Show Schedule Editor Clear as mud.

[Roger Leon Forbes]

This section is about as clear as mud to me. Does anyone have some notes or something that can help. 1st, when I do a musical show editor, when I try and do a cleanup sequence nothing shows up to add. When I try and build a show sequence that runs just music and voice overs with just my rope lights and topper on it conflights with my musical show. Do I have to set a time to end one before the next one begains and ends. I really don't know what to ask, the mud is thick tonight.

[Brian Mitchell]

First, try to explain what you want to do with your show. How you want it to work.

Then I can help explain ways to do it. The show scheduler and editor can be pretty tricky if you want to do a complicated show. If you just want to put a bunch of sequences in and let them run and repeat for 5 hours, its pretty easy.

[bob]

1st, when I do a musical show editor, when I try and do a cleanup sequence nothing shows up to add.

Do you mean that when you click on the button to add a cleanup sequence, a file selection dialog opens up, but that dialog doesn't show any sequences?

If so, I am going to guess that all of your sequences are musical sequences. A sequence to be used as a cleanup sequence must be an animation sequence, not a musical sequence. So, the file selection dialog only shows animation sequences, of which, I am guessing, you have none.

Another possibility is that your sequences are in some directory other than the one that the file selection dialog initially looks in. If so, use the file selection dialog to browse to the directory that you keep your sequences in.

When I try and build a show sequence that runs just music and voice overs with just my rope lights and topper on it conflights with my musical show. Do I have to set a time to end one before the next one begains and ends.

Sorry, I don't understand this. Could you please be specific about what you're doing (what buttons you're pushing and so forth), what you hope to happen, and what actually does happen? Thanks.

[Steven]

I don't think anyone uses the cleanup sequence. It's an animation (no music) sequence that is run between every musical sequence.

• If you want to have a pause between your musical sequences, you can set a delay.
• If you want all lights to turn off between musical sequences, you can check the "Turn used lights off..." box.
• If you want to leave certain channels on after a musical sequence, then just make sure the sequence ends that way.
• Perhaps someone can post a reply where a cleanup sequence was actually useful?

Are you trying to run a voice over and a musical sequence at the same time? If so, it's not possible, and not really a good idea anyway.

[bob]

Perhaps someone can post a reply where a cleanup sequence was actually useful?

One might want a standard animation between songs.

You could do this by manually putting it between each song in the musical section's list, but only if you choose to play your musical section in order (as opposed to randomly), and in any case, it's easier just to specify it once, via the cleanup sequence.

[Roger Leon Forbes]

OK, thanks got part of it cleared up about the cleanup box. Now as for what I want to do:

1st: 5:30 pm, have only some lights on while playing music and voice over for 30 mints. ( know I have to make a musical seq, with only those channels turned on) got that much.

2nd: At 6:00 pm first show starts with 5 seq's and voice over at start and ending. (should run for apx 24 mints)

3rd, Back to 1st for 6 mints of music and voice over until 6:30pm

4th, Start show again and repeat this until 10:00 PM at 10:00pm run the last show of night with voice over saying good night.

This is generaly what I am trying to do. I am having trouble getting it to run right, the show and the break between keep inter linking each other. I am going to play with it again tonight and see what happens now that I somewhat understand the cleanup part.

Thanks all for input. roger

[Ponddude]

Alright, here is what I would do if I was you.

Create a few different shows in the Show Editor...as follows:
1...Create a 6 minute show that is just music with the channels on that you want on.
2...Create your show that is your musical sequences and voice overs.

Now go into the schedule editor. Schedule from 5:30 to 6:00 with #1 (listed above) Then from 6:00 to to 6:24 schedule #2. Then Schedule #1...and so on. Go back and forth.

What you should realize is if the show is longer then 24 minutes, it will play the whole thing, then start whatever else you have scheduled. The easiest way to do it IMO is in the Schedule editor. There is probably someone who can explain it a little clearer, but I hope that helps.

[cmoore60]

Another way you can do this that really is the way I like. Since an animation sequence can be terminated in mid stream. You can have an simple animation sequence during the time you want just some lights on. They use a seperate program called ZaraRadio to play your music. You can interface from LOR for zara to stop and start.

Michael Farney is working on tutorial on how this can be done. He is expecting to have the tutorial complete shortly.

Chuck

[Steven]

Ponddude wrote:

1...Create a 6 minute show that is just music with the channels on that you want on.

Now go into the schedule editor. Schedule from 5:30 to 6:00 with #1 (listed above) Then from 6:00 to to 6:24 schedule #2. Then Schedule #1...and so on. Go back and forth. .

In order to avoid a split-second timing problem, I would schedule show #1 to end and show #2 to start at 5:58.

If show #1 has a 6 minute musical sequence (or 2 3-minute musical sequences), then it will still play for exactly 30 minutes, but it won't start another sequence and run over if the sequences are a few seconds shorter.

Likewise, schedule show #2 to end and show #1 to start at 6:22.

[Richard Hamilton]

cmoore60 wrote:

Another way you can do this that really is the way I like. Since an animation sequence can be terminated in mid stream. You can have an simple animation sequence during the time you want just some lights on. They use a seperate program called ZaraRadio to play your music. You can interface from LOR for zara to stop and start.

Michael Farney is working on tutorial on how this can be done. He is expecting to have the tutorial complete shortly.

Chuck

Chuck, here is my way of using Zara events to play music and announcements during the night and day, and to also turn on or off as needed between LOR show. I copied this thread of information from a posting on my own forum so you don't have to go login to see it.

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The below comments are best utilized for LOR users, but they also apply to the general use of events in Zara. The notes refer to the image attached to this posting. It shows my Zara Event sequence for the Christmas season. A different set of events run during the remainder of the year.

First 4 Events (starting at :00:05)
These show a time announcement is followed by a silence, temperature announcement, and finally another silence. The silence files are nothing more than a simple mp3 file that contains 1 second of silence. Putting these in between the time and temperature announce makes it more naturally sounding instead of having the temperature being immediately announced after the time. The final silence is for the same reason... to have a spacing before the next song starts. Note that all days of the week are selected and that the hours of 19, 20, 21, and 22 are NOT selected. This is because the light show is running from 6:00 PM (20th hour) to 9:30 PM. Also, the event time is set to be one second apart. This allows proper queuing so files play back to back.

Second set of 4 Events (starting at :30:05)
This is identical to the first set of 4 events except they occur on the half hour of every day. Thus, by using the 4 events mentione above and this set of events, the time and temperature is played every half hour during the night and day. And since the "Start" column is set to "Delayed", the announcements play at the end of a current song instead of interrupting it or talking over a song.

Events Occuring at 5, 20, and 35 minutes after the hour (:05:00, :20:00, and :35:00)
The event at 35 minutes is actually wrong in the image. It should be set to 40 minutes. This is because I want an annoucement every 20 minutes during the day that says what time the show starts in the evening and any other important information. I start them at 5 minutes after the hour to not interfere with time and temperature announcements, but actually, you could have any number of announcements play at any time. Note, that the hours of playing are from 8:00AM until 5:35PM only.

Events Starting at 17:39:02
About 20 minutes before the light show starts, I play a tigher series of annoucements that say things like "The show starts in just a few minutes". Note that the event times are set to about every 3 minutes. Since a typical Christmas song is about 3 minutes, this means that this short 5 second announcement occurs after every song. It's just to confirm that the show is starting soon.

Stop Zara Event (18:00:00)
This event immediately stops Zara to prepare for LOR to start the 6:00PM show.
The two other events right after it are just to ensure that Zara really stops.

Start Zara again after the Light Show
There is no visible event for this. As mentioned in another posting, LOR plays a DTMF tone file that Zara hears and then starts automatically.

Events after the Show
The events at the bottom of the list occur about every 3 minutes to announce that the show has finished for the evening. Note that the hours of 0, 1, 22 & 23 are selected. Therefore, the end of show announcement occurs after every song from the hours of 10:00PM until midnight. After midnight, there are no more events until the next day, so the Christmas song list plays as usual.


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