Hi, I have some house lights, and backstage lights in the theatre that I work in, and they run off DMX, I would like to have a way to keep them unaffected by the blackout (e.g. blackout all but channels X and Y)
Many Thanks,
Adam Mathieson
Custom Blackout
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GGGss
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When you have to switch between design and operate mode the only solution is:
with extra hardware: DMX Splitter / merger - if input A has no signal input B takes over...
I carry 2 splitters / mergers with me all the time.(And an extra raspi).
If houselights have to be put onto the desk than I use either the house desk in 'A - B' mode, when QLC+ stops working - the house desk takes over
OR
house and other lights are programmed on the QLC+ and raspi in the same 'A - B' mode but with the other splitter. When QLC+ stops working raspi takes over. (and when I go home the house desk takes over again...)
if the blackout you are talking about is the QLC+ function then:
tampering with fixture channel properties so that the fixture remains at x% level all the time : https://www.qlcplus.org/docs/html_en_EN ... rties.html
with extra hardware: DMX Splitter / merger - if input A has no signal input B takes over...
I carry 2 splitters / mergers with me all the time.(And an extra raspi).
If houselights have to be put onto the desk than I use either the house desk in 'A - B' mode, when QLC+ stops working - the house desk takes over
OR
house and other lights are programmed on the QLC+ and raspi in the same 'A - B' mode but with the other splitter. When QLC+ stops working raspi takes over. (and when I go home the house desk takes over again...)
if the blackout you are talking about is the QLC+ function then:
tampering with fixture channel properties so that the fixture remains at x% level all the time : https://www.qlcplus.org/docs/html_en_EN ... rties.html
All electric machines work on smoke... when the smoke escapes... they don't work anymore
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djthomasryan
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I think OP is referring to just live mode, not necessarily switching between the two.
I too think the blackout function needs some configurability. Instead of zeroing ALL channels, I'd like to be able to optionally assign which channels/channel groups should be zeroed out. This also should optionally override all HTP/LTP.
I don't think a fixture channel modifier would work here, because what if I want my moving heads to keep moving while just the lamps are off (to maintain position integrity)?
I too think the blackout function needs some configurability. Instead of zeroing ALL channels, I'd like to be able to optionally assign which channels/channel groups should be zeroed out. This also should optionally override all HTP/LTP.
I don't think a fixture channel modifier would work here, because what if I want my moving heads to keep moving while just the lamps are off (to maintain position integrity)?
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lighthacker2020
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The blackout button for QLC+ is likely just a simple toggle that says stop sending all output in all universes. I can't imagine it is overly difficult to create your own VC button to control a collection to do exactly what you are looking to accomplish.
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janosvitok
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Blackout:
- has top priority over everything else
- zeroes all channels, but applies channel modifiers to those zeroes
- has top priority over everything else
- zeroes all channels, but applies channel modifiers to those zeroes
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lighthacker2020
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From a software design standpoint, this would be awful to implement, and likely to leave some significant portion of the people hoping to use a solution like this unhappy. Here's why ....
I see at least 3 different ways people would want to see this implemented. One group would like to apply a blackout at the fixture level (for example, they have no need to preserve data on pan/tilt channels, or they have fixtures which aren't using a dimmer channel, like simple 3-channel RGB fixtures). Another would be a group that wants to apply blackout at the channel level (since they want to continue to output pan/tilt info, or only care to force dimmer channels to zero). However, that 2nd group would leave the fixture-level people frustrated, since they would need to individually manage each channel for every fixture to black out. The 3rd group probably sits somewhere in between those 2 and would prefer to see blackout handled through QLC+ functions (for example, modify a specific set of fixtures and/or channels defined in a scene) Then, within each of these groups you'll get factions proposing the ideal way to accomplish this either as an inclusive or exclusive set for the group, with the inclusive faction arguing that only fixtures explicitly defined in the custom blackout should be considered (since they only have a small number of things they would like to black out), the exclusive group would argue the opposite as they would prefer to define what is left on and black out everything else. To top it all off, it doesn't even account for other implementation details such as deciding if this should be part of the Application-Level blackout feature, or should some new Virtual Console functionality get written to make this work? (Personally, I would argue for the VC route, since you could then define something like "blackout groups" and have different widgets define different blackout scenarios, analogous to something like mute groups, or DCAs in audio mixers)
I'm not saying it can't be done, but if I was a (mostly) one-person software development team for a no-cost software package, I'd likely tell you to send me your code patch to implement this, or expect this to sit in the queue with other requests and bugs to be dealt with as time and money allow.
I see at least 3 different ways people would want to see this implemented. One group would like to apply a blackout at the fixture level (for example, they have no need to preserve data on pan/tilt channels, or they have fixtures which aren't using a dimmer channel, like simple 3-channel RGB fixtures). Another would be a group that wants to apply blackout at the channel level (since they want to continue to output pan/tilt info, or only care to force dimmer channels to zero). However, that 2nd group would leave the fixture-level people frustrated, since they would need to individually manage each channel for every fixture to black out. The 3rd group probably sits somewhere in between those 2 and would prefer to see blackout handled through QLC+ functions (for example, modify a specific set of fixtures and/or channels defined in a scene) Then, within each of these groups you'll get factions proposing the ideal way to accomplish this either as an inclusive or exclusive set for the group, with the inclusive faction arguing that only fixtures explicitly defined in the custom blackout should be considered (since they only have a small number of things they would like to black out), the exclusive group would argue the opposite as they would prefer to define what is left on and black out everything else. To top it all off, it doesn't even account for other implementation details such as deciding if this should be part of the Application-Level blackout feature, or should some new Virtual Console functionality get written to make this work? (Personally, I would argue for the VC route, since you could then define something like "blackout groups" and have different widgets define different blackout scenarios, analogous to something like mute groups, or DCAs in audio mixers)
I'm not saying it can't be done, but if I was a (mostly) one-person software development team for a no-cost software package, I'd likely tell you to send me your code patch to implement this, or expect this to sit in the queue with other requests and bugs to be dealt with as time and money allow.
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djthomasryan
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As a senior software engineer myself, I don't think it would be that difficult to add - just show a fixture list and tick the channels you want blackout to ignore. Otherwise, zero everything. I may try my hand at contributing this one day when I can find the time.