Slide Projector Commands

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Slide Projector Commands For Ektagraphics:

FS#:
Find the next slide early enough to allow it to complete the finding before the lamp is turned on, else undesired slides will flash in the audience's eyes! At the beginning of a show script, find the first slide used by all projectors (the group SETUP of all slide projectors may be useful):

Dissolve-pairs
Instead of advancing a projector forward to the next slide when the lamp is on, project the next slide with a second projector aligned to the same projection field. Two such projectors are called a dissolve-pair. To dissolve from a slide in ICA to a slide in ICB enter the following commands within the same cue block:

Note: PF commands do not need to be sent to the projectors after they have dissolved off, because the dissolve-off command automatically advances the projector one slide.

Cue Blocks

For manual playback, one could execute commands like the above simultaneously. Each cue block is executed together by pressing the Page Down key (down arrow); Hercules then jumps down to the next MQ line.

Study the script above:

 
• How many cue blocks are shown?
• The first cue block brings up a three-segment panorama, say of inside the control room of a spaceship, with all segments appearing simultaneously.
• The second cue block superimposes a visual, say a view of Mars, framed above the central panorama image.
• The third cue block fades out the first pan while bringing up a second pan (say, a view of a Martian landscape). Simultaneously, the central Mars visual is replaced by a different central visual, such as a view of the spaceship from outside. (Note: If desired, the central view of Mars on approach could be obtained from a laserdisk with the Video Projector. The center informational projector would then replace a video segment with the slide of the spaceship.)
• Another MQ cue line (not shown) would begin the next cue block.

Group Shortcut:
The above script can be written much more concisely. When using multi-slide sets with the Informational or Panorama projectors, bring them all on or off together with group commands (INFA, INFB, APAN, BPAN). Other groups are available (see the Configuration List for more examples).

For SMPTE time-code playback (instead of manual playback), the above script would look like this. Note that MQ commands have been replaced with TIME commands (and group commands have been used for the pans).

WAIT command
Instead of dissolving multi-slide images on as a group, we can bring them up independently in a sequence, e.g., left to right (wipe effect). This effect often would be desired with the informational projectors. In this case, take them down in the same order as they were turned on.

In the above script, the first cue block wipes on three informational projectors, and the second cue block wipes them off. For time-code playback one would substitute TIME commands for the MQ commands as above.

Note that the timing of the wipe effect depends on the WAIT commands, and thus is determined within any cue block relative to the time the cue block is started. Therefore with manual playback the cue block executes in sequence, according to the wait commands, rather than instantaneously. The advantage of using wait commands rather than extra SMPTE times is that the start time of the cue block can be changed, if necessary, without throwing off the wipe effect.

Step On and Off:
For a really neat effect, the second cue block can be initiated before the first cue block has completed its execution. Then the ILA projector could begin dissolving off before the IRA projector had finished dissolving on, as in the example below.

Study the above example.

1. When the first cue block executes, three projectors dissolve on, appearing left to right. During the first second only the left projector is coming on.
2. At 2 seconds the left and center projectors are dissolving on.
3. At 3 seconds the left projector is entirely on, the center projector is 2/3 on, and the right projector is 1/3 on.
4. At 4 seconds the left projector starts coming down while the center projector is entirely on.
5. At 5 seconds the center projector begins to fade away while the right projector is fully on.
6. At 6 seconds the right projector begins to fade.
7. At 7 seconds the left projector has completely turned off. Etc.
8. All projectors are off at 9 seconds. By this time, the next cue block will most likely have begun executing: Up to 8 different cue blocks using WAIT commands may execute simultaneously.

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