Use of scrollers with PAR/LEKO lamps
Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 3:50 pm
Fellow DasLighters
I realize I'm probably a bit behind the technological powercurve, but I'm still using DMX scrollers in front of my PAR 64s. 56s and 360Q lekos vice LED colorchangers or CMYK devices (mostly due to affordability). That said, using scrollers with PAR cans with DasLight can be a bit of a challenge. The difficuly lies in the fact that you can't "group" non-contiguous DMX addresses together under one name in the program. For example, if your PARs are on a dimmer pack with addresses 1 thru 8 (mine are on NSI packs with DMX translation provided by a "DMX-later"), you can't dynamically re-assign addresses to "make room" for the scrollers. To clarify, if I could do what I wanted, PAR dimmer on channe1 1 would stay on channel 1, then the can on channel 2 would get re-assigned to channel 3 to make room for the scroller on channel 2. When finished, the PARS would be translated as 1>1; 2>3;3>5; 4>7, etc such that the single channel Wybron scrollers would be on channels 2,4,6,8, etc AND would be groupable under one heading name such that they could be controlled as if they were 2-channel contiguous devices. Nich thought, but that appears impossible to do with the current software.
SO - my current solution is to create 2 channel dimmer/color personas for the PAR/Scroller combinations for use in the 3D software that only actually address the scrollers, leaving the "real" DMX PAR dimmer channels on separate channels, not visible in the 3D software. In my setup, this works out as channels 1-8 are under the grour "PAR 64", and the scrollers are on eight 2-channel pairs from channel 145 thru 160, with each odd number addressing a real scroller, and the even number being a "fake" placeholder for the real PAR dimmer, so:
1 = real PAR dimmer 1
145- PAR scroller 1
146 - fake PAR dimmer 1
2 = real PAR dimmer 2
147- PAR scroller 2
148 - fake PAR dimmer 2
3 = real PAR dimmer 3
149- PAR scroller 3
150 - fake PAR dimmer 3
...and so on
The idea is then to replicate whatever I program and visualize for the "fake" PAR dimmer channels in the "real" PAR dimmer channels. This technique works, but it is cumbersome. Has anyone come up with a better way to handle groupings of non-contiguous DMX channels in the DVC2/3D visualizer software?
I realize I'm probably a bit behind the technological powercurve, but I'm still using DMX scrollers in front of my PAR 64s. 56s and 360Q lekos vice LED colorchangers or CMYK devices (mostly due to affordability). That said, using scrollers with PAR cans with DasLight can be a bit of a challenge. The difficuly lies in the fact that you can't "group" non-contiguous DMX addresses together under one name in the program. For example, if your PARs are on a dimmer pack with addresses 1 thru 8 (mine are on NSI packs with DMX translation provided by a "DMX-later"), you can't dynamically re-assign addresses to "make room" for the scrollers. To clarify, if I could do what I wanted, PAR dimmer on channe1 1 would stay on channel 1, then the can on channel 2 would get re-assigned to channel 3 to make room for the scroller on channel 2. When finished, the PARS would be translated as 1>1; 2>3;3>5; 4>7, etc such that the single channel Wybron scrollers would be on channels 2,4,6,8, etc AND would be groupable under one heading name such that they could be controlled as if they were 2-channel contiguous devices. Nich thought, but that appears impossible to do with the current software.
SO - my current solution is to create 2 channel dimmer/color personas for the PAR/Scroller combinations for use in the 3D software that only actually address the scrollers, leaving the "real" DMX PAR dimmer channels on separate channels, not visible in the 3D software. In my setup, this works out as channels 1-8 are under the grour "PAR 64", and the scrollers are on eight 2-channel pairs from channel 145 thru 160, with each odd number addressing a real scroller, and the even number being a "fake" placeholder for the real PAR dimmer, so:
1 = real PAR dimmer 1
145- PAR scroller 1
146 - fake PAR dimmer 1
2 = real PAR dimmer 2
147- PAR scroller 2
148 - fake PAR dimmer 2
3 = real PAR dimmer 3
149- PAR scroller 3
150 - fake PAR dimmer 3
...and so on
The idea is then to replicate whatever I program and visualize for the "fake" PAR dimmer channels in the "real" PAR dimmer channels. This technique works, but it is cumbersome. Has anyone come up with a better way to handle groupings of non-contiguous DMX channels in the DVC2/3D visualizer software?