It sounds like you may be making things more difficult than they need to be when working with the Catalyst, but I'm not sure I understand what you're doing.
My main question is what are your "sync" cues doing?
I think the best way for you to simplify your cueing would be to use the intensity trigger play modes. This will allow you to not have to hard code a play mode value into your fade up cues and allow you to remove your stop cues completely. The intensity trigger play modes set the appropriate play mode, but won't actually play a media file until the intensity of the layer is above 0%.
Many people here know that my background is primarily as a programmer and Wholehog 3 owner. I can't remember the last show I programmed where I didn't have multiple media servers. I had the opportunity recently to program a show with 2 catalyst servers using a total of 24 layers across 4 outputs. This isn't what I consider to even be approaching a large count these days, but my challenge was that I was using pixel mapping to feed 18 different video surfaces. There were times when I had 23 of my 24 layers live on stage at one time.
I had two things helping me in this situation. The first is that the Wholehog 3 uses an abstract fixture model that allows me to treat all fixtures similarly, whether they are a desk channel, a moving light, or a media server. The second is that Catalyst is a great application with a huge list of useful features (like the intensity triggering I mentioned above) and that it has an extremely well laid out DMX protocol. In almost all situations, I was able to limit myself to 3 basic cues for each given sequence. The first would mark every parameter I needed to use. The second would fade up the intensity (and trigger playback). The third would fade out the intensity (and stop playback when intensity reaches 0%).
It sounds like you may be making things more difficult than they need to be when working with the Catalyst, but I'm not sure I understand what you're doing.
My main question is what are your "sync" cues doing?
I think the best way for you to simplify your cueing would be to use the intensity trigger play modes. This will allow you to not have to hard code a play mode value into your fade up cues and allow you to remove your stop cues completely. The intensity trigger play modes set the appropriate play mode, but won't actually play a media file until the intensity of the layer is above 0%.
Many people here know that my background is primarily as a programmer and Wholehog 3 owner. I can't remember the last show I programmed where I didn't have multiple media servers. I had the opportunity recently to program a show with 2 catalyst servers using a total of 24 layers across 4 outputs. This isn't what I consider to even be approaching a large count these days, but my challenge was that I was using pixel mapping to feed 18 different video surfaces. There were times when I had 23 of my 24 layers live on stage at one time.
I had two things helping me in this situation. The first is that the Wholehog 3 uses an abstract fixture model that allows me to treat all fixtures similarly, whether they are a desk channel, a moving light, or a media server. The second is that Catalyst is a great application with a huge list of useful features (like the intensity triggering I mentioned above) and that it has an extremely well laid out DMX protocol. In almost all situations, I was able to limit myself to 3 basic cues for each given sequence. The first would mark every parameter I needed to use. The second would fade up the intensity (and trigger playback). The third would fade out the intensity (and stop playback when intensity reaches 0%).
