# Multiple Projections from one or two computers?



## Liam Morley (Sep 17, 2016)

So I've started working on a production about the tornado that went through the town I live in five years ago and the decision has been made to use three projectors. The projectors will be used show photos/video of the damage/reconstruction of the town as well as a couple of video scenes. We normally use power point for the little projection we do as we are PC based and have not had the need for anything fancy. 

I have been looking into different solutions and cue lab always seems to be one of the top choices. I have an older mac book pro that we could use with cue lab 2. I also have an older mac mini that we could probably use and in the worse case we could borrow the co-writer/co-directors brand new mac (laptop). I have seen it mentioned but have not found a lot of info on linking multiple instants of cue lab together in a master/slave configuration. I was wondering if anyone has tried this before and has any tips that would be great. As you can probably tell where on a budget. If there is anything that is easy as cue lab on Windows for multiple projectors that would probably work as well. 

If anyone has any ideas that would be great.


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## Polfernandez (Sep 17, 2016)

I think that your best option is to buy a Matrox triplehead2go that allows you to divide one output into there, an then use Resolume arena to run the show, it's really easy to start with. and there is a lot of free tutorials out there. this way you can have completly diferent conten on each projector or use all there as a single panoramic. Hope it helps!!


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## ruinexplorer (Sep 17, 2016)

I agree that having one machine control all three outputs will be preferred. This will make things much easier for you in the long run. The Matrox unit will make your computer think that there is one large image, which is actually three identical outputs. This is important that all three of your projectors have the same resolution.

Qlab, as you stated is a good program for doing this type of work. One of the benefits is that you can rent a license for very little money, especially if it is part of a school. You are limited to Mac, and I would highly suggest going with the most modern computer available and running the latest revision.

There are a number of PC programs available. What kind of budget do you think you will be working with?


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## Liam Morley (Sep 18, 2016)

ruinexplorer said:


> I agree that having one machine control all three outputs will be preferred. This will make things much easier for you in the long run. The Matrox unit will make your computer think that there is one large image, which is actually three identical outputs. This is important that all three of your projectors have the same resolution.
> 
> Qlab, as you stated is a good program for doing this type of work. One of the benefits is that you can rent a license for very little money, especially if it is part of a school. You are limited to Mac, and I would highly suggest going with the most modern computer available and running the latest revision.
> 
> There are a number of PC programs available. What kind of budget do you think you will be working with?


The small budget has been mostly been put towards other things. Is there any free or very affordable programs? We don't need it to be a long term solution just something we can make work for the show.


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## scapino (Sep 18, 2016)

Show Cue System is very affordable, and can do many outputs simultaneously. I just finished running "Nine" with a 3 screen, 3 projector set up. I used small inexpensive USB to VGA to get the extra video outputs from the PC, and then I use VGA to CAT5 adapters to run the 3 cat 5 cables from the booth 150" to the individual projectors back stage. Worked great, stills and video. No problems.

Kurt


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## jonliles (Sep 26, 2016)

+1 on Show Cue System. I ran Avenue Q tracks and videos from SCS 10 using 3 monitors, using a windows XP laptop and a VGA signal replicator (1 up to 5 outs)

Also ran a local playwrights show that used 2 monitors that would show same and different material using SCS 11 (the writing was wretched and I purged the name a long time ago). For this, I used a WinXP desktop with 4 independent HDMI outputs on 2 NVidia Cards.


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## dbaxter (Sep 26, 2016)

Cue Player Premium Plus is another Windows alternative. (disclaimer: it is from my company). I would consider it inexpensive, as well. Multiple computers and video cards can be controlled over a network in addition to outputs from the main computer.


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## Joshualangman (Oct 3, 2016)

This is my standard recommendation for up to three projectors.

Get this computer:

*15-inch MacBook Pro with Retina display
2.8 GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7, Turbo Boost up to 4.0 GHz
16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3L SDRAM
1 TB PCIe-based Flash storage
Intel Iris Pro Graphics + AMD Radeon R9 M370X with 2GB GDDR5 memory
*
Use QLab 3.

You will make up for the cost of the machine with the time, angst, and expense you save during tech.

You can run all three projectors off the one computer. You won't need any master/slave setup, unless you want redundancy. QLab 3 will give you an enormous amount of flexibility in how to use each projector.

Don't try to use QLab 2. It's no longer supported on current operating systems and its video capabilties were very limited in comparison. I would also avoid older computers. You will want the most processing power you can get.


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