Controlling MX-4's

[Silvie]

Hi all (Newbie Here !)

 

I've got 4 x Martin MX-4's set up at my business, which does a lot of kids discos, etc. I've got one a master, and 3 slaves, all connected and work great with the auto-music trigger, all in sequence... but...

 

With Halloween coming soon, I want to take control of them, so I can try and set a scary scene. I'm thinking fixed white light, in different directions, with the odd bit of lightning (I may buy a smoke or haze machine too soon).

 

I'm not sure on the whole DMX thing, but what is the easiest (& cheapest !) way of achieving control?

 

Thanks in advance !

 

Paul.

[rossmck]

Try something like the MagicQ software by Chamsys - there's loads of threads about it on here and you can get a USB DMX dongle for PC really cheaply.. If it's a one-off I wouldn't bother buying a 'proper' controller but if you're likely to use them under DMX control often it may be worth looking at.

 

Alternatively if it's for one or two days contact a local hire company and hire a basic desk (and a decent hazer)

[jonhole]

Hi Paul,

 

The MX-4's use 7 DMX channels each, which can be seen in Appendix A of the manual, available here:

http://www.martin.com/product/product.asp?product=mx-4

 

To control each one separately, you would need 28 channels (7 x 4). If you just want them all to do the same thing, you can address each one to the same address (so only need 7 channels). Or you could pair them, and user 14 channels etc etc.

 

The cheapest and simplest way might be to buy one of the software packages that have been discussed a lot recently, which come with a USB > DMX dongle.

 

Alternatively, a manual DMX desk with the number of channels you need will do the job, just not quite a 'nicely'. Annoyingly for you, these usually come in 6 / 12 / 24 / 48 configurations. With this, each fader will relate to what is listed in Appendix A of the manual (there is a 'percentage' column which relate to the level of the fader). With this option, the 1st channel of each light can be set to between 70% - 80% and will still do your light to sound movements.

 

If you are happy to pair them, you could have two addressed to '1', and they would be faders 1 - 7, and the second pair could be addressed to '8' and be faders 8 - 12 (missing the last two channels which you are probably not too worried about).

 

Hope this helps

[MrJay]

If you wanted to use a manual controller then you could use something like this... It's cheap, has enough sliders to use all 7 channels and shouldn't be too hard to get used too....

 

 

 

 

http://www.thomann.de/gb/stairville_dmxmaster_i.htm

[Silvie]

Cheers for the reply's chaps... !

 

Mr Jay, that board looksa very effective and quick way to get my plan going....

 

.... still interested in the USB dongle soft ware idea. Where the best place to pick up a USB DMX dongle?

 

Thanks again !

[smalljoshua]

Choose the software, then buy the dongle. Not the other way around.

 

Josh

[greenalien]

One thing that the Stairville DMX Master desk will give you that the PC dongle plus software solution won't have is sound to light, which is very useful in a disco.

 

The Stairville desk is quite easy to use, and works well with MX4's. The basic building block of the desk is the 'scene' which is just a recording of your lights in one state. Move a few sliders to create the next scene, save that and so on. It stores its scenes in banks of 8 and you can then sequence through the 8 scenes with the music beat. You can also build up to 6 long chases that can contain scenes from any bank, and these can also be music triggered. Lots of fun to be had, and a good intro to the basics of DMX programming.

[Silvie]

Cheers Chaps!

 

Decisions Decisions !! I will have to run the cost's past the real boss (aka the wife !) and see what she will let me spend :-)

 

Thanks Again!