In the Company of Giants
I think that when you appear in the release notes for this software, you are officially a geek.
Scroll down a ways, through all kinds of compu-lighting-geekery, and you will discover that yours truly has added a tiny piece of functionality to a fantastically complex piece of software, software that excels at modeling the ultimate complexity, light.
While I realize that in comparison to all the work done by Greg Ward and several other giants in the Radiance community, my contribution—comprised of nothing more than a little copying and pasting from a shell script, I might add—amounts to the equivalent of a key grip credit on a Hollywood feature, I’m still pretty happy to see my name there, and I appreciate the credit.
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3 comments
Hey Rob!
Great work on those ”-lw and -lh options!”
The only contribution that I have made to WYSIWYG is giving all of the tech support people headaches because I can’t get beams to render properly on any of my installatons here at the theatre.
We THINK that it might be a WindowsXP problem. . .
Hi Charles,
As you know, half of the reason for my migration to architectural lighting was my fascination with computers. When I was in school—at least the school I went to—computers played almost no role in theatrical lighting. So I’m totally out of the loop on theatrical lighting software.
What does WYSIWYG do? Actually render the shape & direction of the focused beams of light in a plot? You know, Radiance has been used with great effect in rendering theatrical lighting designs. Rob Shakespeare (co-author of ‘Rendering with Radiance’, the Radiance bible) uses it for this purpose, and his techniques were outlined in the book. Fascinating.
P.S.
WindowsXP is a WindowsXP problem.
Rob,
Computers in entertainment are “where it’s at” in 2004. In my small theatre I have three performance related machines (2 for lighting, 1 for sound) as well as a desktop machine and a laptop. I have a total of 6 LCD flat panel monitors and 1 17” CRT. Check out some pictures at http://www.msnusers.com/NewmarketTheatrePhotos/shoebox.msnw
As far as WYSIWYG goes, it is a total 3D CAD/Visualization software package. It allows you to draft your venue in 3D and then render looks as they would be created by your lighting rig.
WYSIWYG is also 100% integrated into ETC’s new(ish) “Emphasis” lighting console. With Emphasis, I have a 3D model of my theatre that is interfaced with my lighting console. I can see the looks rendered into a shaded view as I work, and I can also get preview of cues coming up in the stack via a preview window.
The preview window is very useful in cueing in blind mode while a show is running. And the live shaded views are useful in the positioning of moving lights while cueing.
Overall, WYSIWYG is a very nice package, and it has the ability to grow with your needs. The 2D “Report” version is the starting point, and you can move up to the 3D “Design” version and the even more powerful “Perform” version. It’s a great tool for schools, and has various packages available for the educational market.
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