Dmx lighting control for install

[Paul Maughan]

Hi all,
Currently fitting out a new music venue. Looking into the possibilities of having the general house lighting to be controlled with stage lighting via DMX. I’ve found dimmable driver packs with DMX interface and dmx wall plate switches. Not really something I’ve done before so just wondering if anyone has any good articles/advice on this it would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Zdb]

 

[davesparks]

What do you want to know?
What are you using for houselights?
Do you want just DMX control or do you want DMX and independent control?
Are you installing dimmers are part of the stage lighting installation or will it be all intelligent fixtures?

Usually we install Zero88 Chilli bypass dimmers for stage lighting with a separate small chilli dimmer for house light control (either normal dimmer or HF/fluorescent dimmer). The house light dimmer then has control via DMX and pushbutton panels.

Don’t forget you need to consider how your emergency lighting will work with the the system, a failure of the data to the lights is a failure of the normal lighting which could need to bring on the emergency lighting. But that will of course depend on the licensing requirements of the local authority.

 

[Paul Maughan]

Brilliant cheers for the reply Dave. Looks like client gonna go with a beta 88 dimmer they already have for stage lighting, and keep house lighting as standard ie non dmx. I’m going to pay close attention to the dmx setup as it’s something I’ve never used tbh but can see the potential for non stage/theatre jobs in the future. How do you make sure EM lights kick in if all dmx signal fails but mains power stays on, is there some kind of magical dmx interface that could be used as control for relay/contactor ? Thanks again for the help

 

[davesparks]

A beta 88? Is it a zero88 betapack?

I personally wouldn’t choose DMX for non-stage lighting applications as there are better control protocols out there and very few lighting fixtures with DMX receivers built in.

I don’t know what is available to achieve correct triggering of emergency lighting, in a theatre environment you normally expect to have a separate installation of maintained secondary lighting Fed by a static inverter

 

[Paul Maughan]

Yes you’re right it’s the betapack zero 88. True when I was looking into it was going to have to use a fitting with driver pack I could switch out for one with dmx control, bitmof a mess around but originally client wanted to be able to control house lights with dmx desk but now not fortunately ! Is it possible to use DALI protocol with DMX or is that a ridiculous headache of an idea ?!

 

[davesparks]

Artistic licence manufacture a range of protocol converters including DMX/DALI converters, as well as all the DMX signal processing units you could possibly need.

As I said earlier DMX control of house lights is easily achievable by using a DMX dimmer such as the chilli unit to control them, this gives the choice of standard dimming or the HF version (0-10v dimming with relay control of the power) plus the ability to add wall stations with configurable HTP/LTP/takeover interaction with the DMX.

 

[Deleted member 105166]

Worth staying mindful that the DMX512 protocol does not include any error checking, i.e. the controller/desk is just sending out packets of data that may or may not be received by fixtures. For that reason, it is not suitable for mission critical applications. If a waggly head doesn't waggle or pans instead of tilts, no-one's life is at risk, so it's good for what it was designed to do.

Digressing slightly, it is concerning to see manufacturers of cheap albeit powerful "entertainment lasers" incorporating DMX into their fixtures, which are more often than not used by people with questionable levels of competence. It is scary to imagine the possible outcome, should a beam controlled by an unsuitable protocol become static outside the 3m height specified in HSG95 (or whatever that document has now been renamed to).