I understand the board, i understand what a dimmer is, and how it works with the light. though what i dont understand is the rhyme and reason behind it all is. I guess what im asking is how a basic light plot is made, from the actuall running of the electric to the dimmer, and all of the reasoning behind it. Any info you guys can share would help.
Basics of light circuitry please
- Thread startersnarefire
- Start date
I'm not sure exactly what you are asking but I'll give it a shot. Assuming you truly understand the board, what you do on the send low voltage signals to the dimmers. If you are running analog it is usually a 0-10v signal. If you are running DMX a variety of things could happen. Most times you send DMX to the dimmers, then to the lights. You could also be sending signal directly to the lights if they are movers, LED or other DMX toys. No matter which system you are using, the dimmers take the instructions from the low voltage and sends line voltage to the lights attached to the dimmers.
If you are asking how to decide what light gets used where and what color, that is a long discussion that requires a lot of study. There are many books that can help learn different methods.
I don't if any of this answered your question or did it just cause more questions. Let us know how to further answer.
If you are asking how to decide what light gets used where and what color, that is a long discussion that requires a lot of study. There are many books that can help learn different methods.
I don't if any of this answered your question or did it just cause more questions. Let us know how to further answer.
We'll need some clarification as to what specifics you're looking for. Are you asking how the electrical distribution is done, the type of dimmers are specced, and the construction phase in general of the system or are you asking more about just in generality such as a touring setup. Perhaps an already installed system and you're just wondering about design theory? Once there's more details we can help better.
I guess i need to clarify, i understand how a board controls a dimmer, and i understand the dimmer increasing or decreasing said voltage to a lamp. what i dont understand is the patching process. The patch channel on top of the baton weather a dimmer is directly connected to that, as in a single set of wires runs from the dimmer the baton wiring inside of the rack and to each outlet on the bar. My boss explained why 1-1 patching is not really efficient, but i am having a hard time visualizing why it is not. At the school i am working at, we are running an older encore series 24/48, which if i am right runs a dmx signal to the dimmers. The dimmer then ups or downs the lights its attached to. I Understand the concept that a channel is really just a set of dimmers which the computer recognizes as a single unit. I also understand that a single or multiple lights. I hope this clarifies what im asking
shiben
Well-Known Member
Yeah. So what "patching" is is basically adjusting your user interface on the board to make it more user friendly. Each dimer has an address, and that address is what the DMX tells to do things. What patching does is take that address, and move it to a different channel number. This allows you to do a lot of things, group certain lights together so they are easier to select on a keypad or with a pencil group machine (if using submasters), etc. It can also be useful for formatting issues, like on a HOG console. Another thing that you can do with patching is to patch multiple dimmers into the same control channel. If you have, for example, a large bank of PARs that you just want on all at the same time, and you will never use them independently of eachother, then you can patch all of the dimmers into one channel, which means you only need to grab one thing as opposed to a lot of them. Basically, patching just makes dimmers easier to use. As far as i know, the patch information never even leaves the console, its all a UI thing.
If I understand what you are asking, with all the systems I have used, the dimmer in the rack is connected straight to the plug on the batton. When the computer is patched 1-1, channel 1 => dimmer 1 => plug on batton (labeled) 1. When you patch any way else the computer is actually telling the rack to turn on x dimmer or xyz dimmers. I believe the patch is in the computer itself.
Please correct me if I am wrong though.
EDIT: I think I just restated what shiben said. I just didn't finish in time!
Please correct me if I am wrong though.
EDIT: I think I just restated what shiben said. I just didn't finish in time!
Last edited:
I personally like 1-1, but I have only used ETC boards and have done fine. Some people might not like 1-1 if you don't have as many submasters or too many different areas. I also like 1-1 because I only have a few submasters and tend to do more with specific areas. Seems to be personal preference.
OK so if i understand this right, a light can be run to any dimmer it really doesnt matter where, but the patch in the board determines which light is controlled by what channel. I beleive my boss mentioned something along the lines of down lights are a set of numbers from like 60-80, electric 1 is a certain set of numbers and so on and so on
Les
Well-Known Member
Correct. You could have Electric 1 set at channels 1-20 even if the instruments are connected to dimmers 30-50 with some skipped dimming circuits. In many situations, this simplifies programming by a good margin. In other situations, you can simply use a 1-1 patch and a good magic sheet.
Sony
Active Member
Okay, I think a distinction needs to be made...
I think a lot of people are confusing Hard Patch with Soft Patch and Dimmer per Circuit with a Patch bay.
For the information I have gleaned so far it seems that the OP is in an older house with a large Patch bay and not a Dimmer per Circuit house.
Snarefire your boss most likely Hard Patches his lights because your lighting board may be difficult to Soft Patch or you may have larger dimmers that he likes to be able to use wherever he wishes like a 6kw dimmer or 3.6kw dimmer. (I'm assuming you have an older dimming system since your house is from the 1970's) Back in the day dimmers were very expensive so many houses would have a few larger dimmers and a hard patch bay rather than a have one dimmer for every circuit resulting in a lot of smaller dimmers like it is done today. There are many advantages and disadvantages to both but today because the price of dimmers has become so cheap virtually all theatres are built in a dimmer per circuit configuration, that means one dimmer for every circuit.
Most likely your houses configuration is something like this:
Console -> DMX -> Dimmers -> Patch Bay -> Circuits -> Lights
So you have two ways to patch, you can hard patch or you can soft patch, most modern houses can only soft patch. (That is if you don't consider using two-fers as hard patching)
Hard patching is when, say you want Circuit #72 to be in Dimmer #4, you would go to your patch bay and physically plug Circuit #72 into the 4th dimmer in your dimmer rack.
Soft patching is done at the console using the console software. However in this case it is Channels vs. Dimmers and not Dimmers vs. Circuits. So on the board say you wanted all of your frontlight to be Channel #1 but your frontlight is plugged into Dimmer #12 or more likely #3, #12, #15, #26, #27....etc. So in the software you would tell the console that when you turn Channel #1 to Full/100% you want Dimmers #3, #12, #15, #26, #27...etc to go to 100% instead of just Dimmer #1.
There are many advantages to patching, the most prominent is ease of programming. If you know that all of your frontlight is channel 1 through 10 then if you wanted to turn your frontlight up all you would have to type is 1 through 10 at ??% instead of typing 3 and 12 and 15 and 26 and 27...etc. It is also much easier to memorize numbers if they are sequential, making you have to look at your patch sheet less often and speeding up your programming.
I think a lot of people are confusing Hard Patch with Soft Patch and Dimmer per Circuit with a Patch bay.
For the information I have gleaned so far it seems that the OP is in an older house with a large Patch bay and not a Dimmer per Circuit house.
Snarefire your boss most likely Hard Patches his lights because your lighting board may be difficult to Soft Patch or you may have larger dimmers that he likes to be able to use wherever he wishes like a 6kw dimmer or 3.6kw dimmer. (I'm assuming you have an older dimming system since your house is from the 1970's) Back in the day dimmers were very expensive so many houses would have a few larger dimmers and a hard patch bay rather than a have one dimmer for every circuit resulting in a lot of smaller dimmers like it is done today. There are many advantages and disadvantages to both but today because the price of dimmers has become so cheap virtually all theatres are built in a dimmer per circuit configuration, that means one dimmer for every circuit.
Most likely your houses configuration is something like this:
Console -> DMX -> Dimmers -> Patch Bay -> Circuits -> Lights
So you have two ways to patch, you can hard patch or you can soft patch, most modern houses can only soft patch. (That is if you don't consider using two-fers as hard patching)
Hard patching is when, say you want Circuit #72 to be in Dimmer #4, you would go to your patch bay and physically plug Circuit #72 into the 4th dimmer in your dimmer rack.
Soft patching is done at the console using the console software. However in this case it is Channels vs. Dimmers and not Dimmers vs. Circuits. So on the board say you wanted all of your frontlight to be Channel #1 but your frontlight is plugged into Dimmer #12 or more likely #3, #12, #15, #26, #27....etc. So in the software you would tell the console that when you turn Channel #1 to Full/100% you want Dimmers #3, #12, #15, #26, #27...etc to go to 100% instead of just Dimmer #1.
There are many advantages to patching, the most prominent is ease of programming. If you know that all of your frontlight is channel 1 through 10 then if you wanted to turn your frontlight up all you would have to type is 1 through 10 at ??% instead of typing 3 and 12 and 15 and 26 and 27...etc. It is also much easier to memorize numbers if they are sequential, making you have to look at your patch sheet less often and speeding up your programming.
hitchhiker
Member
As to why you would use a soft patch. When I set up my patch, I usually like setting my main area lighting to be the first set of channels-organized by area, then my color and/or pattern washes, and finally my specials. It makes life a lot easier when programming.
Go to Google and search the images for a lighting patch bay. If you have something similiar to one of the first 6 pictures, you have a hard-patch system in your house.
Go to Google and search the images for a lighting patch bay. If you have something similiar to one of the first 6 pictures, you have a hard-patch system in your house.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, all of you have been really helpful
1.) We do not have a patchbay in house anymore, that was removed, and we have newer (still kinda old) technology in the house
2.) Still very useful information, now i understand the point of a soft patch, and the point of a hard patch.
3.) Anyone know what the name of the box (I beleive its only a long series of circuits and outlets protected by a insulated metal casing) that sits on top of a batten?
4.) So let me double check my understanding if you will. a light more or less can be plugged into any dimmer. So long as you know where each light is plugged in, you can patch the board to assign it a channel. So instead of 1+8+20 @20 go, you get 12@20 go
1.) We do not have a patchbay in house anymore, that was removed, and we have newer (still kinda old) technology in the house
2.) Still very useful information, now i understand the point of a soft patch, and the point of a hard patch.
3.) Anyone know what the name of the box (I beleive its only a long series of circuits and outlets protected by a insulated metal casing) that sits on top of a batten?
4.) So let me double check my understanding if you will. a light more or less can be plugged into any dimmer. So long as you know where each light is plugged in, you can patch the board to assign it a channel. So instead of 1+8+20 @20 go, you get 12@20 go
Pictures of your setup would make the info a little less confusing. For example, in the theatre that is next door, they used to have a patch system where you could assign curcuits, this is where the light on the electric plugs in, to any dimmer. In this system, which was analog, the dimmers and channels were always the same thing. They changed it out to ETC dimmers that are now hardwired. At that point all you can do is soft patch. Some prefer to do 1 to1 so you have individual control of every area. Others prefer to gang all warm fronts together, etc.
shiben
Well-Known Member
Essentially, if 12 is your channel that addresses 1+8+20 are plugged into. As others have said, the primary benefit is that you can control multiple addresses on a single channel. Alternatively, if addresses 1, 8 and 20 are your Stage Right Orange Fronts (or whatever other type of thing), you can patch them as 1, 2 and 3, so your first 3 handels controls those lights, even though the circuit number is different. You could then, on a more modern console, record all of those into a group or submaster for further grouping, as opposed to a single channel.
DuckJordan
Touring IATSE Member
Something that may have been missed, possibly assumed...
1-1 dimmer assignment is inneficiant because if you have your dimmers located a fair distance away from where the end circuit is, you have to run that much more copper to get the power their. Where as if you have 2 connections per dimmer on the same batten or rail, you only have to run extra line from the one connection to the other instead of both back to the dimmers.
The biggest reason we have doubles in my old high school was they decided it was more cost effective to put larger dimmers in but basically hard wire a two-fer inline.
Its also good to note, that soft patching is in the console while hard patching is placing wires between two circuits and a single dimmer or others.
Its fairly old thinking since dimmers now are costing less and its starting to be thought of ahead of time...
Its also good to note as we move towards more "intellegent" fixtures that we will start seeing less dimmer hard wired to battens and more DMX drops.
Some of my favorite theaters to work in require us to go up to the grid and drop circuits, it allows of cleaner looking fly spaces, and even easier load in for scenics.
1-1 dimmer assignment is inneficiant because if you have your dimmers located a fair distance away from where the end circuit is, you have to run that much more copper to get the power their. Where as if you have 2 connections per dimmer on the same batten or rail, you only have to run extra line from the one connection to the other instead of both back to the dimmers.
The biggest reason we have doubles in my old high school was they decided it was more cost effective to put larger dimmers in but basically hard wire a two-fer inline.
Its also good to note, that soft patching is in the console while hard patching is placing wires between two circuits and a single dimmer or others.
Its fairly old thinking since dimmers now are costing less and its starting to be thought of ahead of time...
Its also good to note as we move towards more "intellegent" fixtures that we will start seeing less dimmer hard wired to battens and more DMX drops.
Some of my favorite theaters to work in require us to go up to the grid and drop circuits, it allows of cleaner looking fly spaces, and even easier load in for scenics.
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