Visualizer Simulation Help

[capardo]

Hey all,

 

I'm on version 4.3.18 of the LOR software.....

 

Been a while since I've fired up the visualizer.  I've also moved to a new computer and lost my previous .LEE files.

It seems I've forgotten "something" about creating a .LEE file.

OK, here goes:

I took a photo of my house.  It was too big for the visualizer, so I dropped the size down to 2500 by 1400 in my local photo editing software.

I imported the photo into the visualizer.  I created a simple string of lights on my eaves.  Assigned it to controller #1 and channel 14.  Saved it as a fixture.

Go into simulation mode.  (A different size picture of my home appears - i don't remember this happening previously).  Start my sequence.  I can hear the music playing, but see no lights or a light string or anything on my photo in simulation mode.

I've tried messing with the size of the photo within the visualize.  Again, saved the new version and ran simulation mode.  The string of lights DID appear, BUT no where near the eaves.  In fact, they were high up in the sky!  (Again, I don't remember this happening previously.  If I cropped the photo within visualizer, when I went to simulation mode that cropped photo was used)

So, what am I doing wrong? 

Stay safe, everyone!

 

Chuck

[dibblejr]

Yes, if you can see the picture of your house in simulation mode the props will appear out of place especially on the eves and roof lines. I have experienced that from the beginning.

However, if you didn't see any lights you unit ID and channels are wrong. 

Best bet, turn down the brightness of your background before going in to simulation mode. You will not know the difference. I have attempted to offset the roof, eves, windows but it takes to long to get them perfect.

With S5 there is no further support in the Vis. Yes I am still S4 and use the vis.

JR

Edited April 27, 2020 by dibblejr

[Orville]

 

8 hours ago, dibblejr said:

Yes, if you can see the picture of your house in simulation mode the props will appear out of place especially on the eves and roof lines. I have experienced that from the beginning.

However, if you didn't see any lights you unit ID and channels are wrong. 

Best bet, turn down the brightness of your background before going in to simulation mode. You will not know the difference. I have attempted to offset the roof, eves, windows but it takes to long to get them perfect.

With S5 there is no further support in the Vis. Yes I am still S4 and use the vis.

JR

I tried adding a prop in the S4 PE, managed to actually get one to show up, but can't figure out where or what I am doing wrong when it comes to the controller and making it work in the PE main display window.  I am not using a background photo because the way my manufactured home sits, it's impossible to get a photo of where the lights would go.  I can't get it to go along with the music and not seeing the RGB Controller show up with all the channels that I added {RGB Controller 1, Aux A, 500K}.    I tried adding lighting commands, but I only see one large blank row for the prop, not all the RGB Channels I see in the S4 SE.

I even tried IMPORTING a completed sequence from the LOR SE Ver. 4.4.4, and it shows the music, but it doesn't do anything with adding the channels to the PE from the original sequence or any of the lighting commands for any of the controllers listed and used in the original S4 sequence.  I was hoping it would import everything, the CTB16PC Controllers and their channels, my older CCB100D 5V Controllers and the temporary section I have set for the LOR Singing Christmas Trees.  

It shows the Singing Tree controllers in {I think} the preview area where you can select the props, but nothing else gets imported, no active channels with lighting commands for ANY of the other controllers in that sequence.  This has me perplexed, as I thought the PE should IMPORT EVERYTHING {Controllers used, Lighting Commands and ALL Channels used in the sequence} from a completed sequence, but the PE seems to pick and choose only what the PE WANTS and not everything in the imported sequence.  And not even a channel or lighting commands can be found.

If it weren't for Don's S5 class we're taking, I doubt I'd ever gotten a prop actually installed.  But I can't get the prop to work in the main PE window like he did.

What or where am I going wrong?

[Orville]

9 hours ago, Orville said:

 

I tried adding a prop in the S4 PE, managed to actually get one to show up, but can't figure out where or what I am doing wrong when it comes to the controller and making it work in the PE main display window.  I am not using a background photo because the way my manufactured home sits, it's impossible to get a photo of where the lights would go.  I can't get it to go along with the music and not seeing the RGB Controller show up with all the channels that I added {RGB Controller 1, Aux A, 500K}.    I tried adding lighting commands, but I only see one large blank row for the prop, not all the RGB Channels I see in the S4 SE.

I even tried IMPORTING a completed sequence from the LOR SE Ver. 4.4.4, and it shows the music, but it doesn't do anything with adding the channels to the PE from the original sequence or any of the lighting commands for any of the controllers listed and used in the original S4 sequence.  I was hoping it would import everything, the CTB16PC Controllers and their channels, my older CCB100D 5V Controllers and the temporary section I have set for the LOR Singing Christmas Trees.  

It shows the Singing Tree controllers in {I think} the preview area where you can select the props, but nothing else gets imported, no active channels with lighting commands for ANY of the other controllers in that sequence.  This has me perplexed, as I thought the PE should IMPORT EVERYTHING {Controllers used, Lighting Commands and ALL Channels used in the sequence} from a completed sequence, but the PE seems to pick and choose only what the PE WANTS and not everything in the imported sequence.  And not even a channel or lighting commands can be found.

If it weren't for Don's S5 class we're taking, I doubt I'd ever gotten a prop actually installed.  But I can't get the prop to work in the main PE window like he did.

What or where am I going wrong?

HOORAY!  I actually figured most of it out.  I didn't assign all the props first after loading an SE Sequence.  Once I got the props all set, all the channels and everything showed up with their proper lighting commands!  I finally achieved how to somewhat use the PE!  Thanks to Don and his class.  

Now my only problem is, I can add in a prop, but the one I'm having the most trouble with is adding RGB Bulbs in a straight horizontal or vertical line form.  When I select bulbs, and then enter the # of RGB Nodes, it shows a straight line of 50 bulbs, but when it runs the preview during playback it changes this to a circle.   How can I make this a straight horizontal or vertical line and not a circle?  

I've looked at every option I can think of, there must be an easy way to make this circle a straight "horizontal" or "vertical" line.  But I've yet to figure that out and it's driving me nuts, since I want to add a lot of straight line horizontal and a couple of vertical RGB bulb lines to the working preview.

Any suggestions or ideas?   I'm lost on this one.   I saw Don do it in class for regular incans and RGB bulbs, but I can't seem to do it in the S4 V4.4.4 PE.

[capardo]

Update....

I decided to follow the Tutorial that comes with the Light-o-Rama software on the Visualizer.  😃

Started over.  Took my original JPG photo and resized it to 849 by 565 (which is the size of the townhouse jpg in the tutorial.lee file provided by LOR).

Drew a light string on my eaves.  Assigned it to LOR regular controller, Unit 01, Channel 14.

Went into simulation mode.  And what do you know?  The lights appeared exactly on the eaves where I drew them!

I'm not really sure why it wasn't working previously.  I suspect I was using "too big" of a JPG photo.  That's all I can think of.  Nothing else makes sense.

 

Anyway, moving on!

Thanks for the replies, JR and Orville.

 

Chuck

[dibblejr]

On 4/27/2020 at 3:45 PM, Orville said:

HOORAY!  I actually figured most of it out.  I didn't assign all the props first after loading an SE Sequence.  Once I got the props all set, all the channels and everything showed up with their proper lighting commands!  I finally achieved how to somewhat use the PE!  Thanks to Don and his class.  

Now my only problem is, I can add in a prop, but the one I'm having the most trouble with is adding RGB Bulbs in a straight horizontal or vertical line form.  When I select bulbs, and then enter the # of RGB Nodes, it shows a straight line of 50 bulbs, but when it runs the preview during playback it changes this to a circle.   How can I make this a straight horizontal or vertical line and not a circle?  

I've looked at every option I can think of, there must be an easy way to make this circle a straight "horizontal" or "vertical" line.  But I've yet to figure that out and it's driving me nuts, since I want to add a lot of straight line horizontal and a couple of vertical RGB bulb lines to the working preview.

Any suggestions or ideas?   I'm lost on this one.   I saw Don do it in class for regular incans and RGB bulbs, but I can't seem to do it in the S4 V4.4.4 PE.

Somehow I missed this.

I have never seen a straight line of RGB's turn in to a circle. It would be cool though. I have circles in my vis and in my S5 preview.

Since you are talking about Dons class, is this happening in S5. 

You can make a straight line of rGBs a circle in prop definiion and adding segments.  In the end its not a smooth circle but its a circle. Not sure if that is what you are describing or not.

JR

Edited April 30, 2020 by dibblejr

[Orville]

7 hours ago, dibblejr said:

Somehow I missed this.

I have never seen a straight line of RGB's turn in to a circle. It would be cool though. I have circles in my vis and in my S5 preview.

Since you are talking about Dons class, is this happening in S5. 

You can make a straight line of rGBs a circle in prop definiion and adding segments.  In the end its not a smooth circle but its a circle. Not sure if that is what you are describing or not.

JR

S4 V4.4.4   I haven't migrated to S5 as yet.   If I can get my 2nd desktop computer to work again.  It's temperamental at times.  But I'm waiting until my new TV/Monitor arrives on Friday to do that.  Then I'll be installing S5 on one of the two systems so I can start messing around with it.  Currently I'm playing with the S4 PE first so I can get more of a feel as to what S5 is before moving over to it on a more permanent basis.

But yes, when I inserted a line of RGB's in the prop definition, which shows me a straight line at the bottom  of the screen ans a single line with dots for the bulbs, when I view it in the preview when running a musical sequence imported from the SE into the PE, they run as circles, not straight lines.  Which I thought was strange, if I pick "wreath"  I could see them change to a circle, but that's not what I chose.   So I set up a "Wreath" to see if that would give me the same ciecle.  No, the wreath is more defined as a regular circle, but the straight line comes out defined as egg shaped, like an egg being viewed from lying on its side.

 

Unfortunately I missed Don's 2nd  S5 class Wednesday night.    I was in so much pain from some of my medical issues I had to take a pain pill around 5pm, and unfortunately the medication knocks me out and I just got up at 6:30AM Thursday morning.   Since it was still twilight looking I thought, great I hadn't missed the class, but soon realized it was NOT 6:30pm Wednesday, but 5:30am Thursday when I got on the computer.   I'll have to go watch the replay of the class later so I can get caught up with the rest of you folks.   And I was looking forward to learning some more about S5 so I can migrate into it.   Still got to figure out how I can add single or multi-bulb{up to 6} incandescent bulb and sometimes multi channel props that my Blow Molds are set up as in the SE.   I don't use the VIS at all, I've never used that, I've always just used the Animation area of the SE in S4.

Edited April 30, 2020 by Orville

[dibblejr]

3 hours ago, Orville said:

S4 V4.4.4   I haven't migrated to S5 as yet.   If I can get my 2nd desktop computer to work again.  It's temperamental at times.  But I'm waiting until my new TV/Monitor arrives on Friday to do that.  Then I'll be installing S5 on one of the two systems so I can start messing around with it.  Currently I'm playing with the S4 PE first so I can get more of a feel as to what S5 is before moving over to it on a more permanent basis.

But yes, when I inserted a line of RGB's in the prop definition, which shows me a straight line at the bottom  of the screen ans a single line with dots for the bulbs, when I view it in the preview when running a musical sequence imported from the SE into the PE, they run as circles, not straight lines.  Which I thought was strange, if I pick "wreath"  I could see them change to a circle, but that's not what I chose.   So I set up a "Wreath" to see if that would give me the same ciecle.  No, the wreath is more defined as a regular circle, but the straight line comes out defined as egg shaped, like an egg being viewed from lying on its side.

 

Unfortunately I missed Don's 2nd  S5 class Wednesday night.    I was in so much pain from some of my medical issues I had to take a pain pill around 5pm, and unfortunately the medication knocks me out and I just got up at 6:30AM Thursday morning.   Since it was still twilight looking I thought, great I hadn't missed the class, but soon realized it was NOT 6:30pm Wednesday, but 5:30am Thursday when I got on the computer.   I'll have to go watch the replay of the class later so I can get caught up with the rest of you folks.   And I was looking forward to learning some more about S5 so I can migrate into it.   Still got to figure out how I can add single or multi-bulb{up to 6} incandescent bulb and sometimes multi channel props that my Blow Molds are set up as in the SE.   I don't use the VIS at all, I've never used that, I've always just used the Animation area of the SE in S4.

The animation should be simple enough, the problem if you want your entire display you will have to redo the entire animation. I only use the animation for faces and in my face animation I have 3 lines that represent my house outline, rgb floods and windows. I use those for my beats for regular sequencing.

But yes, to add to the animator means to have to recreate the entire animator. You could always make a dummy config with just those props and sequence them or copy paste the sequence to the dummy config to view. Just how my faces are. For my show sequences I do not have an animation at all.

While doing the faces I often hear what would make for a great beat and will tag them within the three beat channels to remind me to come back after I finish the faces.

I use the vis when and if I need to see how it will all look) rarely have time for this any more. That is the one good point about s5, its already there without opening up another window. The bad, I just cant build a prop on a whim any more , throw it up and put lights to it. Must build it in S5 before it will show. I am an on the fly type person during setup. I may think of something like my 360 pixel mega tree last year. Set it up, added to my sequence and it was in the show.

JR