Chaser/Effects starting from a different index position depending when the cue is triggered

    I've noticed that when I use chasers and effects they don't always start in the same index position.


    For example, if I create a simple chaser with 12 dimmers and a chaser duration of 250ms, and make it the first cue in the cuelist, it will start with dimmer 1, then dimmer 2, etc as expected.


    But if I start that cue, for example, 2 seconds after the first cue, the chaser will start with dimmer 9 . This makes me think that the chaser's internal timer is triggered from the time that the GO button is pressed, even if the chaser cue isn't triggered immediately.


    I hope that description makes sense?


    Is there a way to ensure that chasers and effects always play from the beginning when they are triggered? If not, I think it would be more useful to have a predictable behaviour like this if possible in a future version of DMXC.

    All the best,

    Phil

    Hi,

    Quote from philbearman

    I hope that description makes sense?


    Is there a way to ensure that chasers and effects always play from the beginning when they are triggered? If not, I think it would be more useful to have a predictable behaviour like this if possible in a future version of DMXC.

    yes, your description was sufficient. This behaviour comes from the fact, that the chaser and effect timer starts with the start of a cuelist. We decided to implement this behaviour, because then all effects inside a cuelist are synchronous. This is the solution to have a predictable behaviour inside a cuelist because with this solution all effects and chaser run with the same time base. Otherwise, they would drift (we had such issues in the past and decided to implement this solution to fix this issue). Therefore, there is no way to start the effects and chaser at the start of a cue. However, if you start your cuelist at the correct time, then the effects start correctly.


    All the best,

    JP

    Ah ok thanks for the explanation.


    It becomes an issue for me when I'm doing timecode light shows set to music and although I have the chaser/effect frequency set to match the tempo of the song and I start the cue exactly on the first beat of a bar of music, the chase is sometimes out of phase with the beats/bars.

    I guess the solution would be for me to edit the audio track so that the beginning of the track is an exact number of beats.


    All the best,

    Phil

    An idea to kinda work around this problem is to start another cuelist from your main cuelist. In this separate cuelist the effects run in their time frame, so you could use this way. To start a separate cuelist, drop down the "Add Button" in the Cuelist Editor and select "Special Cue".


    All the best,

    JP