Thread: VSA, DMX, Lighting and a small brain

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I am using VSA/DMX to control a few items this year, one of which is a Chauvet 152B LED Splash light. I believe it is a larger version of the Splash JR. The light comes on as soon as current is applied. When VSA runs, the light turns off until VSA tells it to turn back on ( this is good). My problem is how to keep the light off until VSA tells it to turn on. In other words, I need the light off, until the VSA program is triggered. I have seen other props on this site using a similar set up (particularly Terra’s Boogedy and DMX Coffin), and the lighting for those props appears to be off until VSA turns them on. I suppose I could use a dimmer/relay pack to control the current to the light, but in the examples I have seen, the DMX lights were not plugged into relay/dimmer packs. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

First question, I didn't understand if you have the light hooked up to the DMX chain. Do you?

If so, then look at your settings in VSA for the light. If you set the default to be on, then that is what it will be. I hope that is clear enough. If not, I will open up my VSA program tomorrow morning and be more specific. (heading off to bed).

Thanks for responding Terra. I do have the light hooked up to to DMX. In VSA, the first position for the light is off mode. When the light is plugged in to an AC power outlet and the DMX chain, the light is on. After I start VSA, the light goes off as programmed, and runs through the remainder of its routine; however, once the VSA routine is complete, the light comes on again and stays on. I will try and take a screen shot today so you can see what the program looks like.

I've made some screen prints of how I programmed my Chauvet Color Splash Jr. Because there are a lot of people who are curious about DMX lighting, I thought I'd go ahead and do a 101 class on it. I find that if someone starts off with the basics first, I can understand it better. I have a small brain too when it comes to computer stuff. heh.

OK, first the primer about a DMX light. They are designed to be absolutely controllable. In order to get that control, they gave you four channels that you can program. Here are the four channels:



These four channels are also called DMX addresses. There are a total of 512 DMX address on a DMX chain. So, I need to assign them which address they are going to be. In order to do that, I set the dipswitch on the back of the light. First, I have to tell the light that I want it to be DMX controlled. So, I turn on dipswitch #10 to ON.

OK, good...now I have to assign the light which DMX address I want it to start on. Here is the example in the manual where they show how to do that:



If you look at the very bottom of the dipswitch chart it has what each dipswitch number represents. You add those up and they give you the address you want. So, in the first example it shows how to set the dipswitch to give you a DMX address of 10. You switch dipswitches #2 and #4. (2 + 8 = 10). Now that you have set your light to address 10, it will take DMX addresses 10, 11, 12 & 13. Because this DMX light has four channels which also means 4 DMX addresses.

Just to make sure let's set DMX address 24. I would turn on dipswitches #4 and #5 (16 + 8 = 24). So this would take DMX addresses 24, 25, 26 & 27.

We've now turned on the light to take DMX commands and also set the DMX addresses. Now, going back to the four channels. Here are their values:



Channel 1 (Shutter, strobe and dimmer settings):

0 - 1 is blackout (or no light)

2 - 127 is slow strobe to fast strobe. So, if you use 2 it would be an extremely slow strobe. Then if you use 60, it would be a medium strobe. Then, if you used 127, it would be a very fast strobe. You can use any number between 2 - 127 to get the speed of strobing you like.

128 - 255 is dimmer settings. 128 is basically off or no light. 255 is full on brightness. The numbers in between are percentages of those. So, if I used 188, it would be medium bright.

Channel 2: Red

0 - 255. 0 is no red and 255 is full red. 127 would be medium red.

Channel 3: Green and Channel 4: Blue

is the same settings value as the red.

So, if I wanted just red, I would set channel 2 to 255 and channels 3 & 4 would be 0. But, if I wanted yellow, I would set channel 2 to 255 and channel 3 to 255 but would have channel 4 at 0. If I wanted white, I would change channel 4 to 255. That is the beauty of RGB lights (Red, Green, Blue) you can make any color in the rainbow (including white) depending on the values you set.

The next post I will show how I program the DMX light in VSA.

Oh, hi McScreaminn, looks like I crossed posted you. I'm going to go ahead and show how I programmed my DMX in VSA and perhaps that could show the problem.

First, bring up the setting menu in VSA and fill in the info for your DMX light and the four channels. Here's a screen print of mine:



My starting DMX address is 32 so I am taking up channels 32, 33, 34 and 35, so I type that information in and then type in the values that this particular DMX device uses. (Yeah, I know I have the wrong number for the dimmer/strobe channel - it should be 255). So, you are putting in the + value column the maximum and in the - value column the minimum for the hardware you are using. In the default column, you decide where you want it to normally start at. I chose it to be off for the red, green, blue and off (max dim) in the dimmer/strobe channel. I could have also picked 0 or 1 for that but if I had a long event in VSA, the light would have to travel through the strobing values before it hit the dimming values and I didn't want that.

NOTE: You will see 'NONE' in the port column. If my ENTTEC was plugged into the computer it would show ENTTEC.

OK, the settings are put in, now I can write the events. Here is a screen shot of what the events looks like in VSA:



You can see that I activated the light a little bit after the routine started because I wanted the light to come on a little bit after the action to better scare my ToTs. I'm also using only the red and blue channels because I wanted a purple light to start with. So, let's click on the first event that is under the dimmer/strobe to see how I programmed it:



You can see that I set the DMX light to start from no light (128) to increase in brightness over the length of the event (250....should have been 255).

Now that I've set the dimmer/strobe I have to now set the colors. Let's bring up the red event:



You can see that I had it start with no red (0) to medium red (100). If I brought up the blue light, it would show the same thing.

Now, VSA will keep that last command until I make a new event. So, I just keep adding new events when I want the light to do different things. At the end of the routine I must make sure that I turn off the light (if that's what I want) so, let's bring up the last event for the dimmer/strobe:



It shows that it was on full bright and then I had it turn to off (128). So, I'm thinking that perhaps your last command is what is keeping your light on.

Hope that helps

Very nice tutorial. My DMX light is a little different from yours. It has 6 DMX channels and a music mode. When your light is plugged in to power only (no DMX connection) does it turn on? With the dip switch set to 10 and power and DMX connected (no VSA program running) is your light off? I will go back and look at my settings and compare them to yours, but at a glance, they look similar. I am beginning to believe the issue is with my light.

Thanks.

My light is not on when it is plugged in but no DMX. It flashes on for a second when I first plug it in but then it goes off. Just for giggles I turned the #10 dipswitch off and the light turned on because I had one of the other dipswitches turned on. When I turned the #10 switch back on, the light stayed on. I unplugged it and plugged it back in and the light came back off.

When it's hooked up to the DMX system and no VSA program there is no light.

So, I'm curious, what do the additional two channels do on your light?

UGH! I was afraid of that. This is how the instructions describe the functions of the channels on my light:

DMX channels 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 functions are determined by the current settings of channel 1. For example, while Channel 1 is set between 000 and 029 the following conditions will apply;
 Channel 2 will control the Red LEDs
 Channel 3 will control the Green LEDs
 Channel 4 will control the Blue LEDs
 Channel 5 will control Strobing
 Channel 6 will control the Dimmer

It has a stand alone mode, a sound active mode and a DMX mode, but not an off mode apparently. I bought it new off of ebay and thought it would be a larger version of the Splash Jr.

Does your light have a stand alone mode where it will light up w/o DMX?

Yes it does. In fact in the stand-alone setting you can pick what colors you want and how bright you want them. It also has eight built-in chase programs which are kind of fun

I have looked at the manual for the Splash Jr and it appears to be fairly similar to the 152B, so I am left with the conclusion that I must have a defective light due to the fact that it will not turn off.
Thanks for your help.