MediaShout vs ProPresenter, Round 5

I’m glad to see that Renewed Vision is actively adding to the feature list in ProPresenter. Mike’s recent posting inspired me to write about one of the features unique to MediaShout that I love to use.

Above is the screen you get when you insert a “Script Control” type cue into the MediaShout script. If you want to loop through a series of announcements (stills or videos, or any other type of cue), and then automatically start a video (opener or countdown) at a given time, you can do so with two script controls. The first control tells the system to loop, the second has the box marked “Start Action At:” with the appropriate start time.

This means that I can start the announcements and then go backstage to talk to the worship team or whatever, and even without my presence the announcements fade out and automatically begins the opening video (which then cues me that I have x minutes to get back to the booth).

MediaShout vs ProPresenter, Round 4

Question for you ProPresenter fans out there:

On Wednesday nights there’s a group that meets in the room I volunteer at. They watch a 35 minute clip that’s on a DVD and then break out into small groups. I’m trying to simplify my life by capturing the DVD clips and converting them to H.264 format. This would be particularly useful next week because I will be absent, and they are showing 2 clips from 2 different DVD’s. So my preference would be to have the clips on the hard drive ready to go in ProPresenter rather than have my substitute mess with switching discs, etc.

So, last Wednesday, I tried running my H.264 clip. It was 640×480 and encoded at 1200 kbps. I figured this was a reasonable quality for a standard definition projector, not too high, not too low. I watched the first five minutes before hand, everything looked good. So the event starts, I click the video. And about 10 minutes in, the audio and video get out of sync. After a few more minutes it got so bad that people started coming up to the sound board to see if I noticed (Yes, I did, thanks). I ended up switching to the DVD mid clip.

What’s weird is that the video on the local computer display was fine, it was the projector feed that was horribly out of sync. I’m thinking it was just too high quality for feed for that computer. Am I right? How low can I go without noticeable loss? Any other recommendations?

When a program like ProPresenter or MediaShout runs the video in two different places at once (on the projector’s output and on the preview display), it takes quite a few computer resources to pull that off. That’s why MediaShout defaults to not showing the video on the local display, it only shows the thumbnail (along with Play/Pause, seek bar, etc), but there is an option to turn it on if you think your computer can handle it.

Does ProPresenter have any such option to turn off the local preview? Would it help in this case?

MediaShout vs ProPresenter, Round 3

I was going to save Round 3 for another day, but Mike’s already commented on Round 2 and it seemed necessary to respond.

Round 3: Reliability

Winner: Nobody, it’s all a bloody mess. Mike has blogged about his horrible experience trying to play an AVI file in MediaShout. For me, I would have checked what codec was used on the AVI and (re)install or fix it. I probably could have had it working faster than the time he took to convert the video. I have mentioned the problems I’ve been having with ProPresenter on the computer I work with at North Point (and my “boss” there has gotten quite the earful on it). Likewise, the right Mac expert can probably fix that computer in no time. The fact is, all computers are prone to some kind of failure, whether it is a hard drive failure, bad memory chip, improperly installed software, malware, poorly written add-ons, etc.

Okay, maybe the statistics say that Pro/Macs win this round too. But I’m not going to repeat everything I said in Round 1. I once heard a quote, I think it was C.S. Lewis but could be wrong…something to the effect, “That which has the greatest potential for good also has the greatest potential for evil”, or possibly the inverse. Point is, a PC has a lot of open doors which could be really really bad, or really really good, equal potential in either direction. A Mac has the same relationship. A functional properly installed/maintained PC has great potential and can do more than the Mac will allow. A messed up PC will be so much worse than a messed up Mac.

So if you are reading these posts trying to make up your mind about which platform to go with or what software…re-read Round 1 and go with whatever you have the best support for. If your IT dept (or IT volunteers as the case may be) are better at working with Macs, go with ProPresenter. And if you have a shortage of IT volunteers, then Mac/Pro is probably the safer option as well. (Notice I said safer, I can’t bring myself to say “better”, there’ll be a lot of features you miss out on, I’ll get to those in future rounds.)

MediaShout vs ProPresenter, Round 2

MediaShout:

• Laptop with good amount of video memory, and decent processor: $600

• Cost of software: $429

ProPresenter:

• Check out the Renewed Vision store if you want to see who wins this round.

Disclaimer:

Okay, so the Macs that Renewed Vision sells have a 2.0 GHz processor vs the 1.7 I saw at TigerDirect. But the point is PC’s are a lot cheaper. You can still buy a 2 GHz PC for a lot less than $1140. And a 1.7 dual core is more than adequate for most applications. My last event that I ran Mediashout at was a Men’s Retreat for the Covenant Southeast Conference. I was using my personal laptop for recording, and using my wife’s laptop (which was my laptop years ago) for MediaShout. That computer is a 1.4 GHz *single* core processor with 768 MB RAM. Granted, it was simple as far as video clips and such go, but it handled the job just fine without any complications. I even played AVI’s, FLV’s, and SWF files on it. MediaShout will play anything as long as you have the proper codec installed.

MediaShout vs ProPresenter, Round 1

Based on my conversations with people who have decided on MediaShout or ProPresenter, the PC vs Mac debate is really at heart of the issue.  Some of the other issues like “Ease of use” are really just side issues based on which platform you are more used to or can handle.

So Round 1 has to come out in favor of ProPresenter.  Macs are easier to use, easier to train volunteers on, and generally speaking (though I’ve seen exceptions first hand) are more reliable.

But, I still choose PC’s and Mediashout for the same reasons.  Macs are easier to use and more reliable because they leave you with fewer choices.  Businesses default to the PC platform not because they are easier to use, but because they are easier to customize.  Their potential is greater because the PC platform is generally open to any form of customizing you want to do and you can make a PC do something you want it to even if Microsoft didn’t think of it first.

I’m generalizing here, but the opposite is true for a Mac.  If Steve Jobs & Co didn’t think of it first (or Renewed Vision in this discussion), there’s little you can do to add the feature yourself.  This is why Macs are more reliable, people aren’t customizing it with conflicting options or accidentally changing something they didn’t intend to.  Developers can’t write code that has the same access to the core of the system the way they can on a PC.  This is great if the only developers you interact with write viruses, but bad if you run a business and want to hire developers who can automate your business.

The catch to it all is, you have to know what you are doing.  This means that the PC user needs more training, and generally speaking the average user won’t get to utilize the benefits unless they go into advanced training and learn to develop their own software solutions.  ProPresenter and Macs in general take much less training to get a new volunteer used to using it, and it’s difficult for them to mess anything up because their aren’t nearly as many options to mess up.

The bottom line is that if you give me a good computer with MediaShout installed, I can usually accomplish more and spend less money than anyone using ProPresenter.  But I know what I’m doing, and I will freely admit it’s harder to get a volunteer to start doing what I do.

Presentation Software

At North Point, I’m just a volunteer at the bottom of the food chain.  So I don’t get to be involved in creative process (generally speaking, there are exceptions) or make administrative decisions.  One of which is to use ProPresenter and Macs exclusively for all video, lyrics, and even music.  So I’ve learned to use it as best I can and try to appreciate what we have (that they’re not making me use PowerPoint!).

More than not, I’d rather be behind the sound board mixing than behind the computer managing what’s up on the screens.   I’m not really visually wired, I love the worship experience of being behind the mixing console, closing my eyes (with my hands one or two key volume faders), and soaking in the experience.  But for some reason God has been putting me more and more into the position of running the computer graphics and being responsible for the creative components of projecting lyrics, backgrounds, video clips, etc.

So in the environments where I’m the creative director and I make the executive decisions, I use MediaShout on my own laptop.

At Highlands Church, I’ve also had the opportunity to see EasyWorship in action and play with it a little.  Granted, not as much as the other alternatives, so my opinions are worth no more than what you are paying for them.  But I’d like to share my opinions on the software and offer my perspective on which option to go with if you are considering a purchase for your ministry.

My preference is clearly for MediaShout over ProPresenter, just as I would prefer to have a PC than a Mac.  When staff at North Point hear me say this, they respond, “I’ll pray for you.”  And so be it.  But I do make a living working on PC’s, and know them inside and out, so one could say I’m biased.   Keep that in mind when reading future posts where I attempt to compare the different options.

Mike Sessler has a clear opinion too and would much rather have ProPresenter.  He blogs about his transition from MediaShout and I posted some comments if you want to follow along.