Born and raised in Florida, DJ Icey has risen to worldwide prominence, running two indie labels dedicated to breaks and touring 100+ dates a year. I have always been a big fan and jumped at the chance to work with him. Sometimes I let my guys run the big name shows but not this time. Lighting has always been my strong suit but this year I have turned my attention to video.

The Edirol V-4 is a powerful little mixer. For about a grand, you can not only seamlessly mix from video to camera to computer with hundreds of effects, you can remix the videos themselves. Learning the memory dial is an essential tool for VJing effectively. I wasn't happy with the factory presets, so I spent an evening looking through the manual and experimenting. As I learned to change the settings, vast options became available to me.

My favorite effects are shake (great for a simulation bass effect when tapped on beat), negative, monochrome (single color), posterize (low res much like a cartoon), color pass (Only letting selected colors through, and mirroring (horizontal, vertical, and grid). Most of these effects can be modified with the effects control just look for the *. For instance the monochrome* effect will allow you to change the color by turning the effects control dial. The dial will also increase or decrease the level of the effect such as in posterize- lowering and raising the res. For each memory bank certain effects can be stacked to create a video look and transitional themes. The unit is user friendly and can be figured out without looking in the manual. However, I recommend spending an afternoon perusing the manual just to become familiar with the terminology and possibilities.

The Transitional effects (218 to 221) allow me to put The Forum logo on the bottom of the screen which is great for promoting the club for two reasons. First, anything that is custom made generates conversation about the club as well as transfers a cool factor that makes party goers feel that they are at the right place. Second, every time a picture is taken the logo will show up in the picture, which promotes the club every time someone shows their friends the pic.

The unit is compact, easy to use, and has many effects/transitions. I am a novice when it comes to mixing video but in the past several months I have received numerous compliments from VJ's and club owners alike. The best part of the evening was when DJ Icey ask me for a DVD of the Video work I had done that night. Unfortunately we don't have a DVD burner to record our shows but the compliment was received nevertheless.