In order for kinetic tracking to work you must have purchased the kinetic tracking plugin
from Pangolin and had your license File flagged for kinetic tracking.
Before we can start to track kinetic balls, we must start first by setting up DMX input.
This can be done with either DMX using something like an Enttec box, or Artnet.
Go to Settings> DMX> DMX/ Art-Net Settings… and enable a DMX universe input either using
Art-net universes… or selecting an Enttec box.
Once you are receiving DMX which can be seen using the DMX monitor you are ready to start
tracking.
Kinetic tracking features are located in the standard Quick Targets Beam Settings window,
added you will see the option to create a “path” beam type instead of just a static beam,
this is what will allow us to create a path for the beam to follow along the path
of the kinetic fixture.
Start by Selecting a beam to work with, enabling that beam, and setting a zone for that beam.
We will then select path.
This will open many options below to create your path.
On your DMX console, or whatever is controlling your kinetic fixture, you can bring your kinetic
fixture to its start point, and then we can set the start point position where the laser
beam hits the kinetic ball in real life.
Then we can use the console to bring the kinetic to its end point, and position our beam to
the end point.
If your kinetic is inconsistent, or you have a complex setup, you can set more points in
the middle, or by 25 percentages or higher to create a more accurate tracking.
Now that we have assigned a start, end and any middle points, we can get the beam to
follow the DMX values and position itself automatically.
Under path control, you can select if the fixture is 8 bit (1 channel) or 16 bit (2 channel).
Select your DMX input (what you set up earlier) and the position starting address for the fixture.
If you are not using the full length of your kinetic ball, and your end point is not the
full DMX value set, then you can change this here.
If this is set correctly, your beam will track position to the DMX value of the kinetic fixture
in real life.
Note you must press okay on this window, and have the DMX input button selected here.
Now we can set our color control for our beam.
Select Beam sequence if you want to determine color in your quick targets tab, own color
if you want to set its color here.
Or DMX IN to have the console control its color.
This could be the RGB Values of the kinetic fixture itself or patched separately in the
console to control the kinetic fixtures color and the beam color separately.
Here we can enable RGB, and enable a dimmer channel, in my console I’ve added separate
RGBI generic fixtures to control and color my beams.
Enter those channels from your console here.
Now if you've done this correctly, what will happen is, the laser will follow the dmx channels
exactly.
However because, these fixtures are physical objects and have motion and physics, what's
going to happen is, the beam is going to go to the immediate position of the dmx has,
but the ball is gonna lag behind.
So we've included a feature where you can actually accelerate the beam to act like a
normal real life fixture.
So underneath speed control, what we're going to do is, we're going to enable this control
of the speed.
And then we can select our dmx input and our channel number, if our fixture has a speed
master channel on your fixture.
I actually like to just put that at Max at all times, so I'm going to set this to a value
that is not used in the patch.
Then what we'll do is we'll set an acceleration that's quite fast so that we don't have any
problems with it.
And I'm gonna make guess at how fast my balls will move.
Speed here is all about how fast the top speed of your ball is.
Acceleration is all about how long it takes for it to get to that top speed.
These values right here will be the same if you are just using to not have control of
the speed fader on your console.
I actually recommend this, as most people are going to create their motions that are
slower and it'll work better anyway.
So let's give this a shot.
Once we put this in, I'm gonna press ok and now you can see that the beam moves in a way,
that's kind of like the kinetic ball.
We just have to match it.
So at first we're just going to look for the actual speed at the top speed.
Which looks a little too fast.
So let's bring that down.
Go back into here.
And we'll change this to say maybe 25.
And let's see what that looks like.
And again we're just interested in how fast the beam moves at its top speed.
It appears to be a little too slow.
So the beam kind of lags behind the ball.
So let's adjust it a little bit more.
And I fine-tuned this earlier.
So I can put in what I learned earlier.
Which was 26.9.
And I'll put that in for both.
So now ignoring the acceleration, the beam will move the exact same speed as the ball
had its Max speed.
So let's just adjust our acceleration.
Let's go back into here and let's change our acceleration value to say 25.
Now you can see the beam kind of sits on the ball and follows.
But it's a little bit off still.
It looks like that the beam could accelerate a little bit faster.
So let's go into our quick targets here again.
And let's set this to 30.
Now when I move this, the beam should sit on the ball and follow physically just like
the ball.
In “extra anchor points” you can adjust anchor points, so If you experience tails
on your beams, you can add or subtract anchor points to fix that here.
In custom Image you can change your simple beam to any frame or animation, even create
shapes and abstracts instead of just a simple point.
Creating cool looks, moving images, or potentially even fatter beams.
Thank you for watching our quick hints video on our kinetic tracking plugin.
If you still need support you can contact our support line.
Or if you have time you can watch our deep dive video on kinetic tracking.
Thank you for watching!