High School Upgrade

[axle]

I'm currently heading the push to upgrade my old schools theatre lighting and this will inevitably include an upgrade to a DMX system. The first stumbling block is, what's the best wire to use for this when you will be fixing it onto a permanent scaffold lighting rig? As this is likely to be there for the same length of time that the current analogue system has been there for without being touched (30 years nearly!) I want to make sure everything will last it out, especially as I head off to Uni soon so won't be the sole LO any more (fortunately I'm helping train up one of the GCSE students who's doing the lighting for his exam to take up the reigns).

 

Any recommendations for a user-friendly but fairly sophisticated control system (doesn't have to be a desk as we were promised a computer or two in the specialist school bid so we could wire up a PC based system if that would suit best.

 

Any information for Sound equipment and Light fixtures will be very much appreciated. I'll try and grab some picture of what I have to work with before I start doing anything so you can see the size of the task in front of the team.

[Jivemaster]

See

http://www.blue-room.org.uk/index.php?showtopic=6647

and use the search function and read lots of posts, please. The structure is more important that the lanterns or controllers. You can hire todays fashion luminaire but if you've no bar to hang it from or power to run it off.....

[gareth]

Note from the moderators :

 

As Jivemaster says, there's already a lengthy discussion underway concerning the refurbishment of school lighting systems - follow the link in his post to get to it. (There are also lots of others in the forum archives - use the search function at the top-right of each page to find them.)

 

If you're replying to the question of DMX cable types, please reply here - otherwise please post replies concerning control systems, etc. to the other topic to avoid unnecessary duplication or topic-splitting.

[axle]

sorry ^.^;

I did try the search function with one or two different criteria but didn't turn up anything more than the basics. As I mentioned, this is an overhaul (electrics, sound, lighting) on a 30 year old, largely untouched since it was installed, setup.

 

If a bulb blows (which has happened, fortunately, very rarely) they just had the caretaker take the offending piece of equipment of the rigging/out of the theatre and dump it in a store room o.o

 

Again, sorry about the new thread but my search (which obviously wasn't good enough) didn't turn up a seemingly related result but I shall go and keep a eye on the other as well now that I know where it is.

[mac.calder]

When you say "Best wire" do you mean DMX cable? If this is what I am thinking you mean, WHY are you running a DMX cable to the grid? If your school has a low maintenance approach to lighting, I gather you will not be using moving fixtures - in fact I would not recommend it at all.

 

If most of your stuff works fine, ie your lights. It is only the dimmer rack (which I would NOT recommend flying) and your desk which need to be upgraded to DMX.

 

As other people have said, in other threads, focus first on your infrastructure, get the LX grid wired to optimal specification - if it is a small venue, electrical extension cords (correctly rated) can be used (don't wrap them around the bar though) with cable ties to hold them together.

 

These should run to where you are going to put your dimmer rack - ie next to a 3-phase outlet, and have enough slack for you to be able to hard patch them (unplug them and change ports on the dimmer)

 

I would suggest getting a board with at least the following 'modes'

 

2 scene preset (allows you to have one state up, set the next and then cross fade)

 

or scene master (allows you to save 'pages' of 'scenes' each to a 'scene master', then you cross fade between these saved scenes).

 

Being a school with lighting maintained as "well" as you mentioned, I doubt you will need a high spec board, in fact something that is easy to use would be ideal for you. The newer computer boards would require each person who uses it to learn the board, maybe an hour minimum. a board with scene masters, I can teach a monkey how to op in 3 seconds, and a relatively competent person to program in 5 mins. In 2 scene preset, they can basically sit down and use it straight away.

 

Sure they wont know how to do soft patching, but that is why you have the dimmer boards in an accessible place to be able to re-patch.

 

My suggestion for a board would be nothing more complex than an atom or it's newer incarnations.

 

Unless you want to teach other teachers how to use the things (ROFLMAO - I have tried to teach teachers before, not a fun experiance) (*No offence to teachers*) but (as I don't know your status in the school, teacher or student), no matter what position you hold, you will eventually be gone. Then what happens. The students are the only constants, you teach them, and get one of them to train a few of the younger ones etc.

[axle]

I'll do a full sit. rep. tomorrow after I've been by the school to sort one or two things out with them (mainly reembursement for damage property) hopefully I'll have a dump of pictures of the current equipment.

[V.A.]

On the subject of boards, I know nobody really gives them much credit, but I really like the Sirius Range for use in schools. They're effective but REALLY simple to understand and use, which is perfect for school kids and teachers who have to learn quickly, and don't need anything spectacularly fancy.

 

If you want DMX capabilities you'll have to go for the 250/500, otherwise there's the 24/48.

[Jivemaster]

First fully refurb what you have, you Will be needing it! Lanterns suddenly get brighter when gently cleaned. A full instalation test and PATest seems in order.

[KindredHyperion]

Desk-wise, I would heartily recommend the Jands 408 - it is probably the best desk I have seen for simple control of both movers and generics, and anyone can use it who just wants to be able to see the stage (like teachers) because of it's simple two-preset functionality. What's more, it's only about £2k. The moving light control is just as good.

[audio]

In fairness, I dont at all see the need to spend £2k on a desk if its not needing to run movers.... a strand 200 comes in well below £1k and a sirrus is even less and both have the functionality required by the original poster.

[axle]

First fully refurb what you have, you Will be needing it! Lanterns suddenly get brighter when gently cleaned. A full instalation test and PATest seems in order.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Well... as the latest PAT sticker (and I checked them all) on the lights says 1983 iirc, I'd say they need re testing

 

We actually have a Sirius 24 in there now, but when I get back I'll explain why it's not the best suited to the theatrre, other than the fact that nobody knows what happened to the 15 keys that they had cut for it when it was bought o.o

 

 

Moderation - yet another unnecessary double post merged into one. We've said it before (more times than we care to remember), and we'll say it again - if you post something to a topic, then decide you have something to add to it (we all occasionally forget things until just after we hit the 'submit post' button!), use the EDIT button to add the afterthought to your initial post - don't make another post to the same thread directly under your first one.

 

(Of course, if there's been a reply to your first post by the time you come back to add to it, this doesn't apply.)

[V.A.]

We actually have a Sirius 24 in there now, but when I get back I'll explain why it's not the best suited to the theatrre, other than the fact that nobody knows what happened to the 15 keys that they had cut for it when it was bought o.o

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The key is probably one of its better features (in that it pretty much erradicates the risk of accidental/purposeful harm to your long and hard work once complete!) and also one of the worst ('coz you can never find a key when you want it!!!). To solve this problem in our school, we have 1 key, which is kept by me, and anybody wanting to use the board has to take the key off me, and I keep a track of who's got it (I do have a spare for emergencies but nobody else knows that!), so people are far more careful with it as they believe that if they lose it they are gonna be very deep in the brown stuff... To highlight the contrast, there are numerous copies of the other theatre keys (storeroom, stage door, op room etc...) floating about and as a consequence people just take the attitude "Oh never mind someone else will have one".

 

Other than that, I would be interested in hearing why else you don't like the sirius...

[DSA]

If you want DMX capabilities you'll have to go for the 250/500, otherwise there's the 24/48.

Not necessarily, as there is/was a DMX output card available for the 24/48. If you look in the right place then you may well find a DMX capable one. (The one at school had DMX - although was never really used as the dimmers were analogue!).

 

David

[axle]

Other than that, I would be interested in hearing why else you don't like the sirius...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Other than the lack of keys you mean? ok, the missing slider caps and dials that have been prised off and lost. I have nothing majorly against the desk itself, it does the job fine.

 

The fact is (as I didn't manage to get pictures today, will on Monday) that we have 40 dimmable sockets on the ceiling, when you reach the 3 dimmer packs, each has (iirc) 6 PAIRS of dimmable outlets on them. So to recap, out of 40 available outlets, we can only use 18 pairs of lights and out of those 36 available sockets on the dimmer packs, we have 17 lights plugged in, 5 of those don't work either so any show atm that is put on runs off 12 static lights maximum.

 

Now if you managed to follow that (because I had trouble myself when re-reading it) and are still following. All those 15A sockets are running on 10A fuses so will likely blow if we have 2 lights in each and on full (especially with the fact that the wiring is pretty shoddy). Half of the lights on the rig aren't safety chained to it and those that are have some very old (probably only low rated) chains.

 

Hopefully the pictures on Monday will explain a little more than I can in words.

[Jivemaster]

does sound as if re-instating the original rig in as new condition would be a great improvement, and this is something that careful kids could help with. Clean, and dust every lantern and fit new lamps as needed. Get all kit inspected and tested, rewire as required, If you have the power available then a further few dim packs as before will add flexibility, Perhaps get a De-mux to use analogue dims from a DMX desk. Unless you are very lucky your budget will shrink as your designs expand.