scenes vs. cue

I'm tiring to figure out is there any advantages to using scenes instead of building a cue list . in an ambient party type lighting situation. were there might be a room look,dinner look ,movie look and then some flash n' trash for a minute then back to a room look.
This stems from an embarrassing moment during tech were i had all my looks set a hour before show and my boss decided to show his lighting ability's through me.and as we were editing colors on some leds they would not edit and save.So I believe it was the infamous tracking and not being able to pin point the cue or just a glitch.Because back at the shop it edited just fine.
So my question is what are the pros and cons of scenes vs. cues ,and are scenes the same as record/state in cues. And would it be practical to build a show in a bunch of scenes.
thanks for your time
  • I for one see it both ways. I know a lot of people are surprised when I tell them how much I tend to use virtual scenes, but they can be useful.

    Scenes seem to be intended to be moved onto IPCB faders, as releasing them in the scene directory can cause some ugly looks to occur on stage. You can create a scene in the directory (let's call it scene 1) and the scene directly below it can be a release for that scene, thus allowing a quick, timed release without having to hold your finger on the screen while pressing the release button. Here's how to do it: Create your scene (scene 1 for instance), and then create a blank scene directly below it in the directory. Move the blank scene to a master temporarily. View the contents of the master by pressing the respective choose button, and for the particular scene, use a comment macro to release the original scene (scene 1). You can adjust the release time in scene options then.

    I just used a combination of scenes and cues on a show recently where there was a limited rehearsal period and it wasn't exactly obvious where all of the looks that I built were going to occur in the show. Labelling and organizing the virtual scenes, (along with an inhibitive group master) allowed me to quickly grab any look the stage manager asked for and play it back live.

    This is GREAT for things like house lights or curtain warmers where you can have the house fade up on 4 seconds and down on 8 seconds all with the tap of a touch screen.

    So while it's not really feasible to run an entire show off of virtual scenes, they can be used for your "simple room look" example, and they certainly have their place even in the largest of unstructured shows.

    Jason
  • Though pretty much everything you mentioned in your post can be done with virtual cuelists as well. The only difference being that when you you play with cuelists you can have multiple cues within that list...
  • Oh absolutely: The only difference being that in an unstructured show running virtual cuelists, in order to access specific looks that a stage manager may call at his or her whim, you may have to cycle through a bunch of cues or use "goto" to find them. In this respect, virtual scenes are very simple and quick.

    Someone posted a method of accessing and releasing virtual cuelists as well, in a similar manner to the scene approach I mentioned. I've used this method occasionally for busking as a quick method for accessing chases when I have limited hard masters, and it works very well. But for something as simple as curtain warmers or houselights, I think scenes can be more straightforward. It's just a personal preference for some applications.

    Although, the virtual cuelist options are very powerful.
  • BTW guys

    1- IPCB can also be done on cuelists as of several SW builds ago
    2 - Using a Virtual Cuelist also has some advantages over a Scene if it is something that needs to be released rather than "stomped". Cuelists have the option "add release end cue" which will allow you to "toggle" a cueliust on and off with out eating up two spaces on the screen. As a rule of thumb I tend to use scenes for things that get "stomped" like Colour on the fly which you would typically "stomp" with another scene to change. Scenes are also good places to store "looks" that you don't want to have clutter up a cuelist or palette directory.

    Hope this helps:)
  • I proposed a while back that scenes could become "enviroments" that is to say the combination of cues, chses, effects and the programmer could be saved as a snapshot to a one touch library for easy recalling with swap, flash and solo options etc.

    Ross
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