Lighting Control User Interfaces

[indyld]

I've just been having a conversation on Twitter with a young student who used MagicQ PC for the first time and wasn't impressed. Fair enough, the MQ is a lighting console that happens to have a software version. Much like GrandMA on PC or Hog PC, a hardware desk laid onto a screen doesn't make for a great UI. The discussions about PC vs. Hardware control have been long and varied on this board before.

 

But it got me thinking:

 

There are people in the world that never used a Strand Galaxy or a Celco Gold. Or a Hog II for that matter.

There are people that have never used a computer without a windows GUI.

 

The young people that are learning lighting control systems today seem to be a tad unimpressed by the state of the UIs. The iPhone generation have certain, well educated expectations as to how things should work when it comes to the interaction between man and machine.

 

While desks like the Jands Vista seem to have taken these expectations to heart, other platforms like Titan have taken legacy UI and tried to add new features with (personal opinion) mixed success. The oft hallowed MA has another take on user experience, with a combination of clunky input hardware layout and so many user configurable screens it's difficult to remember to actually look at the stage.

 

Are you like this student? Do you think that lighting control is living in the UI dark ages and are frustrated by interfaces that don't work how you expect?

 

Current lighting consoles work for me because they were designed by people from my generation who share my history. I would be interested to know what everyone thinks.

 

Cheers

[mac.calder]

As far as UI goes, I would rather a HogII or HogII (and much rather a grandMA over all of those bellow) to the Vista UI. These UI's have taken the shape they have for a reason - They are optomised for touchscreens, with big, in your face grids of buttons with minimal wasted realestate.

 

It does mean that I often need 3 or 4 screens to be able to fit all the information I want up there, but the large "clunky" interface means that my large "clunky" fingers can do a hell of a lot more work in a lot less time.

 

I do not like the Vista for (one of) the same reason many people love it - the interface. I cannot just jab my finger at the screen to select an entire row of fixtures etc, I need the extra resolution of a special pen... it's just one thing I don't want to have to wory about in the middle of a show.

 

The Off-Line editors disuade a lot of people because the average PC is nothing like the hardware they are emulating. Most PC's are single headed, non-touch interfaced boxes, the keyboard shortcuts are all really close together and not logically grouped and there is no tactile fader surface - the consoles control surface is part of the UI that the people who put down the bigger desks don't understand.

 

Lets use the MA as an example - I spent >10 hours a week programing on that desk - when I started, I would be looking down at the buttons on the surface every 10-15 seconds and I had started to optomise the screen layout for my programing style. After a few days, I knew (by feel) where the important buttons were. After a few weeks, I knew where almost every button I needed during a programming session was, and knew the layout of my screens intimately, so well that I rarely looked down from the stage. I could operate largely by feel.

 

Hog III - same deal.

 

I cannot feel buttons with a mouse. I cannot feel them with a special pen. I cannot operate a keyboard properly with 1 hand. This "Clunky input hardware" allows me to do that though. As far as being able to watch the stage as opposed to the monitor in front of me - I am afraid my "clunky input hardware" (once properly learnt) will surpass an on-screen pretty GUI.

[HobitLight]

I much prefer the "number crunching" method of working than the visual method of working provided from the Vista, as that's how my mind works.

 

My experiance with the Vista is limited but from what I have used of it I much prefer using a desk with dedicated buttons to perform certain functions. The advantage of touchscreen user interfaces is also the disadvantage: the screens can be customised to however you want them. If it is your personal console, it's great that it can be customised for your own needs, but if not other users of the console will be looking for where buttons are as they won't know, coming back to mac.calder's point; with a console such as a Strand 520i for example, any user who is familiar with it will be able to instantly use it as they don't have to spend time looking for where buttons are as they will know where the screen buttons are, where the FX set of buttons are, etc.

 

Just my two pennies worth, or have I got the wrong end of the stick?

[charl.ie]

Well, as a young student who never had the privilege of Windows 3.1 or a pure command line interface and is sitting here with a macbook, I felt quite at home doing some (admittedly basic) programming and oping with the Strand 520i interface. I haven't done it enough do know where all the key positions are by heart (and unfortunatly never will), but it's really easy to type 1 THRU 10 @ 5 and have 1-10 at 50%. Clicking through the patch and bits isn't too difficult.

 

Surely big, clunky interfaces are good when you're unable to do precision editing, like when your in a dark LX booth half way through a show?

 

It actually makes me feel quite safe knowing the desk is focussing on my show and not pretty GUI elements.

 

(apologies for the badly written, poorly though out and pretty useless post)

[the kid]

I don't think UI's can EVER live up to expectations. What I want is totally different from what both venues I casual at, what I want/need at work, and indeed what everyone here wants.

 

I use the a Congo jr maybe once or twice a month, and I HATE it, too many menu's, too many ways to do the same thing, I found 4 ways to start writing on the submaster menus, 3 TOTALY different ways to make chases and yet each one is different, if I need to make a change I want to make a change one way and ony way only. Sure the congo looks nice but to do simple things it seems to be a mission. Granted I don't use it enough to get use to it, but still, is a good UI not meant to be easy to use?

 

To make it easy a UI would have to be almost a touch screen with a optimus maximus keyboard. But then you have the readout screen's which might look weird . Most of all in a UI I want to have a easy clear button, and a num pad for entering channels, and an enter button.

 

I hope this all makes sense.

[Tomo]

I use the a Congo jr maybe once or twice a month, and I HATE it, too many menu's, too many ways to do the same thing, I found 4 ways to start writing on the submaster menus, 3 TOTALY different ways to make chases and yet each one is different, if I need to make a change I want to make a change one way and ony way only. Sure the congo looks nice but to do simple things it seems to be a mission.

May I ask why you think that, and what you had trouble with?

Here or PM if you prefer.

 

To make it easy a UI would have to be almost a touch screen with a optimus maximus keyboard.

Which would make the console cost around £100K, so nobody could afford it. IIRC, the Optimus Maximus had a hardware cost of around 10K on its own, and they've only managed to build a 3-key proof-of-concept.

It's a very interesting idea though - if the cost comes down far enough!

 

With regards to the general thread:

There are always things which could be improved in any console.

If you have specific suggestions - tell the manufacturer. All manufacturers want their product to be the best it can be, and comments from the sharp end are very important to achieving that.

[Guest lightnix]

I think that "standard" consoles will continue to evolve and be with us for some time to come. A problem is, that it often takes a few years for control technology, in general, to catch up with luminaire technology; it happened with moving lights and has happened again with LEDs.

 

I do get all excited, at the possibilities offered by Tangible User Interfaces, such as Reactable. OK - it's a synth interface, but the idea could just as easily be applied to lighting control.

 

If flexible, fabric screen technology ever becomes reality, then maybe one day the operator will arrive, unroll the console over the production desk and spread a few knobs and widgets around it. Maybe it'll be a layout they've designed themselves, to suit their own, personal programming philosophy; or the way a particular LD likes to work; or to meet the unique demands of a particular project.

 

So... My £0.02: There will be desks as we know them, for the foreseeable future; but greater opportunities to create custom controllers quickly and cheaply.

[Nick S]

To make it easy a UI would have to be almost a touch screen with a optimus maximus keyboard.

Which would make the console cost around £100K, so nobody could afford it. IIRC, the Optimus Maximus had a hardware cost of around 10K on its own, and they've only managed to build a 3-key proof-of-concept.

It's a very interesting idea though - if the cost comes down far enough!

 

Although the Eos sort of does this - we have our console setup with two external monitors in addition to the two touch screens, so we use all of the available touch-screen space with the button overlays (which dynamically change according to what you're doing).

[smalljoshua]

I like the MagicQ, it has a feel of logic and constraint that the frilly apps such as (Admittedly not a LX App) MS Office 2007 have.

 

I like the idea that I know each window will look like a spreadsheet, a group of buttons, or a combination of the above. Nothing more apart from maybe a colour mixer pallet.

 

Josh

[niclights]

I grew up with computers way before these new fangled WIMP systems when they just sat there waiting for commands. Spent years programming. Yet I hate command line consoles. Go figure.

[WiLL]

This is simply part of the process of technical evolution. As the people who use and design the desks change so will their properties. The next generation of lighting technicians will be using and designing the next generation of desks. Because it's evolution not revolution this means we can expect to see gradual change, sometimes so infintisimal so as not to be noticed, however when you step back and look at the progress over a decade then the changes are obvious.

The process HAS to be slow to ensure that

a) Both the old and the new generation have an understanding of the equipment, incorporating the accepted standards of the old with the experimental ideas and technological advances of the new.

b) Mistakes are not made, with 'old-fashioned' UI elements being consigned to the scrapheap simply based on their age despite the fact that they may simply be the best way of doing things. (We haven't replaced the wheel yet).

The next generation will always strive for something that resembles the chosen consumer electronics of the moment (iphone etc) whereas the current generation will want something which they are already familiar with and have used successfully in the past. Therefore the most successful desks will always be the ones who can blend these two elements together most effectively.

When the current generation breathe a sigh of relief and retire to their sheds to potter then the next generation become the current and suddenly they are stick-in-the-muds according the new next generation for wanting a boring old touchscreen interface when everything is now vocal recognition or light-beam interface.

This is the way of the world, and it has shown us time and again that slow, gradual change is more effective at maintaining consistent success then revolution. I still believe that most UI elements we are familiar with today will be defunct in 15 years time, when any desk with actual physical faders on will be regarded in the same way that we would regard being told to op a show using nothing but a rank of mini-8 breakers.

 

I have to say that while I think that operating a show from nothing but a Tempus 12 when I first started doing theatre work and escalating to the dizzy heights of a sirius 24 desk probably made me what I am today, I do not think that this makes it a necessary thing that all upcoming technicians need to experience in order to have an idea 'what it's all about'. But what we first learnt on in our formative years DOES affect our subconcious ideas of what constitues a 'good' UI.

So change IS coming folks, but it'll happen in the mainstream so slowly we'll barely notice it.

 

Evolution in action baby.

[Nick512]

Very interesting topic.. I have been involved in the development of a couple of different lighting consoles over the past few years.. I think the most interesting point is that we get used to the layout of the physical buttons and when you do the speed you can program/work is increased..

 

I have never been a big fan of touchscreen buttons as you never got the feedback from them especially when you cant look away from the stage for more than a few seconds, having a physical button provides the feedback and reduced the amount of mistakes by hitting the nearby soft buttons..

 

That said the latest console I am working on, has a whole bunch of touch-screens (8) , but with one button press any soft button can be shifted to a bank which has hard keys too... That way I still get the hard keys that I want and have more options with the touch-screens. Its still early days and the interface and features still need alot of work but at the moment Im very happy with the way things are going with it, and I think its a great advancement in the control surfaces that we use.. The features that are planned are going to make programming very fast and intuitive, but it will be a new interface, quite different from what's out there at the moment.. Development is coming along nicely so I have swapped it onto my current tour, so we can do the first road tests in a real show environment... Exciting stuff in the future of lighting consoles..

[karl]

The best UI is the one everybody agrees on. Pianists can play any piano or keyboard because there is a standard layout of keys; imagine the chaos if every manufaturer came up with their own 'improved' way of laying the keys out.

 

A few years ago ergonomic computer keyboards became popular. The problem was when somebody who was used to a traditional keyboard tried to type on an ergonomic keyboard their speed and accuracy dropped dramatically. Likewise once somebody got used to the ergonomic keyboard they would struggle when faced with a conventional one.

 

Of course product designers want to make their product unique, to give it a selling point - our interface is easier to use than theirs. The trouble is that the easiest interface to use is the one you are familiar with, no amount of new bells and whistles will make up for the problems encountered when moving between different design.

[Woofy]

The best UI is the one everybody agrees on. Pianists can play any piano or keyboard because there is a standard layout of keys; imagine the chaos if every manufaturer came up with their own 'improved' way of laying the keys out.

Ah! there speaks a man who's never tried any of the Concertina flavours!

[back_ache]

The best UI is the one everybody agrees on. Pianists can play any piano or keyboard because there is a standard layout of keys; imagine the chaos if every manufaturer came up with their own 'improved' way of laying the keys out.

 

To follow your metaphor along you could say while we are all music makers aiming to create a tune, some of us prefer guitars as an interface, other flutes.

 

What would be great would be if manufacturers could allow third-party gui's be attached (perhaps in a *gasp* standardised way), I am thinking in a similar way as is happening with the "open" movement in computing