Recording movement effects

[ice]

Why aren't the parameters of the shape generator (ie speed, x and y size, the kind of shape, offset and so on) stored when one saves these movement effects into a scene?

For instance color values are remembered by the desk and displayed on the LCD. Also pallete values are displayed as P01 (if I'm not mistaken) on the LCD, but the values of the effect generator are lost.

This way it's hard to alter a specific move if that's nescessary. You can't change any of the values in the effect generator cause such a thing results in a full stop of the movement of the fixture.

It would be very helpful if the desk would remember such parameters and display them in the LCD so that live editing of scene's would become possible as it already is when working with the gobo's / effects / colors etc.

[K-Nine]

When you set up a fixture with a movement effect and then save it into a scene memory, chase step or directly as channel data onto a submaster or SX button, the movement effect parameters (Effect, Size X, Size Y, Offset, Rotation, Speed) are saved with the fixture data.

 

If they weren't, then when you output the memory, raised the submaster or pressed the SX button, there would be no movement effect on the outputs !

 

It's not the case that they are not stored, it's a case of they are not displayed when you preview the memory or submaster.

 

If I remember correctly, if you wish to adjust a movement effect on a memory or submaster you need to EDIT the item, select the required fixture(s) and then select POSITION. The movement effect parameters should then be at their correct values on the LCD.

 

The following issues relating to movement effects have been noted :

 

Frog Reference 5405 - When you preview a memory or submaster with a movement effect, the movement effect parameters are not shown on the screen.

 

Frog Reference 5403 - If you set up a fixture with a movement effect and then save it into a position palette, the instantaneous values of the pan and tilt parameters are taken when the palette is programmed, resulting in a static position without the movement effect.

 

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.

 

We are planning to address these issues in future software updates.

[ice]

Ok that's indeed what I meant. Looking forward to the updates

[Jeff M.]

I lose my movement effcts whenever I try to go back into a memory and re-adjust my fixtures position for a different room using my memories saved for my show. This is only on the memories saved as a scene with an effect. Is there some thing I am doing wrong that can correct this?

[GLX]

Yea its a pain, if you have movement saved to a sub or memory,if you edit anything to do with the memory/sub the movement stops.

You'll have to reprogram the movement too.

[Jeff M.]

Is there any remedy to this loss of going back and manually resetting all the movements when editing any thing else?

[ice]

I don't know how it would react when you save the movement as a pallet; and use that in your memory. I'm not totaly sure about this but I think movement on the pallets can be altered; and the pan/tilt positions modified.

Another possibility: program one pallet for the positions (for instance P01), another for the movement (use P01 for the position parameter; and change the rest to your needs). You should try this, and take a look at what happens when you alter P01... If that works let me know; would be rather cool! Just don't get your hopes up, I don't think it will..

[K-Nine]

I lose my movement effcts whenever I try to go back into a memory and re-adjust my fixtures position for a different room using my memories saved for my show. This is only on the memories saved as a scene with an effect. Is there some thing I am doing wrong that can correct this?

 

Please could you clarify what you mean by "try to go back into a memory". Are you actually editing the memory or just outputting it via the playback x or a submaster, and then adjusting it's position via the control wheels ?

 

As far as I remember, if you EDIT a memory with a movement effect, then you should see the movement effect live on the outputs and if you select a fixture which has a programmed movement effect, you should see the movement effect parameter values on the wheel LCD.

 

I will check this as soon as I get the opportunity

[ice]

Nope that's not true I think... when you run a movement recorded in a scene the pan - tilt paramaters on the LCD will display the values begin output => so they go up and down the whole time, according to the movement. As soon as you even touch one of the wheels, the value at that point will be raised / lowered (depends on the movement you made) and lock in that value: movement will be killed.

 

At least that's what I thought; I ran into this problem a couple of times, but always managed to do somekind of work-around. I'll try to open up the desk one of these days to try it.

[Paul]

If the movement effect comes directly from a Memory / Submaster / SX, then the wheel display shows the output of the effect (Pan, Tilt values changing). If you change any of Pan, Tilt, Effect, SizeX, SizeY, Offset, Rotation or Speed, the desk assumes you want to seize control of the selected fixture(s), so it stops the movement effect on them. If you want to change any of the above parameters from their programmed values without stopping the effect, then you have to use the EDIT function on the relevant Memory / Submaster / SX.

 

If the movement effect is coming from a position palette, then the wheel display shows the palette number (e.g. P05). In this case, individual parameters CAN be adjusted with the wheels without stopping the effect.

 

This difference in behaviour might be a consequence of the adding of movement effects to palettes in release 9.0, or it might be by design for a reason that escapes me now! I'm sure K-Nine will fill us in. If there's a strong consensus as to which way you all want it to work, then it might go on the list for review in future software updates!

[K-Nine]

I have just checked this out on a fat frog and if you have a scene memory or submaster data with movement effects and you EDIT LIVE the memory or submaster, the movement effect does appear on the outputs, and if you select one of the fixtures with an effect, you can see the movement effect parameter values on the wheel LCD in the 2nd and 3rd wheel groups of position.

 

Sounds like you must be doing something different - are you just playing back the memory/submaster and then expecting to see the movement effect parameter values on the wheel LCD.

[K-Nine]

Yea its a pain, if you have movement saved to a sub or memory,if you edit anything to do with the memory/sub the movement stops.

You'll have to reprogram the movement too.

 

I have just tried this on a fat frog here and this does not appear to be the case. Maybe this was a bug in an earlier version of software ?

[ice]

Yeah that editing was improved, the live-edit of movement effects works fine, completely true. Unsure how it responds when you use a pallet? But i'd say you should be able to alter the parameters and re-save the pallet?

[K-Nine]

Yeah that editing was improved, the live-edit of movement effects works fine, completely true. Unsure how it responds when you use a pallet? But i'd say you should be able to alter the parameters and re-save the pallet?

 

There could be a difference when using a movement effect in a position palette, since there is no way to directly edit a palette, in the same way as you can a memory or submaster.

[pscandrett]

Hi

 

This is the sort of thing that I am sure has been covered before but I can't find anything about it so, er, please forgive me if this is a repost! It may be a 'training' issue as much as anything else...

 

I'm using a Mambo Frog (latest OS I think) and utilise the effects generator quite a lot (ellipse, tri, quad etc). (With mini macs, but that's irrelevant I guess.) I set up effects and stick them on submasters so I can trigger them at various points during the show. I will sometimes want to tweak what I programmed earlier during the gig - to slow it down, perhaps, or change the X or Y values (or sometimes even the shape).

 

The thing is, if I set up an effect (for want of a better way of putting it) and transfer it to a submaster, it records the /values/ of the ellipse, etc, rather than the fact that it's an ellipse (if you see what I mean). Consequently you can't just tweak the effect once you've triggered it from the submaster - changing any individual parameter 'resets' it - so if, for example, you've got it going really fast and you want to slow it down you change the 'speed' parameter, which flips to 0, making it all look a bit odd. It'd be much better to be able to change the parameters from what they're set to, rather than starting from scratch.

 

Is there any way of transferring the information as 'Ellipse' rather than the calculated positions/rates etc?

 

I hope that makes sense!

 

Many thanks

 

Peter

 

<><

[GLX]

Store your movments to the pallets.

[pscandrett]

Store your movments to the pallets.

 

It's not just the movements that I want to store (which is why I bung the whole 'look' on a submaster). I do have a few pallettes with movements/positions stored for busking a song; however, if I want somethign to happen as part of a scene storing only the movement on the pallette isn't very helpful (as I understand anyway), is it? Or have I misunderstood?

 

ta

 

Peter

 

<><

[K-Nine]

OK, First of all the movement effect data is stored as SIX additional position parameters (effect, size X, size Y, Offset, Rotation and Speed).

 

These six parameters define the algorithm that generates the offsets that are added to the pan and tilt parameter values to provide the final effect.

 

When a movement effect is added to a fixture or fixtures, ALL six parameters are stored with the base pan and tilt position in the memory, submaster, SX button or palette as appropriate.

 

If you wish to change the programmed value of any of the movement effect parameters, eg speed ... then you need to EDIT the item itself.

 

Press EDIT, select the appropriate fixture(s), select Position, press the wheel group button to show the movement effect parameters, adjust as required, press EDIT again and save the changes.

[daoops]

On fixtures I have effects on the position attributes, by pressing wheel group. But these functions don't appear on the monitor, only on the LCD screen. Is it or could it be possible to get this function?

[nighteyes]

Hi,

 

i'm using a bullfrog with software version 9.6.1 and noticed 2 things:

 

1) When i program and then replay an ellipse (or other effect) on the pan and tilt from a submaster, and then look at the parameters, it doesn't say ellipse at the effect parameter. It just says no effect, even though the effect is playing. Color and gobo parameters that were stored in the same submaster are displayed on the proper values though. I first noticed this problem because i wanted to store a memory composed with submasters, and everything was recorded right except the pan tilt ellipse.

 

 

 

2) I recorded a memory with some fixtures in it, just a position and no effects or anything special. I then played a ellipse on the pan and tilt on the same fixtures from a submaster i programmed . Next i cleared the memory with the fixtures in it ( the memory wasn't active on the playback x or on a submaster). The result was that the effect playing from my submaster at that moment, was also cleared. I had to reload the submaster for the effect to play again.

 

all was done programming in partial memory mode. The fixtures used were 8x mac500

 

have i found 2 bugs, or am i doing something wrong?

 

 

 

greetz,

 

 

nighteyes

[K-Nine]

1) If you look at the pan and tilt values on the wheel LCD you will see that they are changing according to the movement effect that is being output. In this situation the wheel LCD is merely showing the output values of the real fixture parameters.

 

 

2) Was the submaster programmed directly with fixture parameter data (channel data) or did it contain a transferred memory ? If you clear (delete) a memory, then you also clear any submasters (or SX buttons on a mambo) which have that memory transferred onto it.

[ice]

That first point you mention is rather irritating. You can't alter speed / position / whatever parameter without completely freezing the movement or getting weird effects. When a fixtures is moving by the effect generator, why isn't that displayed as being an effect?

[ice]

The same as this topic I guess:

 

but still; why?

[nighteyes]

reffering to the second point, the submaster was programmed with one memory that was outputting the shape. I programmed a different memory and then cleared it again. while the first memory was still existend and outputting from the submaster. then i lost my effect on the submaster

[nighteyes]

also reffering to my first point. i still haven't been able to program a memory containing the effect i was outputting from the submaster, even after tagging the fixtures manually. while the pan and tilt parameters are indeed in fact, changing according to the effect, my guess would be because the effect parameter says 'no effect' it doesn't get stored in the memory when i press the program button.