x-scan help

Hey welcome to the forums. if you are running your fixtures via sound active within the dmx traits they will not be in perfect synch to each other. there is no way to have them be synched like that unless programmed or running them in master/slave mode. Let me know if this answers your question. happy thanksgiving.
P.s. i am a Minneapolis,MN native. good too someone from home on here.
Sincerely,

i'm sorry, i don't think i descibed my situation very well. on channel 7 of the dmx mode there are built in chases. when i first set my two units up i could put it on the different chases on 7 and they were in perfect synch. but then, being the rocket scientist that i am, i had to try and see if there was anything i forgot to do with the settings on the two units. now, when i put it into a chase they just do wild and crazy random stuff. when i have them in stand alone non-dmx mode running off sound the first one says master and the second slave but in dmx, i do not get those messages. what am i doing wrong?
thanks

You're doing nothing wrong.

When you put DMX fixtures into a sound active or chase mode(check manual), the fixtures will NOT sync together by design. They each behave independently, doing their own chase to their own trigger.

This subject has been covered before via other postings here. People wanted to do "master/slave" type syncing while also having DMX functionality. The short answer is you can't do both at once.

You're not doing anything wrong. The lights are behaving as they should.

Jingles: MN native? Do you just have this thing about enjoying cold places? Of course, stupid me, out here in California where all we have are earthquakes. Been to Minneapolis once, for an NBA All-Star weekend as a guest of the NBA. Cool time(even colder being winter)

Yup Mn. Born and raised there. Rather be cold than shaky. haha! When was the NBA all star weekend? for sound?
Sincerely,

I forget the year, I gotta find my ticket for the event since my laminates got lost in a move. Yes, it was for sound. I was working for an NBA star at the time and his band was invited to perform. I had to do bass and keyboard tech as well as mix them for the TNT and stage feed. Got to see the Rookie game and other events tied to the day before. THe next day we had to head out and could not see the All-Star game since our flight left around halftime. I remember being stuck in the nosebleed seats for the rookie game.

When we got there, two of the guys are "native" to the area. One was on the phone to Morris Day(The Time) and the other was trying to hook up with some other celeb friends while we were checking in at the hotel lobby.

thanks for all the input. first let me apologize if i am not getting it. but, i am just trying to run the lights in dmx mode (not sound active) using the built in moving head motion on channel 7 of the dmx. i am trying to run them in master/slave with the slave doing the reverse pan.

my main job is to run the sound for the shows that my lights are at and i would like to set up some of my chases with auto motion to let me concentrate on the mix. you know, just let it do what it does for movement (synched) but let me tell it what gobo and color to be so it works with the rest of my lights.

in my strange little world, i should be able to set the first light as a master and just set the second to slave (which i can to with some of my lights) and i shouldn't even have to set a dmx address on the slave lights. they just do what the first one does. period. left/right/up/down

the manual says "Operating Modes: The X-Scan LED™ can operate in two different
modes. In each mode you can run the fixture as a stand alone fixute or in a master/slave confiugration." if i have to set a dmx channel on my second unit i can't see how it is actually running in slave mode

again, i apologize if i am getting annoying and everyone does understand what i am trying to do and it is impossible. but it just doesnt make sense to me that i can't do this.

thanks for your tolerance

okay, i don't know what i have done right but as a i typing this, my lights are doing exactly what i want them to do. (as i have said a couple times in these posts, i have had them doing it) i just dont know what i did that actually made them do it. so for future reference, what did i do right? does someone know? i swear, i don't wear a helmet and i can legally use a steak knife.

OK, no helmet, can cut your own food. You outta diapers yet?

Just kidding. You set yourself up for that one.

First off, you're not being thorough enough. Your weakness is only lack of experience, but it sounds like you're getting plenty playing with your lights. And to that, I congratulate you.

You can't run the lights in DMX mode AND master/slave mode. It doesn't work. If the lights have an option to reverse X or Y(pan or tilt), then it would do that, if that's what you wanted it to do.

So, let me state this again:
You need to be in FULL DMX mode for your lights, or they must be chained together using Master/Slave mode. You can't set one light up to be a DMX Master and the other to be a slave or even a DMX slave, it won't work.

It makes full sense that you can't do this.

Read it some more:

If you choose to set up one ligtht as a master, and then other lights as slaves, the slaves will follow the master. Sounds clear as day, right? It is. But, in this mode, this is NOT DMX, this is a proprietary signalling used for those fixtures. It's probably nothing special or majorly interesting, but it's sufcicient for a light to broadcast out its settings to the others. Probably some sort of fixture ID followed by a pulse of values on various channels. The slaves listen for this and replicate their settings to that of the master.

In DMX, there are NO SLAVES, only DMX. You may set up lights with matching addresses, no harm there. But, you can't set a light to be a master(in theory) to be controller via DMX, and then have the "slaves" follow it, it don't work that way.

So, step 1:
Check your addressing on your fixtures. DOCUMENT THIS BY WRITING THIS DOWN. Just for the heck of it, match them all up, OK? All your lights on that DMX signal chain have to be in DMX mode. Any ONE light not in DMX mode and everything after it is gonna be acting funky. And I don't mean the good kind of funky. I'm talking the kind of funky you get when you don't shower for a week kind of funky. Not the "get down, get funky" kind of funky.

Ensure you're on the correct fixture switch on your DMX controller.

Now, all should respond the same.

I'm a sound guy first and foremost. I keep my lighting shows simpler for now. But, I'm usually handling 40+ channels of input and monitors on one desk, so I kinda sorta got my hands and ears and eyes full just keeping the slackers on stage in check and rock and rolling.

Share more data. That's all I can say.

You might want to read some remedial type stuff on DMX. This isn't to be insulting, it's to get you to understand DMX and how it works, and why you may be having SOME problems. The rest will be learned from reading your manuals and taking notes. Trust me, this taking notes, even if you don't ever use them, helps knock it deeper into your head for better recall later on. Get a decent meal and a good night's sleep and it should stay locked away in your brain for a while.

Thanks Chris. Metro read this pdf i am linking you to. it is a beginners guide to DMX. it is called DMX 101 and it should hopefully help you out a bunch.
Sincerely,