DMX Settings - help needed

[DazzyD]

I'd advise anybody to read the fine manual for their fixture before changing any dip switch settings.

Some I've seen let you set master/slave mode & others pan/tilt inversion while others let you set DMX addresses in clumps according to how many channels the fixture has.

What they usually mean is the address a fixtures channels start at.

All fine and well if you've got a manual! I got mine second hand from Access All Areas in Gateshead a couple of years before he closed. Have not been able to find an English manual on line.

Off the top of my head I think the dancer came in a set of 4. And is 2 channel dmx one for mirror and one for the lamp.
Best thing to do is set one unt to channel 1 dip switch 1 on rest off and try it with your controller.

According to the head profile in MagicQ it is a 2 channel head. I'll be messing around with it tomorrow. I've still got 5 weeks before this gig to get sorted.

Darren, s2l is all well & good if the infernal programs know the difference between slow & fast music. I've seen fixtures step through mad strobe sequences during s lower songs to the point where I've had to physically unplug them to stop them being annoying. I'm looking at acme & adj lights there.

Fine if you have some kind of remote but otherwise DMX is the only way to tame those beasts.

Would it kill fixture makers to try to measure the tempo & adjust themselves accordingly? Apparently in a lot of cases, yes it would.

I just wish lighting came with a simple controller like what you got with njd datamoons. So simple and were all you needed.

I used to have a CA-8 controller that I had with a set of smart heads I bought from Images in Scotland years ago. I left it in a venue by mistake and went back for it the next day but it had gone. It was really simple to use and helped get the best out of that light show. Like you say, if only all manufactures made those!

[Nakatomi]

I'm just on making some programs with qlc plus now. In about an hour I've got a show scanning circle thing going on and all colours chasing together. I'm really impressed so far, apart from my cheap 'dmx' dongle keeps being blasted by the windows driver. I've jumped ahead & built qlcplus on my laptop running Linux so I'll have no more drivers resetting the chip id to zero. Yay

[DazzyD]

I just use the free Chamsys MagicQ with the £10 MagicDMX dongle. I can see why a lot of people are put off by the software as it's literally massive - there are so many buttons! But I've figured out I can simply load the head, patch it, and then control the sliders in "Simple View" mode. And, suddenly and in only 3 steps, I've got full control over my lights. Chris the light guru recommended MagicQ and he said it can be as simple or as complicated as you want to make it. And I think he's right. It doesn't take a genius to use it (or I'd be goosed!) and it's brought my intellegent lights (some of which I didn't even realise were DMX until a couple of days ago!) to life.

And getting the barrel on the MobileSpiral to actually move slower rather than at the speed of light is an achievement I'm very proud of!

[Nakatomi]

Heh.

That's my number one bugbear with disco lights.. builtin programs are always way too fast. I'm glad I persisted with QLightControllerPlus.. it's so much more intuitive than MagicQ. The adapter I got, which has issues in Windows because it has a non-genuine FTDI chip onboard... well, under Linux it's fine. And the reason I didn't just buy the £10 MagicQ one is I'm going to modify mine to make the DMX port fully isolated & I'd have to strip down a USB dongle to do that anyway so I figured I may as well buy a 'bare' board.

[DazzyD]

Heh.

That's my number one bugbear with disco lights.. builtin programs are always way too fast. I'm glad I persisted with QLightControllerPlus.. it's so much more intuitive than MagicQ. The adapter I got, which has issues in Windows because it has a non-genuine FTDI chip onboard... well, under Linux it's fine. And the reason I didn't just buy the £10 MagicQ one is I'm going to modify mine to make the DMX port fully isolated & I'd have to strip down a USB dongle to do that anyway so I figured I may as well buy a 'bare' board.

That's way over my head. I'm a consumer of prducts not an engineer. The only thing I engineer is a damn good party!

[ppentertainments]

Heh.

That's my number one bugbear with disco lights.. builtin programs are always way too fast.

A dot of blue tac or a sticky pad over the mic usually solves that ;-)

[ukpartydj]

A dot of blue tac or a sticky pad over the mic usually solves that ;-)

Hmmm I may try that on a couple of my lights which go mental sound to light and no adjustable mic.

[Chris1984]

According to the head profile in MagicQ it is a 2 channel head. I'll be messing around with it tomorrow. I've still got 5 weeks before this gig to get sorted.

In the newer magicq software - not sure which version you are running but in the patch window there is a column labeled as (256--------1) - these are dip switch settings for the start address 0 being off and 1 being on. Can be a handy feature if needing to find the dip setting quickly.

Heh.

That's my number one bugbear with disco lights.. builtin programs are always way too fast. I'm glad I persisted with QLightControllerPlus.. it's so much more intuitive than MagicQ. The adapter I got, which has issues in Windows because it has a non-genuine FTDI chip onboard... well, under Linux it's fine. And the reason I didn't just buy the £10 MagicQ one is I'm going to modify mine to make the DMX port fully isolated & I'd have to strip down a USB dongle to do that anyway so I figured I may as well buy a 'bare' board.

I believe the magic dmx dongle is isolated although i could be wrong but it definatly has some protection.

[Nakatomi]

In the newer magicq software - not sure which version you are running but in the patch window there is a column labeled as (256--------1) - these are dip switch settings for the start address 0 being off and 1 being on. Can be a handy feature if needing to find the dip setting quickly.




I believe the magic dmx dongle is isolated although i could be wrong but it definatly has some protection.

After a night of using my spare laptop to control the lights I'm now thinking I could be better off with a standalone controller. A computer is all very well & good, but it's another screen to look at & press buttons on. That and a standalone controller will boot instantly - and being embedded will be much more reliable by default.

One thing I can't seem to find out is whether I can program some scenes/chases with some fixtures but not others, and run different things at the same time. A few programs I made with QLC involved a slow scanner pan around the floor with gobo & colour unset so I could change them at will on the fly. Similarly I had LED PAR chases set up but with a 'flash' (brightness on the LED PARs up full, no change of colour) and a 'blinder' button (LED PARs on max RGB & max master brightness) as one shots I could use to accent the music on the fly if I saw fit. Is there a standalone controller for less than £150 that'd let me do anything like that? That ADJ wifly controller is starting to look tempting, especially with its ability to set heads & mirrors going in shapes. I'm right in thinking no other controller in that price range can do that so easily, right?

[Platinumeventsolutions]

Have a look at getting a dmx wing for your laptop.