Help me please

[Techie123]

Hi I'm new to this so please bare with me, at our collage we have got 3 pin ronded fader box on the side of our stage and we have a LED par can with little dip switches on it and a Zero 88 Jester 48 channel lighting board and I want to connect the par can into line 28 on the board and we are using an adaptor on the plug that goes from normal plug into round 3 pin to go into the fader box, so how would I go about putting all this together to do the colour changing on the LED.

Thanks James.

P.S. sorry if it doesn't make a lot of sense I am new to it.

[jamessmith2k]

Do not connect the LWD par can to the dimmer, it will need to be connected to "hard" power - that is a normal (non-dimmed) supply. You will then need to extend your DMX chain to the lEd fixtures via 3pin (or less likely 5 pin) DMX cables and set the dip switches as needed to be controlled by channels on the desk.

 

Remembering to terminate the line at the end of the run of DMX.

[themadhippy]

the 3 pin ronded fader box sounds like a dimmer,DONT plug your leds in there,take the adaptor off and put the normal plug into a normal socket.on the Zero 88 Jester 48 theres a socket marked DMX out,this should have a wire going to the dimmers.this is the wire that needs to go into the DMX in on one of the led cans,then link the DMX out of this can to the next led can input,the out then goes to the next led can and so on ,finally the output of the last led can then connects to the DMX input on the dimmer,alternativly the dimmer might have a DMX out,you can use this to go to the first can,link the cans the same as above ,youll end up with last cans DMX output having nothing to plug into it,you should in theory put a DMX terminator in there but in most cases you can get away with it.next you have to address the cans,depending on the cans it might be binary dip switches or maybe up down arrows and an led display,whatever it is set the address to 28 on all the cans .next raise fader 28 on the jester,if nothing happens try all the combinations of the faders from 28 upwards,once you get something happening you should be able to work out what fader does what.

[Bryson]

Moderation: Moved to the Beginners Please forum.

[Roderick]

Let me see if I can make some sense out of this.

What you are describing is the problem of running a LED par from a lighting desk using DMX. That is fairly simple but the terminology you use is a rather confusing which makes it a little difficult.

 

You will need to do a little research into DMX and how it works and then you'll need to understand how to set the DMX address on the LED Par and how to patch that address in the Zero 88.

A heads-up, it won't be a single channel (or line as you call them) but at least 4 to make the thing work.

Alternatively, try to find someone nearby who can show you what to do in about 10 minutes....

[Techie123]

OK cheers and I know I made it sound complicated we have got the DMX in from the fader packs on stage which has already got 27 lights plugged in such as a whole bar of LED jelly pars and the zero 88 Jester has got a 5 pin DMX out but the LED's have only got a 3 pin and we have not got long enough leads to go from our tech box to the stage as it's like a 50m Hall so is there any other way and these are what have have got on stage with all the other lights plugged into http://www.stagelighting.co.uk/control/dimming/zero88/zero-88-alpha-pack-2 we have several of them and I thought as we had got other lights plugged into them I thought I could plug these in there

[Ynot]

This is going to sound a little patronising, but to be honest (and blunt, which I feel may be needed here) the sort of questions you're asking are pretty basic when it comes to modern theatre lighting equipment, and the responses you're giving suggest that your knowledge and experience are extremely limited.

 

So the best advice that you can take as a student in this situation is to step back completely from the problem and pass it back to the teacher who is (who MUST be) in charge of the project and reluctantly say that you don't have the ability to sort this at this time. The teacher or other school rep - if none of them have the required knowledge/experience (which wouldn't be surprising) - should then contact a local theatre tech company and ask for assistance in setting up the kit. If done in the right way it's very likely that for a school, they won't charge for the advice.

 

Once that's sorted (and it really shouldn't take them long once on site) you can then go and research how DMX works, and how things should be connected - check posts here on the Blue Room for links and suggested reading, and the Wiki here isn't bad. That way you may be better equipped for future tasks.

 

 

 

[Techie123]

Yes I have not got a lot of experience in this and I know how to do it now but the reason I thought it was more complex is because we have not got a DMX panel on stage so we have got to go from our jester board all the way down the hall to the lights

[themadhippy]

so we have got to go from our jester board all the way down the hall to the lights

isnt there a DMX line from the jester to the alpha packs?

[paulears]

5 pin from the desk can just be converted to 3 pin for these LEDs with a converter, which you school/college can buy from CPC one of their suppliers for a few pounds.

 

MDX only used 3 of the pins in the 5 pin plugs - so not a problem. To be fair, it's a lot of faffing around, just get the teacher to do it who will know - and may even have an adaptor.

[Techie123]

OK thanks guys