Multicell Help

Question

Looking at the vidoes and this board I realize I am way out of my depth and our setup here is really totally simplistic. To me a 3 channel RGB lamp with a DMX base address of say 10 would take up 10, 11 and 12. Without any fancy attribute/profile or whatever other gizmos I can raise/lower each of those faders to control the lamp. But I can see that modern fixtures can be very much more complicated and not only take up many single channels, sometimes pairing channels for extra definition and using some channels "portioned" or sub channeled for extra control. 
 What threw me watching a video (which went way to fast for my poor old brain) was a lamp like the 3 color might be given an address (again) 10 But somehow the other two would appear like 2/241-242 !! Does this mean the lamp has two DMX inputs; U1 and U2? 
 This would be way too much for an explanation here so what I am looking for is a sort multicell 101 primer! As mentioned the videos run over stuff very quickly with buttons and screen changes going by in a blur. Is there a book or article out there that describes this sort of dual universe business for multichannel devices? "Dummies Guide to Multicell Patching" 
 A lot to ask. My Bad!

ueliriegg · Answer

this is a bit longer, but don't worry, it's not gonna hurt ;) 
 
it's simpler than what you may think: 
 
there are dimmers, fixtures, multipart channels (sometimes called compound) and multicell fixtures. but the cool thing is, in the shiny new world of modern lighting controls they just take up one channel number. you don't need to remember that the first number is red, and the second green (which is especially helpful, when you come across a product that doesn't do RGB but rather GRB...) 
 
in patch you have channels and addresses. channels are the numbers that you use to tell the board which light should go red or zoom or brighter. each object you want to control gets one channel number, no matter how complicated that thing is. 
address is the number (or numbers) the console uses to talk to the world. as soon as you patched that light once (and put the address into the receiving device as well) you can forget it. the console takes care of the rest. 
 
- i think with dimmers you feel comfortable, right? they have a dmx address that is assigned to a channel. those numbers can match, but they certainly don't have to. 
- fixtures are lights that use more than one dmx address, they can do more than only be brighter or less bright. they can take from 2 to 200 addresses or more. but they are still one channel for you. so when you want to zoom something, or you want to dim something or change its color you don't need to know which address controls those features. the console counts and does math better than all of us together, so let it do the counting. you use real life words. you say you want to change Channel 1's zoom. you don't need to know that this is the 7th address within a fixture that has its start address set to 238. 
- multipart fixtures (compound): think source 4 tungsten light (on a dimmer) that also has a gobo rotator. those are actually two objects paired together. you don't need to know which of the two can do what when controlling the light. you just assembled a channel that can do more than before. if this source4 was channel 2 before, it can still be channel 2, it just has additional parameters. in patch you create two parts for this one channel. those two parts can live in different DMX universes, which is great because maybe your dimmers backstage are on a different line of DMX than whereever you plugged the gobo rotator. 
- and now for multicell. those are objects you buy (as opposed to compound fixtures that you combine yourself). they are one "box" that has multiple (usually equal) light emitting things inside. like an LED striplight, that has 10 round holes that can emit light and change colors. if you want to control them individually although they are within the same metal box, you're looking at multicell (provided that product supports that individual control. in the console multicell channels can be recognized by the . (decimal) in the channel number. Channel 3 could have 10 instances, those would be called 3.1 thru 3.10, while 3.0 is the master. you can either control them together by selecting channel 3 (which includes all the sub-sets as well) or change the first emitter to be red, the thrid to be green and the rest to be off. 
 
i think the advantage of this style of control that it lets you control your lights without counting numbers. you can also control different types of lights at the same time. you can say Chan 1 Thru 3 Red Full Enter. or select them and use the color picker. just because the lighting console is aware of which DMX address has what function. 
 
better?