Control/Dimming Help an ETC (pre Eos) guy learn a Strand Palette.

[Nimick]

I know ETC Microvision/Express/Espression back to front. I just got a gig at a high school that bought a brand new strand palette but has nobody to drive it. now I've got to figure out how.

I poked around on it, but it might as well be greek. nothing seems to make logical sense.

Does anybody have any tips short of "read the manual". With finals next week my time to do that is short.

thanks in advance.

 

[zmb]

DrGisBoh on YouTube has a full video series for the Strand Palette based on v10.4.2 (current version is 10.6.6, but you should be able to learn most stuff) that I have watched before and liked very much.

Link: YouTube - DrGisBoH's Channel

 

[BDS0111]

I poked around on it, but it might as well be greek. nothing seems to make logical sense.

I am with you Nimick... I would toss it in the dumpster or sell it for scrap and get a real desk.

 

[Nimick]

I am with you Nimick... I would toss it in the dumpster or sell it for scrap and get a real desk.

At this point I'm seriously considering telling them to rent an ION or borrow an express or something for the gig they've got cooked up.

 

[Footer]

There is nothing wrong with that console. It does take some getting used to because Strand does not lay out the interface like ETC. There is a 100 different ways to do anything, you just have to find the way that makes the most sense to you. Many of the commands that are now commonplace on every tracking lighting console were invented by strand and are still present in the console today.

You really just need to do some reading to learn how to use a console more advanced then what you are used to.

 

[xander]

I just got a gig at a high school that bought a brand new strand palette but has nobody to drive it. now I've got to figure out how.

Renting may be the answer in the short term, but someone has to learn how to use it or that is a major investment down the drain. If you can get some money together to get some training for the staff and students, you may want to look at Bobby Harrell. He is The strand guy here in New York. Check out his website and maybe get in touch with him.

Good luck,
-Tim

 

[Footer]

He is The strand guy here in New York. Check out his website and maybe get in touch with him.

More then NY. He will fly wherever and do training for whoever. He was the one who first trained me on the Strand line of consoles. Learned a ton that day and forgot half of it the next. He works for strand last time I checked. He helped develop that consoles. He knows more about strand consoles then anyone else on the planet. Essentially he is the Brad Schiller for Strand.

 

[cdcarter]

A venue I work in recently got a Strand Palette, and it was an interesting console to work with. It follows a lot of the conventions seen in most consoles at that level today, so after a little bit of time with it, anyone who has used an Ion or an OII should have a good idea of the basic functions. The main thing to keep in mind is that the Palette has a lot of ways to do different things. You might get confused by all the different ways to turn a unit on to full, but in different work flows, each makes the most sense.

Take some time with the manual, the console, and the most advanced fixture you'll have to program on and see what you can and can't do. Download the offline editor and get used to the software, the Palette itself just runs on a Windows computer with a cool faceplate.

The Youtube videos are okay, but the quality is horrible and you can't really see what he is doing. The best way to learn a console is through necessity.

 

[Nimick]

I've been playing with it for a couple of hours now, and it does make more sense. many of the functions do seem redundent, but useful in their own way.

I do have some familiarity with the ION, I'm just not completely fluent with it. I do see many similarities.

those tutorials helped a lot.

the biggest hurdle now is to figure out why the board isn't talking to the dimmers. This is of course, a structural problem. but I think it's because the dimmers are set up on a network, but the board isn't. It is very confusing.

 

[Syphilis]

When I first learned the express, I thought it was extremely unintuitive. By the time I had to learn an Ion, I was so used to the Express that I viewed the Ion's intuitive features as unintuitive. Our brain works in strange ways.