Alternating Effect Transparent

[natedogqwe]

Hello all! I could really use some help.

I am trying to design my lightshow and when I add the effect "Alternating" it shows up transparent. This makes it difficult to see the work I am doing. I have tried clicking on the color gradient to change it and make it more visible, but I just cant seem to do it. Online tutorials shows that "Alternating" normally shows up as red/green, but that has never happened for me.

Is there some kind of setting I am not seeing?

Screenshot attached.

Any help is appreciated.

[RichieNorthcott]

When you select the colour option (the blue item on the RHS), what colours can you select? It looks like your nodes may be set up for single colour only. If you have single colour strings, then you can change what colour they show as (the default is that blue colour I think). Check the item's colour settings from the display setup window. You don't mention what kind of controller or lights you are using? The alternating effect doesn't have much context for single colour strings, the most you might achieve is alternating on/off or between two intensity levels depending on what kind of hardware you have.

[jchuchla]

Before we go too far with the specific problem you're describing, let's take a minute to talk about element setup. Your element list shows that you may have missed a fundamental concept in vixen. Whenever I see people reference color in an element name, I start there. I'm assuming your windows are made from 3 strings of single color lights.
Whenever you have a prop that has multiple color aspects to it, but each of those colors exist in the same physical space, then it should only be one element. Not one for each color. For example. Window 1 should be a single prop. Not 3 props. When you create the prop, it should be defined as "multiple independent colors" and then you pick the colors that it supports. That way you can drop a red/green alternate effect onto the window 1 element and it will alternate the colors between red and green.
Furthermore, you probably want to put your 4 windows into a group. Then you can put an alternate effect on the "windows" group and have it alternate each window between red and green (or blue)

In the end, the clear effect boxes mean that the effect has nothing to do with the given settings on the prop you dropped it on. This would happen if you put a red/green alternate onto a single color element that only supports blue. Or if the exact shade of red in the effect doesn't match what you set up for the element. So we need to clear up your display setup issues before we attempt to guess at why the boxes are clear.

[natedogqwe]

Before we go too far with the specific problem you're describing, let's take a minute to talk about element setup. Your element list shows that you may have missed a fundamental concept in vixen. Whenever I see people reference color in an element name, I start there. I'm assuming your windows are made from 3 strings of single color lights.
Whenever you have a prop that has multiple color aspects to it, but each of those colors exist in the same physical space, then it should only be one element. Not one for each color. For example. Window 1 should be a single prop. Not 3 props. When you create the prop, it should be defined as "multiple independent colors" and then you pick the colors that it supports. That way you can drop a red/green alternate effect onto the window 1 element and it will alternate the colors between red and green.
Furthermore, you probably want to put your 4 windows into a group. Then you can put an alternate effect on the "windows" group and have it alternate each window between red and green (or blue)

In the end, the clear effect boxes mean that the effect has nothing to do with the given settings on the prop you dropped it on. This would happen if you put a red/green alternate onto a single color element that only supports blue. Or if the exact shade of red in the effect doesn't match what you set up for the element. So we need to clear up your display setup issues before we attempt to guess at why the boxes are clear.

Thanks for the responses.

I should have mentioned that im using a raspberry pi running FPP to control 16 relay switches to toggle on and off "dumb lights".

The youtube videos ive watched on how to do this it seems so simple to use the alternating effect and have it work.

[natedogqwe]

Thank you all for the quick responses.

To clarify, i am using a Raspberry Pi running FPP to controll 16 relay switches toggling on and off "dumb lights".

How would I go about resolving my issue without completely rebuilding my songs?

[jchuchla]

It doesn't matter what hardware you're controlling. Elements are about logical items, not physical props. One RGB element will connect to 3 relays for dumb lights.
Theres' two approaches you can take. In either case i would make a full backup of your profile and keep it in a safe place before beginning.
First create the new elements. Go into display setup. at the top, select "Generic numbered group" add it. Group name "Windows", Prefix name "Window", count 4. Then Select no dimming curve. Then in the color screen select the middle option. "Multiple colors but independent" And in the dropdown right below select RGB. It'll tell you 4 elements added with 4 filters and 4 properties. If you highlight the windows group, you'll see that it has only 4 elements but 12 patch points.
Now the two options.
1) safer but more work. Don't delete the original elements yet. Open each sequence and select the entire window 1 red line and move it to the window 1 line. repeat for blue and green. Then do the same for window 2-4. After all of the sequences are updated and saved, then you can delete the original props.
2) more risky but faster. Delete the original props. Close and reopen vixen. Open each sequence and it will prompt you that there's foreign/unknown elements in it. It will give you the opportunity to map these to your elements. You can then map the red, green and blue elements for each window to the appropriate window element. (3 to 1 mapping, I think that works) Then do the import. You'll still need to repeat for each sequence.