New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Software related to NBTV.

New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby VE9OHM » Wed Jul 20, 2022 2:45 am

Greetings Everyone!

I'm new here... I just joined yesterday and took some time to read through the forum before posting.
My name is Amanda and I'm an artist who works with radio transmissions and video (among other things).

I have a bit of an interesting challenge, and I'm wondering if some of you might be able to help me out, or at least point me in the right direction.

I'm looking for software to encode black and white, silent, NBTV into .wav files; and software that can decode those files in real time.
I've seen lots of different software options on here, but I'm not working with a mechanical TV... I'm just looking to transmit over radio waves, and to have a way that people can see the videos on the receiving end.

I am transmitting from HAARP (the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program) up in Alaska.
It's an ionospheric research instrument that scientists use to generate artificial aurora in order to learn more about propagation.
It normally transmits unmodulated high frequency radio waves... but it is possible to modulate it (AM only) with some audio.
It's the most powerful radio transmitter on the planet (180 crossed dipole antennas distributed in a 33 acre matrix with 3 GW power)

In 2019 I transmitted audio as well as SSTV images from HAARP... but for my next work, I would really like to transmit video (moving images!)... but there are some limitations.

My limitations are that HAARP can only transmit full AM (no SSB, VSB, or OFDM) and it can only modulate a maximum of 30 kHz bandwidth.
This allows me to send an audio signal, and from what I read online, it looks like NBTV can be encoded into an audio signal.

I'm ok with black and white, silent, very low resolution and low framerate... the trick is, I would love for it to be able to be decoded in real time... is that even possible?

============================
Here are my software questions:
============================

1. Which software should I use in order to generate a .wav file (up 30 kHz bandwidth and up to 200 kHz sample rate)?
(black and white, silent, very low resolution, and low framerate - I dig the distortion)

2. Is there software that can decode an NBTV wave file in real time?

3. Does this software already exist, or does it need to be created in the land of DSP?

(I've had a look at Gary's page, and read through the FreeNBTV thread on this forum... those are the places I will start.... I normally work on a mac, but am just setting up a PC with Windows 10 right now so I can try those out... in the meantime I wanted to ask my question here sooner than later in case I head down a wrong path on my own)

I hope to start experimenting with Gary's software and the FreeNBTV software soon, but if anyone has any other leads, tips, advice, or thoughts they'd like to share, I'd be moste appreciative!

Thanks so much!

Amanda
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby VE9OHM » Wed Jul 20, 2022 3:10 am

Replying to my own post here with a list of links to software that I have found....

As I'm browsing through software I see that some only operate on older systems like Windows 95... hmmmm...

if anyone has tried these and has recommendations as to which might work best for me... or perhaps other suggestions not in this list, I'd be very appreciative.

thanks so much!

=================================================================================
list of software links I'm currently exploring (in addition to the freenbtv software in this forum):
=================================================================================

https://archive.org/download/nbtvthebigpicture
https://nl9222.home.xs4all.nl/software.htm
http://users.tpg.com.au/users/gmillard/nbtv/nbtv.htm
https://www.qsl.net/zl1bpu/NBTV/Starting.htm

==============
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby Steve Anderson » Wed Jul 20, 2022 11:23 am

Hello Amanda and welcome to the forum. An interesting project! The NBTV waveform to be applied to a transmitter can be thought as a specialised audio waveform. It as a generalization occupies a similar bandwidth to audio depending on your definition of 'audio'. As you note it can be used with AM, SSB, FM modulation and almost any system that can carry speech.

It does however present one or two challenges. The low-frequency component does need some consideration, for speech, 'telephone quality' audio is considered acceptable, say 300-3,000 Hertz. For speech and music older AM transmitters handled say 40-5,000 Hz, Whereas the mono FM signal (88-108MHz in most countries) generally is 40-15,000Hz.

The challenge with NBTV is the low-frequency requirements. Ideally in common with all TV standards, it should go to DC, i.e. 0Hz. That can be achieved, but at a cost. A compromise of a low-frequency specification for NBTV is 3Hz (three). Very few audio units can handle that, simply as 'audio' doesn't need it, we can't hear it anyway.

The upper frequencies depend on line and frame rates of NBTV, but generally somewhere between 10kHz and 15kHz seems to be an accepted figure. But there is no 'set in stone' standards for any of this. The NBTVA does recommend certain parameters, and most generally follow them, they can be found here:- www.http://www.nbtv.org/

If you seek more information, ask away here....

Steve A.

You'll note that there is an interest in SSTV among a few of the members here, myself included...As an aside, a new and hopefully better SSTV demodulator than the modified Robot 70 I've been using for some time will appear soon in the SSTV sub-section of this forum...yes, I have been doing a few things quietly.....
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby Steve Anderson » Wed Jul 20, 2022 7:01 pm

As for the software you may seek, there are few gifted as much as Gary Millard here. Maybe others might be able to point you in the right direction, but I suggest you don't hold your breath. What happened to Gary I don't understand, nor can I explain. I really don't think (probably) an application exists for what you are seeking, though Gary could probably derive it. But others may well prove me wrong...again!

Steve A.
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby Klaas Robers » Thu Jul 21, 2022 7:18 pm

Hi Amanda,
for test transmissions you might use the NBTV video from the CDs of the NBTVA. You will find your source at www.nbtv.org. This is NBTV + sound in pure audio signal. The video is in the left channel, the sound (mostly speech) in the right channel. You might extract the signal in a digital way, 2 x 16 bits resolution, sample frequency 44100 Hz. usig a CD ripping tool. Then at least you have your NBTV audio, although it is not your own video. For that get into contact with Gary.

I was wondering if your transmissions are receivable elswhere on the globe, e.g. in europe. 3 GW indeed is a high power, but in 1925 we had a long wave transmitter operfating in Bandung (now indonesia) with 2.4 GW on 17 kHz. This was meant to communicate in CW from Bandung to the Netherlands. But few years after its opening short wave came up and it became possible to communicate with much lower powers and in AM speech. I guess the needed power for that was no more than 10 kW.

Interesting experiments that you are doing. And interesting to see that it is driven (of course) by radio amateurs.

73, Klaas PA0KLS
QTH: Valkenswaard,
The Netherlands.
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby Klaas Robers » Fri Jul 22, 2022 8:06 pm

HI Amanda,

I forgot to tell you that there is a complete CD of NBTV video on the website of the NBTV.org. Go to: http://nbtv.org/MUTR-disc where you can download the files that are recorded on the CD that comes with the MUTR televisor kit. With these files you have almost one hour of NBTV video. You read more about this on those pages.

Good luck,
73 de Klaas, PA0KLS
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby M3DVQ » Mon Jul 25, 2022 9:16 am

I've always used Video2NBTV, which will happily generate audio output in the NBTVA standard from images, video files, or live from a webcam or other capture device.
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby VE9OHM » Wed Jul 27, 2022 8:42 am

Hello all,

thanks for the kind and generous responses so far... not much has actually been said about software yet though...

Steve: yes, from what I can tell, Gary is the software expert, and he was the first person I sent an email too... even before joining this forum... but no reply yet, and from what I read on the forum it looks like he has taken a step back... so after finding many different open source software options online, and seeing whole threads about it on the forum, I hoped someone might be able to offer a few tips, tricks, warnings, or recommendations with regards to the existing software. I was particularly interested in the FreeNBTV software developed by SmeezieKitty and wondered if that might work. I found so many software options online, it's a bit overwhelming to know where to start.

Klaas: Thanks for the tip on the CD files... I found those online as well, and they looked quite intriguing. As you noted though, I'm more interested in encoding my own video... I don't need to encode in real time from a live camera... the encoding can take a long time with a pre-recorded video file... but it's the decoding that I'd like to see done in real time.... As for transmitting around the globe, yes, my last transmission from HAARP was in 2019 and I had good reception reports from around the globe.

M3DVQ: thanks for the software suggestion. I'm just cleaning up my PC, and will give the Video2NBTV software a go... I'm running the latests version of Windows 10, and hope that it will still run on this.

From what I see online, both on individual websites, and on youtube... I have seen examples of software decoding NBTV in real time... the problem is that some of those software seem to only run on older versions of Windows 95 and the like... many were probably developed by Gary....

so I'll ask again...

there is a lot of software online to wade through... I'll start with Video2NBTV... but beyond that can anyone recommend a few others to start out with.
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby Lowtone » Wed Jul 27, 2022 10:14 pm

Hello and welcome

Video2NBTV works also on Windows XP, 7 and 10 as far as i tested it. I can convert videos files and also live video into either file or live audio signal.
It is efficient and simple to use.
r a d i o P T T v i s i o n
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby VE9OHM » Thu Aug 25, 2022 2:40 am

Hello again,

I finally had a chance to try out some of the software, but got a few error messages. Can anyone tell me what the issues might be and how I could resolve them?

Here is what I've encountered so far:

--------------------------------
Software: ---- FreeNBTVgen
--------------------------------
** upon opening, it opens two of every window (input; format; output; small black window; medium black window)
** The medium black window contains the following message:
"FreeNBTVgen 0.40
Initializing GTK...OK
Initializing SDL...OK
Warning: Failed to open nbtvgen.fmt for reading
(freenbtvgen.exe:10988):Gtk-[1;33mWARNING[0m**: could not load a pixbuf from /org/gtk/libgtk/theme/Adwaita/assets/check-symbolic.svg
This may indicate that pixbuf loaders or the mime database cound not be found. "

** I can select the video for input, and I select output to wave file, but when I click "START" the entire program closes down.
----------------------------------

--------------------------------------------
Software: -----Video 2 NBTV-V3-Alpha
--------------------------------------------
** looks straight forward, was able to select a source video and destination
** source video was on an external drive (I don't know if this matters)
** when I press the arrow I get the following message:
"Could not connect video source to video grabber
VFW_E_CANNOT_CONNECT (0x80040217)"

**so I copied the video file to the desktop of the PC, tried again and got the same message.
----------------------------------------------

----------------------------------------------
Software: ---- Video 2 NBTV-Version 1.4
----------------------------------------------
** seemed straight forward as well.
** it asked for an .avi file (my other attempts were with .mp4), so I used an .avi file this time
** I got the following error message:
"could not load the media file
ERROR_INVALID_NAME"

** so I renamed the file with a shorter name, only 8 characters, no special characters or spaces, and tried again.
** got the same error message that it was an invalid name.
---------------------------------------------------

Is anyone familiar with these error messages and what the problem might be?

Thanks so much!
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby smeezekitty » Tue Aug 30, 2022 4:10 pm

VE9OHM wrote:** I can select the video for input, and I select output to wave file, but when I click "START" the entire program closes down.

I just found this thread now. You need to select the format parameters (either a sound card or set a file path and name), and click the "set format" button before you can start encoding.

As for real time decoding, options are unfortunately more limited. I planned to make a decoder that would work with many formats but due to being busy with college and now faced with personal issues, that project is on hold. There are a few programs floating around that can do real-time (the most significant one is gary's "NBTV - The BIG Picture!" but it is still stuck to the club standard)

If you're in a real bind and need a custom format decoded in real time, I can probably make something up. DM me with more details on the target format
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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby smeezekitty » Tue Oct 25, 2022 10:04 am

Amanda sent me this. She has already made two transmissions but there are two more upcoming in case anyone wants to try to decode the NBTV from them. I found the image quality to be a bit rough due to ringing on transients but some parts are recognizable


Website is: www.ghostsintheairglow.space

Upcoming transmissions are Oct. 25 @ 16:30 UTC and Oct. 26 at 16:30 UTC
The transmission art work is half an hour long, with several frequency changes, and there are 6 minutes of NBTV signal near the beginning of the work.
There are in fact two different 6 minute NBTV signals being transmitted at the same time, but on different frequencies aimed in different directions.
2.8 MHz will be directed at azimuth 290 toward Asia which will be in darkness
5.9 MHz will be directed at azimuth 110 toward middle America which will be in daylight.

Those frequencies will probably not change for tomorrow (Oct. 25)… but depending on ionospheric conditions, they might be altered for the last day… any changes to frequencies will be posted on the “transmissions” page of the website: https://ghostsintheairglow.space/transm ... tober-2022

I am inviting people to submit reception reports with any recordings they might have through this online form on the website: https://ghostsintheairglow.space/node/add/report
I am requesting permission to post those reception reports in an online “reception report repository” (and they can be anonymous) which can be found here: https://ghostsintheairglow.space/reception-reports
I have physical QSL cards for the Ghosts in the Air Glow project, as well as official HAARP QSL cards that I am sending to anyone who is willing to share their report on the website

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Re: New to NBTV - transmitting from HAARP

Postby GrantXTV » Fri Oct 28, 2022 11:23 am

VE9OHM wrote:Replying to my own post here with a list of links to software that I have found....

As I'm browsing through software I see that some only operate on older systems like Windows 95... hmmmm...

if anyone has tried these and has recommendations as to which might work best for me... or perhaps other suggestions not in this list, I'd be very appreciative.

thanks so much!

=================================================================================
list of software links I'm currently exploring (in addition to the freenbtv software in this forum):
=================================================================================

https://archive.org/download/nbtvthebigpicture
https://nl9222.home.xs4all.nl/software.htm
http://users.tpg.com.au/users/gmillard/nbtv/nbtv.htm
https://www.qsl.net/zl1bpu/NBTV/Starting.htm

==============


Hi Amanda,

Not sure if this information is useful, I been working on a new type of NBTV modulation for sky wave as side project for last few months. I have been in contact with my good friend Con (ZL2AFP) who did a lot of work with his NBTV software 15 years ago and I have been going over his code for the modulator de-modulator section. As I am looking building a modulator into my scan-converter, but there is a lot of work to be done yet, with these ideas I have been working on. So if you interested doing some possible NBTV on HF with sky-wave, I could make a start on a prototype for this modulator to test with, but it is going be a project that will time to work though all the bugs. The only down side is I focusing on spectrum efficiency, therefore it could be more than 30 kHz of bandwidth, but less than 100 kHz is possible. I have done some software modeling so far, for a TV format that is 120 x 96 x 12.5, the works out to 720/6, 576/6 and 25/2, as I am looking at converting 576i/p down to 96p. This format will be able to send Intensity (Luminance), Colour (Chrominance) and Audio (Sound), there is a lot going on with the video in the way I plan to do the analog compression to make this all work.

Grant
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