Here is an example of a smaller rig with some callouts showing you what the symbols mean.
After running the application you need to ‘steal’ the patch from the console. Do this by choosing FILE|POPULATE. The grid will be filled with one object for each of your fixtures.
Those that are moving lights will get a little blue triangle showing you where the light is pointed (and if it’s in its home position, it will have a blue circle around the fixture number). As you pan and tilt this fixture on the desk, the arrow will point to where the light is pointing. Right-click options allow you to offset the pan angle or invert pan if need be to match the real lights. If cues are running, you will set the current state of the world in real-time. (There is no edit vs. run-time mode – it’s hot all the time).
After populating the grid, you can SHIFT-CLICK and drag the objects to where you want on them in your view. Typically, you will first draw GROUP BOXES using the INSERT MENU.
After placing a box, you can SHIFT-CLICK the text to move it and the lower right hand corner allows you to size it. Before adding many boxes, I normally go into the FILE|MANAGE dialog box and uncheck the whole rig.
Then I check off one fixture, close the dialog box and manually place it in the desired location. Then I enter the Manage dialog box again and click off subsequent fixtures. They will automatically get placed next to the fixture with the next lowest number that has already been placed. Continue doing this until your magic sheet is complete. Keep in mind, there is no need to have the entire rig in the view, but keep in mind that the database is a living copy of the Palette Patch. If you add or delete fixtures in the Palette software, they will appear or disappear automagically in My View.
Here is a picture of the Options dialog box:
To date, this is the largest Open Source project we’ve posted. It is still a work in progress and will be for some time, but less and less so with your assistance.
To do (shortcomings)
- Drag and drop sucks! We need ghost image of dragging objects
- Right-click DELETE and PROPERTIES box for group boxes
- Right Click STORE SELECTION SET for group boxes to store the current selection set and send it to the console upon subsequent clicking’s
- Simple Text Labels and Line objects
- Add properties to fixture to show/hide palette names and/or draw borders around fixtures objects
- Need to deal with huge rigs with long palette name text. Lua script at engine end is timing out. Need partitioning when return string gets too long