Tickers

“Tickers”: Creating a Text Crawl

From the Overlays Tab, select Type –> “Tickers” to see (and set) which text crawls are active on which channels.

To create a new ticker, either:

  • select the “add” icon on the right hand side of the interface, or
  • select “Ticker” from the “New:” pulldown menu

To edit an existing ticker, either:

  • select the “edit” icon on the right hand side of the ticker row, or
  • click on the ticker name

You will be brought to the Ticker Overlay editing page. This is where you will set the properties of the ticker, and enter the text of your message.

From HyperCaster v5.2 onward, you can design a ticker with a foreground image (e.g. station logo) that displays on top of your text crawl. Scroll down the editing interface to reveal all the editing tools for Foreground and Background ticker graphics.

There are Tool Tips  throughout the interface with more detailed explanations of each feature. Also, any change you make in the settings will immediately be reflected in the live display on the right side of the edit page.

  1. General Properties
    1. Position the crawl
      1. You can either select one of the Preset Types (Top or Bottom, or one of your own pre-designed tickers) from the General Properties options, or
      2. Set the position manually in the Background Properties section. The X and Y axes have been calibrated for each screen resolution to help you visualize the position on the screen.
    2. Name this ticker
    3. For use of the Emergency Ticker feature, please refer to instructions on the Emergency Notification Console
  2. Text Properties
    1. Type your message in the Text field.  To style your text, scroll down to the “Text Design” tools.
    2. Adjust the speed of the crawl in the General Properties section by entering in this field the number of seconds it takes for a character to cross the screen.
    3. The Text Separator field allows you to insert any characters you want to use to separate the end of your message from the beginning. If you leave this blank, your message will be separated with a hyphen.
  3. Background Properties
    1. You have two options for the ticker background: a colored background ribbon with optional transparency and border, or an image of your choice.
      1. Color choices: Background and Border Properties both allow you to pick the color and set the transparency using the slider widget below the color picker. You can also enter your own color code.
      2. Background Image. Upload your own image. Note that if you upload your own image, a new Text Properties box will open up, allowing you to position your text crawl on top of your background image. If you use Background Color, text positioning is automatic.
    2. Sizing and Positioning: Use the mouse to manually drag graphic elements to the desired position, or for pixel-precision, enter x and y values in the px fields provided.
  4. Squeezeback Properties

(as of HyperCaster v6.0 and ProVue v3.0, you can add a “squeezeback” effect to overlays, which resizes and repositions the live video window according to the settings, i.e. to fit within a cut-out in a graphic background, while the overlay is active.)

  • First, some guidelines to preparing the graphic background
    1. Graphic must be png, with a transparent “hole” of proper aspect ratio through which the video will appear.
    2. For example, if you are going to squeeze an HD video back into a 1920 x 1080 HD frame, you could create a graphic “hole” of 1440 x 810, aligned to top right of screen, like so:
  • Upload the image to Background Properties —> select Image
  • To the left of the Overlay preview pane, scroll down to the “Squeezeback Properties” edit tab.
  • Select “Enable Squeezeback?” to open the squeezeback design options

  • Define X and Y coordinates of the top left corner of the video
  • In this example: for an HD video inset, the following coordinates and dimensions:
    • X = 480
    • Y = 0
    • Width = 1440
    • Height = 810
  • You can also drag the gray squeezeback window to position, and drag the corners or sides to resize.
    Note: To superimpose a Bug on this graphic, you can use the Foreground Image feature, below.
  • Save your changes, and this overlay can be scheduled just like any other Overlay Event. Whenever the overlay triggers, video will be squeezed back based on the settings, and when the overlay completed, video will resume to the full output size.

5. Foreground Image Properties

  1. The Foreground Image will always layer on top of your ticker text.
  2. Upload a transparent png image file. Note: you will need to size the image to your liking before uploading.
  3. Position your Foreground image.

6. Text Design

  1. Font: Choose your font style, size, weight and color
  2. Drop Shadow: Set your Drop Shadow options by selecting the pixel thickness, angle, and shadow color

7. Save your settings.

8. Turn the ticker for the desired channel “On”, and your ticker will be live. Or you can schedule your ticker using the Classic View “Add Overlay Event” option. If you make any changes in your ticker, restart it to reflect the changes.