Guides on how to use multiple lasers

[jgoodwin27]

I know parts of my issues here are not going to have any resolutions and will come down to philisophical needs of the user - but parts will have answers and things that I'm looking for and I would like your wise words of wisdom for the rest as well.

So I just got my 2nd projector and 2nd FB3 to use with Quickshow. I now have two independent lasers that can do stuff.

What is the best way to go about creating cues within Quickshow for them? What if I am basking (I think thats the term I've seen on here for just kinda going with with the flow and entering cues live vs a pre-programmed show) and want laser A to do cue 1 and laser B to do cue 2 but have them trigger at the same time. Is there ways to create cues that launch different effects to different zones at the same time? Are there guides on how to do this?

Also what sort of things do you guys do when running only two projectors. I feel like three would be ideal so you could have your two atmospheric ones and a center laser doing the main show so it say. But what sort of tricks have you guys come up with on only two shows (whether stacked on top of each other or side by side or maybe along the diagnols).

Now I just got the second one so I haven't played much with it but are there any clue effects that you guys have seen that would be a fun starting place to start testing and playing around with (such as running a single beam across say a 10 point line across the two lasers, ect ect)?

I know there are kind of a lot of parts to this but I'm just super stoked and excited to take the next step in my new expensive hobby.

[hitekvoop]

Dunno about QS, but here's how I do it in Beyond...

1. Select Zone for Cue 1 to play in
2. Start Cue 1
3. Select Zone for Cue 2 to play in
4. Start Cue 2 (make sure one-per or multi is set on cues)
5. Drag resulting preview window to new cue.
That's it.

Now, when you start the new cue, it will playback the original cues in their respective zones.

[jgoodwin27]

Ah, there we are "Mutli-Cue" that is the part I was missing that made it not working like I was thinking it should. That makes it a lot better. Thank you.

Now I just need to come up with some cool concepts/ideas.

[Datsurb]

I have a similar setup, and there are lots of fun stuff to do.
Of course the aspect of having two different positions sources of projection is more than double impressive when doing beams. Independent projection is nice.
The possibility of producing more complexed images by letting each projector/FB3 handle one half of the image each. Would require more work/setup, but result in more flickerfree images.

Adding a third projector using two FB3`s is also a nice setup. Using one FB for the center and one for the two satellites - one mirrored. Nice.

[Bradfo69]

I'd have to agree with Datsurb. Three is really a "sweet spot" with two FB3's. You tend to have two basic traditional set ups - one is daisy chaining them together and mirroring the output for beam work. This really negates the need for your second FB3 though. The other is use one for graphics and one for beams. Sometimes people will put one on "stage" aiming back towards the audience for the beam work and you can run all of that on 1 FB3 with the corresponding zones and then with the other, have it out in the audience pointing back towards a screen/wall to handle graphic or abstract type work. Use the other FB3 to feed that projector.

I suppose you "could" also put one projector on top of the other and run one beam pattern through one - say the fans of beams and then run another type through the other - maybe cones or boxes or hot beams or something.

I don't know of any "guides" anywhere but, two of the most invaluable things you can do is get to a LEM and see what others are doing and the other is study YouTube videos. Part of the joy of this is setting up what looks good to YOU. Nothing is necessarily "right" or "wrong". I'm personally attracted to symmetry so I do a lot of mirroring with my projectors. Although... I do tend to use odd numbers with one in the center. Whether that's 3, 5 or 7 projectors lined up. The center may be what's being driven by one FB3 and doing something totally different that the flanking projectors driven by the other FB3. I've seen other people do some things though, that weren't symmetrical and I didn't find it appealing but, that doesn't make it "wrong".

Save up for a third projector It gives a lot more options that two!

[defend10]

Another idea, though I'm not sure it's possible in Quickshow, I've been in Beyond for a year now and haven't looked back. When I was using 2 projectors and 2 FB3s, I split a single zone in half on the x axis, essentially projecting the right half of the cue/zone out of the right projector, left on the left. There's many stock cues that look great this way, and you can "bounce" beams back and forth between projectors on hot beam cues. A little experimenting with what cues look good this way can lead to a great show with a set of stock cues. To the Quickshow experts out there, is this doable outside of Beyond? Pangolin has a tutorial on this on YouTube and it works great.

[jgoodwin27]

OOOOOoooo that is a thing I haven't looked into at all is setting up zones like that... I really haven't played too much with zones at all tbh yet. Just have zone 1 and zone 2 for projector 1 and projector 2.


I will be very sure to look into this and see what I can't find. Thank you.