Control/Dimming Eos/Ion Strobe Effect without using multiple cues/follows

jaslynch

Member
Can I use Beam Palettes in effects?

Here's what I'm trying to do:

I'm prepping our console and I suspect our next show is going to have tons of lightning. I'm trying to get away from using multiple cues/follows for short bursts of lightning. (I just hate to bog my cue lists down with follows.)

I've already created 4 Strobe Beam Palettes (slow, medium, fast, and random) using the shutter strobe parameter and would like to have some effects pre-built for the designer. An effect with 3 seconds of lightning, 1 with 2 seconds, and 1 with 1 second and so on.

So- instead of using multiple cues/follows which I hate to start and stop the lightning, I would like to call up an effect on a fixture and have the fixture stop the strobe automatically via an effect without hitting GO, using follows, twirling around etc.

I noticed that I have the ability to use the Shutter strobe parameter in effects, but haven't really played with this idea. This may be my answer.

I hope this makes sense. Simply- I want to hit go see a burst of lightning/STROBE via shutter strobe and it to stop automatically. And have the ability to change the duration without a series of cues. A lightning EFFECT. (And no I don't want to use the intensity parameter if I can help it.)

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance for your help!

I'm using Mac 2K Washes, btw.
 
This is actually pretty easy to do, assuming I'm understanding you correctly. What you're looking for is an Absolute effect. In the Effects editor ([Effect] [Effect]), create a new effect and make it type Absolute. Select Action 1 and make the Time 0 and the Dwell however long you want to run the effect for. Then in the Level column, select the Beam Palette you want to play back in the effect. Change the effect duration to One Cycle, and you're all set. You can just make multiple copies of this effect and change the Cycle Time to however long you want the strobe to run for. Depending on how you want the lightning to begin and end, you can screw around with Entry and Exit instructions or fade times to make it work for you.

Hope that helps!
 
...I hope this makes sense. Simply- I want to hit go see a burst of lightning/STROBE via shutter strobe and it to stop automatically. And have the ability to change the duration without a series of cues. A lightning EFFECT. (And no I don't want to use the intensity parameter if I can help it.) ...
I don't see how you're gonna achieve the desired effect without using the intensity parameter. You can set the fixture to strobe all you want, but no one is going to see it unless the dimmer channel is above 0%.

Seems to me, this is the perfect place to use multiple cue lists. Someone else will have to explain how to do that on ION, however.
 
I don't see how you're gonna achieve the desired effect without using the intensity parameter. You can set the fixture to strobe all you want, but no one is going to see it unless the dimmer channel is above 0%.

Seems to me, this is the perfect place to use multiple cue lists. Someone else will have to explain how to do that on ION, however.

Very true. If intensity was at 0% then it would never work. I meant I don't want to make an Effect using the Intensity parameter to create strobe/ strobe-like effect. I want to use the strobe feature for the strobe effect. Not 0 to 100% flashing in intensity.

And thank-you, rochem!
 
I know this is an old thread, but it was helpful to me and I thought this might be worth adding:

You don't need to use multiple cues. Build the absolute effect that will reference your Beam Palette as described by Michael. Then you can also build an absolute effect that just says intensity at 100 or whatever value you like. In your cue, you can tell your fixtures to reference multiple effects: One for intensity, and one for your Beam parameters (strobe rate, zoom etc.)

Here's what I did:

I am using some Chauvet Colorado 2 LED Pars. I wrote a few Beam Palettes with varying zooms and shutter strobe rates. Then wrote an Intensity effect: {[Effect][Effect]} Type: Absolute, Dwell: 1.5 Duration: 1 Cycle.
Then another Intensity effect with a longer dwell (1.8 seconds)
Then wrote effects that reference the Beam Palettes with various dwell times (1, 1.3, 1.5, 1.8).

Then in your cue, pick the fixtures that you want to do the lightning, and tell them to reference an intensity effect and a beam effect: {[Chan#] [Effect] [Effect#][Enter]} I like to reference a few different of the beam effects with different fixtures to give a more random look.
Update the cue and the effects will fire when you run it and an external link to the effect will be indicated in the Ext. Links column of the playback window.

That's how I'm doing lightning these days. My first time programing lightning, the designer had me assign a few Strand SL's to each sub bump button and just play them like a piano when the SM called the lightning cues. :)

Ian Fritz
ME, Arizona Opera
 

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