Liam Loves the FC-4!

[JonnyMac]

I hope Liam doesn't mind me reposting his report (posted to the CalHauntS mailing list) on the FC-4.  Thanks for the nice words, Liam, and we're glad you like the FC-4!

Good morning,

I hope that all of you had a great weekend. All I can say is it was too chilly out there to be hanging Christmas lights. But I did it anyway.

Anyway, to get to the point... On Saturday my FC-4 package arrived.  As always, shipping by EFX-TEK was amazingly fast. Although I didn't have time to play with my FC-4 boards on Saturday, I did break one out and set it up yesterday to control my Christmas lights. I am happy to report that set up and programming is simple beyond words. 
(For those of you unfamiliar, the FC-4 is a control board that allows you to control incandescent light levels through a Prop-1, 2, SX, or PC using Vixen).

I probably went a bit unconventional, and used indoor two-prong extension cords from Target to connect to the AC terminals. It seems to work fine, plus now I can easily attach three lighting instruments per channel (up to the wattage limit, of course).

Once I had my FC-4, Prop-1, and requisite cabling secured to a scrap piece of 1"x4" lumber, I was good to go. I downloaded the FC-4 test code from EFX-TEK and uploaded it to the Prop-1. Things worked perfectly, so I got to work programming my sequence.

Fortunately the FC-4 test code comes with a bunch of subroutines. All you need to do is copy and paste them from the program section to the subroutine section, add a  "RETURN" to the end of them, and call them up as necessary. I tweaked some of them to suit my needs, just changing the timing and such.

Anyway, if you haven't yet gotten into prop control using Jon and John's products, you are missing out on a lot. I know the whole "programming" thing is intimidating, but it really couldn't be easier. And for those of you who are already EFX-TEK fans, take advantage of the FC-4 holiday sale. You'll absolutely love it.

Liam

PS - I should also mention that Jon wrote me a program (actually three) last night for a random flicker. I'm hoping to simulate the Indiana Jones Adventure flickering light effect in the queue for next Halloween's project. I'll try out the programs tonight. Being able to fade incandescent bulbs is HUGE. :)

[JonnyMac]

Just a follow-up on Liam's flicker note: it can be a little tough to simulate fire using the Prop-1 due to the somewhat slow communications speed; the Prop-2 and Prop-SX are better.  That said, what you'll notice about the FC-4 is that it has a programming port.  We put this on there for two reasons: 1) We can upgrade the firmware for you and, 2) You can reprogram the board yourself (requires and SX-Key or SX-Blitz) for special purposes.

I actually reprogrammed an FC-4 to be a stand-alone flame simulator for Halloween.  My friend, Peter (www.socalhalloween.com), needed to have a simulated fire inside the hull of his ship and asked me to come up with something -- reprogramming the FC-4 was the quickest solution.  We used four, 100w bulbs covered with lighting gels and it created quite a nice effect.  Peter is working on getting pics and video from his 2007 display posted, so do check back if they're not up now.

[Liam]

Hey Jon,

I'm glad you appreciated the review. I'm really impressed, and can't wait to incorporate it into next year's Halloween display. To follow up, tonight I played with the three flicker programs you wrote and was very happy with all of them. The last one was my favorite, and actually worked great even with the Prop-1. Thanks again for all your help.

Liam

[JonnyMac]

I found these pics on my camera -- they're stills but you can see from the night shot that it appears the ship is on fire inside (a fogger sells the effect) -- this was a reprogrammed FC-4, four light bulbs, and some lighting gels (red, orange, and yellow).  It's tough to get a sense of scale from these photos, but the skull on the front of the ship is about 18 inches tall and about 10 feet from the ground.