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Easy soultion to intergrating RGB lights into LOR yet?


drums114

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I am looking to do this next year but I was wondering if anyone had an document or anything to go off of. I know there are a lot of posts and there has to be a document somewhere...



Mark

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What type of RGB lights are you looking to integrate into LOR? Are you looking for floods or pixels or strips or something else? Are you looking for DMX devices or LOR devices?

Greg

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Let me be more specific - I was looking to get one of those RGB strips and use that in my LOR. Is there a document on how to implement all of that? Or better yet a video?

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Take a look at the ACL101 manual at auschristmaslights. It has a lot of info on the options and components needed to do RGB.

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Here is a nice document we have that shows how easy it is to integrate DMX into an LOR setup. It is available on our Downloads page

https://www.seasonalentertainmentllc.com/pdf/UnderstandingDMX.pdf

We also are going to have the easiest RGB pixels and strips out this June during our PreSale #2. There are videos and pictures of what our new products will look like on the site.

Greg

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  • 2 weeks later...

The Aussie sight, the information on Holliday Coro and the Seasonial Entertainment site is where I got my information. I spent about two weeks going over the info and watching videos. I now have some RGB strips and the Holiday Coro RGB lights incorporated into my LOR show. I bought an Enttec Pro DMX module and got an extra LOR 485 module and set up a universe with each. I also use one of the LOR DC boards to control some LED RGB strips. It works and is really easy to program once you understand the concept. I am planning on trying pixels next. The key is to read and do some hands-on experimenting.

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Ponddude wrote:

There are videos and pictures of what our new products will look like on the site.

Greg
Hey Greg...

couldn't find any videos or your new products on your site..'.

Got a link?
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OK, please do not shoot me, I am new and looking to do my very first show this Halloween and then Christmas. I have 2 PC AC controllers now. I want to also use RGB LEDs in my show. I am thinking this..

I can buy a LOR 12 Volt controller card, use 3 channels for each strip, meaning I can run 4 strips per controller (If the amperage is acceptable)

Or I can get another LOR USB Dongle, make a power injector and hook that to my computer and to as many strips I need (with the cross over cable) assigning the new dongle to be a DMX universe and getting 256 "channels" via the DMX compatability of the software.

Am I correct on this ? If so, why would I want to buy more controllers when the one dongle will do the equivilant of 21 controllers (256/3/4)??

I have read these and many other forums and have so much "stuff" going through my brain I am ultimately confused.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Mike

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Mike, keep in mind that a DMX universe will handle 512 channels. Depending on the set-up you are planning, you could get a 27 channel DMX board from holidaycoro, or other sites, giving you 9 RGB channels. If you want to use your PC controllers and DMX, then yes you will need another dongle.

Like I said, it all depends on how you set-up.

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I have been using RGB strips and spots for years with the LOR DC board - works great. Last year when I introduced RGB dumb pixels to my setup, I started using DMX. BOTH LOR hardware and software has everything you need to use strips, floods and dumb pixels. If you are going to have a LOT of channels and looking for a cheaper alternative, the Ray Wu 27 channel board is perfect for everything RGB.

Don't get RGB mixed up with smart pixels. CCR and CCB's are examples of smart pixels where you control every bulb instead of a group or lights.

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OK, I stand corrected on my math, see, I told you I was confused. :)

If I get a dongle, the crossover cable and a dumb RGB light strip and $8 DMX controller, with a power supply am I correct in my thinking of this...

Computer --> Dongle --> Crossover --> DMX controller --> Light strip

With that setup, does the Light o Rama software now see the 2nd dongle as a DMX universe of 512 channels, of which I am only using 3 for the one strip? Then as I add more strips and DMX controllers, the software would see the additional strips as whatever channels I assign each DMX controller ?

Again, if this is the case, why would I want to spend the extra money for am iDMX or Entec box??

Or why spend extra money to buy 12 volt controllers to hook into the system and run the RGB Lights?

And am I confusing the two ?? DMX and RGB ?? DMX is just the protocol the computer / controller / Dongle uses to determine which light is supposed to be on and RGB is just the light it's self.

I guess in the most simplistic form, I need a command to turn on an LED. The command determins if it turns on the Red, Green or Blue LED or any combination. A 12 v controller is just a relay, sends the voltage to whichever output the software says. Voltage to that output equals a specific fixture and specific color.

DMX is just the computer sending the signal via Cat-5 doing the same thing.

Am I correct in assuming ( I know what that does ) that both of these are doing the same thing in the end ?

Again, thanks to all for not frying me if this is repititious, I am still confused. Heck, just bought my controllers during the March Mad Grab and starting from scratch.

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? What do you mean by crossover cable ???

First, you do not need to go DMX to use a RGB strip, you can use a LOR DC board. And that board can control up to 5 strips. so $99 to run 5 RGB devices or $130 to run 170 RGB devices. (170 is 512/3)

Second, LOR software does not recognize anything. You tell it what you have. So if you hook up an entec, you tell the sequence editor what channels of your DMX network do what. You can tell it you have all 512 or you can tell it you have 3 channels. It is up to you.

iDmx does not offer you 512 channels, it is either 128 or 256. So the enttec is the better choice.

To ensure you are not confused, here is a quick lesson.

DMX is a protocol, a language that is used to allow comunication between your computer and your lights.

RGB is Red, Green, Blue lights that show white when all are light with full power.

Pixel is a RBG light that has it's own protocol that allows your computer to control each bulb individually.

Using the LOR software, you will set channel 1 to Red, Channel 2 to Green and Channel 3 to Blue. If you tell channel 1 to send full power you will see Red. If you tell all 3 channels to show full power you will see white.

DMX does not have to use cat 5, it can use standard spt wire. The wire has to handle 120 olms.

Do not get stuck on voltage, LED's do not have to be 12v. I use 5v lights. They come in 5v, 12v, 24v, 36v lights.

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jimswinder wrote:

Ponddude wrote: 
There are videos and pictures of what our new products will look like on the site.

Greg
Hey Greg...

couldn't find any videos or your new products on your site..'.

Got a link?


Sure do...

Pixels are here:

https://www.seasonalentertainmentllc.com/rainbowpixels.htm

MultiController is here:

https://www.seasonalentertainmentllc.com/multicontroller.htm

All pictures and videos (that are up) are on the bottom of the pages.

If you "Like" our Facebook page we released information on the presale as well documentation on how to incorporate our pixels into a DMX system.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Seasonal-Entertainment/165810776804917
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For a crossover cable you need something to convert from the LOR network to the DMX network...they use different pinouts on the cables.

We offer a simple crossover cable that just plugs into the LOR adapter and converts to a DMX network that can than be connected with standard Cat-5 cabling. It also goes the other way around LOR to DMX and DMX to LOR.

http://www.seasonalentertainmentllc.com/store/en/adapters/107-lor-dmx-adapter.html

Greg

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