Phoenix LIVE - Please help me to help a friend?!

[jfloots]

A friend asked me for a short laser show at his coming housewarming party.

So, I want to play a laser show that is pre-programmed to a song (any song)!!!

I have a Red/Green/Blu-ray laser with ILDA control and I only have Phoenix LIVE software and the DAC that came with it.

There are some nice shows that come with Phoenix but it is not playable with LIVE - to play that I have to fork out the full > $2000 for the software.

Is there any other freeware software that will work with my DAC that can play a laser show pre-programmed to a song?! PLEASE TELL ME THERE IS!!!!

Or is my only way to be able to do this, to hope I win the lotto this week to be able to fork out the extra $2000???

Thanks for reading this and thanks in advance for any advice!!!

Regards,
J-F

[greenalien]

Phoenix live is designed for live 'jamming' use and won't play any music-synced pre-programmed shows directly.
The best you can do, just using the software, is to use Edit mode to build a long frame with lots of different figures in it (the default frame length is 10 seconds, but you can make them much longer if you choose) - matching it exactly to a piece of music would be a matter of trial and error - although you do have playback speed control and beat matching controls, so you should be able to do a reasonable job.

A more versatile option would be to use a DMX controller to trigger your show - you'd have to set the controller up to do all the patch changes and effects, but this could at least be timeline based or music-triggered, depending on the controller, and could be programmed quite easily once you have the controller correctly attached to the DAC, the software set up to respond correctly to the controller, and of course you'd need to know how the controller is programmed, and would need the DMX breakout cable for the DAC.

If you'd rather just find a solution that plays pre-programmed shows, there are cheaper options to buying Phoenix Pro.

One possibility would be to bid for this http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...=STRK:MEWAX:IT

and then upgrade it to the 2010 version (free of charge). Note that the software doesn't need a separate USB dongle but the dongle is built into the DAC; unfortunately the software won't run unless it finds it, so you can't just download the software and use your DAC (although you can use your Phoenix DAC to control a second laser if you wanted). There are loads of pre-programmed shows that can be downloaded from the software website at no charge. I know this isn't free, it's down to luck as to how many others bid against you ... however, even at full price, it's still half the cost of Phoenix Pro...

[jfloots]

Thank you greenalien for this helpful information!

[majorlee]

i would be cautious buying any Phoenix products, as u have to pay for the updates and they do not provide Downloads to previous software