FLX approach to concert lighting requirements (#1)

[kgallen]

Hi Edward,

Thank you for your replies! (Hope term has started ok too!)

9 hours ago, Edward- Z88 said:

This is because cues 7 through 10 don't have intensity data recorded, and so will not display an intensity fade time. When it comes to then having a playback trigger/release, this is using the cue fade defaults (defined in SETUP -> Defaults -> Cue Intensity Fade).We are looking at reviewing this behaviour in a future software update. I have logged your example as a comment to ZOS-8747. When recording cues 7>10 you could have tapped RECORD, typed the cue number, dialed the encoder to 0/ tapped the middle encoder button and defined a cue time of 0 seconds, and then tapped the Master Playback's button to complete the command. Alternatively to update these cues with 0 second fades, go into each cue, hold CLEAR + tap Fader Funct. to release all other playbacks, tap UPDATE, dial the first encoder to 0, then tap the Master Playback's button.

I can't see this happening when the fade times have been removed from cues 7>10, can you?

Tomorrow we are doing the LX plot, so I'll be filling in the gaps of cue 1 etc - but this detail is useful, because I think some of those earlier cues are going to be busked, so I might well need to do the encoder business you detail above - thanks!

9 hours ago, Edward- Z88 said:

Again, this is because playbacks 3 and 4 have intensity information with default fades of 0 seconds (as they act like a "submaster") and so the trigger and release is using these fades. Cue 8 is using the console cue fade defaults (3 seconds) when triggering/releasing.

Thanks for the explanation. I must find that console cue fade default you identify above!

9 hours ago, Edward- Z88 said:

Global Tap Tempo only effects the speed of chases. Effect speed can be adjusted on the fly using Speed Override.

Ok - thanks for confirming, I suspected this might be the case!

9 hours ago, Edward- Z88 said:

You may find if you've clicked in the Output Window this is where the cursor is navigating in. A double tap of VIEW (or clicking into the cue list with touchscreen or mouse) will solve this and bring you back into the Cue list window.

I will have been whizzing between all sorts of windows - at the time I didn't have an external monitor, so doing everything on the internal screen. At least with View or Z or with my usual show setup with Mouse and Keyboard this should be less of an issue!

9 hours ago, Edward- Z88 said:

Why are you finding you're having to do this?

It's a known "issue" - actually it's probably not a bug as such as PB0 behaves the same as other PBs in that you need to raise the PB fader from 0 to trigger the PB - pressing the Go button with the PB0 fader at full (from power up) is not enough. My FLX usually has the PB0 fader left up at full as I'm generally using a cue stack on PB0 (and effectively it's just like the Frog Playback X fader to me, although I know it is "so much more" on FLX). What this means is when I start playing around I get no output then scratch my head for a while until I realise I need to drop and re-raise the PB0 fader to actually get some output. There is a ZOS for it and I do tease Jon every now again that it's not "fixed". I probably understand why that is ("not a bug") but it is a bit annoying nontheless!

Much appreciating your help this week or so. Within a couple of days I should stop asking dumb questions (for a couple of weeks anyway!).

Cheers! (Not sure how to send you a real or virtual pint, so that will have to do for now! I've been rigging all day, I could do with some refreshment too!)

Kevin

 

 

[Edward Z88]

Hi Kevin,

On 9/7/2018 at 9:01 PM, kgallen said:

you need to raise the PB fader from 0 to trigger the PB - pressing the Go button with the PB0 fader at full (from power up) is not enough.

Are you still finding this an issue? This should have been fixed in ZerOS 7.9.4, and seems to be working for me. Now when you power the console and trigger a Playback, you trigger it at the fader level. Are you finding the button is "dead" until you lower and raise the fader?

Edward

[kgallen]

20 minutes ago, Edward- Z88 said:

Now when you power the console and trigger a Playback, you trigger it at the fader level. Are you finding the button is "dead" until you lower and raise the fader?

My comments relate to PB0 - I'm not sure about the others. It gets me every time! I press GO and nothing happens and I scratch my head wondering why the lights aren't coming on... then I remember...

However hold the thought, we have a Dress Rehearsal tonight, so I will do a cold boot and see if PB0 GO will get the house lights/stage preset up without me needing to cycle the PB0 fader...

[kgallen]

One (ok maybe more than one it seems...) other question from my plotting.

So I have a stack on PB0 and I also have some chases on other PBs that I trigger from PB0 (as discussed above).

So with some fictional cue/PB numbers for ease:

PB0/1 triggers chase on PB7

PB0/2 adds some conventionals in

When I've GO on PB0/2 I decide I want to tweak the level of the conventionals, so I select them and tweak the levels. I now want to update PB0/2, but of course I don't want to capture the current state of the chase running on the "unrelated" PB7 into PB0/2. How do I do this?

-> When I was plotting I had an "issue" where I was RECORDing this cue, and it captured not only the fixtures I'd added in but also the current state of the chase that was "running in the background". This captured a "freeze" of the chase into the new cue. Try as I might, I could not use "Remove" to get rid of those chase fixtures. In the end I had to delete the cue, release the chase manually (Clear+Chan/PB), then record the state changes for that cue (without the triggered PB7 chase running), then go back to the trigger cue and run through from there to check. Now I guess this kind of makes sense, but I wasn't expecting it and I wondered if there was a "better" way.

Other than that the show is looking good and I'm very much appreciative of your help... and I've learnt a lot more about the desk and especially the Effects engine. I would like to note (as others have) that the documentation is very weak here - I ended up going through a lot of the (colour) effects and with the insight you gave me earlier (on Blue Rainbow etc), work out what e.g. "Red Step On" actually did - how the base colour was formed and what the effect waveform modulated on top. So I understand a bit more now how I can e.g. get a red base and swoosh a yellow through it...

One other thing - I think I noted it a while back: I set up a number of Groups, with the selection order carefully defined. So 1 THRU 5 and another 5 THRU 1. I expected 1 THRU 5 and "Forward Individually" to go 1,2,3,4,5 but it always seemed to go 5.4.3.2.1. Likewise "Backwards" did 1,2,3,4,5. Random did what I expected!

Thanks,

Kevin

[Edward Z88]

Hi Kevin,

23 minutes ago, kgallen said:

My comments relate to PB0 - I'm not sure about the others.

All Playbacks (including the Master) should behave the same, and should "Go" into a cue at the fader level, even straight after booting.

17 minutes ago, kgallen said:

When I've GO on PB0/2 I decide I want to tweak the level of the conventionals, so I select them and tweak the levels. I now want to update PB0/2, but of course I don't want to capture the current state of the chase running on the "unrelated" PB7 into PB0/2. How do I do this?

I would disable SmartTag for this Update. This will then only include programmer tweaks into cue 2, and leave your chase running untouched. Alternatively before making the update, hold CLEAR and tap FADER FUNCT. to manually stop the chase running- this will also help to see what your base lighting state looks like.

21 minutes ago, kgallen said:

-> When I was plotting I had an "issue" where I was RECORDing this cue, and it captured not only the fixtures I'd added in but also the current state of the chase that was "running in the background". This captured a "freeze" of the chase into the new cue. Try as I might, I could not use "Remove" to get rid of those chase fixtures. In the end I had to delete the cue, release the chase manually (Clear+Chan/PB), then record the state changes for that cue (without the triggered PB7 chase running), then go back to the trigger cue and run through from there to check. Now I guess this kind of makes sense, but I wasn't expecting it and I wondered if there was a "better" way.

Again, for recording this cue you could turn SmartTag off, which will not include your running chase, but will include programmer information. To remove your chase from your cue once the information had been recorded, you could have gone into the cue, selected your chase fixtures, tapped Z -> tapped the middle encoder button for intensity (Untag [Intensity]) -> UPDATE -> Remove -> Update cue.

26 minutes ago, kgallen said:

Effects engine. I would like to note (as others have) that the documentation is very weak here

Yes, the effects engine is powerful, but not the clearest on how to use it. In the next software update we are looking to make a lot of changes to the effects engine, and we'll ensure there are knowledgebase articles to compliment this.

29 minutes ago, kgallen said:

One other thing - I think I noted it a while back: I set up a number of Groups, with the selection order carefully defined. So 1 THRU 5 and another 5 THRU 1. I expected 1 THRU 5 and "Forward Individually" to go 1,2,3,4,5 but it always seemed to go 5.4.3.2.1. Likewise "Backwards" did 1,2,3,4,5. Random did what I expected!

Already logged as ZOS-8569.

Any queries let me know.

Edward

[kgallen]

Hi Edward,

Thanks for your quick replies.

55 minutes ago, Edward- Z88 said:

All Playbacks (including the Master) should behave the same, and should "Go" into a cue at the fader level, even straight after booting.

OK, I'll check this, thanks.

55 minutes ago, Edward- Z88 said:

I would disable SmartTag for this Update. This will then only include programmer tweaks into cue 2, and leave your chase running untouched. Alternatively before making the update, hold CLEAR and tap FADER FUNCT. to manually stop the chase running- this will also help to see what your base lighting state looks like.

Yes, in the end I used Clear+F/F. I did try some "SmartTag off" but I think I'm still a bit of a novice on this one! (Yes I agree there should be nothing to worry about, just tag the stuff you want, but I'm not sure I always get quite what I expect!).

55 minutes ago, Edward- Z88 said:

Again, for recording this cue you could turn SmartTag off, which will not include your running chase, but will include programmer information. To remove your chase from your cue once the information had been recorded, you could have gone into the cue, selected your chase fixtures, tapped Z -> tapped the middle encoder button for intensity (Untag [Intensity]) -> UPDATE -> Remove -> Update cue.

I think my mistake was I *selected" the fixtures I wanted to remove, and missed out the "(Untag [Intensity])" step. I need to practice the Remove process at home I think as I never get it to work when I need it (user error not desk error!).

55 minutes ago, Edward- Z88 said:

Yes, the effects engine is powerful, but not the clearest on how to use it. In the next software update we are looking to make a lot of changes to the effects engine, and we'll ensure there are knowledgebase articles to compliment this.

Yes now I've had a good play with it I understand it more now - I can see it's powerful, I'm just not always sure which "base effect" to start with and what then to adjust. Your detail earlier in this thread was a great help.

I've not needed to use it recently but the Waveforms tab is the worst for me - the touch boxes are just way too small for me to use reliably.

Looking forward to seeing what you guys have come up with - I'd like to use the Effects feature a lot more...

55 minutes ago, Edward- Z88 said:

Already logged as ZOS-8569.

Aha... I'm not going mad then!

Regards, Kevin

[kgallen]

On 9/10/2018 at 9:04 AM, Edward- Z88 said:

Are you still finding this an issue? This should have been fixed in ZerOS 7.9.4, and seems to be working for me. Now when you power the console and trigger a Playback, you trigger it at the fader level. Are you finding the button is "dead" until you lower and raise the fader?

Hi Edward,

You are right, certainly from "cold" this works correctly on 7.9.4.

At the time I had the "issue" I had been programming other playbacks, and had then gone back to PB0 to add the trigger macros into the main cue stack. I'll try to keep a watchful eye next time I'm doing this!

Thanks,

Kevin