Add Fixture in Visualizer - Impact on SuperStar Sequences

[Ed K]

I need to add more fixtures to my Visualization file, and then add these new fixtures to existing SS sequences.  When importing a Visualization file, SS assigns the sequencing row and "box" for each fixture, which causes the "box" for some existing fixtures to be different (specifically, for fixtures in the same sequencing row as the new fixtures).  This changes my existing sequence.

 

How do I control where SS puts my new fixture so my existing sequences stay intact?  I guess I'm really just asking:  how do I add new fixtures without disrupting existing SS sequences?

 

I've artificially added new fixtures in Visualizer to lower areas of the Visualization window, which allows SS to assign the new fixtures to a new row.  But this defeats the purpose of seeing a simulation of my lights  in Visualizer.

 

 

 

 

Ed

[HowardShank]

Look into your VI and override the props there... See image below. Not sure what settings you'll want, but you can put props at specific rows/columns or override to use your VI settings... Haven't messed with it much and just recently learned about it.

 

Howard

 

 

[BrianBruderer]

You can do what Howard said, but the problem is that when assigning row/column to props you often have to do it to all of them or else the ones without row/column get placed above the ones with row/column

 

The other approach is to use the "Import Visualization Pair" feature. To use this feature you create a "real" visualization and a "row" visualization. The real one looks like your real display. The row one is organized into rows and superstar will place them in rows according to the rows you have made.

 

Then you click on the File menu, select "Import visualization pair"

[HowardShank]

Brian, I don't quite understand the pair and what would go in which file... any good documentation on it? The manual just glosses over it.

[BrianBruderer]

Send me an email at brian@superstarlights.com and I can set up a time to remote into your computer and show you how

[Ed K]

Thanks for the hints.  

 

Email just sent to Brian.

 

I will first try Brian's suggestion, in order to get an understanding of how to maintain my "real" visualization, but give SS a "row" visualization.  That sounds like what I need.   A few weeks ago, I added three fixtures, but moved them down in my Visualization just so SuperStar would put them in their own row (which it did).  But, of course, the three fixtures are not where they "really" are in Visualization.

 

Ed

[Ed K]

I might have the same question as Howard:  Do I create the "real" and "paired" files in Visualizer?  Do I open each fixture and select some parameter(s)? 

 

 

Ed

[Ed K]

Note to self:   "Read the directions."

 

I just read the brief LOR online documentation for SuperStar Sequencer | Visualization Sequences | Import Visualization Pairs. I'll see if I can follow that documentation to accomplish what Brian suggests.  It looks like I need to create two Visualization files, each with a different name of course:

 

(1) how my fixtures are really placed, and

(2) how my fixtures are moved around so they show up in different rows when imported to SS.  

 

Then I open the row visualization file in SS.  Again, I'm guessing this is what I need to do, so I'll give it a try and report back.

 

I also will run my SS-created sequence through Sequence Editor to confirm that the sequence "plays" in Visualizer, with the props as they are "really" placed.

 

 

Ed

[Ed K]

I created two files in Visualizer:  

 

(1) how fixtures are really placed

(2) fixtures in rows that I want shown in SS.

 

I then imported both files in SS, using Import Visualization Pair. To keep this simple, the two new fixtures I had added to Visualizer do show up in the bottom (6th) row of SuperStar, just as I wanted.

 

SuperStar displays the five original sequencing rows, plus the new sixth row (with two boxes - two fixtures).  

 

But, SuperStar shifted all my scenes and morphs down one row.  All of my scenes and morphs display just as I had place them in layers at the top.  However, each scene and morph now is controlling a fixture in the sequence row just below where I originally had them.  E.g., a scene that controlled one fixture in row 1 now is now controlling one fixture in row 2. 

 

Is there a setting I need to select in the Import Visualization Pair function?

 

 

Ed

[BrianBruderer]

The principal is that if you took your real visualization and arranged them in rows, you could get superstar to import them the way you want, but the visualization wouldn't look right anymore. So with the paired visualization you import a "row" visualization that is organized the way you want it to map to the sequencing grid. And you keep your real one.

 

You then click on the file menu in superstar and select "Import VisualizationPair"

In the dialog box that pops up you select the real and row visualization and then you import.

Superstar will use the "row" visualization to map things to the sequencing grid, but it will use the real visualization when you play it to the screen.

 

A note about getting superstar to import according to the row visualization, anything that superstar thinks is a "matrix" it puts at the bottom. Unfortuanately the code is not very smart and thinks a lot of things are a matrix. So if there are props that are being put at the bottom, click on the "superstar" button in the prop and set "This prop is a matrix" to "No"

[Ed K]

Thanks, Brian.  In Visualizer, I added my new fixtures in the same row, but to the right, of a row of existing fixtures.  Doing so allowed me to add new fixtures without disrupting any existing SuperStar sequences.  After using Import Visualization Pair in SuperStar to import my new Visualizer files (ROW and REAL), the new fixtures are represented by new boxes in the same SuperStar sequencing row as the existing fixtures.  As a result, none of my existing SuperStar scenes or morphs are effected.  I then Export to Sequence Editor.  As Sequence Editor plays, I can see my lights with the Visualizer REAL version file open, and in Play mode.

 

Perfect, thanks.

 

 

Ed