Prism Projection Introduces Reveal Studio LED Fixture – NAB 2010
While at NAB last week, I ran into one of my good friends Miles Dudgeon from Prism Projection. After geeking out for a bit together on the show floor over some Zeiss len’s and other photography things, Miles walked me back to his booth to show me their latest product. Garrett Young, the President of Prism Projection did a quick demo of their latest product, the Reveal Studio LED fixture.
Just like their first product, the Reveal CW, the Reveal Studio uses Red, Green, Blue, Amber and Cyan LEDs. The fixture is designed for use in studio applications as well as on location or any other use where a color mixing fixture can be used. Just like almost all of the new fixtures shown at NAB, Prism Projection has not added the Reveal Studio fixture to their web site, www.prismprojection.com. Look for ore information on this fixture and something new from Prism in the near future.
Thanks Miles and Garrett!
Tags: #NAB2010, Fixtures, LED, Prism Projection, Reveal Studio
4 Comments
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By: Gooze
What everybody wants to know for LED fixtures unfortunately isn’t answered in the video: “How does it behave fading down those last 5% in 20 seconds?”
By: To.Em
That’s always the point where the conversation starts to “stutter” …
By: Miles Dudgeon
Gooze,
Its a tricky question to answer. 5% of 255 is 12.75. Since DMX can’t do partial values lets call it 13 possible steps in the last 5% of the range. Over 20 seconds thats a step taken every 1.53 seconds. The console controls all this.
Some fixtures (including Reveals) do an interpolation between some number of DMX frames and smooth it out. But with the console only changing values every second and a half, the sample for interpolation would have to be at least 66 frames. That would really mess things up when you want fast changes.
Lots of fixtures have a motor speed control channel because the motors can move at a much higher resolution than DMX and the device might be better at figuring out how big a step to take than the console. This hasn’t really caught on with dimmer channels.
Some fixtures (including the Reveals) can use 16 bit controls for some things including dimming. This makes a 5% fade over 20 seconds a bit better. We now have 65536 possible values instead of 256. Since we only care about the last 5% thats 3276.8 or lets call it 3277 steps to take. If the console is pumping out DMX at the full rate of 44 frames a second, we have 880 frames to move 3277 steps. 3.723 steps each frame. Or some frames 3 and some frames 4. But these are much much smaller steps than normal 8 bit values. It will appear smoother because its always moving even minutely and gives the device something to interpolate against.
How you choose to operate and control a fixture drastically effects how “steppy” it will be.
In the case of the Reveals, we’re pretty smooth with even steps down to the 2-1% range in 8 bit control. We’re really proud of our dimming controls.
Where are you located, we can see about setting up a live demo for you?
Regards,
Miles
By: Gooze
Hi Miles,
Thanks for your response. I understand that the very fast nature of LED’s reveal every step on the control side. I think 16-bit dimming channels are a very good first step. As you say, a speed channel would solve many problems, but set’s us back to the beginning of the moving light control era. Isn’t there any other protocol out there (like ACN) that keeps things moving so to say?
The theatermachine is located in the Netherlands. We would love to see your fixture. If you are at PLASA we will definitely visit the Reveal booth!