Fixture Question: Dimmer/Strobe on same channel

[Kevin]

Hi all,

I could use some help with getting a fixture done correctly, I've got a (cheap-ass) Mini Moving Head. The vendor has decided to put the Dimmer and Strobe function on the same channel.

I've tried leveraging a Dimmable Effect to define functions, but when I map those to the grid I don't get any light. When I change it to a dimmer and limit the DMX value it's all fine off course, but then I don't have/get control of the strobe.

I'm pretty sure I'm doing something wrong, since I'm a real noob in the lightning world, can someone push me into the right direction please?

I've attached an overview of the available DMX channels.

Thanks in advance!

[Kevin]

Oh a work-a-round till now has been to map the full DMX 3 channel to a dimmer and leverage the Min/Max sliders to get some control.

[Mathieu]

Hi,

Using a dimmer capability in the fixture editor is the right way to do it. For the strobe, you can generate it in Lightjams with the strobe function or selecting the strobe wave.

[Kevin]

Ah, cool. Thanks Mathieu.

I was wondering if there is much difference in using the strobe function on DMX opposed to the Strobe function in Lightjams. But I'll leave it as is then.

Good to know!

[Ryan Shea]

The issue with strobing via Lightjams is that DMX has an update rate of 25hz/40ms. Any strobe faster than that will result in inconsistent flashing.

Mathieu, how do you recommend working around this?

Many thanks

[Ryan Shea]

Correction, the update rate is 40hz/25ms. Effectively 20hz though (nyquist frequency).

[Ryan Shea]

Update: I figured it out. Using pulse instead of strobe is the way to go. A pulse timing of 150ms and 50ms duration is the fastest strobe you can achieve that won't result in skipped frames.

[Mathieu]

The strobe function makes sure one on dmx value is folowed by at least one off dmx value, taking into account the dmx output rate. So it should be able to achieve the maximum stobe rate possible with the output rate.

However, that really depends on how dmx is sent and on the dmx node. If sending via the network, then it needs to be reliable. For the dmx node, it needs to support the proper ouput frequency.