XLaser Skywriter

2W, 30pps, should give you a beautiful presentation. I have two of their other products so have not used the HPX, but saw it demo'd last year and they looked great.
Haven't heard of any issues and X-Laser for me has been a great company to work with for FDA/CDRH approval and tech assist.
Not sure if your using them with DMX only or ILDA with control software like Pangolin. If you are I would look into the FB4 with allows control over ethernet, much better
than running long ILDA cable runs.
 
We don't know how we are controlling them yet....we have to figure out more about the control options and fin out what is going to help us better
we are getting 5w
 
Sheez, those are going to be gorgeous...they will do some pretty cool stuff right out of the box via DMX from the lighting console, but to get the most out of them you will want some controlling/animation software.
I use Pangolin, only runs on windows and if you get the old controllers they are called FB3's, you need one USB port and a controller that connects to the Laser with an ILDA cable (basically a
parallel printer cable) for each Laser. You can daisy chain via the ILDA cable but then they all display the same thing assuming no loss of signal on the daisy chain, which I have read can have problems. The most recent
controller from Pangolin is the FB4, uses CAT5/6 ethernet. I believe you can daisy chain them and the controller will ID each laser individually.
 
We are using QuickShow from them we know for sure. our only thing that we don't know yet is if just straight DMX will work for 3 of ours and then the other will need the ILDA cable.
We shall see how it works. i'm really excited to play with them a little bit and learn we can do with them.

Have you had any issues with anything with them?
 
I think two things to check first off would be scanner alignment and color matching. I don't know what all is available in Quickshow (QS) as I started off with
the Beyond software. You can bring up some test and alignment patterns that will help identify if there are any potential alignment issues and also help with
setting projection sizes and zones. It's been a few years, but seem to recall a very minor scanner adjustment that X-Laser talked me through on the phone.
Same thing with color. Like SMPTE or PAL color bars. For color you can map them side by side and compare the color palettes. You can also make some software adjustments
to the color mixing, but if there is a problem it's best to send back to the lab. I didn't notice this until I started mapping an animation over both projectors mapped
side by side for a wider single projection. Ended up sending them back to X-Laser for adjustment, quick turnaround, and they came back just about dead even.
Probably preaching to the choir...remember to submit a variance request to the FDA/CDRH, X-Laser will also help you do that and also set up reminder for your
annual report requirements. If you haven't seen them there are also some good blogs: https://www.photonlexicon.com/forums/ and https://forums.pangolin.com
 
Would the setting up Projection zones make it so that we can set a limit as to how low or High the laser will project an image?
 
if you are using Pangolin Beyond software Yes setting the zones controls where the limits of where the laser gose , off the crowd .... and on the walls or ceiling
 
Oh. Yeah no. We aren't going to use Beyond software....we have using Quick Show, or Straight DMX
 
+1 on Glenn's comments. The Beyond software allows you to set the projection map for the projector X and Y in projector setup. Then you can add multiple zones that can be used to create various types of
projection profiles for liquid sky, animation, and other kinds of graphics. Lots more creativity and flexibility with the Beyond software. Of course the next cool feature you want to use is always in the next level of upgrade : )
I don't know the DMX profile for the Skywriter, but it should include channels for X and Y size as well as X and Y for aiming so you should be able to set some cue's that have the projection parameters the way you want
it from the console.
 

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