B. MIDI Show Control

MIDI Show Control (MSC) allows WATCHOUT to be controlled from a lighting console, or similar device capable of outputting MSC commands.

NOTE: During production, connect your MIDI device to the production computer. When not using the production software, connect it to the primary display computer in the cluster.

In addition to enabling MIDI Show Control, you also have to specify which input device to use for MIDI show control and the MSC Device ID (see “Control”). This acts as a channel number for MSC commands, and must be set to the device ID number output by the console. In addition, WATCHOUT also recognizes the global “all call” device ID.

Some MSC commands allow a cue/list/path to be specified. WATCHOUT doesn’t use the “path” number. The “list” number can be handled in either of three ways, as specified in the WATCHOUT Preferences:

• Ignore Command. In this setting, the entire command will be discarded (not acted upon) if a list number is specified.
• Map all to Main Timeline. This setting ignores the cue list number, sending all such commands to the main timeline.
• Map to Auxiliary Timelines. If a cue list number is specified, the command will be applied to an Auxiliary Timeline with the same name (where the name must be numeric, to match the list number).

The cue number, if specified, makes WATCHOUT locate a Control cue with that name (that is, the name of the cue must be a number). The GO and TIMED GO, LOAD and STOP commands interpret cue number 0 as specifying “no cue”, allowing you to specify the cue list part only. This allows you to use the STOP command to stop an Auxiliary Timeline without necessarily specifying a particular cue, by setting the cue number to zero.

The following is a description of each command, as it relates to WATCHOUT.

Go

• If given without a cue/list specification, runs the main timeline.
• If given with a cue but no list, locates the specified cue on the main timeline and runs from there. This does nothing if a cue with that name doesn’t exist.
• If given with cue and list, locates the specified cue on the specified Auxiliary timeline, and runs it from there (assuming cue lists are mapped to Auxiliary timelines). This does nothing if specified cue or timeline can’t be found.

Timed Go

Performs like Go, ignoring the time value specified.

Stop

Pauses the timeline, optionally locating the specified cue.

Load

Similar to Go, except that the timeline is not run.

Reset

Stops all Auxiliary timelines (returning them to their inactive state) and resents the main timeline to its beginning.

All Off

Enters Stand-by mode.

Restore

Exits Stand-By mode.