New User- Quick Question

[jahhuggy]

Hello,

I have been working with the software for a few weeks before I purchase the converter/dongle, and I have one important (to me) question that I can't seem to solve on my own.  It may be obvious, and I apologize for the wasted bandwidth if the solution is right in front of me.

Here's what I need and can't seem to achieve:

I need to be able to press a playback key and get a single cue scene, press another payback key, get another single cue scene, and so forth.

What I'm seeing when I view the attributes of the fixtures as the change for each new selection is that the first playback selection will combine or interfere with the second until, when I go back to the first, all I get is the combination of the two.

I understand that you can press "release", hit a playback key, then choose another, but is there a way to just get, for instance a "green" scene from playback one until I choose a red scene from playback two, and so forth down the line. 

I also don't know if that's just what's happening on screen and that it would be different with my fixtures (I'm using a combination of MAC 250 Washes, Kryptons, and Entours), but that's my concern before purchasing the dongle.

Everything else about the software is great and I'm very impressed - I'm confident it will allow me to do what I need with the automation of movement. 

I'm used to an old NSI MLC 16 board where a "scene" is just a static scene with no timed cues - and I need to be able to have those static scenes available one right after another with no blackouts, etc. - am I missing something?

Thanks so much in advance,
Doug

[Maarten Engels]

hi Doug,

Sounds like a good question to me!

if you press a second play button you will get a new scene on all attributes except: Dimmer, always HTP mixing. Colour mix, by default HTP but in options you can turn that off (going to LTP) which I think will be more how you would like use it.

What you see on the screen will be send to your Moving heads, except when use the Blackout of Grandmaster.

If you would to switch between cues with no fade time, just set the fade times to 0 seconds.

Have fun!

[jahhuggy]

Thanks for the quick response!

I had thought of the fade time "0" solution, and I couldn't get that one to work exactly as I needed either.  I guess, if I'm reading you correctly, since the dimmer level remains the same and the colours will mix instead of switching to a new pure color upon selection of a new playback, is there a way to have each of the playback cues auto-release when a new playback number is selected?  As it is -  using the release button on a laptop and choosing a new scene (all attributes) of my fixtures is creating a bump in the workflow on my laptop because I need to start by clicking playback 1 - release - clicking playback 1 again to release it - and then click playback 2 in order to get exactly what I'm needing.

I suppose I'm really trying to dumb it down in the beginning, almost to the point of the old super basic "4 scene" NSI controllers with par cans where you could just sit there and hit "A-B-C- and D" and get your stage looks, only using the moving head fixtures instead. 

I fully understand everything else about the program and have gotten extremely deep into programming some terrific and involved cues - love the strobes and blinders - I just can't wrap my head around this simple simple thing  I know the way I'm using this may not be typical of how someone with more experience using larger consoles would use it, and as such, I'm sorry my process may seem so backward.  Is it possible that because I am learning this program on the screen rather than on stage that I'm simply not inferring what's happening in real-time from the computer display?  (I only have access to the fixtures themselves before each performance of the group - and I will have to integrate the program very quickly prior to date we make the switch-out.)

Thanks again,
Doug

[Maarten Engels]

hi Doug,

Please switch off the 'Colour mix htp' option. Then all attributes except dimmer will behave LTP. And there would be no need for releasing the previous playback.

The dimmer attributes is always HTP. Switching from scene to scene would typically be done by programming multiple cues in one cuelist. Pressing 'go' on its playback will take you to the next cue. Setting fade times to zero will make it a switch rather than a cross-fade.

[jahhuggy]

Thanks so much - I understand completely now...

I appreciate your prompt and courteous responses!

Justin

[KnowSlumber]

I have a similar question about stacks.
Right now, I have stacks of chases (looks) on the go buttons.
For example:
I have a red stack (red LED chase/red movers sequence) on go button 1
And a blue stack (blue LED chase/blue mover sequence) on go button 2

Right now:
When I press go button 1 it triggers the red stack
when I press go button 2 it triggers the blue stack, but still displays the red stack on the lights, until I release go button 1

Ideally:
When I press go button 1 it triggers the red stack
When I press go button 2, it releases the red stack and trigger the blue, so that blue "look" takes priority

I ask because:
Essentially, I'd like to be able to sequence "looks" (chase sequences of LEDs/Movers)
So I can have a Look for the Intro of a song, a Look for the chorus, a Look for the breakdown, and a Look for the bulk.
That would simplify it for me so all I would have to do on the performance end is press a button at the appropriate time and match the tempo/speed.

Is there any way to achieve this with Cuelux?

[Jeroen van der Velden]

Essentially, I'd like to be able to sequence "looks" (chase sequences of LEDs/Movers)
So I can have a Look for the Intro of a song, a Look for the chorus, a Look for the breakdown, and a Look for the bulk.
That would simplify it for me so all I would have to do on the performance end is press a button at the appropriate time and match the tempo/speed.

To sequence "looks", you could create a stack-'list' instead of splitting all stacks to different playback faders/buttons? So instead of each time recording the stack to another fader, record to the same fader. That will create different stacks after each other. Then you can simply press the same GO each time you want to go to the next look. It will automatically release the playbacks that are not used in the next stack.

Or am I wrong?

[KnowSlumber]

The issue with stack lists is that they have to be sequential. A-B-C-D
And I need to be non-linear in sequence. A-C-B-C-B-D- etc.

Would it be possible in midi?
Can I map it so that the on note for gobutton1 is the off note for gobutton2-8 etc.?
I guess this would mean that each go button would have to have multiple off notes.
Which brings me to my next quenstion:

Can midi assignable features have multiple midi triggers?
And, if so, how is it written in the xml?

[KnowSlumber]

Got it.
I figured it out with the old generic.xml.
MIDI can have multiple triggers for anyone who wants to know.
So you just give each go button 1 midi on and 63 midi offs. 
Ive got some coding to do...

[kinglevel]

nice thread. i was thinking about this!

didnt find the htp option until now.

[jahhuggy]

Maarten - I finally got the physical USB to DMX dongle and have been working with my actual fixture and am still having the same problem I described when just working with the software alone..

hi Doug,

Please switch off the 'Colour mix htp' option. Then all attributes except dimmer will behave LTP. And there would be no need for releasing the previous playback.

The dimmer attributes is always HTP. Switching from scene to scene would typically be done by programming multiple cues in one cuelist. Pressing 'go' on its playback will take you to the next cue. Setting fade times to zero will make it a switch rather than a cross-fade.

Maarten  -  I finally got the software running with my fixture - all control individually is absolutely perfect, better and easier than I expected.  However - I'm still having the same issues with getting my most important set of needs happening as expressed in the first and third entries in this thread.

Here's essentially what I'm doing - explaining as simple as possible.

---  I'll create a look where all of my washes are flesh tone and all my profile fixtures have whatever color/gobo/spin/etc combo I want.  I will save that look going to "record" 1 for instance.
---- Next I will change all the attributes about that look that I want - maybe making the washes blue, and the profile fixtures doing something completely different.  I will save that look under "record" 2
---- I'll then go in, edit each cue so there is only one "halt" fade time of "0" in and "0" out - making what in my mind should be seamless transitions between scenes.
---- My playback buttons will briefly flash green when pressed, then immediately go to red.  After pressing the second cue, both will be red. 


when trying to playback those cue - i get very odd results (different colors than either I selected for the scenes), sometimes different pan positioning on or all of the moving heads, etc.

I've tried manually releasing one, or both of the scenes - that doesn't do it.  If I have a scene up on the board that i've created manually that I like - there's no problem with blacking it out and bringing that back up.  Grand Master works fine.  I'm confident that if I set up groups - I'll have no problem with the strobe or blinder - I just can't get past this first hurdle.   This past weekend I had a guy sit there and select individual profile fixtures (or in the case on the washes,  a group) because we couldn't save the simple looks we needed.

HTP Colour mixing is definitely off.

Editing each fixture from any main menu is no problem - as long as it hasn't been "stuck" by pressing scene 1, then scene 2.
Should also note - I am using version version 1.00 on Mac OX 10.6.2
What am I missing?    

Thanks, Doug

[Maarten Engels]

hi Doug,

Reading this:

---- My playback buttons will briefly flash green when pressed, then immediately go to red.  After pressing the second cue, both will be red. 

Makes me wonder if perhaps the 'Loop' setting is disabled (property of the cuelist). I would enable this setting, or add an extra 'halt' cue at the end.

Do you have the same problem when you run v1.01 build 9?

[jahhuggy]

Maarten,

I never disabled the loop setting, and I have tried adding the extra halt cue. Under the prior version, I wasn't getting what I need with the change of any of those settings,

With that being said, I've been having a considerably better experience since upgrading to v1.01/build 9.  I still occasionally have some issues when changing scenes, however, the main issue now is that whenever I try and edit a cue manually, the entire program crashes after a brief period of "ball spinning."  If I avoid trying to make those edits, the program runs very smoothly. I've been attempting to create other conditions that could cause a crash, as well as a workaround for the critical crash that makes getting proper scenes much more difficult (becuse you never quite know what fine details you may need to grab a hold of and edit), but I think I would be pretty much on my way if I wasn't now having crashing problems.  Let me know if there are any other details I could provide to help track down the reason for this.

Running on a 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 1 GB RAM, SW Version 10.5.8, 2009 MacBook
----
Last unrelated question - when setting up blinder...  It's working great, except that I can't seem to get my smaller aperture moving head fixture to automatically switch to white - they max out on dimmer, but will not change color to white automatically.  How can I se it up  so that everything goes to white when pressing that button, not just my wash fixture?

Thanks for everything

Doug