Patching past 48. fat frog HELP.

[davelowe]

Hi, new to a frod desk.

how do I set the dmx address on the desk so I can set chases up on  sub masters to go above 48, need to

have several submasters with chases for up to dmx 248.

every time i change the dest settings in the super used it changes what i have already set to the submasters

I am obviously doing something wrong HEEEEEEEEELP Please pretty please

[Edward Z88]

Hi Dave,

13 hours ago, davelowe said:

Hi, new to a frod desk.

I have moved your post to the Frog range forum. I am guessing from your previous posts this is a Fat Frog.

13 hours ago, davelowe said:

how do I set the dmx address on the desk so I can set chases up on  sub masters to go above 48, need to

The 48 channel faders on Fat Frog, can be manually patched to any DMX channel, and duplicates can be added. To do this, see page 57 and 58 of the manual below...

https://zero88.com/storage/downloads/24230203-252a-4a5a-b578-43c498bd6721/Frog-Range-Manual.pdf

If you aren't using all 12 fixtures, you can assign dimmer channels to these too, to give you extra dimmer channel control.

Once you have access to the DMX channels you need, you will then be able to program them onto a chase on a Submaster.

If you have any questions let us know.

Edward

[davelowe]

HI I posted about this before but just got pointed to the manual so maybe It is me that is getting this all wrong so forgive the longer description.

I have 4 banks of 4 par cans all having 8 DMX addresses and I want to set them up all on different addresses requiring 32 addresses per bank.

so i set the first bank to 1 to 48, program with faders into mem 1 a chase and then transfer without time to a sub master, all works well so far.

go to super used , desk setup patching, manual patch and change the DMX addresses on the faders to 49 to 96 to do the same chase on the second bank of

lights, but now the first chase saved into memory does not run nor does the mem 1. but the faders are giving output on 49 to 96. I was under the impression once you saved a scene of chase into a mem or submaster then it was stores and could be run from the mem or submaster, but it seems to me that the changing of the addresses of the fadres is killing the memories and sub masters

Can I only ever use 48 addresses or is there a step I am missing ????? getting ready to out this to the skip it is so frustrating

I am sure it should do this but I just cannot see what I am doing wrong.

Thanks Dave

 

 

[Edward Z88]

Hi Dave,

13 hours ago, davelowe said:

HI I posted about this before but just got pointed to the manual so maybe It is me that is getting this all wrong so forgive the longer description.

Please keep your query in one topic - it helps keep all the information in one place. Also, please post in the relevant forum for your console. The "General Discussion" forum is designed for posts that don't fit into any of the other forums.

13 hours ago, davelowe said:

go to super used , desk setup patching, manual patch and change the DMX addresses on the faders to 49 to 96 to do the same chase on the second bank of

lights, but now the first chase saved into memory does not run nor does the mem 1. but the faders are giving output on 49 to 96. I was under the impression once you saved a scene of chase into a mem or submaster then it was stores and could be run from the mem or submaster, but it seems to me that the changing of the addresses of the fadres is killing the memories and sub masters

When you program Memories or Submasters, they contain channel data, not raw DMX data. Therefore if you readdress your channels (or fixtures), your memories and submasters will then simply use the newly assigned DMX addresses.

13 hours ago, davelowe said:

Can I only ever use 48 addresses or is there a step I am missing ?

On Fat Frog, you are limited to 48 individual channels (which could each control multiple addresses), plus 12 fixtures (which could also each control multiple addresses).

If you have any questions let us know. 

Edward

[kgallen]

Dave

This is never going to work how you think - on any lighting desk. You’re not repatching faders you’re moving the DMX address where your fixtures live. 
 

In Fat Frog in wide mode you have 48 faders (these are one control channel each) plus you have the 12 fixtures control on the right. The 12 fixtures can be much more complicated beasts - one fixture has brightness, colour, beamshape, position etc. 

So if you want individual control of every one of your 8 channel parcans you can get at most 48/8=6 on the faders plus another 12 on the fixtures bank. So that would give you up to 18 of your parcans all with independent control of all 8 DMX channels on the parcan. It will be a bit clunky to drive though, using a mixture of faders and fixture controls. However you will be able to record what I understand you want.

You can of course "double-up" by either setting more than one parcan at the same DMX address or using multiple patching on the Fat Frog.

Or, do you need to use the 8 channel mode on the parcans? Is there a lower channel count mode that still offers all the features you want but could be better fit between the 48 faders or the 12 fixture controls? Maybe only some of your parcans you need "total control" - use the fixture panel for this, much easier to set up colour and strobes etc. Then put any leftovers onto the faders - which will be a more clumsy control surface for "complex" fixtures.

You can’t repatch in between programming steps, that makes no sense whatsoever, you're moving the foundations of the house, hence what you observe.

HTH

Kevin

[davelowe]

Edward, Thank you, I have been told some porkies so got to rethink, was told by a "friend" that this would do 250+ off the faders but could not make it happen.

and now I see why, so back to the drawing board.

[davelowe]

Kevin Thanks that makes a lot of sense based on what I have found although toiling under misinformation.

I think with a bit of juggling I can get to most of the effects I am looking for.

I got the frog as I injured myself and cannot now lift heavy stuff and all the PA has gone along with all the heavy lighting and I am now down to LED pars and movers but the Avolite is very heavy so that also has to go, frog seemed a good choice, but not as flexible as I was led to believe.

But Ha Ho, I might have to get rid of knobs and sliders and go lappy based............... (awaits the abusive responses) 

[Edward Z88]

Hi Dave,

19 minutes ago, davelowe said:

Edward, Thank you, I have been told some porkies so got to rethink, was told by a "friend" that this would do 250+ off the faders but could not make it happen.

It is true, that you can control over 400 channels from the channel faders. However this is because each channel fader can control a maximum of 10 DMX channels each simultaneously (if duplicate addresses are added), meaning you still have a maximum of 48 different channel faders.

11 minutes ago, davelowe said:

But Ha Ho, I might have to get rid of knobs and sliders and go lappy based............... (awaits the abusive responses) 

 Haha there are pros and cons to laptop based control - our current offering is Phantom ZerOS with an unlock dongle.

Personally, you wouldn't catch me running a show without proper console hardware!

If you have any questions let me know.

Edward

[kgallen]

Hi Dave,

Fat Frog was designed when most venues had mostly generics (lamps on dimmers) plus maybe a few movers (MAC500 and the like) and Fat Frog was great for this (exactly why I have/had mine).

These days the split is different. I have about a 50/50 split of generics and "complex" fixtures like LED PARs and movers - and it's only moving in one direction and that is not towards "generics". These "complex" fixtures of course have a much more complicated control plane. No longer one "knob" per light but 4 upwards. This is why the "fader per channel" type desks are a little limited these days for anything but the smallest simplest rigs. On DMX counts, my generics are fully handled by 24 DMX addresses. My other fixtures take several hundreds (which is why FLX is now my desk).

Sounds like the "perfect" desk for you would be an FLX S24. But then the spondoolies come into play!

Back on your Fat Frog, you're pretty much there. Why not put your 12 most important PARs on the fixture section then the other 4, maybe with a simpler DMX setup, onto the generics faders? FF is still a capable (and extremely reliable) desk, so I wouldn't be going near a skip with it any time soon. Mine is still in the shed, it's not going in a skip.

Kevin

[davelowe]

Hi Kevin, LOL it won't be skipped. I got it for 30 quid and have had to replace the battery  No7 fader top row and am awaiting a middle coder wheel.

With a bit of manual patching I can get the primaries on 1 row of faders and the secondaries on  the other with the hazers set to the last 2 so faders all full!!!!!

the 6 gobo movers and 2off  multi beam effects will fit as sit on stage on the fixtures section, so I will have 4 places spare for a couple more movers for follow spots and then thats it, thanks for the suggestions and good luck for work next year.

Dave

[kgallen]

Hi Dave

Thanks for the update! Sounds like you're nearly there. As it looks like you've done, there is no reason the 48 faders need to map 1:1 on DMX addresses, so arranging the key DMX channels per fixture across desk channels 1-24 and mapping the secondary channels on 25-48 is a great idea! Of course if you don't need per-fixture e.g. strobe control, then these could be multi-patched DMX addresses to one (or more) desk channel fader.

As I'm sure you're aware from your earlier post, you can "mix down" some useful combinations onto sub-masters. However if you want to "layer" the submasters for LTP attributes like colour you will have to start looking into Partial mode and Tagging. In addition to the manual, make sure you have the latest set of release notes which cover quite a few more advanced features - the manual updates stopped long before the software updates stopped, so there are many "new" features not in the manual and some operational details have changed.

Are you running 10.12 software? Somewhere in the updates[1] the number of submaster pages[2] were increased, which sounds like something that could be important in your use-model.

Good luck!

Kevin

FrogOS 10.12: https://www.zero88.com/storage/downloads/8a28f4e9-9100-4a34-bab9-5cd0a2c66f0e/Frog-Range-Software-10.12.zip

Final Release Notes: https://www.zero88.com/storage/downloads/c970efd0-79b5-4fe0-8546-6a64ddf858a5/Frog-Range-Software-Release-Notes-10.12.pdf

[1] Number of palettes and groups was updated from 24 to 48 in 10.8. Note however these only apply to the fixtures section ("non-generics") so aren't usable as colour palettes on your RGB PARs mapped to generics faders.

[2] This must have been a longer ago than I recall, I can't see it mentioned from FrogOS 9.2. I'll look back in my stored RNs!

 

[davelowe]

Thanks I have the  10.12.1 software, did that first to see if that made a difference

If I change the setup a bit and group some lights I can get all the cans in and have 2 left over for the hazers that were linked anyway.

I have found a profile for the movers I have but cant find the quad scanners in either library although they seem to be shown with a code QSPro32 in the database?

Any help on that would be appreciated (I have put that in the fixtures page yesterday)

Thanks Dave

[davelowe]

American DJ quad pro scanners 1, 5, or 32 channel setting, in the database as QSPro1, QSPro5, QSPro32 

[Edward Z88]

Hi Dave,

These fixture files are available from the link below...

https://zero88.com/fixtures/legacy-consoles/Current library (v1.0)/AMER DJ/QSPro32.ift

Please download the fixtures you require, and then copy them to the floppy disk of your Fat Frog. You will then be able to load and patch the required fixtures.

Hope this helps,

Edward

[davelowe]

thanks Edward