Foreground and Background

[DocBrown86]

I haven't ever had any luck getting this feature to work. I looked in the help file, but still no luck. Perhaps it doesn't do what I think it does? Like could I set a shimmer effect and have it fade out the light with the effect going?

Sorry if this seems really simple and dumb, but I think I am losing out on a lot of more complex show attributes by not understanding how this feature works. Could someone explain it real quick?

[ainsworth]

I'll take a shot at it; foreground effect will only effect cells that are not completly turned off. So if you have cells shimmering and you turn on foreground effect and ramp down, those cells that are turned on will be replaced with ramp down. If you turn on foreground and shimmer ramp down the cells that are on will be replaced with shimmer ramp down. So in general terms, with foreground effect turned on, what ever effect you pick (on, off, shimmer, ramp down twinkle, etc.) will replace effects that are in those cells.

It sounds like you are asking if you can use foreground or background to add an effect, like with paste from foreground. No you can't. In the example you gave, turn on foreground and shimmer fade down that will replace all cells that are on with shimmer fade down.

[Geoff Harvey]

The foreground/background effect works as stated by ainsworth; ie, the new effect replaces what is in any cell.

However, what you require is the custom tool - ie the gold star on the toolbar used in conjunction with whatever follows (the next 5 buttons are greyed until you press the star). With this tool, you can create custon twinkle or shimmer at any intensity or any fade up or down. I have found this a very useful set of tools.

[DocBrown86]

Yes Geoff! That took care of my issue.

Ok, so lets say I have 4 chs doing a slow fade out, and during the fade out I want these same channels to continue to fade to 0, but follow the beat that I set to bounce back and forth between them.

Ie) 4/4 time (getting into music terminology), Piano is fading with my 4 channels, the piano starts to ding on "_a2_a3_a4" in a sense of a 16th note situation. I want the 4 channels to click on/off separately at these points during the fade. Possible?

Edited November 10, 2012 by DocBrown86

[Geoff Harvey]

Set the 4 channels up to the beat just using on/off.

Then apply standard &/or custom effects over this pattern using foreground or background effects,

See screen capture:

Blue channels are a simple chase (4 channels)

Red channels were copy of blue, but with following effects applied over these:

0 to 3 sec Foreground effect - Fade up o-100%

3 to 5 sec Background effect - Custom 30% shimmer

5 to 8 sec Foreground effect - Custom twinkle fade down 100-0%.

Hope this helps.

[Tim Fischer]

Some really good examples above. Foreground is very handy when you're doing a chase of some sort and want to fade it up or down (it's good for other things too, but that's what I use it most for. Background can take the same chase and apply a base effect on it - think a mega-tree spinning, but you want the whole tree on at 50% while the tree "spins" a slice at 100%- you'd first sequence the spin as a chase, then add the background effect of 50% intensity.

[aurickle]

I have really come to love the Background feature, especially. I had a couple songs that were looking absolutely psychedelic with all the flashing going on. I hit upon the idea to select the rows, turn on Background and then press N to fill everything to "on" except for the moments when those lights were already sequenced to do something. It kept all the action, but toned things down to where it was very pleasant and even soothing, as opposed to seizure-inducing.

I did the same thing with another sequence, using 50% intensity rather than full on. Again, it looks great.