Glossary
Welcome to Blinderkitten !
We use a lot of technical terms in the software and in lighting in general. I'll try to explain most of them here.
Lighting basics
| Word | Definition | More infos |
|---|---|---|
DMX | The DMX is the protocol mostly used to control stage lights with consoles. One DMX cable can carry one DMX universe. A DMX universe contains 512 channels, each channel is a controllable value between 0 and 255. | |
DMX mode and adress | Every stage light using DMX have an adress and a mode. The adress is the number of the first channel listened by the projector. The mode defines how the projector reacts and how many channels it use. | |
Artnet | The artnet is a network version of the DMX. It can transmit multiple universes via your local network. | |
sACN | sACN is another network protocol for DMX. It is currently not supported in blinderkitten | |
Node | A node is a device with DMX input and / or outputs for your computer. It can be USB or network (for artnet / sACN) Some nodes are not usable with other software than the builders one, so be careful before buying one. |
Blinderkitten basics
Fixture | A fixture is the representation of your stage light in the software. You must have one fixture for each projector you want to control. Each fixture have an unique identifier (ID) used to control it, a fixture type and some patchs. | |
Fixture Type | A fixture type correponds to one DMX chart of a projector. It give all informations to blinderkitten to control all parameters of this types of fixtures. | |
Channel / Parameter | A parameter, also called channel represents one controllable function of a projector. | For example : Red, Green, Blue, Intensity, Pan, Tilt... |
Patch | A patch connects the fixture to one or multiple channels in a DMX universe. You can specify the projector address and the selected interface. | |
Interface | A blinderkitten interface allow you to connect to DMX nodes or MIDI devices. | |
Sub Fixture | Some fixtures like leds bars or multiple head spots can have many times the same parameter. this type of fixture will be separated in multiple sub fixtures so you can control each one independently. | |
Programmer | In blinderkitten, you have some encoders to control directly the channels of your projectors. All these commands are handled by a programmer. It will keep your values active until you clear it. You can copy its content into a cue to save and replay your commands. | |
Cue | A cue is a set of commands to apply to your fixtures. When a cue is triggered, all commands inside it are called back and the parameters of fixtures are set to desired values. | |
Cuelist | A cuelist is an ordered list of cues. | |
Effect | An effect allow you to vary a channel value in time. Effects use a curve to change the values. | |
Carousel | Like effects, but the variation is set with checkpoints values instead of curves. | |
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