Trace Live Video on an Oscilloscope (and Send It to a Laser)
To trace live video on an oscilloscope, open OSC-1, switch to Creator mode, choose VIDEO SOURCE → CAMERA or SCREEN, tune Edge Threshold, and click DISPLAY. OSC-1 finds the edges in each frame and draws them on the XY display in real time. To send the same outlines to a laser, connect a DAC under LASER OUTPUT, or use Video to Laser for files and live shows.
Hi, I'm Trina with BeamTracer.com — in this one we'll turn a camera into a line drawing that an oscilloscope can draw, look at what changes when that drawing goes to a laser instead, and sort out which of BeamTracer's three video-to-laser routes you want.
You point a camera at a dancer and the oscilloscope redraws her as a single glowing outline, in real time. That's the whole trick, and it's more approachable than it sounds, because the scope isn't playing video. It's drawing the edges of the picture as a path.
A camera feed traced live onto the scope.
The scope has no pixels to light, so the picture has to become lines. OSC-1 does that for every frame: it finds the visible edges, joins them into paths, and sends those paths to the XY display. Sharp, high-contrast footage turns into clean outlines; busy footage turns into noise.
How do you trace a camera or screen on an oscilloscope in OSC-1?
Open OSC-1 in Chrome or Edge, switch to Creator mode, and find VIDEO SOURCE in the Sources panel. Choose CAMERA or SCREEN, allow the browser's permission prompt, set Edge Threshold so the picture has a manageable number of strong edges, and click DISPLAY to send the traced paths to the scope.
- Open OSC-1 in Chrome or Edge and click Creator at the top.
- In the Sources panel, scroll to VIDEO SOURCE.
- Click CAMERA for your webcam, or SCREEN for any browser tab, window or screen.
- Allow the browser's permission prompt. The panel reads the source and its size, such as Source: CAMERA and 1280×720.
- Move Edge Threshold: lower finds more edges, higher keeps only strong ones.
- Click DISPLAY to route the traced paths to the oscilloscope.
- Use STOP to end capture, or RESET VIDEO to reset every video setting.
What do RAW, EDGE MAP, TRACE and BEAMWALK show?
They are four views of the same pipeline. RAW is the unprocessed feed, EDGE MAP shows the detected outlines, TRACE shows the vector paths that actually drive the XY display, and BEAMWALK previews a different drawing style. The first three are inspectors, so switching between them doesn't stop what the scope is already drawing.
In TRACE, the Detail Level slider trades fidelity for speed. Its readout steps from ULTRA through HIGH, MEDIUM and LOW to FAST, with "← MORE DETAIL" and "FASTER →" at the ends. The panel also shows how many paths and points the current frame has and how long the trace took, so you can see the cost of a setting as you change it.
BEAMWALK draws one continuous, organically flickering trace that walks along the edges instead of separate outline paths. It's the look to reach for when you want the picture to feel hand-drawn on the beam. It needs Chrome and uses a bit more CPU than the standard trace.
How do you get a cleaner outline from messy footage?
Remove the clutter before the edges are found. REMOVE BG separates a foreground person from the background first, so the XY silhouette has less room detail in it. MASK limits edge detection to a rectangle you drag on the preview, and CONFIRM applies it. CLEAR removes it.
With a mask drawn, FIT zooms the scope view so the masked region fills the canvas. That's the quick way to put a face, a pair of hands, or a block of on-screen text at full size. High-contrast subjects work best: a person in front of a plain bright wall gives clean, stable edges, and a screen capture of line art or a vector app is already made of the clean edges the tracer wants.
How do you send the traced video to a laser?
Connect a laser DAC in OSC-1's LASER OUTPUT panel. It lists SIMULATOR, HELIOS, ETHER DREAM, LASERCUBE and IDN. Start on the free SIMULATOR with GALVO SIM on, then connect real hardware, press ARM, then START. OSC-1 sends the scope's signal to the laser the same way it does for music.
The laser path is the same one the oscilloscope music on a laser projector post walks through, so the controls, the Point rate and the safety behavior are identical. What changes is the source: instead of an audio track, the signal is your traced video. A laser is also far slower than the beam in a scope, so a drawing with a lot of detail will round off at the corners. The Detail Level slider is where you keep the path simple enough for the scanner.
A moving picture is still a real beam
Rehearse on the SIMULATOR first, keep the Power limit low, and never aim at an audience. Read the laser show safety guide before the first beam leaves the lens, and keep your projector's physical interlock within reach.
Which of BeamTracer's three video-to-laser routes should you use?
Use OSC-1 when the drawing is scope art or you want to see it on an XY display, use Video to Laser CONVERT when you need a finished ILDA file from a video, and use Video to Laser LIVE when you want a laser to follow a camera, a screen or a visualizer on stage with more control over the trace. They share the idea but not the output.
| OSC-1 Video Source | Video to Laser · CONVERT | Video to Laser · LIVE | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Where | OSC-1, Creator mode | Video to Laser, CONVERT | Video to Laser, LIVE |
| Input | CAMERA or SCREEN | A video file: MP4, WebM or MOV (H.264) | CAMERA, SCREEN, VISUALIZER, or a file |
| How it runs | Live, frame by frame | Offline: traces the clip frame by frame | Live, with a laser clock of its own |
| What you get | An XY drawing on the scope, and a laser through LASER OUTPUT | An ILDA animation to download, or an SVG sequence | Live output to a laser DAC, with POINT BUDGET and DECIMATED readouts |
| Point budget | Detail Level and the Point rate | POINT BUDGET reports WITHIN, NEAR LIMIT or OVER LIMIT | The bar under the preview shows used points against the ceiling |
| Best for | Scope art, performers as silhouettes, XY experiments | A finished show file to play anywhere | A live show, a VJ source, a camera silhouette |
If you want the finished file, open Video to Laser, stay on CONVERT, add your clip, trace it, and use Download ILD for the complete ILDA animation or Open Viewer to inspect it first. If you want a laser to react live, switch to LIVE: it traces moving pictures continuously and can drive a laser DAC directly, and its LASER PREVIEW can show the output in 2D, SCAN, HAZE or CINEMA before anything lights up. The Video to Laser documentation covers every control, and the Video Source documentation covers the OSC-1 side.
Can a real oscilloscope show the traced video?
Yes. OSC-1 is also a way to drive a real scope, because it works as an XY signal. How to connect one, with the cables and an audio interface, is in the OSC-1 hardware documentation. Expect more detail than a laser can draw but less than a camera sees: an XY scope still draws one line at a time, so fine footage needs a lower Detail Level.
A different kind of footage: a wireframe animation traced the same way. Footage that is already made of lines is the easy case, because the edges are already there.
Is it free, and do you need anything installed?
OSC-1 and the Video to Laser tools run free in Chrome or Edge with nothing to install, and the SIMULATOR and GALVO SIM preview cost nothing. Output to a real projector is a Studio feature, and every signed-in account gets 3 free output sessions to try it. A Helios plugs in over USB and needs no extra software; the other DACs need the free BeamTracer Bridge for macOS. Pricing has the current plans.
Trace your camera on a scope and a simulated laser — free, in the browser
OPEN OSC-1 →Where to go next
If you want the laser side first, oscilloscope music on a laser projector covers connecting a DAC, the point rate and what changes from a CRT, and laser blanking and the lines between shapes explains why those stray lines show up. For a still image instead of video, how to turn an SVG into an ILDA file is the starting point, and the oscilloscope-to-laser guide lists every route to a laser from OSC-1.
That's live video on a scope and a laser. beamtracer.com — I'll see you in the next one.