What you all accomplished with A3d was herculean and I applaud you for that and I can’t wait to use it on my first show next month. Speaking of which…
I only recently discovered the limited ability I have to merge in A3d fixture data (xyz, orientation, edge, color, gobo etc). Right now Patch is all or nothing. At least for me, (but I suspect many others), that’s going to be a significant roadblock in my eagerness to incorporate A3d into my workflow. As a theatre designer, my time in the theatre is often very short and very expensive. That’s why I come in on day 1 with magic sheets made, groups ready to go, palettes pre-mixed, etc. And usually in those situations the show has already been patched, or more likely, is in the process of being patched often right up to, and including, during the focus. (so getting a complete patch file in advance is not really a great option) I desperately need a way to be able to merge in all the A3d fixture data without wiping out addresses that already exist.
Right now the workaround is to import an .a3d file, but there is still a great deal of work that may need to be done after that. I don’t use any of the focus features in VW (and don’t see myself doing that anytime soon) so I’ll need to focus all my conventionals in patch, as well set beam softness, set my “show beam” checkboxes, and other settings. If I can’t do any of that until I’ve already arrived at the theatre, that’s a big time problem. Sometimes the tech may start very soon after the focus. There just isn’t necessarily the time to do all that A3d work on site. (especially because there likely WILL be A3d work that can ONLY be done on site, like FPE, or dealing with p/t inversion issues, etc so I need to spend the little time I may have doing that stuff.)
As you look towards the improvements you want to integrate into the next update, which I’m sure is a list a mile long, I would strongly encourage making this a high priority. A3d is super powerful, but like magic sheets, it takes a lot of front end time to make it a usable tool. Until the Patch merge becomes more granular, I can see people just not having the time to really use A3d as they would like.
I know I'm not the first one to bring this up, but I think it's really important so the more voices the better.
thanks,
Cory
