Question about Martin Mac250 lights

[HungT]

Hi everyone,

I have a question regarding the control of Martin Mac250 lights. My church will have a party at a restaurant, where they already have four (4) Mac250 light mounted on the ceiling. I saw they are wired with DMX cable and run to an outlet on the wall, only one. I have no idea which address they are set to, so I have to find out later. The issue here is we only have two basic controllers: Elation StageSetter-8 and Elation DMX Controller. I don’t know if they are suitable to control these lights or not since I have very little knowledge about controlling lights beside the par cans.

These are the light modes I’m looking to get: (1) synchronize “shimmering” color + still position, (2) changing color or AUTO color + AUTO rotation, and (3) AUTO color + strobe + AUTO rotation.

With the controllers available, can I achieve any/all of these modes? Or, which is the cheapest, easiest way to operate these lights? Or maybe, is there an AUTO switch on these lights?

Please help me and God Bless you all. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving.

HungT

[zactommo]

The lights can be controlled by any dmx controller. Basically the lights will use up mulitple channels, and each channel will control a different function. Eg pan ch1, tilt ch 2, gobo ch 3 and so on. So, although it's not easy to run them this way, It is certainly possible.

A couple of things to make life easier. Either set all the lights to the same dmx start address, so one lot of commands controls all the lights, or if the are addressed seperatly, then assign different functions to scenes, so you can get them all running without having to control 30 channels

Another helpful thing is is that in the menus of the lights, you should be able reverse the x & y axis, so that the lights mirror each other depending on where they are placed.

[HungT]

thanks zactommo, i think i will set them all with the same address.This is very helpful since the board only has 16 channels. There is 255 bit per channel so I assume that each bit value will change the property of each function right? Do you think I will run out of channels to control these lights? is 16-channel enough? And last, what do you mean about reserve x&y axis? Can you explain more for me? Thank you very much

HungT

[zactommo]

Here is a link to the user manual. http://www.productionireland.com/sit...+%20Manual.pdf
I'd take a good look at that. Take it slow, and read carefully, as there is some complex stuff in there.

Each light needs upto 13 channels to control, depends on what mode your in, so setting them to the same address would be advisable, given you've only got 16 channels. I hope your console has lots of scenes, otherwise operating them will be nigh on impossible.

Important thing to note in the manual is pages 21-23 show you what each DMX channel will control, and what data ranges will give what results. This obviously has variations depending on what mode your in, which is shown on the table.

Reserving the pan a tilt is the the personality menu, covered in page 9 of the manual. This is the idea of reserving the pan or tilt. Imagine you had two lights, positioned say 5 meters apart. If they are both set to the same DMX address, so in their center position, they both face forward, and panned hard left, they both face hard left. But if you reserve the pan on the right fixture, they are still in the same place in the center position, but if you pan hard left, the one on the left goes left, and the one on the right goes right; if you pan right, one goes right, one goes left, which results in them meeting in the middle. From a design point of view, the movements of the lights will look a lot better, and symmetrical, which is good! The same applies for the tilt. How you want to use this effect is dependent on the layout of your lights.

[HungT]

thanks zactommo, your information is very helpful. Now I understand what is reserving. I will try all your suggestions. Thanks again

[hoosierdraft]

Originally Posted by zactommo

Here is a link to the user manual. http://www.productionireland.com/sit...+%20Manual.pdf
I'd take a good look at that. Take it slow, and read carefully, as there is some complex stuff in there.

Each light needs upto 13 channels to control, depends on what mode your in, so setting them to the same address would be advisable, given you've only got 16 channels. I hope your console has lots of scenes, otherwise operating them will be nigh on impossible.

Important thing to note in the manual is pages 21-23 show you what each DMX channel will control, and what data ranges will give what results. This obviously has variations depending on what mode your in, which is shown on the table.

Reserving the pan a tilt is the the personality menu, covered in page 9 of the manual. This is the idea of reserving the pan or tilt. Imagine you had two lights, positioned say 5 meters apart. If they are both set to the same DMX address, so in their center position, they both face forward, and panned hard left, they both face hard left. But if you reserve the pan on the right fixture, they are still in the same place in the center position, but if you pan hard left, the one on the left goes left, and the one on the right goes right; if you pan right, one goes right, one goes left, which results in them meeting in the middle. From a design point of view, the movements of the lights will look a lot better, and symmetrical, which is good! The same applies for the tilt. How you want to use this effect is dependent on the layout of your lights.

I'm assuming every mention of "reserving" should have been "reversing"?

[zactommo]

Had a bit of a dyslexic there. Good save hoosierdraft!

[HungT]

both of the words sound right to me =))