Need to start bloging again.

Posted on April 27, 2021 by Faye Bell

I need to actually start blogging again.
I am going to try once a week by Thursday, since Wensday and Thursday are my two days off in my work week.

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Just another sketch

Posted on January 27, 2021 by Faye Bell

I am trying to improve my sketching skills, by trying to sketch once or twice a week.

anyways here is todays sketch.

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New design using the idea of the Angle Beats stage.

Posted on November 10, 2020 by Faye Bell

its still some WIP, but its going to be cool when done.

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Fighting Fate by iMeiden. How I am making this work.

Posted on February 27, 2020 by Faye Bell
Design Idea

you can read my design statement in the youtube details.

Here is the details on how I am doing this.

  1. Buy a license of capture . I am just using 1 world of dmx in it.
  2. Learn how to use it.
  3. Hook up a lighting console to it. Capture supports almost everything and the kitchen sink. I use Art-Net with Lightfactory.
  4. Get a screen capture system. either with hardware or software. I use screenbits on the Microsoft app store.
  5. Make a video sync sound to it and show it off.

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Lighting Design Idea! The intro to Gen:LOCK.

Posted on January 29, 2020 by Faye Bell

I created this as I felt it would look interesting. I had this song stuck in my head for a bit. I then Designed it.

I plan on uploading designs to different songs as time permits. on my youtube channel.

Anyways Please Enjoy

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Some art I did for LGBTQanime.club

Posted on January 11, 2020 by Faye Bell

I made a business card for the group I run.

Anime face. original art by Faye
concept. drawing
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Automating the Home Meetup Theatre experience.

Posted on July 31, 2019 by Faye Bell

What do you get, when you have Network PDU’s, DMX controlled lights, OSC Audio controlled mixers, Led signs and a serial controlled HDMI switcher?

A complex machine.

Using the Linux controlled systems, that I have previously made for my PBX control and Twitch Streamer ex-roommate. I can control the Network PDUs via the TCL/TK Expect scripting language. Send scripted commands to the telnet server on Light Factory (DMX control system),

Also,I have written scripts to Mute and un-mute the X-AIR 16 mixers, that control my desk audio and Theatre sound system.

With that, what do you do when your room mate moves out, leaving behind a custom lighting infrastructure for streaming?

Re-purpose it. Also add a projector to the mix. Then make a venue for my meetup friends.

With some re-configuring of lighting positions. I now have a wall wash, that looks pretty.

A view of preshow.

With that I can send my DMX console to change the lights and reposition the RCL’s to other points of the room.

With that, done, I created scripts that can be called from a secure web interface.

I login to my web server that is public facing on my phone. I click a link to start up the system. That server will ssh over my WAN, to trigger everything on the network in my Austin apartment.

The flow of the process is this. on clicking on the Theatre-GO Link

  1. Turn on power to the Projector and HDMI switcher.
  2. Mute all inputs on the Main Mixer
  3. Turn on power to the RCL’s
  4. Tell the DMX control system to go in to the “wall wash preshow”
  5. Turn on the Speakers.
  6. Tell the Switcher to go to input 4. then turn on the output to the projector.
  7. Tell the LED sign to display the logon info for the guest network.

The flow of the off process is mostly the same.

  1. Mute all inputs on the main mixer.
  2. Turn off projector and Speakers
  3. Turn off the power to the RCL’s
  4. Tell the DMX control system to go to the “off look”

Side bar. The led sign.

Led sign saying "are you a Neko?"
AMS director sign displaying a message from the guest net web server.

My guests that come to my Meetups, can connect to the wifi. I am using a PFsense captive portal, to secure my fire walled off stub “simple” network. upon login they are redirected to the Anime LED sign control system. The goal of this sign is to let them spam memes and silliness during the show.

Okay Back to the Processes. How do you control the HDMI switcher?

I am clicking a link that calls a shell script to spam the serial link. To tell it what input to select. or to turn on or off the output.

The next phase of this system is to make a better audio remote control system. Currently I have to use the X-air remote control apps, to adjust auto levels, and EQ. I would like to be able to control it from the same web ui. I will be replacing the LED sign with a one that can control each pixel. So my friends can draw on it.

How do you control the lights?

Using the same Web UI, it ssh’s to a local machine in Austin, to send the Light factory server, commands to switch looks.

Currently I have presets for Show, House lights. Panic, and “off”.

the show look is dim look with most lights off.

the House light look, use some color wash lights and dim-able LED lights to illuminate the room .

The Panic look turns on all my DMX controlled lights to a “white” color and at full.

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More automation in the apartment.

Posted on May 24, 2019 by Faye Bell

Soon, I will be writing up the “theatre” automation.

the goals of this project is to do the following.
1. Change lights
2. control the projector
3. Control Audio and Video sources.
4. Control a LED sign

Some of the work has all ready been done. (The DMX control of lights and audio mixer)

The projector control, is going to be a tad bit harder. I need to capture the IR codes for the power. and push it to a Audrino or PIC.

more to come ….

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Drawings

Posted on March 27, 2019 by Faye Bell

Here is some drawings I have been working on. I find that I like water color brushes. I think I am going to start posting more art stuff. That I have done or am working on.

Just playing with the Arms
Working with 2 point perspective.
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Lighting. System automation.

Posted on November 16, 2018 by Faye Bell
Just playing with lights.

So how do you tie the following together? turning on non-dim set lights. Sending power to DMX controlled lights that can go in to “disco mode”. Controlling a few cues on a light console. Then Of Course….. make it easy for anyone to start and stop the system?

The answer is Automation.

This Blog Post will be touching on how I solved this problem off a “simple on/off switch” for this complex system.

Part One: What was the scope of this sub-project?

This system Must, make it where the end user can Start Up and Shutdown(safe) the lighting system. this control system shall be accessible from any network.  To allow any device to start or safe it via a Website. 

The website Must be secured. The only options shall, use two links. “OFF and ON”.

Part Two:  Old Implementation

Asterisk dial plan showing opt 9999 and 0000

Back when I started work on this to be controlled by my PBX, with  the 6602 extension. The end user would call the 6602 extension and press a option. then the following would happen. (when turning it on) 

  • Hard coded DMX values being sent via OLA daemon over network to a DMXking eDMX4 to get the DMX to the lights to set the color.

The main issue I had with this setup, I could not dynamically control the system.  Also you had to be on my PBX, or white listed to be redirected when you dial in to my home phone line. 

Part Three:  Current Implementation

With those known limitations, I decided to do something about it Implement the scope of work in Part on

Webserver to Austin VMs. 

I have a hub and spoke VPN infrastructure all ready in place. Lets look at the Hub. 

Censored key details. (security through obscurity ) 

This Pfsense vm links using OpenVPN to a few sites. but most importantly it links to my apartment. 

With that link I can remotely call commands over SSH to turn on  and off the system, from the web server.  then It is just a matter of calling a shell command to kick off a Shell script on the Austin utility VM.

$output = shell_exec("/usr/bin/ssh www-server@aus-netbox PROD-GO");<br>echo $output;<br>

Above is the PHP code for turning on the system.  the off code is 99% the same.  Its secured with a username and password.  Looking at the aus-netbox host, the system is running a bunch of different Expect scripts.

  • Turn on outlets on the PDUs 
  • Tell LightFactory to go to a standby cue. over its telnet connection.

Let us look at the integration via expect and and LightFactory 

Expect script to go in to cue 8888

 First we say log all output to the shell 

the “set timeout 20” is Very Important. as it helps keep the telnet session from hanging. all it means is this, “If I don’t get input from the I//O stream bail out” 

spawn says what we are running and redirecting I/O from. 

Then its expect “foo” and send “bar”. its pretty simple 

To touch on the Light Factory commands.  sc31 is a shortcut macro (I created) to release all channels. and cue  line calls the cue from the cue list serah #8888 . 

Then it exits.  Now Serah can then control the system via the LightFactory Myinterface app. As long as she is on the right WiFi Network.

Shutdown is similar to what was explained.

 

 

 

 

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