New to theatre lighting lots of questions.

[mark5]

I inherited the job of taking over my daughters HS theatre lighting and sound. We currently have at ETC 24/48 Express board with MD80 dimmers and conventional lighting instruments. I want to slowly move them to LED lighting. I have played with MyDMX on my PC and it's easy to use and I can show the students how to use it. There is also a keypad back stage with 8 preset light conditions so that any teacher can use the theatre without using the board. My question is, can I use MyDMX with the conventional lights with the dimmer packs while replacing some with LED instruments? All the house lights also go through the dimmer packs.

How many LED DMX instruments can I daisy chain together and be able to address each one individually?

Any thoughts will be appreciated.

Mark

 

[icewolf08]

The answer to your question really is: it depends. First of all, what is the space like and what is your budget? LED fixtures that are useful in most theatre settings are very expensive.

As far as who many you can connect together, DMX supports 512 addresses per universe. LED fixtures usually require a minimum of 3 and a maximum of 7+ addresses depending on the fixture. So, if you had your LED fixtures on their own universe you could have as many as 170 or you might only be able to have 70 if you want individual control. If you opt for individual control your controller also needs to have a sufficient number of control channels. DMX also only supports 32 devices in a single daisy chain. Due to that limitation devices like opto-splitters are needed to split the stream into multiple outputs, each capable of driving 32 devices.

Personally, I don't think that putting a computer based solution into a high school setting is a great idea mostly on account of the fact that many students (especially tech students) see a computer and think about all the things they could do with it. A dedicated controller has a lot less potential to be hacked and corrupted. If you do go with a computer solution, make sure that it is never connected to the internet and that the ONLY software on it is the lighting software.

 

[shiben]

Personally, I don't think that putting a computer based solution into a high school setting is a great idea mostly on account of the fact that many students (especially tech students) see a computer and think about all the things they could do with it. A dedicated controller has a lot less potential to be hacked and corrupted. If you do go with a computer solution, make sure that it is never connected to the internet and that the ONLY software on it is the lighting software.

Plus, even if it isnt connected to the internet, just wait for it to have iTunes, games, etc on it. In order to make it worth it, you might need to instal profesional grade permissions software on it, so that the only thing that you can open and/or use is the lighting software unless you have an administrator password.

 

[mark5]

Alex,

Thanks for that reply. I have a dedicated computer hooked up to our Tascam DM3200 sound board not connected to the net and it has worked fine for the students. One of the first questions they asked was it connected to the net. I agree, can't have the students running a show and on the net at the same time, only leads to trouble.

With the opto-splitter would I address the instruments sequentially or is there a sub address per each split?

Currently I have 96 dimmers each a single DMX channel and that would leave me 416 available channels and if each LED instrument required 7 DMX channels I could in theory have 50 LED instruments; is this correct?

Which PAR64 LED instruments would you recommend?

Thanks again,

Mark

 

[icewolf08]

All an opto-splitter does is split the signal. It is essentially an electronic version of a Y-cable. So, no, you don't have to change any addressing when using a splitter. However you do have to use a DMX splitter, you cannot just use a Y-cable or even a box with multiple outputs wired in parallel.

In terms of addressing: yes, you have 416 available addresses, and it doesn't have to be sequential at all. Since you have 96 dimmers, you can address your first LED at 97, but unit 2 could b 204 and unit 3 could be 101. It doesn't matter how you address them as long as you know how you did it. You can even address groups of them the same and control them all at once.

 

[gafftaper]

Which PAR64 LED instruments would you recommend?

For theater performance, none of them. There is a HUGE flaw in your plan. The only LED's with enough output to be used as conventional fixture replacements start around $600 each if you want them from a reliable domestic manufacturer. There are Chinese products out there that produce a ton of light for a lot less money (BillESC sells some good options send him a PM to discuss), but they are Chinese. What happens when one breaks in five years. Good luck calling China for service. I'm sure a good dealer like Bill would do his best to help you, but in an industry where many of us regularly use fixtures that have been around our theaters for 30 or 40 years, that's a gamble many of us are not interested in.

You'll find that most affordable LED options have these flaws:
-The cheap ones are vastly under powered compared to conventional fixtures. There are many "Par64" LED's out there that are not as bright as my AA Mag light.
-The better cheap LEDs are strong in creating deep colors but very poor in creating white and subtle pastel colors used in theater. That means they are not bad at all for lighting a backdrop, but will not make you happy when trying to light a face with a subtle cool or warm pastel.

The only LED that I can completely recommend for theater use are the ETC Selador series fixtures. Unfortunately, they start around $1000 per foot depending on the model you choose. However they are bright, produce fantastic whites and pastels, and even dim without changing color. They look fantastic together. I got a quote about four years ago of around $40,000 to light a 40 foot cyc with Selador's. That price has dropped and the output has gone up since then (so you need less) so it might be more like $30,000 now... but that's still out of most of our price ranges.

At this point LED's are a great choice for putting a lot of heavy saturated color on a concert tour when you have a huge budget. They are also a good choice for small night clubs or band tours on the cheep with electrical issues... when you don't care if the lead singer's face is a little too red or green most of the time. With a good budget you can install Seladors into a space and get good theater lighting. But for most theaters LED fixtures are either disappointing in color and output, a little bit of a gamble going Chinese, and/or too expensive.


FYI, check out the LDI 2010 forum for some videos of demos I shot. The only other product that really impresses me at this point in the energy consumption category is the Selecon Nemo. It's not LED, it's plasma. It's about 1/10th the energy consumption of a normal incandescent. Freakishly bright and totally awesome. But they are also too expensive at this point for most of us. The good news is the major manufacturers are starting to move in this area as well. They have more to loose so they will wait until they have really good products to show us. Strong for example had an LED ellipsoidal on display. It was under powered but the fixture worked. They were projecting gobos out of a color mixing LED "ellipsoidal" fixture. They just have to ramp up the output and drop the price to make them accessible.

P.S. Welcome to The Booth. Please asking questions we LOVE to help new people like you. Also stop by the new member forum and introduce yourself. Finally don't just get this question answered and go away. Stick around and you'll learn a lot!

 

[justind]

Nemo is made by Ocean Optics/Seachanger, not Selecon (although still very pricey)

 

[mstaylor]

Why do you want to change to LEDs, power consumption or lack of dimmers? There are things that you can do to conventional lights to make them more useful and is more affordable that LEDs.

 

[Synchronize]

For theater performance, none of them. There is a HUGE flaw in your plan. The only LED's with enough output to be used as conventional fixture replacements start around $600 each if you want them from a reliable domestic manufacturer. There are Chinese products out there that produce a ton of light for a lot less money (BillESC sells some good options send him a PM to discuss), but they are Chinese. What happens when one breaks in five years. Good luck calling China for service. I'm sure a good dealer like Bill would do his best to help you, but in an industry where many of us regularly use fixtures that have been around our theaters for 30 or 40 years, that's a gamble many of us are not interested in.

China isn't alway horrible. Theres quite a few manufacturers that import from China and really stand behind their product. I carry Blizzard Lighting products (as does Bill) and I was really impressed when I first saw the ProPar 336. I'm currently working with a church in SD that's making the move to LED and they've fallen in love with the ProPar as well. Another thing you want to consider with LEDs is whether you want your traditional RGB(AW) or a TRI or QUADRA fixture. The latter help eliminate color shadows, but often add quite a bit to your bill.

Something else that you have to plan for when you make the switch to LEDs is clean power. You can't plug your LED fixtures into dimmers, you have to have un-dimmed power outlets. If your venue doesn't already have these installed it can easily cost you upwards of $1000 per circuit to have them installed.

From a design standpoint, I would still suggest maintaining a complement of conventional fixtures and dimmers and using the LEDs as a supplement. LEDs are great because you can create virtually any color, but in theatre settings they aren't optimal for front lighting (which is your primary concern, especially in a school setting). I would always recommend brining in a consultant to make purchasing recommendations before you go and spend $10000. A lot of dealers will even send somebody out for free if they think they can get a sale out of it.

Just a couple things to consider.

 

[Les]

Non-dim power wouldn't be an issue if you're willing to replace a few of your dimming modules with relay modules. You could power a bunch o' LEDs with a single channel.

Exactly what is your conventional/dimming/control situation like right now, and what limitations are you experiencing that you feel will be solved by LEDs? I ask this because it will probably be in your best interest to strategically place LEDs where they may be useful, rather than moving an entire system to LED (there really aren't enough options out there to see the task through). LED ellipsoidal/profiles, for example, cost $850 each on the low end and only produce a fraction of the light that a standard conventional will give you. The technology is also experiencing some growing pains, so you probably won't want to get much more involved than just adding some LED pars to help out with color washes over the stage.

As for control, I'm a little weary of MyDMX. I believe it is an ADJ product, and not really designed for theatrical applications. I'm guessing the Express doesn't have the necessary control channels to independently drive a rig of LEDs, which is why you're looking for a software supplement?

 

[bishopthomas]

.
As for control, I'm a little weary of MyDMX. I believe it is an ADJ product, and not really designed for theatrical applications.

I actually just sold a pair of myDMX dongles because it is such a cue based software. It does not allow for scene stacking, so for every look you want you have to create a new scene for it. I don't do a lot of theatre work, but it seems like this could be completely usable for theatre where you have time to create scenes and know in advance when and what to cue. All of my shows are 100% busked, so it makes programming a nightmare if I have more than one type of fixture. myDMX also accepts MIDI, so some sort of MIDI "Go" button would be a very easy addition.

 

[LXPlot]

If you're just starting out I highly recommend that you don't do a lot of LEDs, and I think a lot of the pros will agree with me. If you are working on your first production, my vote would be towards you using pretty much only fresnels, PAR cans, and and a few ellipsoidals. If it's a tech program run by parents, they aren't expecting anything really flashy and more likely would be happy if it just worked well and had no huge problems, especially considering you're running sound as well.

As for MyDMX, I'm pretty positive it is a DJ software, but from the looks of it you could use for theatre without huge losses.

 

[bishopthomas]

If you're just starting out I highly recommend that you don't do a lot of LEDs, and I think a lot of the pros will agree with me.

I'm not sure how "pro" I am, but I don't agree. Someone's experience level shouldn't dictate what tools they can use to do a job. I'm not going to build an entire house with a hammer and nails just because I don't currently know how to use a nail gun. There's really nothing difficult about learning how to program LED's. If they're appropriate for the task at hand then there's no reason not to use them.

As for MyDMX, I'm pretty positive it is a DJ software, but from the looks of it you could use for theatre without huge losses.

myDMX is not DJ software, it's a software based lighting controller. The only thing it has to do with DJ's is that sometimes DJ's have lights...

 

[LXPlot]

myDMX is not DJ software, it's a software based lighting controller. The only thing it has to do with DJ's is that sometimes DJ's have lights...

Ok never mind about that then. I just saw "AmericanDJ" and my mind didn't make the connection right away.

As for whether to use LEDs I think it's a process where you should learn the basics first. Sure, you may want to use that nail gun to build the house, but you should probably learn how to use the hammer and nails really well first. On the other hand, it's an opinion, so...

 

[Les]

I was mistaken on the software. I guess the ADJ name gives me some preconceived notions. I owned some ADJ lighting once, and in all honestly, it worked pretty darn good and took some abuse for many years. Then someone stole a lot of it, and now they're abusing it... Ah well.

 

[mstaylor]

Bishop, back to your statement that if appropriate then use them. I don't think they are appropriate. They are too expensive and not true colors for front lighting. If you were doing R&R or bar bands then sure, but I don't think they are good enough to fit into a theatre plot yet.

 

[DuckJordan]

plus with the push towards LED units they are going to , as said before, run clean power to them. Plus with the addition of needing to get opto-splitters and dmx cable, plus if the space doesn't already have a DMX out backstage they may also have to either run more cable or put one in by the dimmer rack, this is a much bigger endeavor than most high schools can afford.

So coming from a University who is now getting into using LED and movers I will be the first to tell you that conventional inventory should be updated and maintenance before trying to get into LED + movers.

1. LED and Movers take more knowledge and better trained people to hang/focus.
2. They also require more technical maintenance neither of those can really be found in a high school setting.

I would just like to note that I love working with new technology but at this point I don't think a high school can function with completely LED technology.

 

[bishopthomas]

Bishop, back to your statement that if appropriate then use them. I don't think they are appropriate. They are too expensive and not true colors for front lighting. If you were doing R&R or bar bands then sure, but I don't think they are good enough to fit into a theatre plot yet.

I was referring more to the experience aspect of LXPlot's post, not necessarily if they are useful in a theatre environment. I agree that the current crop of LED's are not adequate for typical theatre use.

 

[mark5]

One reason I want to get some LED's is that getting to the lights to gel them is a big hassle. I have to put a work order in to have some untrained person climb the ladder to put the gels in. By the time there finished the focus points have moved. Besides LED's sre going to be the way of the future. Maybe not in 2011 but they will be. They run cool, use way less power, you can change the color remotely and they last for years. The new ones coming out with 3 watt LEDs can throw 50 ft without a problem. In my environment all the instruments are focused to a fixed point on the stage and they are never moved. The wiring is so much less bulky and costly. You can daisy chain the lights together and only change the dip switch address so that each instrument is unique. The software is very easy to use and very intuitive. In our environment we build light cues and step through them one at a time as the action on the stage changes. With myDMX I can put a show together in 5 minutes and have a virtual stage on my computer to see the effects. Editing the cues is simple. LED's will happen, the price will come down, the quality will get better. I was at a vendor shop last week and they had 80 LED instruments daisy chained together running off one DMX to USB controller.

Thanks again for all your input. It's great to have this forum with all the experts to help.

 

[mstaylor]

Just remember you can't plug to existing circuits without changing modules in the dimmer rack. It takes less power but it has to be nondimmed power, not undimmed power.