jmdh

Hi, I have a dusty ETC Expression 2X that I'm happy to give free to a good home. I collected this from a member on this forum in September 2019 who said: "Absolutely no charge but obviously no guarantee either (might need the Smartwatch chip replacing, don't know if ETC still do that). It worked fine last time it was used but that was several years ago!" We tested its basic functionality with a rig soon after collecting and everything seemed fine, but unfortunately the pandemic put paid to any more use of it. A change in circumstances means we can no longer store it. Would need collecting from Oxford.

Hi all, thanks for all the suggestions and sorry for not replying sooner - went into full on production mode. VLC worked well in the end - aside from the fact that the UI is terrible, and has no way of saving capture/streaming presets that I could find! But it can create an Ogg audio stream and serve it over http with no bother to a couple of other VLC clients. To round off the other suggestions/issues - yeah, Mac Minis were overkills, but they were what I had available :) No chance of using analogue audio on this, it was a staff network in an educational setting across several buildings and getting access to the network at all required a favour.

I'm working on a show which where we need to install some show relay using the venue's wired ethernet IP network and a bunch of mac minis, so looking for ideas about how best to arrange an audio only audio stream from a show relay mic. Requirements: two separate output feeds in different dressing rooms stable (eg would auto-reconnect in the even of a network glitch) free/low cost software on each mac. latency of up to 1-2 seconds not a huge concern as both locations are far away from the performance area but obviously don't want huge lag as it's being used for cueing Won't really know how the network performs until we try it, should assume that it's reasonable stable but may not be gigabit. One suggestion has been NDI tools on both sides, but that involves sending a video feed as well, so much higher bandwidth just to send a black screen. I know VLC has some built in stream source functionality, has anyone used that in show conditions? Any other ideas? Thanks!

Thanks richb, that article about advice for LAs is illuminating (in some ways much more than the performing arts specific pages). In the end though, my interpretation is that LAs would only be involved if the event was a licensable event (https://www.gov.uk/guidance/entertainment-licensing-changes-under-the-live-music-act) or if there were a serious public health threat per The Health Protection (Coronavirus, Restrictions) (England) (No. 3) Regulations 2020. ("These powers should only be used if the event, venue or gathering in an outdoor public place poses a serious and imminent threat to public health that cannot be mitigated in conversation with the event organiser") For small events (eg a play ending by 11pm with < 500 audience) it's back to self-management of risks by the event organiser. Does anyone disagree with this interpretation? I don't think that it's written out explicitly anywhere, but I don't see what legal basis LAs would have to impose restrictions contained in that guidance other than the existing premises licensing arrangements and the imminent threat to public health powers. I understand that people in this thread are thinking of lots of different types of event in mind, and we should take care to not over-generalise.

I agree it's all pretty unclear isn't it! My current understanding is that things are proceeding exactly as per https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-response-spring-2021/covid-19-response-spring-2021-summary (with additional changes to international travel), and that says: "The government will also allow some larger performances and sporting events in indoor venues with a capacity of 1,000 people or half-full (whichever is a lower number), and in outdoor venues with a capacity of 4,000 people or half-full (whichever is a lower number). In the largest outdoor seated venues, where crowds can be spread out, up to 10,000 people will be able to attend (or a quarter-full, whichever is lower)." Depending on whether you think the word "some" applies to the second part of the sentence about outdoor venues, it sounds as if 50% of normal capacity is the expectation, so I'd be expecting to write a risk assessment documenting what a usual capacity for any given space would be based on the type of event. Of course true to form there's no sign of any legislation to enact these changes with less than a week to go, let alone industry specific advice - at least there's been no update on https://www.gov.uk/guidance/working-safely-during-coronavirus-covid-19/performing-arts reflecting step 3, though I am keeping a close eye on that.

On the offchance that someone can use a bunch of rusty Strand stands, we can no longer store these almost any offer from £0 considered particularly if they would be used for a theatrical use! https://photos.app.goo.gl/rVZmasXcD5C3cMQ9A Full description on Ebay: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/174766791253 - please check there are no bids before making me an offer separately

In my experience, LX1 is always just upstage of the pros arch and subsequent bars are numbered going upstage. Anything in front of the pros is an advance bar, circle front, FOH, bridge (at the Oxford Playhouse) etc. In studio theatres with grids, I've generally not used bar numbers as it always feels calling the bar at the rear of the audience LX1 wrong! Hello from the just up the road in Oxford.

... 5 years later. So, I read that ETC were planning a proper DMX controlled driver for these, but it doesn't seem to have materialised. So I'm looking at doing something similar to you - how hard is the mod (I'd quite like to retain the possibility of using the built in driver), and what were the specs/current ratings needed?

I am going to be enquiring about this, Jivemaster - I'm not a party to the hire contract. The venue is fairly well equipped as a small theatre, but the people managing it are not theatre specific, so there may be some expectation management on both sides. The overhead projection equipment is not a deal breaker because it's only one piece of the show, and if we need, we can find (inferior) alternatives (to be honest, it's starting to look like we'll need to do this for budgetary reasons anyway). The house lantern stock is adequate for our other overhead rigging needs. And it now seems like I will at least be allowed to use their mobile scaffold for focussing, so small victories... But this is really all off the original topic :)

Thanks for all the many thoughts on this topic! Summary of some of the most salient points: - Secol and Unicol are brands that include flexible "system" projector mounts - Various suggestions on how to fabricate a vertical mount (beyond my capabilities!) - Don't hang a projector vertically via its base plate mount unless the manual says it's okay or if you have a cradle which supports its centre of gravity - You lose quite a bit of brightness using a mirror - Use a first surface mirror to avoid ghosting It does seem like the consensus is that the mirror idea is sub-optimal, which is not surprising Personally I'm not comfortable to fabricate a hanging cradle so I think a vertical mount such as https://unicol.com/products/projector-mounts/projector-suspension-unit would be the way to go, budget allowing. Another spanner in the works comes from the fact that the venue is now saying we can't rig any equipment of our own (I don't think is a judgement on any of our specific plans so much as a blanket policy - we need to go back and question them on this), so this may be all academic...

Hmm, interesting idea! I would have assumed wing mirrors are convex, but a cursory web search suggests that some are indeed flat. I'm not sure whether they are first surface though - I suspect not (meaning ghosting of the image, AIUI). It's a full motion video which needs to cover a wide playing space, so having a large enough mirror that it can be mounted somewhere sensible is another concern. For a 4m wide image approx 4m throw (ie a 1:1 lens), there's a 1:1 ratio between the width of the mirror and the distance you'd need to mount it from the source (which in optical terms will be *hand waves* behind the front of the lens. FWIW the piece is here . In that performance (which I wasn't involved in) they used a projector at a steep angle up on the grid, but it'll work better if it's truly vertical (with actor lighting supplemented from the sides) I think.

I've had a scout around at info online (blue-room and elsewhere) about this, but have come short when it comes to practicalities. I'm after a projection solution on a shoestring budget, to project vertically onto a stage from a lighting bar. I'm taking as a starting point that any projector I can beg/borrow/hire cheaply is not going to come with vertical flying hardware, even if the projector is happy with the idea, so I'm looking at getting a first surface mirror (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Optical-First-Surface-Mirror-ST-GS/dp/B00BARO9LS looks ideal), But how to mount it? I have access to a stock of short scaff bars, kee clamps and regular scaff clamps of various sorts, and plenty of wood, but I don't want to fudge something that's going to be suspending glass above actors so interested in all advice. Any thoughts about how to securely make or acquire something suitable would be much appreciated. I am assuming I'll have to bridge between two scaff bars to get a mounting position in front of the projector, but if there is a way to do so directly from the projector position that would be even better.

I agree with you up to a a point Paul - but I assume the OP was seeing some real show issues with random machines coming in, and if people a literally just double clicking on files in explorer, I'm not surprised. In my group one of our core missions is to educate - and if I see people doing things like the OP described then yes, I'm going to intervene. If on the other hand someone comes in with some tool that they know and are committed to the whole run I'm not saying they shouldn't be able to use it (this happened recently with someone bringing along MagicQ on a laptop for example). But the scenario where someone rocks up with a system that's not fit for purpose and saying nothing about it doesn't help the show, and it doesn't help the growth of the individuals. And even if you have someone using a perfectly good system that's unfamiliar to everyone else, you have to consider what happens when they are suddenly taken ill (or, common for us, that the operation runs on a rota). For that reason, standardising on tools that well known by multiple people (and having a training programme, whether dedicated or on-the-job, to ensure that), makes a lot of sense.

Personally I would always want to make sure that any show I had a stake in was using a proper cuing system such as QLab - on a properly prepared dedicated show machine - for the obvious reliability reasons. This is pretty well established as a convention in our theatre group - either our Mac mini (which we were fortunate to be able to invest in together with a decent USB audio interface and flight case) or a venue system. That said, the person who is appointed the sound (or projection) design doesn't always do the QLab programming, so it sometimes falls on me... If a personally-owned machine can be dedicated to the task for the week of the show, set out properly (I love that preparation doc of QLab's) and left at the venue (much like the discipline of the Prompt Copy never leaving the venue during show week) with the operation team having all the info they need to get up and running each day - then the ownership per se doesn't matter so much, but in practice it's so much easier to have a machine not owned by an individual and not used for anything else. In our case members are offered the chance to borrow it in advance for design work, and I quite often lend out an old Macbook Air for the same purpose which helps and is rather more portable. I suspect your challenge will be in persuading people that it's worthwhile and not an annoying arbitrary rule given the history which you've described. How has the ad hoc double clicking on files thing worked out in practice? Does it result in frequent mis-cues or other issues (volume?) for example? One thing you could do would be to run a class on designing with QLab - it's easy to do if you can rent your rehearsal venue for a couple of hours and have access to a Mac, a projector and a small PA. If you can take people through the possibilities (not just more reliable cueing, but more powerful dynamic sound designs), perhaps it will be easier to get people on board? (Hmm, it's probably time I did another one of those myself...) The other aspect is windows vs mac. It sounds like you have a company Mac computer which implies that you have already decided on that as the official platform, much as we have - but if using Windows is needed - there are QLab equivalents on Windows out there. I know very little about them, and I know about none that have commanded as much attention as QLab, particularly in the small-scale market - but a little bit of research there might yield some other possibilities.

We might have one or two in Oxfordshire (near Abingdon). When do you need them by and would you be able to collect? If yes I can try and find out more.