ETC smartfade ML

[Joe Bleasdale]

hi guys,

I was wondering if anyone has used the ETC smartfade ML. have you had any problems, or any praise to give it? My school are supposed to be getting one so.... is it any good?

[Brian]

Yes, I own one and have had no problems with it. I think it's a cracking little desk, very easy to use and lots of features. If you haven't already done so then download the offline console simulator and have a play.

[mar]

I would second the recommendation to try the offline simulator. We hired one in for an event before Christmas and as I knew I'd only have about a day at best to get my head round busking on the desk the chance to get familiar with the layout and basic functions in advance was a godsend.

 

I found the desk a little confusing at first (but then as my day to day desk is an Express, it is a but of a step up) but once I'd got the hang of it I was able to busk with our fairly basic rig okay. Well that is until someone sat in the seating behind me managed to kick the plug out of the wall killing the desk and my FoH dimmer.

 

I have not tried it as a traditional cue stack desk, but from reading the manual I suspect it could be limited in that capacity.

 

I guess it really depends on what the desk is being bought for, live events, traditional theatre, static rig or moving lights.

I would certainly hope that it is not a desk the school is going to be attempting to teach lighting on (as part of Theatre studies for example) as I would have said it is too complicated for an absolute beginner (which is why we have our Express)

[Joe Bleasdale]

the desk will be used for 4 robe 250 colour spots and possibly 20 generics in the future. im not a total beginner, I have used the bull frog, 520 and the 520i so I hope the free days training should be enough! ;)

[woody74]

the desk will be used for 4 robe 250 colour spots

 

A good desk for the application; so the school is buying them? In your other post, they were just hoping to buy.

 

-w

[Joe Bleasdale]

well you know! with education there are always problems and snags! :** laughs out loud **:

[peter]

If you've used a Bull Frog, you might like to look at the Jester ML, which works in pretty much the same way :** laughs out loud **:

[elarsen]

the desk will be used for 4 robe 250 colour spots and possibly 20 generics in the future. im not a total beginner, I have used the bull frog, 520 and the 520i so I hope the free days training should be enough! :)

 

 

As well as using the Virtual SmartFade ML software on a PC, you should explore the video tutorials on our website too.

You will find them at: http://www.etcconnect.com/product.tutorial.aspx?ID=20338

And within the next week a free PC application will become available from our website as well - SmartSoft - that will allow you to connect via USB to your SmartFade ML desk in live or to use it offline for programming.

 

Rgds

 

Erik Larsen

Market Manager

ETC Ltd.

[Guest]

IMO, an excellent desk! Compact, simple and easy to use. Would definately recommend it. Feel free to PM if you have any difficulties when you first use it etc.

 

Cheers,

Alex.

[marijn hubregtse]

hi guys,

I've been working with the smartfade ml for almost a year now. in a club situation with 8 hes technobeams, and 24 par cans paired on 12 dimmers. also a few extras such as led spheres and a star curtain.

although I realy like the design of the console and it has been very intuitive to work with from day one, I have some problems;

using the scans in memories the the scans intensity's do not react to the memory fader, I have to put intensity to full manually.

when turning off a memory with scans in it the scans will not home, they will go back to the position of a random previous used memory, or just stay in a mix of the memory I last used and all the memory's used before.

also positions wil sometimes vary after turning off the console. eg scans on the mirriball sometimes are next to the mirrorball.

is there something I'm doing wrong or are these bugs?

it isn't that much of a problem because I mostly just play with palletes but sometimes I just want to change colour, possition, beam and effect in one action.

 

oh by the way the only thing that I realy do not understand:

why do you have to refer to existing memories if you want to make a chase or cue stack? tooo much work!!!

regards,

marijn

[Tomo]

using the scans in memories the the scans intensity's do not react to the memory fader, I have to put intensity to full manually.

Sounds like the memories you've recorded don't include the intensity. Try re-recording them with the intensity at full.

There was a bug with the display of the intensity for fixtures with a remote dimmer that's fixed in 2.1.1, but this didn't affect the real output of the desk.

The other options to watch for are [Go Mode] and [int Only], which radically change how the Memory faders work.

when turning off a memory with scans in it the scans will not home, they will go back to the position of a random previous used memory, or just stay in a mix of the memory I last used and all the memory's used before.

When you pull the fader back down it goes to where it would be without that fader, which depends on what other memories are active and if you've used other controls.

As you're often playing with the palettes, you'll see this quite often - once you manually move something, it's considered to be the Most Important Thing and overrides everything else.

- SmartFade ML is "Latest-Takes-Precedence" for attributes other than Intensity.

also positions wil sometimes vary after turning off the console. eg scans on the mirriball sometimes are next to the mirrorball

That sounds like your scans are drifting under use - unfortunately many scans aren't very repeatable as the mirror doesn't have position feedback so the fixture is 'guessing' where the mirror is.

why do you have to refer to existing memories if you want to make a chase or cue stack? tooo much work!!!

No need to do that - when you [Record], hit the [stack] key instead of a Memory bump and then choose how to record the cue (New Step/Replace Step etc)

 

Finally, which version are you running? There have been quite a few extra features and bugfixes along with built-in library updates recently.

 

The current released version is 2.1.1, so I'd suggest upgrading if you haven't already.

- You'll need either a Windows XP PC with a USB port (and download SmartSoft), or an SD Card and suitable SD Card reader to do the upgrade.