elektraLite CP100xt Manual Part Two - Manual (Page 52)

52
START AND END THRESHOLDS EXPLAINED
WHAT ARE THEY AND HOW DO THEY WORK?
When you’re in a Fixture or Group Features display you are able to access the Start and End
Thresholds by using the up & down cursor keys. You will notice that Start Thresholds have a default
value of 0% and End Thresholds have a default value of 100%.
So just what the hell are they?
A Threshold is the percentage of time within a Cue’s crossfade
that each individual feature will change.
i.e.: You have 2 cues. The first is a white spot at one end of the room. The second is a 10 second
crossfade into a blue star at the other end of the room. With the Thresholds set at the default values
you are going to see all of the features slowly change. The color wheel will slowly scroll through all
the colors until it gets to blue and the gobo wheel will scroll through all of it’s gobos until it gets to
the star.
What we really want to see is an immediate color and gobo change and then watch the beam slowly
move across the room. So we want the color and gobo channels to “end” right away, but the pan &
tilt channels should crossfade throughout the full 10 seconds. All that we have to do is call up the
Cue that we want to change, use the cursor keys to go to the “End Threshold” display of the fixture,
and, using the rotaries, change the color and gobo features to 0%. If they are told to “End” at 0% then
that means that they will finish making their changes right away. After all is said and done, you have
to re-store that Cue so the changes that you just made are recorded for playback.
When we playback these 2 Cues the first becomes our white spot at the one end of the room. Then,
when we play the second Cue the fixture’s color and gobo snap immediately into a blue star and then
start to slowly move across the room.
Start and End Thresholds are terrific ways to create multi-part Cues and lend themselves to some very
unique programming. We admit that they can be a little tricky to figure out at first but once you’ve
got the hang of it you’ll be pulling off some pretty complex maneuvers in a fraction of the time of
what it normally would take to prepare. The key is to play around with them. Don’t try to tackle
some wild programming maneuver that you saw on a Pink Floyd video. You’ll more than likely
become rather postal and start waving Uzis around fast food restaurants. Take it slow by trying out
some basic color and gobo changes like the one described above. Once you’ve got it down you’ll be
unstoppable!