FocalPoint

[IRW]

Hi All,

Hope it's OK to put this here- it's as much about promoting discussion about modern control methods as it is about bringing attention to my work!

After a month or so of solidly working on it, and 8 months prior to that of 'bubbling along', the time has come to announce my latest project:

 

http://www.irwfocalpoint.com/Images/FocalPoint_Logo350wide.png

 

http://www.irwfocalpoint.com

 

For the whole backstory, please see the website, but in a nutshell, I'm fed up with controlling intelligent fixtures with encoders, and having to have my head in a computer when designing, when there is so much modern technology around now that can be used to enhanced my workflow, but just simply hasn't been implemented by console manufacturers. I've been pondering for the last year or so how, and even if, motion control and augmented reality could be used to increase efficiency and aid creativity at the production desk, and FocalPoint has become a conduit to assist with these experiments. So far, it's looking positive, and I'm already reaping the benefits of not having to deal with pan, tilt and zoom encoders on my shows, and instead having parameters literally in the palm of my hand and at my fingertips without having to click through encoder pages. Have a look at this video I've made of the system in action to start getting an idea of where I'm going:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gL0qoseJoFg

 

And here's me in the 'lab' actually using the entire system on a recent show:

http://www.irwfocalpoint.com/Images/ian_smartglasses.jpg

 

 

I've come out of that particular show with lots of ideas as to how I can improve the information that I'm seeing on my smartglasses, but that's for another day...the main thing for the time being is the motion control side is starting to work rather well, which is why I have decided that now is the time to get this out there. To continue development, I need to know if what I'm working on is useful to other people- if it is, I'll carry on developing in such a way that other people can actually use it. If not, then I'll just develop it in a prototype-kind of way just for my own benefit! Bear in mind I'm not just talking about the positioning aspects of what it does- I'm talking about the wider way of how we interact with that equipment hanging X many meters away from us, in such a way that creativity is nurtured, whilst being able to work at the speeds that modern schedules require.

 

 

If you'd like to have a play with this, I've deliberately made it scalable- it will work as just a computer. From there you can use an iPhone to start experimenting with motion control (sorry Android users- I've only just learnt how to do iPhones in the last week!). If you get on with that, then you can introduce LeapMotion for 'proper' seamless control if you want. The FocalPoint software is available for both Windows and OS X- there are time-limited demo versions available on the website to play with, and if you like what you see, I'd appreciate it if you could buy a copy- It's not particularly expensive, but as an introductory offer to BR members, if you use the code 'blueroom181' at the checkout, you'll get a whopping 50% off, as I really need some early adopters to start playing with this and sending feedback my way! This code is available to the first 25 people who buy a copy.

 

 

FocalPoint currently talks to EOS family consoles of all flavours, but the way I've coded it will make it a doddle to enable communication with other console families- all it needs is for me to work out how to get data in/out of other systems in a suitable manner, and I'd be especially interested in talking to anyone who is knowledgeable in how to talk to MA, Hog, or Chamsys programmatically.

 

 

Thanks for reading! I'd really appreciate it if everyone can spread the website around through whatever channels you use!

 

 

Ian

 

(I'm going to apologise in advance about the formatting of this post in case it doesn't work properly, as I know from past experience editing it will make it even worse!...I can work very clever consoles and write some nifty software, but this forum editor always seems to get the better of me!)

[indyld]

Interesting stuff. Nearly ten years ago, we were messing around with various things including Wiimotes and TUIO and Smiffy wrote a short piece on 'Minority Report' style control. And yet here we are and very little has changed other than a few more touchscreeny-slidery-twisty things on some consoles.

 

Given that we gave joysticks and the old Avo graphics tablet the heave-ho yet not really sought to replace wheels/encoders, I wonder what it is about them that makes the latter so enduring. I actually don't mind encoders, probably something to do with subtley and accuracy. As for command line, well that's a question for the theatre-desk fanciers. For me it's hard to place the value of an improved interface for EOS family desks because I find them needlessly hard work compared to the anything from the lineage rooted in Hog or Avo (including MA etc) to begin with.

 

Love to mess about with it. Although it does currently mean fighting with an ETC desk too. :-/

[timsabre]

That's very interesting and as Rob says, the positional control is very similar to the Avo graphics tablet from 15 years ago. Personally I am not sure about the hand wavy stuff but a good lighting control system will provide a variety of ways to work to suit different people.

 

Since Avo integrated the Capture visualiser you can do the "touch to point lights" thing on that. There is still work to be done on that integration though, it is not always a smooth experience.You don't list Avo in your connectional aspirations but I can tell you how to connect to them via their WebAPI if you want.

 

[indyld]

Since Avo integrated the Capture visualiser you can do the "touch to point lights" thing on that. There is still work to be done on that integration though, it is not always a smooth experience.

 

That particular feature is common on most pro consoles these days but as you say, isn't always an ideal experience when actually trying to create on stage. It's one of those things that I never really bothered to use in anger on the old Avo tablets (fun idea but took too long to set up) , and don't really use on any desk that can do it today (which still needs an accurate model but at least doesn't involved paper cups and mic stands.) Not least because there are very few points in any show where I want a large group of fixtures to all point to the same bit of the stage and if I do, it takes seconds to create by hand with a combination of groups and different fan/align settings. Even if I did find a need to all start off at one point in space, I'd always need to Next,Next,Next through to tweak the individual fixtures.

 

This also brings up the workflows of working with fixtures, in particular the idea of working with positional movement relative to the fixture. This can seem a pain if one treats fixtures as individual units, working through their focus positions one at a time as with conventional fixtures. However, few moving light programmers treat fixtures like this and actually herd great handfuls of them into rough positions (not in the same place) before banging through the Next button and making tiny adjustments. The only thing that we habitually waste time on is in moving the encoder slightly, only to find that the fixture needs to go the other way! But it's a small inconvenience and I'm not sure that working in 'stage space' would help me much in that regard.

 

So for me, the interesting element here is the way we physical interact with the fixture values and the resulting light on stage. Having tried a few non-encoder methods of even the most basic control, I'm still undecided on how much hand-wavy, pinchy-twisting I'd like to be able to do on the few attributes that lend themselves to gestures.

 

One thing that this does start to provide is the potential for a more intuitive transition from doing one thing (such as position) to another (such as zoom) without having to remember to punch buttons and turn off Fan settings etc.

 

I'm all for development though, so let's keep on thinking and experimenting.

[J Pearce]

Looks interesting. The sort of thing that moves a magic sheet from useful to a significant way of interacting with the rig.

 

I won’t have an EOS show with lots of movers til March, but I’ll probably have a play with it then.