Light intensity Question/Confusion

[Obejohnknobe]

Hello everyone,

  Hope everyone's light show was successful this past year!  My show this past year was a simple show setup (no music) to get use to the programing, lights and other quirks that need to be worked out before the music can be added.   I have found the light intensity to be too bright in some props and need to be toned down to balance the light intensity with the other props.  I am asking/confused on how to set the light intensity for my pixels (Pixie 16, 8 and 4) as well as other units such as the CTB16PC 3rd gen, CMD-16, and CMD-24 balance them out.  It appears the light intensity can set  on the Sequence Editor prior to the sequencing but when I look in the help section, it shows the cards need to have it on the hardware utility.  The CTB-16 appears it needs to be set at 100% (or off) for my single colored led lights because the LED lights cannot have a fade ramps. Can someone out there set me straight?

Thank you!

John M.

[dibblejr]

2 hours ago, Obejohnknobe said:

Hello everyone,

  Hope everyone's light show was successful this past year!  My show this past year was a simple show setup (no music) to get use to the programing, lights and other quirks that need to be worked out before the music can be added.   I have found the light intensity to be too bright in some props and need to be toned down to balance the light intensity with the other props.  I am asking/confused on how to set the light intensity for my pixels (Pixie 16, 8 and 4) as well as other units such as the CTB16PC 3rd gen, CMD-16, and CMD-24 balance them out.  It appears the light intensity can set  on the Sequence Editor prior to the sequencing but when I look in the help section, it shows the cards need to have it on the hardware utility.  The CTB-16 appears it needs to be set at 100% (or off) for my single colored led lights because the LED lights cannot have a fade ramps. Can someone out there set me straight?

Thank you!

John M.

The pixie series (at least gen1) have no intensity control in the HU.  You must use SE to control the intensity. I experimented with this but not sure if it even worked since my sequences were already produced prior to the holidays. Once I get my garage set back up with my matrix I will be doing extensive testing with all of my gen 1 pixie series 4-16's.

I also have some of the new pixie series 8 and 16 Gen2's. (no gen 2 pixie4's have been released yet) I will be testing those since they have dip switches. I am hoping we will have the ability to set the intensity in HU since it is much easier than in SE while writing a sequence.

I was told that you can change an existing sequence in SE, I attempted to follow the instructions provided however it seems that only the sequence changed. As a matter of fact I can no longer see the sequence written for my matrix in the sequence I tried to adjust the intensity. The sequence still plays on the prop but it is the same 100% setting even though it says 70% in SE.

You can control the intensity for your non RGB controllers by using the fade tool. 

Hope that helps you a little and maybe Matt will chime in on the intensity settings in SE with an existing sequence. 

JR

[k6ccc]

Note that with LEDs you are hard pressed to see a difference between 100 and 70 percent.

 

[dibblejr]

Just now, k6ccc said:

Note that with LEDs you are hard pressed to see a difference between 100 and 70 percent.

 

Jim- if referring to me it was in RGB's. I can no longer see the sequence that was written for my matrix however it does play at the same intensity. Brightest. I was trying to turn intensity down to make better videos to send my mother. I was told to use the "DMX" tab to adjust the sequence I did that and the sequence disappeared but still plays on my matrix.

Maybe I am missing something.

As for the non RGB stuff the only time I use the fade option is during some singing face words or fading in and out of the props, start and end of sequence. 

How did your drone do this year? If I recall you got one last year. I am looking at getting one after a guy recorded mine with his drone it was a pretty cool experience.

JR

[k6ccc]

Nope, no drone.  A friend has one but we never got together and he said he needs new batteries for it.

 

[k6ccc]

3 hours ago, dibblejr said:

Jim- if referring to me it was in RGB's. I can no longer see the sequence that was written for my matrix however it does play at the same intensity. Brightest. I was trying to turn intensity down to make better videos to send my mother. I was told to use the "DMX" tab to adjust the sequence I did that and the sequence disappeared but still plays on my matrix.

You do NOT need to use DMX intensities to control level on RGB channels.  The primary place you would need to use DMX levels in SE is if you are controlling a DMX device and you need to make a channel some specific DMX number.  For example, if you were controlling a spotlight and needed to specify a certain pattern or gobo that required for example DMX channel 7 to be a DMX level of 27 to get the pattern you wanted, you would need to use DMX levels.  For dimming, the LOR levels are just fine.  BTW, that applies regardless if the device is being controlled via a LOR RS-485 network, a DMX RS-485 network, or a DMX via E1.31 network.  Obviously of course a DMX device would not be running on a LOR RS-485 network.

 

[Obejohnknobe]

Thanks for the inputs, everyone!

  My take on this is, straight single color LEDS on the CTB16PC 3rd gen have to be set on 100%.  I have tried different settings on it and it seems to cut out around 40 to 50% intensity settings.  If my memory serves me correctly, LEDs need .7 vdc to start forward biasing to turn on.  Since the CTB16PC 3rd gen is just an AC unit and will only control the AC voltage settings (120vac to 0 vac) the control for LEDS is out.  If I had good dependable incandescent lights then I can control them as I see fit (cost vs electricity).  Mixing both the AC unit with dc units and pixies seems to be a nightmare for sequencing.   Has anybody tried Xlights for intensity settings to convert to LOR?

John M

[dibblejr]

10 minutes ago, Obejohnknobe said:

Thanks for the inputs, everyone!

  My take on this is, straight single color LEDS on the CTB16PC 3rd gen have to be set on 100%.  I have tried different settings on it and it seems to cut out around 40 to 50% intensity settings.  If my memory serves me correctly, LEDs need .7 vdc to start forward biasing to turn on.  Since the CTB16PC 3rd gen is just an AC unit and will only control the AC voltage settings (120vac to 0 vac) the control for LEDS is out.  If I had good dependable incandescent lights then I can control them as I see fit (cost vs electricity).  Mixing both the AC unit with dc units and pixies seems to be a nightmare for sequencing.   Has anybody tried Xlights for intensity settings to convert to LOR?

John M

As I mentioned above and Jim eludes to. LED's can be faded but you wont notice a big difference unless you use a lot of fade. 

As far as sequencing ac and dc units at the same time, a large percentage of us are doing it. 2017 was my first year into the RGB world and I managed just fine. As a matter of fact it was a blast.

No help from me with xlights, sorry. I am strictly LOR

JR

[k6ccc]

49 minutes ago, Obejohnknobe said:

Thanks for the inputs, everyone!

  My take on this is, straight single color LEDS on the CTB16PC 3rd gen have to be set on 100%.  I have tried different settings on it and it seems to cut out around 40 to 50% intensity settings.  If my memory serves me correctly, LEDs need .7 vdc to start forward biasing to turn on.  Since the CTB16PC 3rd gen is just an AC unit and will only control the AC voltage settings (120vac to 0 vac) the control for LEDS is out.

That depends on the light string.  MOST 120VAC LED light strings will dim - some better than others.  Some will be fairly linear and some will dim very little at the top end of the scale, and some will go out somewhere near the bottom of the scale.  You have to test them to find out on the strings that you actually have.  The AC to DC conversion happens in the LED string.  Note that there have been multiple reports that Martha Stewart brand LED strings catching fire when dimmed.

55 minutes ago, Obejohnknobe said:

Mixing both the AC unit with dc units and pixies seems to be a nightmare for sequencing.

Why do you think that would be difficult?  There is no difference in how AC vs DC vs DMX vs E.1.31 channels are sequenced (although the latter CAN optionally be sequenced to specific DMX values if needed or desired).

 

[Obejohnknobe]

Jim,

OK, let me explain on the nightmare I was talking about.  I have some some props located close to each other (small yard) and due to the lights of how bright/dim they are, one seems too bright and overshadows the other.  I can relocate them but they do not seem to look right in the setup.  In  sequence editor I would have to individually control each prop to different intensities due to the brightness inequalities.  That is the nightmare going to each prop and set the max intensities to balance them out on each selection.  Or am I over thinking it and not using the sequence editor correctly?

 

John

[dibblejr]

If you are speaking of RGB pixels some controllers can be set to adjust the intensity in HU. It just depends on the controllers. I have a huge 2 or so acre front yard and have the same problem, my RGB controllers cannot set the intensity in HU, this is a small problem I will be correcting this year.

JR

[k6ccc]

1 hour ago, Obejohnknobe said:

Jim,

OK, let me explain on the nightmare I was talking about.  I have some some props located close to each other (small yard) and due to the lights of how bright/dim they are, one seems too bright and overshadows the other.  I can relocate them but they do not seem to look right in the setup.  In  sequence editor I would have to individually control each prop to different intensities due to the brightness inequalities.  That is the nightmare going to each prop and set the max intensities to balance them out on each selection.  Or am I over thinking it and not using the sequence editor correctly?

No, there is no insanely easy way to adjust levels of a prop across all sequences at the same time.  You CAN adjust all the actions of a channel or group of channels by some percentage for an entire sequence in one shot.  Sorry I can't give you the exact step by step because I have S5 on this computer and it's different.  But if I remember right, in S4 it's something like select the channels and time range to set and right click them select something like adjust levels.  Then select adjust by percentage.  I'm sure my wording is not exactly right, but it should get you there.

BTW, in S5, I don't see any way to do that.