Getting an ION finally!

[SHCP]

I am very excited! We have an Express 24/48, and while I love this board to death, it is time to move into the present. Our theater is 6 years old and they should have purchased this when they built the place. I am sure I will have many questions for this group once it gets delivered and I have to set it up.

 

[ScottT]

Congratulations, and welcome to the modern age!

If you haven't already, be sure to go through the video tutorials on ETC's website. There's a lot of good information, and if you have questions for your trainer you'll be able to get even more out of the session.

If possible, I'd suggest getting two multitouch monitors. The Dell S2240Ts tend to be spoken of very highly.

 

[manuallyfocused]

Congrats Tim! We just ordered one ourselves (private Jewish HS in the LA valley area) last week and are very excited to try it out. When we demoed the console we had the Dell S2240Ts, and they were very nice to work with. I would second the video tutorials- I only had two days with the console before our dance show this spring (we were given a very generous one-week demo by ETC) and the video tutorials were invaluable, along with the knowledgeable ETC reps who dropped off the console and showed me (very quickly, and somewhat confusingly!) how to operate it.

Are you planning to set up any kind of control network? For now, I think we're only going to utilize the two DMX outputs on the console and add several optosplitters to get the DMX distribution we need, but in the future I hope to add a couple of nodes as we augment our inventory with LEDs. Good luck!

 

[lwinters630]

Congratulation. I have one and love it too.

 

[Theatrrap]

As you will find the Ion is an upgrade for sure. As mentioned above the tutorials are extremely helpful and I also agree with the touch screens if you can afford them. I have worked with one without for many years at various spaces though and it is still a very strong, easy to use console so if it's not in the budget right now don't stress yourself. One thing that will be nice is that you will find a lot of similarity in the base functions of the software as to the Express line so things will be inherently the same on the surface, what you really gain are options and more in depth programming when you want/need it. You will love this thing and it shouldn't be too extreme of a learning curve to get started, though there is a TON of stuff you will want to learn if you really want to have fun and use the console to its fullest.

 

[SHCP]

I do not have any movers (yet) just traditional lights and a couple of DMX devices, do you think I should get touchscreens right away? I ordered the ION and two fader wings. There is room in the budget for touchscreens, I just do not know if I need them as of yet, and when I do add movers in a coupole of years, perhaps the touchscreens will have more features, etc..

 

[Lextech]

Touchscreens are a personal preference on an Ion. We bought them and attached them and in 4 years I don't think I ever touched them but my academic counterpart used them all the time. It is exactly the opposite for the fader wings. I think part of it is also age and what you use in your day to day life. I have been using a mouse for, um, 30, cough, years and for me and my big hands the touchscreens are something I just don't use.

 

[Theatrrap]

The touchscreens would be useful to you depending on how you end up running shows and programming. The new magic sheet features could be very useful even with a conventional rig and the magic sheet functionality is increased with the use of touchscreens. That said, if you are good with a mouse or if you intend to program by keypad input, then they aren't going to be something you need. That very much depends on your personal use.

 

[BobHealey]

I find having one touch screen to be useful, all the things I end up using touch for tend to end up on same display, even when two touch screens are available to me. Though I've been finding with magic sheets, high resolution, especially vertically, to be more useful than touch screens due to number of narrow but deep theaters I've used ETC boards in.

 

[petercav17]

Personally I've never used a touchscreen and I am still able to access everything very quickly. Yeah, I admit, when I'm using something like virtual faders it would be nice to have a touchscreen, but for everything else a mouse will do just fine IMO. For me at least, I feel like leaning forward all the time to press the touchscreen might become inconvenient (but maybe that is just due to my setup). Maybe you should hold off until you get some movers. I would suggest learning the ION and doing a few shows and then thinking about getting a touchscreen if you think you need one.

 

[sk8rsdad]

My Ion just went in for the Windows 7 upgrade and the 2 Dell P2314T touchscreen monitors are sitting in the family room. We've had GVision touch monitors with the XP version and I find them very useful, especially with magic sheets and the color picker controls.

While it is possible to do things via the command line and classic controls, I can do things with a single touch that would take dozens or hundreds of keystrokes, and organize things so that my brain doesn't have to translate between thought and the instructions and reference numbers needed to carry out the action. For casual users, having a big green button on a screen labelled "Press to turn on work lights" is much more intuitive.

As time marches on I expect ETC to implement more controls that are optimized for touch gestures.

 

[lwinters630]

I have touch screens and find it very useful. My thoughts are if you have a budget now, get them now because you may not have the budget later. Also if you start with touch screens you will become accustom to them and will not have to relearn a new habit (mouse vs touch).

You've had the express, most everything you are used to is there, some under different names, but there is so much more. Things like - cue 20 go vs go to cue 20 enter, groups are only channels not values, your playback wing is way more powerful, and magic sheets do so much more than just a lighting plot ( you can have multiple sheets though). Don't stay with the old, push yourself to learn new and faster ways to get where you want.

You can down load the off line version, setup your entire new console with patches, groups, subs, and the like. Save to a USB as your standard rep show and then you can load it in the day your new one arrives. Also you can use the off line to watch the tutorials and then try it out. Two laptops side by side is helpful so you don't have to flip windows from off line to the tutorial.

Search CB for ION topics, I find them helpful.

Enjoy

 

[SHCP]

Great advice. Thanks all!
I think I will get one touchscreen, even though I do not have any movers yet, and add another as we grow our inventory.

 

[SteveB]

I should as well reply to the post about what I like about my Ion, so the two biggest are the touch screens and magic sheets.

Used together and it becomes a game changer in speed and usefulness over a mouse and command line typing.

It doesn't matter if you have movers or LED's as even configuring a magic sheet for conventionals can make accessing channels and groups faster. If the LD is on board, they can lose the syntax of "ch., 21 thru 30 at 70" (which requires a purpose to number conversion at some point) and simply ask for the high side pinks, etc... I know of one LD who uses a huge touch screen as their designers remote, same magic sheet, displaying information in a far more useful format then the channel tombstones.

So I strongly encourage you to explore the magic sheet system. It's an extraordinary tool.

 

[SHCP]

ION is all set-up, and all I can say is wow... what a great improvement. Thanks to all for your advice in the forums and through personal messages. Just being able to focus from the grid using irfr saved me hours of work. I am looking forward to learning how to incorporate the new functionality in our upcoming season!