timmeh2

Hi all Interesting read, this thread. Suspending things from underneath a helicopter is actually fairly straightforward, legally, providing the aircraft is fitted with factory-fitted or approved aftermarket sling hooks, and the load doesn't exceed the load rating of the helicopter, and the combined weight of the load, pilot, passengers and fuel does not exceed the all-up-weight of the aircraft, and the performance of the engine(s) and rotor system on the day (variable on things like the weather) are within limits. The hoop is suspending from two slings, but I'd suspect that if one snapped the other one would be strong enough to keep things attached. They're using a longline to keep the hoop out of the downwash from the rotor otherwise it would spin like a top, although there would be some wind irrespective of sling length. Once in the hover the airflow from the blades tends to be fairly laminar, which actually helps to stabilize what's underneath, providing it's not shaped like a wing. A human on a hoop is about as unaerodynamic as you can get. Sure it's been mentioned already but as she sits on the hoop you can see her attach a d-link with a steel cable to her belt to prevent her from falling out. For those that are interested, the helicopter they used is possibly an AS530. They have a rather unique shape to their skids. https://www.aircraft...-Sale/62698.htm All the best Timmeh

Ah yes... but is it more reliable than a disasterpiece in a hot and sticky nightclub?

New price? AFAIK the prelude and coda lines were discontinued years ago...

Hi If you go onto Avo's website they still do the personality discs, writing your own .r20 isn't massively complicated and there are plenty of examples to see how the format works. All the best Timmeh

Hi Theres half of it... https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F163643028783 All the best Timmeh

Hi If you're triggering an MA2 the easiest thing to use is MIDI. My box does support bi-directional comms. It's made up of an ESP8266 programmable wifi jobbie that looks similar to an Arduino UNO - programming is easy and through their IDE. If you're interested, I wouldn't mind writing the code for you. All the best Timmeh

Hi I have an ADA8000 bolted onto the back of my 01v96 desk and I honestly can't tell the difference between the audio coming of that and the desk itself. Even test tones sound fine with no distortion in the waveform. The only thing that really goes wrong on them like Sandall has said is the PSUs but it's trivial to replace the capacitors. All the best Timmeh

Hi I've solved this issue by building buttons that run over Wifi and UDP. It transmits the button condition 10-16 times a second, so when its state changes you're guaranteed that at least one packet gets through. The range of the devices were about 50 ft between button to access point. The other end was a bit of c++ software listening for the packet state and firing off the appropriate MIDI command when it changed. All the best Timmeh

Hi Nope - it will go sticky after being baked on with the heat. The only thing I would be tempted to use is molybdenum dry film lubricant. All the best Timmeh

Hi I use light oil spray such as MechOil, and use it sparingly on the feature wheels. Irises should never be lubricated, because anything you add ultimately dries out and jams the petals together. I would avoid using PTFE spray as it tends to become very gummy over time which inevitably leads to problems. Optical components can be soaked in 100% isopropanol before air-drying. Be wary when removing the 700's diffuser assembly as it is extremely fragile, and the zoom lens must be fully forward before it can be slid out of the chassis. The kryptons are a much simpler affair, although care must be taken not to crush the wiring with the colour/gobo assembly when putting it back together. The focus worm drive can be lubricated with a few drops of 3 in 1. Belts can be lubricated with dressing spray. All the best Timmeh

Hi Mike Ch38; we have four of them, that all misbehave. The 2 remaining AT3000 receivers are in the same rack, and are also in the same band, which don't suffer the same problem. All the best Timmeh

Hi This may or may not be of any value, but here goes... I suffer the same issue with the G4 systems; after some investigative work involving oscilloscopes and RF analysis (at some cost) it turns out they can be atrociously susceptible to high-powered 2.4Ghz WiFi and 2.6Ghz 4G/LTE emissions; we upgraded from AT3000 series (which never had an issue) to AT3212 which was practically unusable because of drop-out and poor performance; so we swapped for G4s in the hope they'd do better. Sadly not. Even with pilot tone enabled the venue's wifi can easily overwhelm the receivers causing dancing RF meters when the mics are off, to dropout and crap range whilst they are on. The venue in question has Cisco access points that can transmit at a power far in excess of a hand-held microphone (or belt pack) and just love to hop all over the place, so much to the point that a 2.4Ghz wireless mouse and keyboard will pack up when the venue is full of guests, as will just about every 2.4Ghz radio mic that a visiting act has tried to use; I've seen an AKG Tetrad mic go titsup within 6ft of its receiver, and they are supposed to be bombproof. This is further backed up by the fact that when the venue is empty the interference is non-existant. Bottom line is you're probably experiencing Out of Band interference like I am; the solution is to use external bandpass filters tuned to the particular range that your mics work on, although these cost several hundred quid a pop, and the programmable ones even more. If you're not having issues with them on, then my advice would just be to ignore it, although I have to make sure that the desk channels are muted when not in use, for reasons like Paul has explained above. All the best Timmeh

Hi Even Smart Dimmers cause issues; I had to deal with an install on a cruise ship that used (supposedly) pure-sine dimmers, that could be configured as hard power. 32 virtually brand-new, destroyed VL1000TSDs later, they decided it might not have been as good as they thought. All the best Timmeh

Hi Have they really only got one universe available? If it's a single output desk I doubt they are using them in 16-bit dimming mode. What desk have they got? All the best Timmeh

Hi Some rather cringe-worthy posts on my part from back then. MA1 on PC (up to desk version 6.606) will output MA-Net without any unconnected hardware, although capture will need to be on the same subnet for it to see the desk. MA2 does not, it requires at least one piece of hardware, be it an NDP, VPU, Network Dimmer or MA2 console before it spits out anything. I presume the change was implemented because it doesn't take a huge amount of effort to decode MA-Net v1 packets and once you've got the raw DMX, you can do what you like with it. I know that there were suppliers from China who, along with counterfeiting the entire console range, were building Artnet and DMX dongles that could be driven directly from onPC. If it's just for academic purposes, then I'm happy to say you can still download MA1 on PC from MA's website. All the best Timmeh

Hi Just to add my 2pence... DMX is far more resilient than most people realise. The standard defines twisted pair conductors with 110ohm impedance but I'm sure we've all used the worst kind of mic cable at some point in our careers, and got away with it. Given that it is a differential signal, providing the conductors are roughly electrically identical you can send it down just about anything. I've fired it down domestic TNE cable with no issues at all. Back in the day, when a fixture's electronics where noisy and only the top-grade stuff had opto-isolation, you could run into trouble. Nowadays even your cheapy LED parcans seem to be mostly immune to interference, unless you do something really naughty. Gone are the days when you had to use terminators and buffer out your LED kit to prevent all sorts of reflection shenanigans, although I still see it from time to time, and it is considered good practise to compartmentalise installations as it makes troubleshooting a lot easier. It also appears that the pin 2-3 reverse issue that often reared its ugly head seems to be a thing of the past. All the best Timmeh

Hi A good proportion of the acts I see use the Bose system, and they sound good. However be aware that the L1 compact is very tall when bolted together at 6.5ft / 79 inches. It's also not expandable, unlike the much more expensive L2, and runs out of steam quite quickly. I wouldn't use it for spaces that held more than 75-100 people. As always, getting it demo'd is key. Don't buy anything until you know exactly how it's going to sound with you using it. All the best Timmeh

Hi A controller won't respond to MIDI commands it isn't programmed to listen to. According to the manual, which is pretty sparse tbh, the box doesn't listen to MIDI Control or Program Change messages. It is possible to adjust the volume of the individual pads in the settings but this isn't what you were after. Chances are that it will do SysEX, but if the chart isn't published you'll be a bit stumped. You can however, use it as a MIDI triggering device - you could drive something like a Novation Drumstation (think TR909 clone) or an Akai S1000 or better sampler - both offer multi-output so you can split out your sounds to your preference. The only thing that really goes wrong with Akais is the LCD backlight breaks, but there are plenty of people who sell kits and new displays for them. And if you do go multi-channel, there's nothing to stop you buying another mixer which you can sub out to your main, which would give you total control over your kit. There's currently a very-nice looking S3000XL on fleebay for £125. If you've never tried to program a hardware sampler before, it is a lot of fun. Glowsticks optional. All the best Timmeh

Hi I just about remember raylights, they were popular in rave clubs at the time. IIRC they were very good at burning holes in things, notably starcloths. As an aside the S4 Par stole the rotatable lens idea from them, although both were equally useless, if the fixture had been running more than 10 minutes the thing would usually jam due to expansion and would also melt your fingertips if you tried to move it. All the best Timmeh.

You're more than welcome, we look forward to seeing some pictures at some point. ;)

Thanks, I now have Anchorman stuck in my head.

All true Although for exhibition stands, the S4 PAR has no equal in terms of aesthetics. You can also mix and match the PAR with the PARnel and they look the same, which is obviously important when your lighting grid needs to be a work of art in itself. All the best Timmeh

Hi I'm wondering if OP was asking how to achieve the same sort of look in real life, given that his question was 'how to' rather than 'how did they' The answer is you could, but you'd need some carefully-placed lighting. You can reproduce the colour palette with a mix of pastels and stronger colours but be wary you'll need some key light for faces. A mixture of something like L120, 363, 175, 200, and the old favourites L115 and L132 might get you somewhere near. And yes, for real-world you'll want to use UV floodlighting. To get the floor look, you can get UV reactive paint that glows bright cyan. I've used it for creating tron-esque bits of set and it worked quite well, although old-skool UV cannons don't produce the greatest look, so you might look at a load of LED fixtures. The others are right in saying that this would have been green-screened. To achieve a background without shadows, without the aid of computers, you need to ensure your walls are as bright as the object light. You could cheat this, and place LED tiles behind a very diffuse filter, but that depends on your budget. The illusion of depth is a camera angle trick, it's roughly at waist height and pointed upwards. As for the ceiling, well you are a bit stumped there. That's how they've hidden the lighting grid post-production. In the studio you'll most likely find a load of top light. I've used Kino Flo in the past as they make tubes specifically designed for green-screen applications. Is this any help? All the best Timmeh

Hi The best advice I can give you is to throw it away and buy a new one. Sourcing spares is nigh-on-impossible and the components and specifications can change with every batch that leaves the factory. What I can tell you is that its a dual-voltage regulated PSU that kicks out 24v for the steppers and 12v for logic and the LED chips, which is pretty common for this kind of kit. You might be able to find a generic board that fits, but they come in many shapes and sizes. If its failing to start it could be a shorted component causing the polyfuse to constantly break and reset. Can you fire it up on the bench to see what happens? Usual precautions about line voltage applies. All the best Timmeh

Hi Slightly OT but most consoles with a DMX In can be slaved to another. I've had an MA running off my Avo Sapphire because I wanted lots of physical faders but the control and power of the latter. All the best Timmeh