Chauvet Gigbar Move + ILS

[Benny Smyth]

Sigh...I've bought one.

This year, like we all do, I will be playing at venues that are either diabolical to access, or I will be the baby that they put in the corner. With the pram. And the cot. And the playpen.

To be fair, this only happens a handful of times a year for me, and until now, my solution to these situations have been my own t-bar - two FX-Par 9s, two movers and a Jellydome, all lifted skywards on a Goliath stand. The problem is that it takes me longer to set up the t-bar show than it does the four plinths. I did contemplate having the lights already clamped on before leaving for the gig, but I have no way of protecting those lights in transit. I also have to accept the fact that awkwardly lifting a combination of lights that weigh about 34kg (plus the t-bar itself) above my head is beyond my capabilities. I can deadlift a not-too-shabby amount, but I can barely shoulder press a mug of tea.

And that's why I have bought the newest iteration of the Gigbar.

If I were starting out today, the Chauvet Gigbar would be a serious consideration for my initial investment. It makes so much sense to get something like this over a combination of lights bought individually. I'd say that because the Gigbar has been curated in a way that the fixtures work together as well as they can do, it will be a lighting choice that will remain on a DJ rig longer than any combination of lights bought by somebody starting out as a Mobile DJ. From a business perspective, the Gigbar prevents upgrading lights too frequently, and allows one the ability to continue saving and then be able to invest more in better lighting. For a DJ starting out, I honestly believe that it is the ideal 'My First Light Show by Fisher-Price' option.

Until very recently though, I wasn't even considering it. I don't need a lighting option to keep me going until I can afford something that looks a lot better - I already have that. What I needed was something to make my life easier when I'm in a pinch. When it comes to size, weight and speed of setup, the Gigbar is far superior to my t-bar. When it comes to how impressive it looks as a light show, it's a step back for me. That's not to say that the Gigbar looks bad - if I'm honest, it's fine. It's inoffensive. Were I on the other side of the decks, beer in hand and dancing like a prat, I wouldn't pay it any notice. With the exception of my well documented hatred of lasers, it's really not bad at all, but there is a considerable lack of 'wow' to it.

I'm programming everything through SoundSwitch as we speak, and I'm going to do all I can to get the best out of the Gigbar. Assuming everything falls into place in time, I'll be taking it out on Saturday night for a wedding where access is difficult and the room is intimate. For me, the Gigbar is a compromise (it's the Denon Prime Go! conversation again!) and I have a feeling that knowing it's a compromise is going to niggle at me every time I use it. Saying that, I am hopeful that the potential outing on Saturday will bring me round a bit more.

And when the time comes for me to sell it, the laser will be 'as new', 'cos I'm never turning that damn thing on!

[DJWilson]

It'll be interesting to see how the lights end up looking after a bit of programming.

I did look at these a while back but the brightness was a real concern, which has stopped me from getting one for smaller gigs.

[Excalibur]

I used a colleague's Gigbar many many years ago, before they had become well accepted, and while the fixtures and aesthetics of it were lacking, once the lights went out, it was clear that the whole was greater than the sum of it's parts. The programming really lifted it to a higher level.

Taking that a stage further, with it being able to control every other Chauvet light from the Gigbar is incredible. I saw that at BPM I think, and it was truly awesome. As Benny says, it would be a great starting point if you were building a new lighting rig.

It now comes in many combinations, and a colleague who was looking at them decided that the Move didn't cut it for him, especially as we all thought the movers were a tad lacking in Lumens. Now it's got the ILS, just imagine being able to add a couple of par cans round the room, and control them wirelessly, to beef up the Gigbar's overall effect. And if those par cans were Wash FX, well just wow!

[Benny Smyth]

Hmmm...

I'm going to hold off final judgments for now as the error code id-10t on my part may have come into effect. I'm pretty confident that it hasn't, but I'm not ruling it out just yet.

In the process of programming with Soundswitch, the Gigbar and SS worked for a while and then just stopped taking to each other. After a lot of troubleshooting, I came to the conclusion that it may have been a laptop-to-lights issue, as it worked fine when I exported everything to the Prime 4. Regardless, I still managed to programme lightshows for my entire catalogue and create the three static scenes that I use the most - first dance, a spotlight for the cake cut and a 'unimpressive, naff all happening' for the toe tapping before we kick off the night properly.

From a 'programming at home before I leave the house' perspective, I found that Soundswitch's autoscript failed me on a few things. To add some context to those that are not familiar, when you add a fixture into your DMX universe, SS already knows that it's a wash effect or a moving head spot etc. The Gigbar - which includes moving head spots, washes, derbies, strobes and a laser - all have to be defined as one category. I can't individually define the spots as spots, the washes as washes, and so on. You pick one, and that needs to cover everything. SS failed to use any other gobo in the movers other than the open spot, and it also had the movement effects on the derbies static. The latter didn't bother me that much as I'd rather the derbies weren't there to begin with. If I have to use that dotty-ness, I'd rather they'd be static while I point them high.

So when it got to 4am on Saturday morning, I decided that while the Gigbar wasn't exactly how I'd like it, I was happy enough to use it in a live situation and then see how I could build on it.

After setting up at tonight's wedding, I did a sound test and let the programmed lights do their thing. All was grand, and I switched on the 'start of night' static scene until the cake cut and first dance. Cake cut time rolls up and while I do my blurb, I press the button to spotlight the cake and nothing happens - the start of night scene remains. The same thing happens while we're doing the first dance, as well as the father/daughter dance. When the dancefloor opens, I switch the Gigbar to auto (for those not in the know, auto is not sound-to-light, but a ready-to-go bank of sequences) and I let it run through it's predetermined scenes. Not a massive issue, as this venue serves their evening food in a tipi away from where I'm playing, so in about an hour I can do a bit of troubleshooting.

With pizzas being served and guests suitably elsewhere, I change the music to something a bit more stripped back and I get to work. Dodgy DMX cable? Nope. Restart the Gigbar? No change. Restart the Prime 4? Same again. The chain of lights I have starts with an LED bar to light up the Liteconsole, and then to the Gigbar. The LED bar is following the DMX protocol exactly as it should be, so logic suggest that something is going wrong between there and the Gigbar, but I've already established that the cable isn't the issue. What if I bypass the LED bar? Nothing, but when I introduce it back into the chain, the Gigbar is now doing as it should be. I don't know why the Gigbar stopped playing ball and I don't know why it started again, but I now have a working DMX show so I just need to count my blessings and perform the autopsy another day.

After about 20 minutes, the Gigbar decided that it didn't want to run through the DMX shows again, so it was back to auto for the remainder of the night.

In my experience, 99.9% of DMX issues that I come across is down to the fact that I have done something wrong. As and when that happens, I tend to suss out very quickly where I messed up and I can rectify that issue instantly. Like I say, I'm not ruling out me being the thicko here, but even with my experience of being able to resolve DMX issues quickly, I genuinely could not work out what the problem was.

That means that my initial use and subsequent review of the Gigbar is based on the auto setting. Essentially, it mirrors what I said at the start of this thread: it's fine. A whole lot better than sound-to-light, the fixtures complement each other as well as they can do and the audience danced the night away not giving a single fugazi. It also looks like what a typical person would imagine how a 'mobile disco' looks. Granted, it's a good 'mobile disco'...but still a 'mobile disco'. I know that this makes me sound like an egotistical snob, but I have not approached the Gigbar from looking at my typical lighting options and expecting it to match. I know that the Gigbar is a compromise, but the fact that it doesn't want to follow the DMX protocol for more than half hour is really frustrating. The fact that Soundswitch didn't do as well as it usually does also compounds to the disappointment that I am feeling.

But, I'm not giving up yet.

[Excalibur]

Conversely, my rig of eye candy Spectrapix battens, Crossfire XPs and " Gigbar in a box " ( for they do indeed possess every feature of a Gigbar in one box ) Hadrons did exactly what they were supposed to do when I pushed those manual faders. I was even complimented on the effects early on. Very Old School I know Benny, and low tech, but as I often say- " If it ain't broke, don't fix it ".

You're not selling SS to me, if it thinks every fitting has only one purpose in life.

[ppentertainments]

Never really looked into it, but is ILS (really) worth the extra ?

I don't even see the point of the move if honest as with the moving heads I find it quite challenging and would prefer alternatives.

[Benny Smyth]

You're not selling SS to me, if it thinks every fitting has only one purpose in life.

It entirely depends on what your expectations of Soundswitch are. SS is a computer programme that is determining a light show for a song by reading a beatgrid. SS is not listening to the song, and it certainly isn't 'feeling' it.

Keeping in mind that SS is not a human being, the shows that it pumps out are somewhere between fine and good - you can really see and appreciate what it is trying to do, and if you have the vast catalogues of music that we have, fine to good is a great start. If you want perfect, regardless as to what you use, you're going to have to go in and do it yourself. The difference with SS is that after you create that light show for that song, SS will save it and put out that show every time you play that song. Instead of messing about with lighting faders, switches and buttons on the night, SS saves us from being distracted from what we should be doing: focusing on the music and the audience.

For my main shows, I have bespoke sequences for certain songs and then let SS work out the rest. For the Gigbar, I didn't have time to create bespoke light shows for individual songs (although, as it turns out, that would have been a waste of time anyway!). Soundswitch's inability to change gobos or implement the moving effects of the derbies is, based on my experience, exclusive to the Gigbar. For my usual lighting options, SS takes full advantage of what's available from my fixtures. Even with SS not taking full advantage of the Gigbar's capabilities, I was still happy enough to take it with me to Saturday night's wedding.

For me, Soundswitch has been totally worth it. Even with minimal effort (well, minimal if you compare it to how much effort you would need to put in for a bespoke light show for every song), you can get something that is already much better than what most mobile jocks will have on display.

But if you want a lightshow that you would do, the only way you would ever achieve that is if you do it.

Never really looked into it, but is ILS (really) worth the extra ?

I don't even see the point of the move if honest as with the moving heads I find it quite challenging and would prefer alternatives.

If I'm honest, the ILS for me is a non-factor, so I'm not the right person to ask that question to.

The moving heads on this fixture are brighter than previous incarnations. While they are still nowhere near what my Intimidator 400's can do, the gap is certainly closer than anything before it (in fact, I didn't spend any point during the night thinking to myself "I wish these movers/washes/derbies were brighter"). ILS is a very jazzy idea, and I can certainly see how it can be used effectively, but adding fixtures onto the Gigbar completely defeats the purpose of why I bought it in the first place.

[Benny Smyth]

Like I say, I'm not ruling out me being the thicko here, but even with my experience of being able to resolve DMX issues quickly, I genuinely could not work out what the problem was.

For reasons I don't understand, it seems that the Soundswitch Control One is the weak link in this very specific chain. When I use the dongle, the Gigbar does as it should when it should. With the Control One, the fixture just stops after a certain period. The LED bar that lights up the Liteconsole works happily with both the dongle and Control One, and even continues to do it's thing when the Gigbar stops. Even weirder is the fact that the Control One works perfectly fine with all of my other lightshows.

I fed this back to Soundswitch, and they asked me to reproduce this behaviour. I'm yet to do so as I don't have the motivation to film and then somehow send 20-30 minutes of footage for something that can easily be imagined. "Close your eyes, and picture the Gigbar going through a sequence of colours and movements. Now imagine those movements and colour changes stopping after a while for seemingly no reason."

As for the lack of gobo changes and movement from the derbies, that turns out to have been my fault. I forgot to set the attribute cues for such things to happen but it turns out that I couldn't do everything that the Gigbar could offer anyway. The Gigbar ILS mapped into Soundswitch doesn't allow one to utilise the strobe lights or laser (although I did get over the latter being unavailable rather quickly). Thankfully, somebody on the Soundswitch Facebook group created a project that lets me do such things, so another session of DMX'ing took place.

I'm less 'ugh' about the Gigbar now that I've gigged with it a few times. It fulfils the purpose that I need it for, but I have to admit that I do try and work out if there's a way that I don't have to use it for this small space/terrible access gig. I did use it for a wedding at one of my regular haunts that is easy to get into and spacious, just to see if the Gigbar would work in there. It didn't. Maybe two would work, but I definitely felt that just using one was underwhelming.

It's fine, and it'll do the job.

[Benny Smyth]

I'm less 'ugh' about the Gigbar now that I've gigged with it a few times. It fulfils the purpose that I need it for, but I have to admit that I do try and work out if there's a way that I don't have to use it for this small space/terrible access gig. I did use it for a wedding at one of my regular haunts that is easy to get into and spacious, just to see if the Gigbar would work in there. It didn't. Maybe two would work, but I definitely felt that just using one was underwhelming.

In what I am sure is a much anticipated update on this, I bought a second one and used the pair for pretty much every gig since the above post. I also chucked the tripods to one side and invested in gravity stands, as well as wireless uplighters to help make things pop. The Chauvet D-Fi system also helps speed things along.

I've had compliments from clients, guests, venues, photographers and videographers. I've also had criticisms from DJs who use two Helix's/Obsessions and a mirror ball.

Take from that what you want.

(FYI, if you've taken offence to the Helix/Obsession comment, you're exactly who I'm talking about. )

[Excalibur]

In what I am sure is a much anticipated update on this, I bought a second one and used the pair for pretty much every gig since the above post. I also chucked the tripods to one side and invested in gravity stands, as well as wireless uplighters to help make things pop. The Chauvet D-Fi system also helps speed things along.

I've had compliments from clients, guests, venues, photographers and videographers. I've also had criticisms from DJs who use two Helix's/Obsessions and a mirror ball.

Take from that what you want.

(FYI, if you've taken offence to the Helix/Obsession comment, you're exactly who I'm talking about. )

The Gigbar has been Marmite since its inception. As ugly as sin, with cut price, low powered units lashed to a bar.

However, when it gets dark, and you turn it on, well it becomes a thing of exquisite beauty and form.

Now that it has enhanced functionality and control capabilities, well it's a game changer. It's still as ugly as sin until you turn it on though, and that's what the Helix brigade takes issue with. Style, or substance it might appear?

And I'm just trying to re-invent the wheel. The Powerbar. Still one of the most useful, visually inoffensive pieces of kit in the armoury. My COB Microbars although effective, just don't quite do what I want, mainly because of the mounting system. There is one on the market which ( to my eyes ) is prettier, and has a perfect mounting system.