Hello again BR,
For our school production of Hairspray, we are hiring some Martin Macs (either 575s, or 500s), some LED pars, a hazer, and some other bits and bobs. We are getting a Zero-88 Jester ML48 to control all the new stuff and the 48 channel dimming rack we already own.

I have downloaded the Phantom Jester program, mainly to get familiar with the desk, and have read the instruction manual. My only question is if I wanted the LED pars to be fading between colours, with the movers doing one of the Fig-8 programs, would I have to program the LEDs to one chase sequence, with the movers untagged and then program the movers to a different memory, with the LEDs untagged, and then set them off separately? Is there any way of combining these 2 effects into 1 memory, to make it easier to trigger and program?

Also, if anyone has any tips with using this desk they would be much appreciated, as I am a little nervous about using an unfamiliar desk, with unfamiliar lights for a production as big as this!

Thanks,
Charlie

I've never used the Jester ML, but from what I can tell, the movement effects work the same way as the original frog range (please correct me if I'm wrong!). So if you set the movers to one of the shapes and programmed a chase with the LED fixtures (with the movers on the same shape), I'd have thought that the movers would continually do the shape as it's the same shape programmed in each step of the chase, and the LEDs would go through the chase.

Can anyone confirm whether or not this is the case?

I thought about that, but then I thought that if I programmed the movers to do the shape on every step of the chase, then it would just repeat the first few seconds of that chase, then go back to the beginning as the next step starts?

I would suggest that this may well be correct.


Don't know the desk, but I'd suggest the most logical way to achieve what you're after would be to program point cues, and auto follow them after the base state cue. (e.g. cue 10 is the base state, cue 10.1 starts off the movers and cue 10.2 starts off the LED cans. Set each point cue with an auto follow time of 0s, or 0.5s whatever suits). Keeping things separate may also help with editing later if required.
Best advice I can give if that doesn't work to your liking, is to contact zero88 themselves, and ask their advice. The Zero88 forum may also be a good place to ask the question too.

neil

As far as I can remember, Jester ML doesnt have follow cues, I havnt used the desk in a good few months, but I remember someone on the Z88 forums saying that it is a feature of the larger desks and won't be implemented into the Jester ML.

Best Regards,

On the contrary, the ML certainly does have Follow-On cues. As of the most recent update anyway.

Josh

What about programming the movement as a cue and setting the colour chase as a sub?

From what I remember the chase works the same way as the memory stack so it will only remember the changes and so the macs will keep doing their pretty pattern until told not to, rather than trying to start it again on each step

Sorry for the very non-technical answer...currently suffering from lack of sleep!

Steve

Brilliant, thanks to everyone that has posted.

I didn't think about follow-on-cues, will read up on them in a minute. Also didn't think about subs, might be worth a look, even if not for this effect, they could be useful for another!

Steve, that may be the case - haven't checked, but as others have said: if we needed to re-program it, it would be a bugger to do with them all on the same chase!

I'll have a play on the Phantom Jester, and see what suits. Thanks for your help guys - once again the BR has not let me down!
Charlie

EDIT: Spelling

If you have the desk in Full programming mode just set the scene up how you want when you are programming and record the memory - all settings will be saved.

If you are using partial mode select your first fixtures and set them up as required (ensuring they are "tagged" (the background of their LCD screen is inverted on the Fixtures page)) then de-select them on the fixtures page. Next select your next fixtures and set them up as required - again ensuring they are tagged. Once everything is tagged record the scene as usual.

Hope that helps!

Nick

Brilliant, thank you!

In the end, I didn't get the Jester that I asked for, and ended up with a Hog 500. With hindsight, this was probably the better desk and could do more effects. The play went brilliantly, and I will be posting some pics when I get them.

Thanks to everyone that posted,
Charlie