Re: Octo Beam - Sound mode is awful

Hi Dave,

Seeing as you haven't gotten any input yet I'll toss in my thoughts on the problem. Yes, sound mode is generally awful on most lighting fixtures, particularly LED units for the reason you mentioned. Of course mileage will vary depending on the exact unit and what your idea of a 'good' lightshow is, but in general automatic mode or sound active mode will never replace the accuracy and coordination of having a light tech with his/her hands on a console. Since you already have a DMX solution, why not program a few acceptable chases in that and run them during the show? Also, as a last-ditch effort, have you played with the audio sensitivity on the light? Sometimes that can help. Hope this works out for you!

Hey Jeff,

Thanks for your comment.

I've been talking to the guys in ADJ support and will have to do what you suggest I think.
I'm not too competent yet with My DMX as I keep waiting for the beta version to be updated to the final version. It just seems to be such a waste to put mics and processors inside the lights and then not put any decent programs in them. They don't even seem to be in time with the music. Maybe in futire fixtures you'll be able to upload your own patterns via a DMX dump to the unit.
Just looking to minimise the amount of gear required at a small gig.

Thanks again.

Dave

I'm glad to hear you're making progress with ADJ Support. There are actually fixtures on the market that do allow users to load programs into, though most are going the way of obsolete. I guess just as a thought going forward, there are products on the market that take 'snapshots' of DMX they receive to playback later, such as at a show. I guess you could call it a simple DMX controller, and the best part is that just about anyone can operate it. You just push a button to call up one of many sequences that were programed ahead of time, and you can even set one up for foot petal triggering if you don't have a spare hand or tech to run your lights. Of course it's not necessarily minimizing gear to buy and travel with, but if your system is big enough but you can't accommodate running a 'real' DMX controller as you perform I would think this is a reasonable option. Best of luck!