Help with how it all works

[hwracer]

Hello everyone!


I design and build models of theatre stages, in particular of the musical Wicked. A friend of mine wired up 115 channels of LOR data. He's recently moved to London so I need some help. I'm not sure about the capabilities of the software so I am just going to explain what I am using now and go on from there.


What I am using now
I have 2 5m RGB LED strips from eBay and a RGB LED Wifi controller so I control them via my tablet.


I want to be able to use a mixture of generic led/rgb diodes and the cosmic colour ribbon. Is this possible? How does it get from the box to the computer (the pictures confused me!)?


From what I've read you control the lights on the computer by configuring all the led data/channels to music (it's musical theatre so that's a plus!!)


Sorry about all these questions! I want to know if it will work for me before coughing up $400AU


- Lindsay, NSW

 

[Jago]

Bit more info on the strips, maybe a link to the items.

I would think dumb strips so you will need a controller for them.

There is a few options. If you are using LOR you can go a CMB-24D Thats a DC RGB controller. It will also require a dongle (converts usb from computer to data the controller can understand.)


Also read the Christmas Lighting 101

 

[ecbailey]

In addition to the controller and dongle Jago mentioned, your going to need some software, there are numerous free and paid options, all will end up with a result, they just will go about it different methods. If your going to go down the LOR route then they have a fairly simple paid program, however you can save some $$ by purchasing their starter pack.


If you have already built the model, with most of the programs you can overlay lights on a picture and link that to the programming of the physical lights so you can see what is happening and if it is in time to the music without having to see the actual lights (this is the visualiser). This is rather handy for Christmas lighting as it is hard to see your entire house from a computer desk (usually), however if you can see the stage model from your computer it is somewhat pointless.


Having a browse through the Wiki will also be quite helpful to you. And a warning: Your house may end up covered in lights by December

 

[DanJ]

I recommend that you do a lot of reading before jumping into pixels with lor. They make great hardware and software but I think they are kind of behind the curve with respect to controlling large numbers of rgb channels. Lor definitely starts bogging down even at fairly modest rgb channel counts. I used lor last year (my first year to do this) and it worked great. I saw it start slowing down pretty significantly even just for six 60 element rgb arches. My two cents Read read read!!! Lots of great info here and other sites. Lots of software choices

 

[firebug]

Welcome to ACL Lindsay... 8)

 

[Kaden]

Welcome to ACL Lindsay!


Good luck with your stage project and as the others said, read the 101 and ask lots of question.


Also you will need to provide pics and vid when you are done, it sound like it will look awesome.