Coloured Groups option. moving groups

Richard CSL · Post by **Richard CSL** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 10:44 am

Hi all, I have tried to get Vianney to include a colour option for groups, as like Andre I do a pink floyd show and have struggled with DVC2 to get it to do all the things I want it to.

One of my problems, which I have now overcome was that all Front Of House lights were in a seperate group. (coz they belonged to the venue)

So to illuminate the band at different times I used a goto (X cue ) command. incidently not possible if the start scene is always loop.

and then use the next cue to bring up the dimmer shutters (mac 250´s)

My biggest gripe is all the songs live page are the same colour. really need different colours if I am ever to hand this over to a novice.

Another problem I´ve noticed is in editor right clicking on colours or gobos and select one shows up on the head tabs but does´nt always change the dmx value. (really anoying)

Also it would be really nice to have cue steps manually changeable, at present I have to create 6 cues and click between them manually (Eclipse-all that you touch etc)

I have used the built in scene generator, and as Andre has said before no option to mirror the effect across 10 scanners. would be nice.

Another problem I have is backing up the program between computers. how many times have I received Microsoft has needed to close the program......... Please sort out the last location file flags Vianney

Andre · Post by **Andre** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 5:52 pm

Yeah coloured groups/buttons will really help a lot.
The ability to hide certain buttons is another.
The ability to be able to include/exclude buttons/scenes from being released either by group or globally would also be very useful as then I could blackout and still have the hazer doing it's stuff as it's been excluded from a global release. At the moment the "global" blackout triggers the Hazer scene but sometimes it does not.
The same goes for a group of three scenes and they are meant to step through each one then return to the first but it ends on the last one.

I cannot replicate the right click on gobo or colour to not change the DMX value.

I actually use the minimum of preprogrammed scenes but have groups for every function a particular fixture can do. For example a moving head would have a movement group, a colour group, a gobo group, a shutter group, an intensity group and so on, each of these groups has scenes in them for it's particular task. I have all the available colours on the colour wheel as seperate scenes so can easily change colour on the fly, each scene in each group does a group release so each press of a button in a group turns off any previous button.
For startup positions I have done shortcut keys so for example if I want the moving heads to move in a circle with an open gobo and the ultraviloet blue, then the relevant scenes in the relevant group would have say a "B" shortcut key. so I press "B" and the lights do as they have been told. I can then click any colour or gobo and it changes on the fly.
Do it this way enables me to have many fixtures all start at the same time and then can change things as the song progresses.
Also this allows for any "accidental" speed up or slow down of a song that the band might do and if I used preprogramed scenes they would go out of sync.

I actually perform most of the show on the fly with pre-set scenes for certain parts of the show, i.e. full audience blind in SOYCD and searchlights when the helicopter sound is being played during "Happiest Days of Our Lives", so each show is unique where the lighting is concerned.

Richard CSL · Post by **Richard CSL** » Fri Jul 11, 2008 6:43 pm

Hi Andre , I understand your method of programming, unfortunately I need to hand this over to a n LJ at some point so the lighting needs to be all set as designed.

SOCD I used yellow scans with a floor to ceiling sweep with dot gobo.
Great gig I used a UV wash all heads then added red pars behind the girl with white mirror ball and rear halogen scan flood.
Run Like hell is the "piece de resistance" as it took weeks in a hospital bed to create. (broken leg) some of it is on youtube link below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3oca1tIJ5Y
Money is all green and yellow with scans working in alt movements.

Andre · Post by **Andre** » Sat Jul 12, 2008 8:30 am

Richard CSL wrote:Hi Andre , I understand your method of programming, unfortunately I need to hand this over to a n LJ at some point so the lighting needs to be all set as designed.

SOCD I used yellow scans with a floor to ceiling sweep with dot gobo.
Great gig I used a UV wash all heads then added red pars behind the girl with white mirror ball and rear halogen scan flood.
Run Like hell is the "piece de resistance" as it took weeks in a hospital bed to create. (broken leg) some of it is on youtube link below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3oca1tIJ5Y
Money is all green and yellow with scans working in alt movements.

Yeah I can understand that, needs to be as easy as possible for the LJ.

I am impressed, very good light show. What are the lights around the circular truss ?

Richard CSL · Post by **Richard CSL** » Sat Jul 12, 2008 9:36 am

Ok I´ve got 8 moving heads the Acme/Showtec. Spot queen.

believe it or not 10 Soundlab Go17S scanners. modified with triacs which run of a pwm feed from a 6 ch dimmer pack. and hacked apart inside to improve air flow. so the lamps last more than 2 nights.!!

16 Showtec par 36 pinspots in the ring. 10 showtec par 56 on the outer rig.

I have 2 art 3200 lasers red and green. (difficult to control via dmx). and a single Art 3400 laser in the middle.

2 coeff wash 200 for low front colour wash.
Front of house 4 mac 250s very old and a bit unreliable. (pan errors common)

A smoke machine in the rear. (Obviously)
Regards richard

Andre · Post by **Andre** » Sat Jul 12, 2008 1:59 pm

Richard CSL wrote:Ok I´ve got 8 moving heads the Acme/Showtec. Spot queen.

believe it or not 10 Soundlab Go17S scanners. modified with triacs which run of a pwm feed from a 6 ch dimmer pack. and hacked apart inside to improve air flow. so the lamps last more than 2 nights.!!

16 Showtec par 36 pinspots in the ring. 10 showtec par 56 on the outer rig.

I have 2 art 3200 lasers red and green. (difficult to control via dmx). and a single Art 3400 laser in the middle.

2 coeff wash 200 for low front colour wash.
Front of house 4 mac 250s very old and a bit unreliable. (pan errors common)

A smoke machine in the rear. (Obviously)
Regards richard

Thanks for the info Richard, some nice gear there.

So it is it the 8 Acme/Shotec Spt Queen doing the movemnet on the ring ?

Cheers

Richard CSL · Post by **Richard CSL** » Sat Jul 12, 2008 3:58 pm

yes only 150 watt units, biggest drawback I have found is the colour wheel is not vector tracking so all colour changes tend to be a bit jerky.

apart from that it has a basic shutter dimmer, rotating gobos. , but this unit is unfortunately now obsolete.

cdsounds · Post by **cdsounds** » Sun Jul 13, 2008 9:13 am

They are still available as an iMove 7S

http://prolight.co.uk/item/isim02/ :wink:

Andre · Post by **Andre** » Sun Jul 13, 2008 10:49 am

Richard CSL wrote:yes only 150 watt units, biggest drawback I have found is the colour wheel is not vector tracking so all colour changes tend to be a bit jerky.

apart from that it has a basic shutter dimmer, rotating gobos. , but this unit is unfortunately now obsolete.

Yeah I have been looking for some cheap and light moving heads for our circle/projection screen, starting to look at LED ones now but they are still too expensive. I have to be careful with power consuption as a lot of places the band plays do not have seperate mains rings for the band, excpet in theatres and some of the better music venues. I did have four 2000w audience blinders for use in SOYCD and the first place I used them it tripped out all the mains. Was a bit of a laugh for the venue operator to hunt down the trip switch in the dark. The audience where great about it.

Richard CSL · Post by **Richard CSL** » Sun Jul 13, 2008 12:26 pm

I would be careful with led moving heads as reading many reports on the blue room.org forum the biggest complaint about them is the brightness.

Still think we are a few years away from that technology.

The cheapest Mh I have found with 150 watt discharge is from German wholesaler Conran.de. they do a unit called the Scannic Astute. it looks very good 7 rotating gobos etc.
http://www.conrad.de/goto.php?artikel=303209

only 299 euros. my problem was that they do not do a matching scanner. in discharge , and my Boss already had some of the Queenspots, so only had to buy another 2 to make up the eight needed for the ring.