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[Graham Coupe]

Hi, i'm just getting started with DMX lighting, and I'm shortly going to purchase a controller and lights for use with live bands, I plan on switching between scenes using Midi, I want whatever I purchase to be expandable, so I have a question I can't find the answer for !! If I started off with a DMX controller that could handle 12 fixtures, could I (at a later date) add a second controller and 12 more lights (completely separate). I'd set up a scene using both controllers, save it as Scene 1 on both controllers, then do scene 2 etc. Both controllers would be on the same midi channel, if I then sent a midi program change message to call Scene 1 would that work ?? I can't see any reason why it wouldn't but I'm confused as to why I can't find anybody else that's done a similar thing ?? Any help appreciated

[Tim McCulloch]

Would you have 2 drivers behind the steering wheel? How would that work out?

That said, there are DMX mergers, as with MIDI.  In general it is better to send remote commands to the lighting controller than to use multiple lighting controllers.

[Jeff Lelko]

Hi Graham.

I’ll first concede that at the varsity level it’s not uncommon to have multiple consoles running at the same time - especially with the prevalence of media content trickling into lighting.  That said, “new to DMX” and “multiple consoles” don’t belong in the same sentence.

Any console worth owning in this decade won’t a fixture limit that can be easily exceeded, if at all.  Yes, this rules out anything like the DMX Operator or Obey product lines that realistically have limited use with modern fixtures.

How much are you planning to spend?

[Graham Coupe]

Hi Graham.

I’ll first concede that at the varsity level it’s not uncommon to have multiple consoles running at the same time - especially with the prevalence of media content trickling into lighting.  That said, “new to DMX” and “multiple consoles” don’t belong in the same sentence.

Any console worth owning in this decade won’t a fixture limit that can be easily exceeded, if at all.  Yes, this rules out anything like the DMX Operator or Obey product lines that realistically have limited use with modern fixtures.

How much are you planning to spend?

Hi Jeff, thanks for the reply, much appreciated. Don't really want to spend a fortune, this project (if I go ahead) is just an exploration of the capabilities of DMX (and Midi). To start I would only buy maybe 4 lights and one moving light plus a controller, with that setup I could learn scene and chase programming and what's possible with midi, if that went well I would then expand to let's say 8 lights for the back of the stage, and 8 lights for the front, and then maybe 4 moving lights for the centre back. It's the controller side where I'm struggling. I've found a controller that will handle 32 fixtures but it will only store 32 scenes and it doesn't have midi, most of the other budget controllers which have midi will only control 12 fixtures, I know I could probably get away with the 12 fixture limit by having lights on the same DMX channels. This was where the question came from, if I had two 12 channel controllers in front of me, let's say one was controlling the back stage lights and the moving fixtures, and the other (completely separately) was controlling the front 8 lights, I set up and save scenes using both controllers. If i put both controllers on Midi channel 1, and sent a midi program change message to select scene 1 to both controllers would that work ??

I appreciate that the products I'm looking at will have limitations, but surely they will work for what I'm planning ?? What do you think the limitations of budget fixtures and budget controllers are ?? reliability ?? how long they last ?? not powerful enough ?? Be good to hear your thoughts

[Graham Coupe]

Would you have 2 drivers behind the steering wheel? How would that work out?

Hi Tim, thanks for the reply, I don't understand why I'd need 2 drivers if I'm controlling everything with midi, I could either send midi commands via a backing track (for use with my own band) or use a midi pad to control the lights.

[Paul G. OBrien]

If I started off with a DMX controller that could handle 12 fixtures, could I (at a later date) add a second controller and 12 more lights (completely separate). I'd set up a scene using both controllers, save it as Scene 1 on both controllers, then do scene 2 etc. Both controllers would be on the same midi channel, if I then sent a midi program change message to call Scene 1 would that work ?? I can't see any reason why it wouldn't but I'm confused as to why I can't find anybody else that's done a similar thing

I think you may be missing or misunderstanding a fundamental property of DMX control, if you want 2 or more fixtures to do the exact same thing then you don't need a separate controller or a separate fixture button on the controller for them, you simply set thier starting address to the same number. The catch with that is it will limit the type of effects that can be achieved, it makes it easy to set those fixture to the same color but you then can't ever set them to dissimilar colors for example.
The curse of DMX control is that once you learn the basics you will immediately want to move on to more advanced operations, but basic controllers have very  limited functionality that immediately becomes a road block.

[Brian Jojade]

I'm curious as to why you want to use MIDI to control these lights?  Why not just make the changes on a controller directly?

While it's technically possible to use a bunch of cheap controllers each controlling a few lights, that sounds like an extremely cumbersome system. 

The super cheap limited controllers that can only control 12 lights are just breaking their controls into 16 channel chunks. If you have say 4 channel lights, you could set them to different DMX addresses and control 4 with each button on the controller.  A little bit of a pain, and creating scenes and chases is super limited, but it's possible.

Once you're beyond the super super basic capabilities that these little controllers can provide, you'll want to move into something far more powerful instead of more limited controllers.  There are software controllers available now for next to nothing that can run on an iPad or on a computer. Many support multiple DMX universes so the number of lights you can run grows quickly.  Once you get into these controllers, you're only limited by DMX channels, not '12' lights or whatever.  If you have lights with varying numbers of channels, you patch as needed to get the most lights on a single universe.

If you're using moving head lights, the little controllers typically have extremely rudimentary capabilities. You can set static positions of the lights, but to get true movement and more importantly getting multiple lights to create movement, you need a controller that can handle moving head lights. Now you can create shapes, patterns, splays, etc.

[Graham Coupe]

Once you're beyond the super super basic capabilities that these little controllers can provide, you'll want to move into something far more powerful instead of more limited controllers.  There are software controllers available now for next to nothing that can run on an iPad or on a computer. Many support multiple DMX universes so the number of lights you can run grows quickly.  Once you get into these controllers, you're only limited by DMX channels, not '12' lights or whatever.  If you have lights with varying numbers of channels, you patch as needed to get the most lights on a single universe.

If you're using moving head lights, the little controllers typically have extremely rudimentary capabilities. You can set static positions of the lights, but to get true movement and more importantly getting multiple lights to create movement, you need a controller that can handle moving head lights. Now you can create shapes, patterns, splays, etc.

Thanks for the reply Brian, after much research this is the path I'm taking, going to run QLC+ on my PC whilst I experiment with programming scenes, chases etc, then if I do venture out into a live situation will run the software on a laptop !!

[duane massey]

To answer the initial question, yes, it would work. However, the limitations on using entry-level controllers will make it horribly not worth the effort. Going th PC-based approach will be a much better choice.

[ProSoundWeb Community]