Omniversity of Manchester

We’re always tinkering with our offer at the Omniversity, and think there might be some interest in a course about interaction. Who would like to learn vvvv, or sharpen their skills with this amazing system? We asked Elliot Woods, who recently presented the LitTree during FutureEverything 2011.

What is vvvv?

©2011 vvvv/meso

vvvv is a ‘multipurpose toolkit’ which can be interfaced to all the inputs and outputs of a computer. It can connect your webserver to your heartbeat, or your old nokia phone to an array of 300 projectors. Inside, lies a ‘more infinite’ array of possibilities to generate, arrange, mix, manipulate, store, communicate and react to data.

vvvv specifically excels is in the generation of interactive live visual graphics, but the tool is so flexible that you may never need to learn another.

vvvv is a graphical ‘node based’ programming language which allows for rapid development and deployment of professional media experiences.
You develop whilst the program is running, there’s no need to compile or ‘setup’ your program each time you want to make a change.
If a node doesn’t exist for what you want, then you can create a new node at runtime using the inbuilt code-editor, or patch a new node out of existing ones.

Why use vvvv?

In Elliot’s opinion, vvvv is the most elegant and powerful patching environment in existence. It allows him to develop between 5 and 10 times faster than openFrameworks, which he also uses extensively.
It has built-in power features such as ‘Boygrouping’ which allow you to seamlessly patch across an array of computers (e.g. for multi-projector arrays) and ‘Spreads’, which allow you to simultaneously handle groups of data in an elegant and tidy way.

vvvv is always free to download and use for non-commercial purposes, so there’s nothing stopping you trying it out (except for that it only runs on Windows). It’s both a great platform for sketching out interactive ideas, as well as delivering final release versions.

If you would be interested in taking this course or learning more, please leave a comment below!