Turn That — Starz Dance Competition & Digital Products

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Turn That & Starz Dance Competition

Welcome to
Starz Live

Photos, videos, livestream, and everything from your competition weekend — all in one place.

More below

How it’s all built

Click any project to see the technical breakdown. Every system below was designed, built, and deployed by one developer.

Starz Media Vault
The engine behind Starz Live, Studio Portal, and all media delivery

Handles everything from the moment a video is recorded backstage to the moment a parent downloads it on their phone. 48,000+ files per event, 276K requests/hour at peak, served from a home NAS at 2.5 Gbps.

Live Media Feed
Real-time photo and video browsing by event. Lightbox viewer, search by routine or studio, pull-to-refresh, mobile-first PWA.
Backstage System
Staff advances routines from backstage. “Now Performing” overlay updates every 3 seconds on livestream, website, and /live app.
Awards Tracker
Track adjudication, high points, and overall placements in real time during the ceremony. Share results as a generated PNG image.
Studio Portal
Authenticated studio login. Browse all media by routine. Download individual files or bulk ZIP. Generate family access codes with expiration.
Family Gallery
Access code system — studios share a link, families browse and download photos/videos/critiques for their dancer. No account needed.
Upload Pipeline
Electron desktop app scans folders, maps studio numbers, uploads to S3 with progress tracking. Handles 50K+ files with duplicate detection.
QA Inspector
Automated daily media checks: missing videos, misfiled photos, corrupt files, wrong studio folders. Side-by-side comparison tools for resolution.
NAS CDN
Synology NAS with 2 Gbps fiber serves all media. Auto-failover to S3/CloudFront if NAS goes offline. ZIP downloads built on NAS from local disk.
PHP 8.1MySQLAWS S3NginxElectronSendGridSynology NASffmpegpdfplumber
Virtual Judge Critiques
Full pipeline from video upload to judge recording to customer delivery

Customers upload a dance routine video, pay per duration, and a professional judge records an audio critique over the video. The system handles the entire flow — upload, payment, judge assignment, recording, merging, delivery, and rating.

Video Upload
XHR upload with real-time progress bar. Multi-file support. Form fills while uploading — email, studio, routine name, preferred judge.
Payment
Square card + Apple Pay. Pricing by duration: 0-3 min $8, 3-5 min $10, 5-10 min $15. Promo code support (single-use, admin-generated).
Judge Queue
Preferred judge gets 4-hour head start, then opens to all. Judges log in, do mic check with level meter, record critique over the video in-browser.
ffmpeg Merge
Server-side: video at 25% audio + judge voice at 150% → 480p MP4 + standalone MP3. Both uploaded to S3, local files cleaned up.
Delivery
Automated SendGrid email with styled download page. 7-day link expiry. Customer can preview, download MP4 or MP3, and rate the judge.
Rating System
1-5 stars, thumbs up/down, optional comment. Updates judge average rating. Admin dashboard shows queue, completions, revenue, and judge stats.
PHP 8.1ffmpegWebRTC AudioSquare SDKApple PaySendGridS3
TURNT Arena
Browser MMORPG launched on Steam — full game loop from scratch

A complete browser-based RPG built in a few months and published on Steam. Explore zones, level up, collect perks, join guilds, fight bosses, compete on leaderboards. Runs in Electron for the desktop client with offline capabilities.

160+ Perks
Perk tree with hidden selection mechanic (Season 2). Stat boosts, abilities, synergies. BCMath for boss HP values beyond PHP integer limits.
Guild System
Create/join guilds, prestige tokens, rebirth system. Guild leaderboards with deduplication and race condition handling.
Endless Mode
Procedurally scaling difficulty. 30-second trial timers. Party system with synchronized victory screens and shared loot.
Procedural Music
Tone.js generates ambient music dynamically — no static audio files. Changes with zones and game state.
Cosmetics & Skins
Account-wide skin ownership, per-character equip. Base64 sprite system for bosses, mobs, and characters.
Steam Integration
Steam login/ownership verification. Auto-update system for Electron desktop client. Patch notes feed, bug report channel.
PHPMySQLElectronSQLiteTone.jsSteam APIBCMathCanvas
Turn That Booking
Hotel group reservation platform for competition events

Studios and families book hotel rooms for competition weekends. The system tracks per-night inventory across multiple hotels, processes payments, and generates rooming lists for the venue.

Room Inventory
Per-night availability tracking. Multiple room types per hotel. Automatic block management — rooms release back when cancelled.
Reservation Flow
Customer selects event → hotel → dates → room type → pays. Confirmation email with booking details.
Payment
Square payment integration. Handles deposits, full payments, and refunds on cancellation.
Admin Dashboard
Manage events, hotels, room blocks. View all reservations. Generate rooming list PDFs for hotel front desk.
PHPMySQLSquare SDKPDF GenerationSendGrid
Starz POS System
Custom iPad point-of-sale for merchandise tables at events

Built specifically for selling merchandise at dance competition events. Runs on iPads at the merch table, connects to a Square Terminal for card payments, handles state-specific tax calculations, and tracks per-size inventory across the season.

Square Terminal
Paired via device code API. Sends checkout to physical card reader. Supports card, tap, Apple Pay. Print or email receipts.
State Tax Logic
Tax-included pricing backed out per state. Clothing exempt in MN & WI. 14 city-specific rates hardcoded. Use tax tracking on program books.
Size Inventory
Track stock by product and size (YS/YM/YL/AS/AM/AL/AXL). Per-event starting inventory. Cross-device sync via MySQL.
Tax Reports
PDF reports: event summary, season summary, transaction log, programs use tax detail. Quarterly filing support for MN Sales & Use Tax.
HTML/JS (iPad)PHP APIMySQLSquare Terminal APISendGridPDF Generation
Schedule Builder & Email System
Parse PDFs, build schedules, calculate awards, email studios

Upload a competition schedule PDF and the system parses every routine, calculates medal/pin/certificate counts, lets you drag-and-drop build the event layout, and generates personalized HTML emails for each studio with their schedule, awards times, and improv sessions.

PDF Parser
Python pdfplumber extracts routines using word-level X-positions for column separation. Handles 1000+ routines, multi-line names, level detection.
Awards Calculator
Medals, pins, runner-ups, certificates, cash awards — all computed from the parsed schedule. Detects unique dancers, split HP pools, and per-session breakdowns.
Drag & Drop Builder
Place HP blocks into room/day slots. Award breaks with editable duration. Auto-timing with configurable durations per division.
Studio Emails
Personalized HTML email per studio with their schedule, weekend awards summary, improv times, and doors-open info. Sent via SendGrid with test mode.
PythonpdfplumberPHPMySQLSendGridDrag & Drop API

What’s running behind the scenes

☁️ AWS EC2

Ubuntu server running PHP, MySQL, Nginx. Elastic IP, auto-start services, 500 PHP workers for peak traffic. Handles all API calls and business logic.

📦 AWS S3

863GB+ media storage. All uploads go to S3 first, then sync to the NAS automatically via Synology CloudSync. Soft-delete system with 7-day cleanup.

🏠 Home NAS

Synology DS925+ with 32GB RAM and 2 Gbps fiber. Serves ALL media viewing and downloads. Auto-failover to S3 if offline. ZIP downloads built directly from disk.

🔐 SSL & DNS

Let’s Encrypt auto-renewing certs on both EC2 and NAS. GoDaddy DNS. Cloudflare-free — no middleman between users and our servers.

📧 Email

SendGrid for all transactional email — studio notifications, critique delivery, schedule emails, receipts, password resets.

💳 Payments

Square SDK for card processing across POS, booking, and critiques. Apple Pay enabled. Terminal API for physical card readers at events.

Need something built?

Everything on this page was designed, coded, and deployed by one developer. No templates, no agencies, no outsourcing.

TDX — The Dancers Xperience
turnthat.com/tdx-homepage
Workshop registration platform with class signups, dancer rosters, and invoicing. A good example of a client project. Check it out.
Sample

Let’s build something.

Payment processing, real-time apps, admin dashboards, mobile-first design, API integrations, inventory systems. If you can describe it, I can ship it. Based in Minnesota, available remotely.

Get in touch →

Staff & Admin Tools

Internal links for the Starz team.

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