Advanced Visualization Studio
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Advanced Visualization Studio (AVS), is a music visualization plugin for Winamp. It was designed by Winamp's creator, Justin Frankel. AVS has a customizable design which allows users to create their own visualization effects, or "presets". AVS was made open source software in May 2005, released under a BSD-style license. AVS is currently at version 2.82 and is included with Winamp.
History
The first versions of AVS came without the "superscope" or "dynamic movement" components, and presets were quite different than they are today. Among fans and users of the plugin, these versions (and, consequently, visualizations made when using them) are known as "old-skool AVS".[citation needed]
The introduction of the superscope and dynamic movement components improved the possibilities of AVS, with users able to write their own code. This new, near-limitless style became known as "new-skool AVS".[citation needed]
Version 2.81b of AVS was released by Nullsoft in 2003. It was faster and added several new features like arrays and interactivity in visualizations. 2.81d is the current release after some minor updates by DrO.[who?]
Recently, AVS has received more recognition as an art form. VISBOT performed at 320x240, the Croatian visual arts festival, and appeared in the Coded Cultures exhibition in the Museumsquartier in Vienna. The author of Line Rider, "fšk", created AVS visuals for nightclubs.
On May 18, 2005, it was announced that AVS would now be open source software, released under a BSD-style license.
Making presets
Every preset is made up of different components. There are three categories of components: Render, Trans and Misc. Render draws shapes, Trans transforms the current image and Misc contains the components that don't fit in other two categories. The components are plugged into a list, which is executed from top to bottom, each component doing something with the image and sending the result to the next one. A lot of components are configurable and a few are codable. Effect lists can be included, which act as presets within presets.
The codable components allow the most customizability, when a preset author can control and program effects through AVS' simple scripting language. The codable Renders are the Superscope, which draws lines or dots, the Triangles, which draws solid triangles and the Texer II, which draws bitmaps. The codable Trans are Movement, Dynamic Movement, Dynamic Distance Modifier, Dynamic Shift and Bump. The codable Misc components are the Effect List and the Global Variable manager.
AVS comes with a set of built-in components, but third party components, AVS plugin effects (APEs), can be added.
User-generated presets may be featured on websites such as Winamp.com or DeviantArt.