Disabling The Blackout Key?

[Duncan Milne]

Hi - how do I do this? I can't find it in the menus?

 

cheers

Duncan in NZ

[K-Nine]

There is no way of disabling the BLACKOUT key (or any other key or front panel control).

 

If you don't want a blackout ... don't press the key

[Duncan Milne]

There is no way of disabling the BLACKOUT key (or any other key or front panel control).

 

If you don't want a blackout ... don't press the key

 

 

OK, but...

 

can't you disable this button on Fat Frog etc? Like you used to be able to do with the flash buttons? Because if you sit your script on top of the desk, as I do, you run the risk of exciting plunges into darkness...

[Kirkup_xp]

No, the Blackout button is always active on all of our desks.

[mikeb]

Hi there,

 

Was thinking of raising this as a feature improvement but searched the forum and found this.

 

Shame it's always active - we've never used the button and it was accidentally pressed during a show today and the chap operating the desk didn't realise what he'd done

 

I know "don't press the key" is an obvious answer but we're not all perfect. It would be nice if this could be a switchable feature in the options settings... please

 

Mike

[iank99]

Strangely I was only doing some training on a Jester last week and spent about 5 minutes telling folk how to mind the Blackout key - it always causes much hilarity but most of our support calls are from folk who don't realise what the key does aside from flashing it's LED at them

 

The action of the key on Strand GeniusPro desks (certainly the 430 and 500 series) used to be defineable to Blackout, stop or do nothing but I'm not sure that it doesn't make things complicated internally to offer the switching ('Stop' was supposedly to bring things like movers and scrollers to a halt as well).

 

Personally I prefer the 'big sign' approach - when the key is pressed, a window overlay appears on the cue stack monitor and on the output LCD windows that says 'Blackout' (I think I saw this on one desk - can't remember which) - there's no mistaking then what's happening.

 

I know accidental presses of the key are a pain but there have been times when I've been grateful the key is active - along with one occasion when I scrabbled to make it active because I'd turned it off

[Jon Hole]

Hi All,

 

We've got an issue (ZOS-3841) called 'Add an option to disable the Grand Master & Blackout Button' to look at this. I've added a comment to the issue linking to this thread.

 

I don't have a time frame for this, and I'll be honest - it's not our highest priority feature, but we have had a few people ask for it and the more that ask, the higher priority it will become!

 

Best regards

 

Jon

[mikeb]

Argh - I accidentally pressed this key during a show yesterday

 

It's so easy to say "don't press it" but I was adjusting my moving lights then somehow managed to hit the blackout button, leaving those on stage in darkness - thank goodness the followspots were on the ball

 

The first time in a long while I've accidentally pressed the blackout button but a software switch to enable/disable the button would be advantageous to the console as well as to save my blushes