually, the first tests (if I can get all the tools running) will be at:

livestream.com/shapengo

I may record them, but what I really want to do is see if it's possible to analyze a longer game on the fly like that.

I suspect, also, that there's an ideal time control to analyze, something that gives me enough time to present the situation, but not so much time that I have to resort completely to my color commentarians

shapenaji · **#12**

In fact, I'd really like to test it right now, I'll be on kgs and on livestream, going to give Zoomit a shot.

daniel_the_smith · **#13**

Looks like you have half a dozen viewers in the queue for when you get it running...

Edit: seems like livestream (or maybe my connection) is having trouble, extremely choppy video and audio. :sad:

shapenaji · **#14**

Yeah, my computer is a laggy salty dog...

I need to find a better machine to do this on, ideal would be if one of the local oregon go players has a pad and stylus I can borrow.

daniel_the_smith · **#15**

But even the 5 spf (seconds per frame ;-)

) I was getting was enough to see that it would be really cool!

shapenaji · **#16**

I'm gonna pull this off... I may have to start mugging graphic artists... but I'm gonna make this work.

shapenaji · **#17**

Update: Got a stream going, (snagged some viewers from the chess community too!)

Check it out sometime!

http://www.twitch.tv/shapenaji

shapenaji · **#18**

'bout to start broadcasting

daal · **#19**

I actually saw part of it (nice job winning games while commenting during a live test broadcast in the middle of the night ^^), but didn't see you drawing any lines. Did you give up on/postpone that aspect or did I just miss it? I think it's a great idea, and I'd love to see you implement it.

I must admit that I like the live-cam a lot. Not only is it fun to see a person whose posts I've been reading over the last few years, but it also adds a human dimension to the comments which I suspect helps to affix things in one's brain.

I didn't see much of the broadcast, but my impression was that it was designed to give chess players a window into the world of go, and as such it was a mixture of introductory comments and somewhat generalized comments regarding strategic and tactical choices. I don't know if this was your plan, or if it just turned out that way because of the type of questions that viewers threw at you, but it's probably a good idea to pick a target audience beforehand.

In any case, the possibility of drawing on the board, showing groups, cutting points, borders, directions etc. would be great - particularly on an introductory level to clarify which battles are taking place and what the key factors are. Keep up the good work, and let us know when you plan your next broadcast!

shapenaji · **#20**

daal wrote:

I actually saw part of it (nice job winning games while commenting during a live test broadcast in the middle of the night ^^), but didn't see you drawing any lines. Did you give up on/postpone that aspect or did I just miss it? I think it's a great idea, and I'd love to see you implement it.

I must admit that I like the live-cam a lot. Not only is it fun to see a person whose posts I've been reading over the last few years, but it also adds a human dimension to the comments which I suspect helps to affix things in one's brain.

I didn't see much of the broadcast, but my impression was that it was designed to give chess players a window into the world of go, and as such it was a mixture of introductory comments and somewhat generalized comments regarding strategic and tactical choices. I don't know if this was your plan, or if it just turned out that way because of the type of questions that viewers threw at you, but it's probably a good idea to pick a target audience beforehand.

In any case, the possibility of drawing on the board, showing groups, cutting points, borders, directions etc. would be great - particularly on an introductory level to clarify which battles are taking place and what the key factors are. Keep up the good work, and let us know when you plan your next broadcast!

Thanks for watching! Yeah, I've been having issues being able to get a good overlaying system working, I thought just getting the stream going would be a good start, and then I can work on the cool annotation tools later.

The first broadcast was definitely aimed at chess players, since they were the main ones who showed up (RobertT has been making friends in the chess community on twitch.tv). But I plan on doing a range of presentations. Just tonight we did kind've a group stream: myself, RobertT, and Andrew Jackson. I played some fast games and we all did some live analysis of some of twoeye's games.

I might actually just make a new thread here "Shapenaji's live stream", and update it with topic/time information for the next stream.

Graphical Overlay for Go Screencasting

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