• Date
    emendelev
  • Date
  • Replies 9 replies
  • Subscribers 187 subscribers
  • Views 5145 views
  • Users 0 members are here

Feature Request: import magic sheet fixture coordinates into pixel map

NOTE: THE REQUEST BELOW WAS POINTED OUT AS AN EXISTING FEATURE ALREADY

It would save a great deal of time (and be much more aesthetically pleasing than doing by hand) to be able to do circular arrays of channels/objects in magic sheets. This would require a radius input and maybe arc length in addition to number of fixtures to add. Alternately, but maybe this is more complex, being able to "align to line/shape". So a circle or polyline can be drawn, and selected along with a group of channels, button hit, and they would at least roughly become aligned to the shape/line. A distribute sub-feature inside this would be fantastic.

THE REQUEST BELOW IS NOT HOWEVER, AND WOULD BE AWESOME

As well, many of the magic sheets I create are physical spatial-relationship representations of parts of the rig. Whether by hand or through features such as the above, once these magic sheets are created, it would be great to copy to a new sheet, take out any group or extraneous gack leaving just the channels in their location on the sheet, and when creating magic sheets, maybe add a button to "import channels from magic sheet. 

  • The circle array already exists in magic sheets.

    Select Create Array and select the "Circle" option instead of the default "Rectangle". Parameters are number of objects and Size, which I think is diameter.
  • in reply to sk8rs_dad
    Aww man knowing that would have saved some time on this gig. Next time. Thank you!
    Would love either something like this in pixel maps, or still to import magic sheets into pixel maps.

  • "As well, many of the magic sheets I create are physical spatial-relationship representations of parts of the rig. Whether by hand or through features such as the above, once these magic sheets are created, it would be great to copy to a new sheet, take out any group or extraneous gack leaving just the channels in their location on the sheet, and when creating magic sheets, maybe add a button to "import channels from magic sheet. "

    I do this too but the group objects become a legend so when I print out the new MS and give it to the gaffer or DP they know which symbols correspond to which light. Or I might create group objects that are arrows pointing to certain channels and they are labeled. Or I might add a truss object or pipe object as part of the set and give it a group ID or no ID. Or a text object that serves as a label and has no ID. So it becomes more complicated than filtering for only channel objects when you have objects with a group ID or no ID that are an actual part of the drawing and at that point it's easier to copy the whole thing and select and delete your "extraneous gack" if you are like me and you have separate sections for your macro and record target objects that don't overlap your channel objects.

    What exactly are you trying to accomplish?

  • in reply to John728
    Hi John,
    The last part of what I was talking about was importing a magic sheet layout of fixtures/channels directly into a pixel map. When creating pixel maps, I'm often creating maps that are not just square grids, but circles, odd shapes and lines in order to map and run media over them to have access to the powerful resulting effects engine within the Eos's Virtual Media Server. When creating the pixel maps in here, I'm often creating copies of what I already have on magic sheets as I use the channels in both a traditional way to run effects and levels on, and like to be able to switch over to Pixel Maps to run other effects and looks. Currently, to create a pixel map its a similar procedure to creating a magic sheet, often with very similar results in terms of the channels' spatial relationships to each other. I was hoping there could be a feature created to automate import of magic sheet into pixel map to save the time building maps for when magic sheets are already created for parts or all of a map that I need.
    Cheers!
    Eugene
  • in reply to emendelev

    I was confused but now I understand. This is what you said:

    "Whether by hand or through features such as the above, once these magic sheets are created, it would be great to copy to a new sheet, take out any group or extraneous gack leaving just the channels in their location on the sheet, and when creating magic sheets, maybe add a button to "import channels from magic sheet. "

    This is what you mean:

    "Whether by hand or through features such as the above, once these magic sheets are created, it would be great to copy to a new sheet, take out any group or extraneous gack leaving just the channels in their location on the sheet, and when creating a pixel map, maybe add a button to "import channels from magic sheet."

  • Also, maybe it is a better solution from a software design standpoint to add a magic sheet creation tool that imports from your pixel map. So you would do the pixel map first, then copy it into your MS. Just an idea.
  • in reply to John728
    Yes, exactly. Possibly, the other way around. However, I find Magic Sheet creation quicker and easier with its numbering automation functions, and not all my shows have pixel maps, but all sure have magic sheets these days.
  • in reply to emendelev
    maybe you're doing magic sheets differently than i do? mine are never based on a grid with all objects in the perfect spot, their distances in scale and their size also perfect...
    i have a feeling that it would be too much guess work for the console?
  • in reply to ueliriegg

    Well, it depends on the gig. I agree, mine are also seldom direct reflections of the grid, usually more transitional theatre-LD-style magic sheets. But for some, like the one I'm on right now, in one area, I've got several large circular lighting positions of conventional and/or color fixtures, and my magic sheets for them basically look like big circles for ease of focus and channel/group-based programming. My pixel maps for them, which I use fairly actively for the show, are shaped the same way, but were a rather time-consuming pain to create, and they're basically copies of the channels on one of the magic sheet in the same orientation. So automating that would be awesome.
    I imagine it would require automatically scaling channel distribution from the maximum extents of channel location in the magic sheet to the total size of the pixel map. There would be some mathematical rounding and distribution based on number of channels vs pixels available for them, but it could also work great. At least it would be a good starting point, and pixel map size could be adjusted to allow for more space as necessary for a re-import.

    Also distribute channels along line/shape would also be awesome in magic sheet.

Related

www.etcconnect.com