Running sound AND light from onstage

[Damian Jay]

Good Evening to you all

 

My name is Damian, and I found this forum completely by accident while scouring the internet for some information to help me with the technical aspect of my shows.

 

I'm currently touring a 1 hour comedy magic show round schools and community centres, with the aim of putting it into small theatres by the end of this year (2009). Untill recently I used a black spangly backdrop and lit the show using 8 Par 56's (300w).

 

I want to incorporate some of my disco lighting into my show. This will add greatly to my show giving a much more theatrical feel and experiance to my audiences. The lighting fixtures I am wanting to use are :-

 

4 x Acme Dynamo Party Scans 100w each (4 channels each)

2 x Acme Dynatwins 100w each (8 channels each)

2 x Magic Gobos 150w each (3 channels each) -(not sure who makes / made them)

1 x Skytec Galaxy Laser (6 channels)

8 x LED Par 64 (5 channels each)

 

The set up is this :-

 

on the lighting gantry at the back of the performing I have the 2 Dynatwins, 2 Magic Gobos and 2 of the Dynamo Party Scans.

 

Out front of the performing area facing inwards, I have one T bar stand on stage left and one T bar stand on stage right. Each stand has 4 x LED par cans and 1 Dynamo Party Scan. Each Par on stage left is paired with its oppersite on stage right, achieved by giving two Pars the same DMX address.

 

Currently I have been using Sweetlight (the USB version) to design my lightshow and sync it to music where needed. However the USB can only be used with up to 10 fixtures, I am wanting to use 14 (as the Pars are assigned in pairs using the same DMX address for each pairing)

 

My plans have since changed, and instead of having someone with me on my shows to opperate the sound and lighting (assistants being hard to come by, and reliability issues, and of course not being able to offer them much in the way of payment). Now I want to run the whole lot by myself while onstage performing.

 

Heres what I want to be able to do (I dont think I'm asking too much :P )

 

1 - I now need to find some software similar to sweetlight that has a 3d view of the set-up. I can then design the show on computer while seeing what Im doing on-screen (the show set up is too big to set up in the house or garage)

 

2 - I need to be able to sync the lighing to music and save it.

 

3 - I need to find a bit of kit that enables me to opperate the whole show (at the touch of a button or foot pedal affair, the latter being most ideal), sound AND lights, from onstage while performing.

 

 

I have looked at this DMXable footswitch from Terralec. This seems like it would be ok, but how do I load in my lightshow?

 

This little obstacle has been bugging me for a couple of days now and for the moment the answer is beyond my knowhow. If anyone has any (polite :P ) suggestions as to how I can achieve my goals I would be very grateful and buy them a virtual drink at the virtual bar :)

 

Thanks for taking the time to read

 

Kind Regards

 

Damian Jay

 

Illusion is just another form of reality !

 

edit due to bad typing

Moderation: The question Damian asked has been expanded in a new post here - so please post any responses there. Paul - mods