Is there ANY easy way to do filler between shows with audio?

[geekboy]

For three years now I have wanted to do one thing: Have the lights on steady AND music playing BETWEEN my shows. I assume, though, that there is no easy way to do this.

My shows run every half hour, and are between 5 and 10 minutes long. In between times, I have the lights on, and would LOVE to feed mixed Christmas songs during that time. But you cant have musical sequences as either filler or background. I have even gone so far as to mix 20 or 25 minute chunks of songs and add them to a musical sequence and then make my show Sequence 1, Filler songs, Sequence 2, filler songs, etc etc etc but this is awkward and leaves no way to have any variety in the music. What i REALLY want is a way to just fun random music from a folder in between shows, and then have the show override it when the time comes.

Any ideas?

[Brian Mitchell]

I do that.

What has to be done is you have to create a musical sequence for every song you want in your playlist. You do not have to assign any channels. Just create a sequence with no timings and save it.

then create a "Music Only" show and put all the song sequences in the musical tab and create an animation sequence with your static lights and put that in the background tab.

Then schedule your animation shows to play at the times you want and schedule the music show to play between those times.


The only problem I had when I did this type of show was that occasionally it would start to play a long song right before the scheduled animation show and by the time the song ended it would run over the allotted time for the animated show and would skip it.
Because of that I went with a set order of songs during the breaks but have it play different songs all night. I ended up with 20 filler shows with about 5 songs each to cover the night.

[geekboy]

Brian Mitchell wrote:

Because of that I went with a set order of songs during the breaks but have it play different songs all night.  I ended up with 20 filler shows with about 5 songs each to cover the night.

A-HA!!! Musical tab - I forgot about that. But - I am not entirely sure what your sentence above means. How can you have a set order but still be different all night? I am all ears!

and THANKS!

[Brian Mitchell]

Each of my 20 filler shows consists of about 5 or 6 sequences. These include my station ids , voiceovers and 3 or 4 songs. Just enough to fill the 7 minute window it will have to play.
I also have 8 different animated shows I spread out thru the evening.

My show schedule looks something like this

5 to 508 Show A
508 to 515 Filler 1
515 to 523 Show B
523 to 530 Filler 2
530 to 538 Show C
538 to 545 Filler 3

This way I have different music playing all night long on the breaks and Each animated show is a little different. I have 3 or 4 songs in each and mix up the 12 songs im using this year a bit differently in each show, so it's about 2 hours before the exact show will repeat.

Are you now more or less confused?

[michael.farney]

MarkHornblower wrote:

For three years now I have wanted to do one thing: Have the lights on steady AND music playing BETWEEN my shows. I assume, though, that there is no easy way to do this.

My shows run every half hour, and are between 5 and 10 minutes long. In between times, I have the lights on, and would LOVE to feed mixed Christmas songs during that time. But you cant have musical sequences as either filler or background. I have even gone so far as to mix 20 or 25 minute chunks of songs and add them to a musical sequence and then make my show Sequence 1, Filler songs, Sequence 2, filler songs, etc etc etc but this is awkward and leaves no way to have any variety in the music. What i REALLY want is a way to just fun random music from a folder in between shows, and then have the show override it when the time comes.

Any ideas?

Another great solution is ZaraRadio. Using DTMF tones, Light-O-Rama can actually tell Zara when to start/stop playing random music. Then, you don't need to make a new musical file for each song. Just put all the music you want to play in a directory, and Zara will do the rest. It's a bit technical to get it all setup right, but it works wonderfully when done correctly. This also eliminates the "long song" issue Brian mentioned as the current song will fade out when Light-O-Rama starts a show. It makes no difference how long/short your songs or shows are, DTMF tones will handle it seemlessly. The only side effect is DTMF sounds exactly like a telephone tone. Your listeners will hear this "telephone" tone once at the start of the show and once at the end (when Light-O-Rama is telling Zara to either start or stop playing random music.) I use 2 sound cards to get this to work properly -- not sure if it will work on one sound card. You could try it with one sound card. It's worth a try if you want a powerful program with great scheduling capabilities that will fit seemlessly with LOR. Email or PM if you need help setting it up, but try out ZaraRadio first to make sure you like the program. It's probably not worth the effort if you just want a simple solution like musical files. ZaraRadio is professional grade software used for real radio stations, so it's more for those who will enjoy having something as powerful as your local radio station as far as scheduling and mixing random music, etc.

[geekboy]

Nope, now I get it. It's still not quite "random songs from a big ol' list" but it IS more elegant than making my own mixes and calling them shows.

Thanks!

[Brian Mitchell]

Well like I said, you could put all your songs in one filler sequence and have them play randomly. You just run the risk of it randomly picking a long song right before a show is scheduled and having it get skipped.

[geekboy]

Perhaps S3 needs a "start show at exact time" option in the schedule editor ... hint hint!!

[HillBilly4Ever]

Hey i'm new and thought I was doing something wrong. :X

I 2nd the idea that if you tell it to start a show at 7pm, stop what ever else is going and start the next show.

[Texan78]

I just set up today with the help of members DTMF tones with Zara and LOR. I tried to find an easy way to do it with events but I couldn't get it times right. So I just have my main musical sequence that has DTMF tons at the start and end of it. Then I have just one simple animation sequnce that is a min long looped for min minutes. Since animation sequnces stop at the set time you want it to end I can have my musical main show start exactly when I want and with the tones the musical will play over that break animation and when the show starts the DTMF tones will turn it off. Thing about my musical sequnce is the first and last 10 seconds are exactly as my animation sequnce so it is seamless because at 5 seconds before the show starts I inserted the tones for the musical to end so when the music from Zara stops the show starts playing exactly on cue. It is very nice, but takes a little time to set up. One bad thing is like Micheal said, you can hear the DTMF tones. It would be nice if it was a high freqency inaudible tone that your guest couldn't hear but Zara could. Oh well beggers can't be choosers.

[michael.farney]

You've definately have the right idea. My tones are on the startup and shutdown tabs. My animation sequence is in the background tab, so when the musical selection stop, LOR will just stop the animation in the middle.

--texan78
Do you have yours setup on one sound card or two?

[Texan78]

michael.farney wrote:

--texan78
Do you have yours setup on one sound card or two?

I have it set up on one sound card and I still am able to run my weather radio in my line in to my internet stream without it effect or even hearing it with the display music and Zara music.

I figured it out that it is about what you set in your recording section of Zara for the mixer. Also playing with the right satellite settings to so it doesn't read a certain input. In my case the line in.

[geekboy]

I am using a combination of these ideas now, and it is faboo. Perfect. THANKS!

One little quibble - i have a "startup" in the "mixed music" show that just ramps up the lights to the level of the static display, and then a "shutdown" at the end of the mixed music to ramp the lights down in preparation for the scheduled shows. The ramp DOWN is fine - but after the ramp UP, there is a delay, then a big blink before the static background show starts. Any ideas?


Brian Mitchell wrote:

Each of my 20 filler shows consists of about 5 or 6 sequences.  These include my station ids , voiceovers and 3 or 4 songs.    Just enough to fill the 7 minute window it will have to play.
I also have 8 different animated shows I spread out thru the evening.

My show schedule looks something like this

5 to 508  Show A
508 to 515  Filler 1
515 to 523 Show B
523 to 530  Filler 2
530 to 538  Show C
538 to 545  Filler 3

This way I have different music playing all night long on the breaks and  Each animated show is a little different.  I have 3 or 4 songs in each and mix up the 12 songs im using this year a bit differently in each show, so it's about 2 hours before the exact show will repeat.

Are you now more or less confused?