Zero88 Up/Down Times

[JMC]

Hi All,

 

Do Zero88 desks still have that annoying "feature" with the cue stacks, where the downtime of a cue actually refers to the next cue? For example;

 

Cue 1: 2/4

Cue 2: 5/3

Cue 3: 7/10

 

What you would get is:

Run Cue 1: Lights up over 2

Run Cue 2: Lights up over 5, DOWN OVER 4 (downtime of cue 1)

Run Cue 3: Lights up over 7, DOWN OVER 3 (downtime of cue 2)

 

I may be way off on this assessment, it's been years since I've used any Zero88 kit...

 

Cheers.

[JimWebber]

All the Z88 desks I have used have been in the format of Cue x = 2/4

 

ie) up over 2 seconds, and down over 4.

 

 

Jim

[peter]

The Sirius desk works like this:

 

Cue 1 3/4

 

Cue 2 5/6

 

 

When you run into Cue 1, the lights fade up over 3 (up time of Cue 1).

 

When you run into Cue 2, the lights from Cue 1 fade down over 4 (down time of Cue 1) and the lights from Cue 2 fade up over 5 (up time of Cue 2).

 

 

The Frogs, Illusions and Jester work like this:

 

Cue 1 3/4

 

Cue 2 5/6

 

 

When you run Cue 1, any lights fading down take 4 seconds, any lights fading up take 3 seconds.

 

When you run Cue 2, any lights fading down take 6 seconds, any lights fading up take 5 seconds.

 

The second (Frog/Illusion/Jester) method is in common with almost every other lighting desk in the world. The Sirius is the oddball in the range.

[JMC]

Lovely, I guess it must be the sirrius I'm having memories (nightmares? panic attacks?) about.. B-)

[Suzette]

Yes your nightmare memories are correct with the Sirius desks - it is VERY annoying, especially when you have been plotting on any other desk in the world and come back to the Sirius and keep forgetting to change the down time of the previous cue when plotting!

Please God (or college bosses?) give me some money to buy a new desk!!!!

[themadhippy]

it is VERY annoying, especially when you have been plotting on any other desk in the world and come back to the Sirius and keep forgetting to change the down time of the previous cue when plotting!

And just as bad,if not worse ,going back the other way,however in a perverse hippy way the sirus method seems more logical.

[Bryson]

I seem to recall that the Jands Event (or, at least, the old type of Event) handles times like a Sirius. And don't even get started on doing point cues....

[Neil Hampson]

Oh come on lets not be too unfair on the old Sirrius. I bet that for a lot of people here it was the first (affordable) desk that had a proper memory stack, A whole generation will have grew up using the Sirrius and it's reign as the king of the school hall has really only just been superceded by the Frog range. Yes I know that the Fade times are a little.. lets say quaint, and that teh insrt points aren't exactly logical, but in it's day (The school's is now for almost 15 years old) it was a good desk, it still is a good desk. It's just been left behind by newer technologies. Remember, a desk can only be as good as it's operator, and the rest of the equipment in the venue. In a studio space full of Patt.23s and 123's it's good enough for me...

(can't you tell I've still got one?) B-)

[johnhuson]

however in a perverse hippy way the sirus method seems more logical.

 

I'm with hippy! I've always found the Sirius way more logical even if it is completely different to nearly every other desk!

[gareth]

John! Hippy! How can you say that?! Anyone who's been brought up with any half-decent memory desk (right back to the early Strand stuff - the first desk I ever got 'hands on' with was an MMS ...) will be familiar with the programming concept of the times attached to a particular cue affecting the transition of the output channels running into that cue. When I run cue X, I want the times attached to cue X to affect what happens when it runs. The last thing I want is to run cue Y, which might be quite some time later, and have the fade times governed by a value which is programmed into a cue which I ran ages ago ...

[Bryson]

The difference is one of concept - the Sirius assigns times to the memories not the cues. While we often use the two words interchangeably, they mean quite different things. Obviously, as we've seen, the method of assigning times to the cues - ie the transitions between memories - has proved to be the most useful, but the Sirius has it's own consistent logic, once you're used to it.

[JimWebber]

John! Hippy! How can you say that?!...

 

Ummm - Ermmm.... I'm not going to say anything....

 

I will be honest though, I don't think I have ever used fade times in anything but a dipless scenario, and have not made any difference.

 

I can see the merits behind both sysems. Plotting wise it is nice to say this state will be up in x, and down in y.

 

Running the show, it is good to see at a glance what is going to happen, and more importantly how long it will take...

 

 

...it's good enough for me...

(can't you tell I've still got one?) B-)

 

You think you've got problems mate!, I've somehow ended up with three of them... ;)

 

Jim

[Neil Hampson]

...it's good enough for me...

(can't you tell I've still got one?) :)

 

You think you've got problems mate!, I've somehow ended up with three of them... ;)

 

Jim

 

Yes But I have one in the house! (currently sitting in a flightcase under the stairs) it seems a good buy at the time... not even for hires, my own personal desk, I could never convince the wife to let me install the dimmers though... ;)