Where is the love for Congo?

Hi Guys,

David Lincecum here - I duck in and out. Ducking in. We at ETC love Congo!

You are correct that the education center has not been offering Congo training.  In the US the Congo user base is widespread, not as dense as the Ion user base. We have had some Congo events that did not make or had low attendance. Since the user base is very large in Europe we have many more trainings there. You can understand that it is hard to have trainings that are not attended or have low attendance.

We would like to offer you the training you need and help your crew improve their skills. We are discussing options for doing that.

Can you make suggestions for cities you are willing to travel to?

What kinds of topics should we focus on?

Would Video trainings - beyond what we offer - be of more value?

What would best serve the Congo community?

Thanks for your responses.

David Lincecum

Marketing manager, ETC

dlincecum said:

Can you make suggestions for cities you are willing to travel to?

What kinds of topics should we focus on?

Would Video trainings - beyond what we offer - be of more value?

What would best serve the Congo community?

Hey David, thanks for your reply. Thanks also to the others who commented. Personally, I disagree with the one comment that the RPN has anything to do with the lack of users in the US: I think it has far more to do with terminology and programming style; there are far more aspects to how you record a cue that are different between Express(ion)/Ion/Eos terminology and Congo thinking. Like the fact that a PRESET is used instead of a CUE, but you can have the same PRESET run multiple times with different fade times... that kind of thing. I do agree with most of the rest of what has been said. I run a Congo Jr with Master playback wing in a touring one-off road house with 6 (hopefully soon more) movers and a bunch of color scrollers, and I can't begin to tell you how much of a difference the upgrade from an Express made. And we demo'ed the Ion before our purchase and decided there was a lot that we needed to do that the Congo did great that the Ion just doesn't do. BUT.... most high schools and colleges and churches are looking for a cueing console, not a busking console. Whether that suits their needs or not (I'd argue it does for theatre programs but not for music programs, for instance) that's what they think they need, so the ION is the console that's taking over the US. Which is great, because ETC is one of a few companies in our industry that I have no problem with them taking over the world.

Anyway, enough rambling... in response to your questions...

Cities I am willing to travel to: depends on scheduling and costs. For sure, you do anything in Seattle or Portland and we're there. (2-4 people depending on expense)  Beyond that, I'd REALLY like to see an intermediate-to-advanced class (also a beginning class) on the Congo at LDI. You provide that, I'm there.  I would think USITT would be good too, but due to timing of the schedule for me and my staff we typically are at the height of our busy season and can't make it ourselves.

Topics: This is tough. As someone else suggested - a theme of how to program properly - I know I'd like to get my LD's hands off the trackball and back on the keypad. That was something I learned at LDI before I bought our Congo, and Sarah and Ulf did a good job of teaching that concept in the basic class.

I'd think a few things I'd like to learn more on would be ways to really use the masters, such as putting stacks and effects and palettes into them, as well as good use of the channel layout screen... I know one thing I struggle with is getting the color palettes specific to our color scrollers into a direct select in a way I can select them faster than holding down the appropriate encoder and then hitting the direct select that matches the color I want. That kind of thing. Setups that make programming or busking faster.

Video training would be AWESOME. We've all gone through the ones you have available, and I would LOVE to have more advanced training videos. Maybe particularly geared towards quick use of effects and palettes.

How does that sound?

dlincecum said:

Can you make suggestions for cities you are willing to travel to?

What kinds of topics should we focus on?

Would Video trainings - beyond what we offer - be of more value?

What would best serve the Congo community?

Hey David, thanks for your reply. Thanks also to the others who commented. Personally, I disagree with the one comment that the RPN has anything to do with the lack of users in the US: I think it has far more to do with terminology and programming style; there are far more aspects to how you record a cue that are different between Express(ion)/Ion/Eos terminology and Congo thinking. Like the fact that a PRESET is used instead of a CUE, but you can have the same PRESET run multiple times with different fade times... that kind of thing. I do agree with most of the rest of what has been said. I run a Congo Jr with Master playback wing in a touring one-off road house with 6 (hopefully soon more) movers and a bunch of color scrollers, and I can't begin to tell you how much of a difference the upgrade from an Express made. And we demo'ed the Ion before our purchase and decided there was a lot that we needed to do that the Congo did great that the Ion just doesn't do. BUT.... most high schools and colleges and churches are looking for a cueing console, not a busking console. Whether that suits their needs or not (I'd argue it does for theatre programs but not for music programs, for instance) that's what they think they need, so the ION is the console that's taking over the US. Which is great, because ETC is one of a few companies in our industry that I have no problem with them taking over the world.

Anyway, enough rambling... in response to your questions...

Cities I am willing to travel to: depends on scheduling and costs. For sure, you do anything in Seattle or Portland and we're there. (2-4 people depending on expense)  Beyond that, I'd REALLY like to see an intermediate-to-advanced class (also a beginning class) on the Congo at LDI. You provide that, I'm there.  I would think USITT would be good too, but due to timing of the schedule for me and my staff we typically are at the height of our busy season and can't make it ourselves.

Topics: This is tough. As someone else suggested - a theme of how to program properly - I know I'd like to get my LD's hands off the trackball and back on the keypad. That was something I learned at LDI before I bought our Congo, and Sarah and Ulf did a good job of teaching that concept in the basic class.

I'd think a few things I'd like to learn more on would be ways to really use the masters, such as putting stacks and effects and palettes into them, as well as good use of the channel layout screen... I know one thing I struggle with is getting the color palettes specific to our color scrollers into a direct select in a way I can select them faster than holding down the appropriate encoder and then hitting the direct select that matches the color I want. That kind of thing. Setups that make programming or busking faster.

Video training would be AWESOME. We've all gone through the ones you have available, and I would LOVE to have more advanced training videos. Maybe particularly geared towards quick use of effects and palettes.

How does that sound?

Agree with Mark that the main stumbling block in the US market is likely to be conceptual gap between theater-style unique cue lists and music-style repeats & multiple cue stacks. 

Looking forward to meeting up with any and all other Congo programmers this summer, if that happens.

So I'm totally jealous right now of all those of you in Wisconsin at the CUE conference... you have no idea how much I wish I could be there.  And I'm pleased to see that the Congo classes are not only being offered at CUE but also that they filled up!!

So the question I have is... considering the success at CUE, (when y'all finish up with it and have time to breathe again) is there any chance you might consider adding a class or two at LDI? I suspect there are many people in my situation that would love to be at CUE but can't get the funds or time free to make it out there specifically, but do have the time and funds for LDI. (Or USITT, or whatever...) I was basically given the choice by my administration to attend LDI or CUE but not both, and since LDI also includes other training I need and my wife is already going to LDI regardless, the choice was pretty clear.

CUE is brilliant and wonderful and a steal for the price, but I can't be the only one who can't make it and really wishes there were Congo classes at LDI.... any chance you're ever going to bring those back?

Also, how are the more advanced training videos coming?