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Show
Basics: Can I Use DMX? |
Can I Use DMX
to Control Laser Shows?
By
David Lytle, Editor, The Laserist
You've
just taken delivery of your band new multi-color, beam-producing,
graphics-capable ready-to-hang laser projector. You want to make
the beams dance and the colors fly, to send the crowd into a
screaming frenzy of laser ecstasy. As a lighting director you
also feel entitled to do this with as little outside meddling
as possible-that is, you don't want a laser tech hanging around
the control room with nothing to do but operate a bewildering
black box. You want the light and the power to control it. Any
why shouldn't you?
In
the beginning, such visions of omnipotence were foolish. When
they first appeared some thirty years ago, laser projectors were
one-of-a-kind wonders understandable only to their inventors.
I remember the first laser projector I used: it was a large black
box bristling with sliders and dials, none of them labeled. If
you were familiar with lasers, you could probably figure it out.
If you weren't familiar with lasers, you were expected to keep
away from the box until properly initiated into the cult.
Fast-forward
to the year 2000, and the situation has changed 180 degrees.
Manufacturers are trying to outdo each other to develop new ways
that customers can easily create their own shows, purchase pre-programmed
shows, perform live shows, and even swap shows with fellow laserists.
Lighting directors can pick and choose from different computer
systems, CD or tape playback units, dedicated "live"
control consoles and, perhaps most appealing of all, projectors
that are compatible with DMX-512 controllers.
Since
DMX-512 is the most common standard used for controlling lighting
and stage equipment, it only made sense for laser projectors
to jump on the bandwagon. That happened in 1995, when Mobolazer
of Thousand Oaks, Calif., introduced a laser beam projector with
16 available DMX-512 control channels that worked with virtually
any DMX-512 controller. "Our concept was to produce a product
that didn't require you to specify a certain controller,"
said Mobolazer
President
Neville Hanchett. "We were in the business of manufacturing
projectors, not control systems."
A show
equipped with a DMX compatible laser projector can use a standard
lighting control board to trigger a barrage of laser beams. Depending
on the particular projector, operators can also use DMX to control
color and brightness and to create atmospheric patterns with
diffraction gratings The projectors typically can channel the
master laser beam through a host of mirror modules that target
the beam to preset locations within the theater. For example,
one DMX control channel could send a beam to stage left, a second
to stage right, a third could send the beam through a diffraction
grating that shoots out dozens of shafts of light. With up to
512 channels available (including controls for color and intensity)
and with the addition of remote "bounce" mirrors that
ricochet beams in new directions, the DMX possibilities are nearly
endless. Best of all, show producers don't have to master a new
control system.
"We
know that lighting directors don't want to look at all their
fixtures on the stage and see a laser and say 'Oh, no, I've got
to have somebody else in my booth with their own equipment to
control the laser.' LDs want to use their own boards," said
Jim Hardaway of OmniSistem, which distributes
a line of DMX-512 compatible laser projectors manufactured by
Lowell Products Development. The company's Q-beam series of projectors
offer a proprietary LCD menu system to assign DMX-512 channels
and to test beam alignment.
We're
likely to soon see laser projectors that assign even more power
to DMX, such as the ability to steer a beam in "live"
mode wherever you want it to go, or control full-fledged animated
laser shows that use scanners (not on/off beam actuators) to
create complex images. Control over these features can be now
gained through dedicated playback consoles designed for club
DJ's and software programs that trigger animation sequences at
the touch of a keyboard button. But most live control consoles,
software controllers, and even automated CD and tape playback
units are not yet easily (or inexpensively) compatible with DMX
signals coming from a lighting control board.
What
these devices-and the DMX compatible projectors-have in common
is the goal of given the user a lot of power over the laser,
and making the process fast and simple. Instant Laser Godhood
may not yet be attainable, but breaking into the priesthood is
easier than ever.
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Images from top:
Laser Images, Inc.,
Laserland GmbH,
Laser Systems Europe
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