opinions please

Hey, first off i would recommend sticking with the operator until you do run out of room. Then naturally before getting a new light you'd have to get a new controller. For right now, as long as you are happy with the operator (i know i am) then i don't see a reason to upgrade to a show designer just yet. I'd get the rainbows if i were you. also the operator can control more than 12 fixtures, if they have less than 16 dmx channels. Rainbow only take up 2 ch. so you could run 8 rainbows as "one" fixture. But instead of each having one scanner button they would all be under one scanner button each having different dmx adress. for instance ch. 1 rainbow 1 colors ch. 2 rainbow 1 lamp ch.3 rainbow 2 colors etc. the downside to operating it this way is obviously program time. rather selecting all the rainbows at one time and adjusting them together, you now have to adjust each one indiv. BUT what you could do is put your dj scans, pockets and xp3's together with the rainbows. foe instance ch. 1+2 in scanner 1 will control rainbows and ch. 3-8 will control pockets. that way you could select all your rainbows at the same time if you wanted and all your intels. i know this prob. got pretty confusing but so is this dmx world that we live in. Bottom line: I suggest getting rainbows first.

Buy the rainbows. Truthfully i dont think it really matters, because you eventually are going to want both.

The rainbows are a great effect in wash mode for a band by the way.

thats what i thought people might say. ok thanks guys, i appreciate it
jon

Jon, One reason you may wish to go to the Show Designer is the programmable fades. I do the band thing too and it is nice to have some scenes snap into effect and others slowly fade in (especially on the slow tunes). The Show Designer has more scene memory and the presets help to make programming changes easy (if you set things up right the first time!). But ... Rainbows as a wash effect are great!

im thinkin bout gettin 8 rainbows and split them. 4 w the wash effect and 4 as spots. hopefully my man is gunna hook it up so i can pick up the show designer at the same time. well see i guess. how many fixtures can you hook up to a show designer?

16 fixtures

Freestyle is kind of right. The Show Designer can handle 16 fixtures of 32 channels each BUT... groups of like fixtures can be defined within a single fixture as long as they don't exceed the 32 channel space. Thus the Show Designer can handle up to 128 fixtures of 4 channels each, etc. You could easily put all 8 of your Rainbows under the same "fixture" since they are only 2 channels each. Confused??? After you play with the Show Designer for a while, you won't be!

how can u set them like that? is it possible to do that with the operator? if it is i dont need the show designer just yet although i know its much better and has other great features. plus i want to start getting involved with midi. will i get much more out od the operator that way? i really dont understand midi. a few people tried explaining it to me but i still dont really get it. i guess i just have to try it and find out

i was also wondering what else u guys think would look good with my current setup. i want to design as killer a lightshow as possible on a kind tight budget(especially after this large purchace)

I don't know if an operator can put multiple fixtures in a "fixture". You need to read your manual and see. Midi and lighting is not real easy. With an operator, you are basically restricted to scene selection via midi. Again, read your manual to see how to do that. You can use a midi sequencer or midi foot pedal to do scene selection.

The Operator can, it's all about how you address the lights. If you have a 5 channel light, just address the second light 6 instead of 17. It does make programming pretty tedious, though. You could also adress the second light 9 and use the page buttons to distinguish between fixtures. I suppose that wouldn't be as bad.

AND if you want the lights to do the same thing, just address them the same. You could invert the pan on one if the fixture has that feature.

I'd go for the separate page thing, but again, it would be harder to program than just using the fixture buttons.

GB- It could also hold 16 sets of DMX fixtures to if you were to master slave the sets.

quote:

Originally posted by gb:
[QB] One reason you may wish to go to the Show Designer is the programmable fades QB]

ok so i just got my show designer last night. i read the instructions a bunch of times and i didnt see anything about this or the snap into scenes. i havent gotten a chance to set up my lights yet so i didnt get to play around yet but i dont have a clue about the crossfaders. can someone explain please