xLights 4 effect similar to Vixen "Alternating"

[Robocrash]

Is there an effect similar to Vixen's "Alternating"?  Is there one planned?

I'd love to alternate to the beat of the music.  but it looks like I'll have to re-learn Vixen of brute force it in LOR SS or SE.

dave

[Gilrock]

I know they think we dig into their program and copy things but truth is I've never actually seen a single effect rendered in Vixen of any flavor other than videos people post.  You got a video that shows the effect and tell you how to do it.

[flyinverted]

You can just add timing marks to an audio file using the built in beat finder and change the color of an on effect to the beats.  By the way, bars has an effect setting called Alternate. I just changes the colors instead of moving them. You might want to try that.

[dkulp]

Can you describe better what it does?

In general, I use the single strand skips effect for this type of thing.   I drop the effect on a "Bar" timing, set the colors I want, set the skip size to 0 or 1, and the number of advances equal to one less of the number of beats in a bar (so normally 3).   

[Phrog30]

Can you describe better what it does?

In general, I use the single strand skips effect for this type of thing.   I drop the effect on a "Bar" timing, set the colors I want, set the skip size to 0 or 1, and the number of advances equal to one less of the number of beats in a bar (so normally 3).

This is close.  In Vixen alternating the "motion" is just back and forth, while XL does direction of left, right, or to/from middle.

The biggest difference with single strand is it really only works well on a horizontal single strand model.  For example, running on a window frame produces a weird result, where the left and right sides of the frame act as one pixel.

James

[Gilrock]

Sounds like something I would do using Morphs but your not going to accomplish it dropping just one down.  If you use two layers and stagger them so that the new head starts when the old head ends you can precisely place them to hit the edges of the model in sync with a beat and just change the direction of the second one to go backwards.   The morph can have a nice 4 color blended tail also. 

[dkulp]

This is close.  In Vixen alternating the "motion" is just back and forth, while XL does direction of left, right, or to/from middle.

The biggest difference with single strand is it really only works well on a horizontal single strand model.  For example, running on a window frame produces a weird result, where the left and right sides of the frame act as one pixel.

You can create a Model Group that only contains the Frame.   Set the group layout mode to "Vertical per model" and it would create a single strand of all the pixels on the frame.   

Actually if you are going to do this for multiple windows at the same time, make the Model group have all the frames with the vertical per model set and it would then apply to all the windows. 

That said, I do want to look at adding an option to the Single Strand for how the single strand is mapped onto a 2D model.  The "Chase" type has a "group all arches" option that unlayers the arches.   We change that to a drop down or something that would allow options.   Would just need to figure out what the options are and what to name them.   

[Phrog30]

The problem with creating multiple groups, which I just found out recently, is xl can only render one group. So, if I want to have multiple effects across multiple groups this won't work.

[dkulp]

The problem with creating multiple groups, which I just found out recently, is xl can only render one group. So, if I want to have multiple effects across multiple groups this won't work.

Huh?  Not sure what you mean by that.   If you have multiple groups in your sequence, you can drop effects on any of them and they should all be rendered.   I'm a bit confused by this.

[Phrog30]

The last group in the sequence list is rendered. Maybe they are all rendered, but only the last is used. I ran into this issue last week.

I'm not talking about layers within models, but separate groups pointing to the same channels.

Sorry, I'm not quite sure the best way to explain it.

[Gilrock]

He wants it where he puts red on one group and green on another and if they hit the same channel it comes out yellow.  That's not how I usually want it work.  If you're happy with how Vixen does it then why are you here?

[Robocrash]

I found a tutorial (but need to find the link again) where the effect I wanted was described.  In xLights, this dude used the single strand effect and added skips instead of chase along his roofline.

I'm going to play with it this afternoon.  I'd like to get my lights to skip to the beat of the music.

 

[flyinverted]

Scroll to the top of this page, then next to HOME, there's the Wiki link.  On the Wiki page, left column there's a Tutorials page. The video you saw is probably one of those.

[Phrog30]

He wants it where he puts red on one group and green on another and if they hit the same channel it comes out yellow.  That's not how I usually want it work.  If you're happy with how Vixen does it then why are you here?

Right Gil, my whole thing in life is to make yellow.

There are great things in Vixen and XL. I am using both. I responded to a thread, that's why I'm here. I think Angus has rubbed off on you.

[JonB256]

I'm going to play with it this afternoon.  I'd like to get my lights to skip to the beat of the music.

If you use the newly added Vamp plug in for beat analysis, and you know the song timing (3/4 or 4/4, then you could set the skips to match over that interval.