Groups

Groups provide a logical association of multiple devices called members. This simplifies the operation so that one key can be used to communicate with multiple panels and Beltpacks that reside within a common Group. Members of a Group do not generally talk/listen to each other but do communicate with devices outside the Group. Hence a member of a Group cannot hear if one member of the Group talks, but they can hear a non-member who has a key to talk to that Group.

For example, a Group named “Floor” is created consisting of Camera’s 1, 2, 3, and 4, and the Floor Manager on a Beltpack. The Group “Floor” would be assigned to key-1 on the Producers INF-MP-16 panel and assigned to key-1 on the Directors INF-MP-16.

When the Producer pushes the “Floor” talk key, each of the devices within the Group will hear them, that is Camera’s 1, 2, 3, and 4, and the Floor Manager. The Director will not hear the Producer.

If the Floor Manager was to push their Group talk button, then only the Producer and Director would hear them. None of the Cameras would hear the Floor Manager.

Using the intercom system described earlier in this chapter, we will now assign Floor-1, Floor-2, and Cam-1, Beltpacks, to a Group called Floor-All. The Group will then be assigned to the Producers Panel, as well as each of the Group devices.

Group Setup

The following Figures show how to configure a Group. Each device wishing to communicate on the Group must be added to Floor-All. This is achieved using the drag and drop functionality in Dashboard.

• Select “Groups” on the bottom right corner, click on “Add”, a pop-up window will appear, enter the text “Floor-All” into the Name field.

• Click “CREATE” on the pop-up window, this will close, and the Icon “Floor-All” will appear in the Groups window.

• Drag each of the four Beltpacks and Producer Panel from the Devices window to the Devices section of the Group window. All five devices will then appear in the Group.

Figure 1- Creating a Group

• Under the devices window, click on the Producer icon to list the keys of the Producer Panel below.

• Drag the Floor-All icon from the Group window to key-2 of the Producer key.

Figure 2 - Assigning Floor-All to Producer contact key 2.

• Repeat each drag-and-drop for each Beltpack device so that Floor-All appears on Talk-2.

Figure 3 - Assigning Floor-All to each Beltpack device Talk-2 contact key

The configuration is now complete. The label “Floor-All” should appear on “Talk-2” of each Beltpack and contact key 2 of the Producer Panel.

Pushing the Floor-All contact key on the Producer will allow the producer to talk to the floor manager and camera operators at the same time.

In addition to the Group facility, audio inputs and outputs can be added to it. The Figure below shows that the output of the Group is also sent to the Auxiliary Loudspeaker output of the Directors Panel. If an external loudspeaker is connected to the auxiliary output of the Panel, the Director will be able to hear the Producer talk to the Floor-All Group.

Figure 4 - Dragging "Dir Aux Out" to provide external loudspeaker output to Floor-All