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MIDI control of Avolite Pearl 2000 Lighting Controller


ThomasL

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Hi All,

 

Does anyone have insights or experience in sending MIDI Notes to the Avolite Pearl 2000 with the objective of controlling each of the 15 Playback Faders?

 

Up to now, I've managed to 'accidentally' discover that Note C (Octave 1) will communicate with Playback Fader 1. Next, I have to 'discover' the other 14 MIDI Notes and relate each to the other 15 Playback Faders.

 

If anyone has any insigths or experience in a more efficient way of discovering or specifying the MIDI Note, it would be appreciated. Normally, I would use 'Capture MIDI message', but the Pearl 2000 does not seem to have this feature. I've tried MIDI Test mode to 'see' the MIDI message sent to the Pearl, but the Pearl's LCD screen remains blank when I try this.

 

In relation to Watchout, we are using VenueMagic DMXAV software on another PC to control WO5 shows (via serial to TCP), and want to use the same (VenueMagic) to control the Pearl Lighting Controller as well (via MIDI) so that WO and Lighting are tightly controlled together. Using a USB-DMX unit on the WO pc is not practical as the lights and controller we hire are programmed by contractors. We just want to control their Pearl 2000 once they complete the lighting cues.

 

Any help or suggestion is appreciated. Thanks.

 

Thomas Leong

Malaysia

Edited by ThomasL
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Thanks. I have been going through that manual, and the pages you referred to had some vital pertinent info such as not using Note Off, using only Note On and velocity to control the lights' value, and setting the Pearl to MIDI Slave Mode as well as the Channel No. However, the software I was using to send the MIDI Notes would not allow the typing in of commands as required by the Pearl manual. It only gave me drop down selections, etc. But I've solved it all today.

 

Basically, the Pearl 2000's Playback Faders (the one we are using here anyway; not sure if other Pearls are programmed differently) would only respond to MIDI Note C (Octave 1) for Playback 1, C#/Db (Octave 1) for Playback 2,...till D (Octave 2) for Playback 15. These are the first 15 keys of a MIDI keyboard from the left. I did not attempt Message Changes, etc. I used a virtual MIDI keyboard, and had to use its 'Transpose' feature at -3 to get the Octave 1 Notes. It initially defaulted, after setup, to 'Transpose = 0' which gave me Octaves 6-7 Notes, which the Pearl would not respond to.

 

Client is happy as he now has a Show Control Template for all 15 Playback Faders which he can sync down to the micro-second with the start of his WO shows or sequences.

 

Thomas Leong

Malaysia

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