Paul

Splitting movements from positions would be part of the most famous Frog Reference of all, 5402. Plenty to read about that one on the forums

Hi Wim, Can you tell us what is displayed on the external VGA monitor? This will help in isolating the problem. Also if you can PM me the serial number of your desk, that would be helpful. Regards, Paul.

Copying attributes in this way, from a fixture which is outputting a palette, will result in the fixture(s) being copied to getting a reference to the same palette as the fixture being copied from. If however that palette does not contain any data for the fixture being copied to, then the fixture seems to output random values. I guess this is a bug, as it's outputs should remain unchanged, or more usefully as you suggest, take the values from the palette for the fixture being copied from. You could then use this method to subsequently add fixtures to a palette by reprogramming it.

"Fixture Cloning" actually has a fair bit of complexity behind it once you start getting into the details. It's not something we currently envisage supporting on the Frog series, however it is on the list for Frog2.

Try BABELFISH. It offers the helpful translation: :?

You can do this with an N-shot chase. Have a read of THIS POST for a verbose description.

I've just tried this on Phantom Frog 9.8, and it works OK, as long as the fixture you're copying FROM is displaying a movement effect on the LCD, and not changing Pan/Tilt values as a result of replaying a movement effect from a Submaster/SX/Playback X. The issue with running movement effects not displaying on the wheel LED has been logged to be changed... Frog Reference 5505 - When a movement effect is running on a fixture this is not reflected in the movement effect parameters on the wheel LCD - they show No effect , size = 0 etc

If you set a channel in a fixture profile as brightness (Highest Takes Precedence HTP mixing), then it will be mixed with the fader, and will respond to blackout and solo. The highest numerical value from the multiple sources (submasters, sequence, and Live!) is the value that will be output. For brightness, this is what you want. For other attributes, it's usually not what you want. For instance, on a shutter channel (for a fictitious fixture I just made up), you might have the following: DMX Value.....Effect 0-9.................Shutter closed 10-19.............Shutter open 20-99.............Strobing 100-199......... Other effects 200-255..........Control & Reset Commands, Lamp Strike etc. Since the highest numerical value would win, it would for example be impossible to override a submaster outputting a strobe effect with one that had the shutter open. The same would apply to colour selection on a colour wheel etc. Hence LTP (Last Takes Precedence) mixing is usually used for attribute control channels. The attribute values are sent to the DMX outputs when the submaster fader passes it's LTP Trigger Level (5% on the Diablo), or the sequence crossfade passes the LTP Trigger position (5%).

Lowering the fader removes the brightness (HTP) contribution to the output. It does not un-trigger the attribute (LTP) channels. You need to create a blackout memory. If you edited the fixture profile so that what the desk thought was the brightness channel, was actually shutter or something like that on the actual fixture, then it would be mixed HTP rather than LTP and hence would respond to blackout. Depending on what you're doing, the tradeoff of HTP mixing against easier blackout may or may not work for you. This is the correct behaviour of the desk. The joystick has a proportional response, so the further you move it away from the sprung centre, the faster your fixtures move. The maximum speed is fixed so that the response feels right for moving head fixtures. Since mirrors can move much faster, it can feel slower than what you're used to. The faders only work for pan/tilt in program mode, since in Live! mode, they're used to control the sequence.

Once a movement effect is triggered it will keep running (regardless of the position of the submaster fader) until you trigger something else to stop it. This is LTP behaviour. When playing back submasters, the red LEDs flash to indicate that the fader has not been 'grabbed'. This happens if you go into another mode like 'Live!', move the faders, then return to the main submasters page. You need then to return the fader to the previous position before it will 'grab' and become active again, at which point the red LED stops flashing.

No, each memory can only contain 1 movement effect, however each fixture can be tagged as included in that effect or not, and each fixture can be given a different offset in the effect. Yes you can do this by setting a 50% offset for fixtures 2 and 4. Yes, again using the offset function. When editing the movement effect, just stick the faders in a slope, and that's it! The movement carries on running, the joystick just changes the focus of the movement for the selected fixtures. Joystick adjustment of Pan/Tilt works relative for the fixtures, so they keep their relative positions rather than snapping to the absolute position of the primary fixture. So if you've programmed a nice fan, you can move the whole lot around with the joystick.

Correct. The Diablo is a full partial programming desk. Only what is tagged (yellow LED flashing) during recording is replayed, everything else stays as it was. Yes. Movement effects can be partially programmed, so you select which fixtures are included in the effect are which are not. No. However a fixture can only run one effect at a time. Effects are applied LTP (Last Takes Precedence), so whichever effect you triggered last for each fixture is the one that it will run. You can do it this way, alternatively if you hold the Go button (below the Master fader) for a couple of seconds, it will force the sequence to change to the current page. Nothing happens, the Page Up/Down have no effect on the outputs until you do something else (e.g. lower/raise a fader) after the page change. The Global Chase controls are intended as a quick way of recalling the chase settings, so that a variety of looks can be pre-programmed and replayed easily. What do you mean by "memories running with an effect"? If you mean active submasters, then no. If you mean page chases / page ripples, then yes.

Video cameras are more sensitive than the human eye to variations in intensity at high light levels. The square law is intended to compensate for the response curve of a video camera, so that the brightness as seen by the camera varies linearly with the control input to the Demux. I'm not sure if this is so much of an issue with modern CCD cameras as it was with old tube cameras, maybe a google around the subject will find you the answer. The nature of phase control on a sine wave (how all triac dimmers work) will give you the S-Law (sometimes called Normal) curve if no correction is applied to the control input. This is quite acceptable in most situations. The linear law, which should strictly be called the linearising law, applies an inverse S curve so that the output of your dimmer will respond linearly to the control input. As to which law is "best", it depends on your lamps, whether it's for TV or live, what kind of effect you're trying to create etc. etc. Experiment and see which works best for you. Unfortunately there is no way on a Demux48 to set the law for all channels at the same time. You can do it on the newer Demux24 though

The old grey Mk1 Level+ Series (12, 18 & 24 channel versions) are now discontinued, in favour of the new black Mk2 Level+ 12. The Mk2 now has a wide mode feature to give 24 channel operation, plus has a sequence which can be run as a chase or as a 'go' style playback stack. The Mk1 had analogue outputs as standard with DMX as an option. The Mk2 has DMX as standard, the analogue option is no longer available. Information on the Mk1 is available HERE.

Yes, it is just a time saving feature. You can achieve the same effect by going the long way round as you suggest, if you've time to kill! You can use the 'Page Ripple' feature to achieve this sort of effect. Correct. The Diablo only has one speed setting, so yes all page chases/ripples have to run at the same speed as the sequence. The 'Global Chase Control' feature is not a chase in itself. Rather it stores the setup of the sequence and the page chases/ripples for easy recall.

The Diablo has 12 sequences, 1 per page. Since the Global Chase Control feature stores the current sequence page, then yes it is effectively remembering the current sequence. Note only 1 sequence can be playing at a time, however the page chase / page ripple features can be used to very easily change the look of this. The Global Chase Control feature does not however store the current step of the sequence or any submasters which are raised. The Diablo Fixture Manager software (included on a CD with the desk, or downloadable from the Zero88 website) uses the same fixture library as the Frog and Illusion desks. Simply select up to 18 fixtures from that library, connect your PC to the desk with the USB cable provided, and transfer them.

Is there any evidence that the Frog Screen is communicating with the Frog Box at all? This could be a cabling issue (check connections, terminations, power etc.). Is the CAN Mode set to 'Chillinet' on the Frog Box?

We are thinking of adding USB support to the main board used in the console (which is common to the Frog range), as the point you make is echoed by many users. No promises on timescales though, since there's quite a lot of work involved in making the change, both in hardware and software.

You can use palettes in one of two ways: 1. (sp's way) Hold down Colour/Beamshape/Position, and without letting go, press a Channel Flash button. 2. (kirkup_xp's way) Lock the Channel Flash buttons onto Palette selection by holding down F1, and without letting go, press Colour/Beamshape/Position. The Channel Flash buttons are now locked on palettes. If you haven't got an external monitor connected, get one! There isn't much on the LCD to help you along with palettes.

Yes, it's true, the support forums are going to be merged as you say, further details will be posted shortly to explain the changes and any potential downtime. Should all happen in about a month or so. Now how did our little secret get out? Apologies for the downtime the other day, this was part of the preparations for the merge.

I think, it was, officially, one of the most bewildering posts on the forum Maybe there is some great conspiracy about the origins of the name Zero88, and you've stumbled too close to the truth 8O Perhaps we could start a "most bewildering post of the year" award...??? Any nominations? None of mine please!

Frog Reference 5526 - Duplicate patching - keyboard numeric entry appears on all duplicates on external monitor. Bug to be fixed in next release.

Something else you've got to see... http://www.sleeping-lampies.com/

Of course it is possible to implement this and indeed any other feature on the Frog desks. However whether it can be integrated in an easily accessible way with the existing user interface controls is another matter We're also not going to add for free to Frog1 every feature that is available on the Frog2 or anybody else's premium products. There's a balance between making Frog1's more saleable and un-selling Frog2's !!

The desk loop (and DMX refresh) time is approx 35ms (0.035s). This is the finite timing resolution of the desk. If you're trying to use times anywhere near this resolution, you're going to run into problems. Even if the desk could go at the theoretical maximum DMX rate of 22.7ms, what you're trying to achieve would still be nigh on impossible.