Scenes

A Scene is nothing more than a list of property changes. A Scene does not have to be just a route change or even include a route change. You could create a Scene that sets memory slots to specific values or that includes memory slot changes, VMix changes, fader changes, and button state changes. Any property available in the system can be a part of a Scene.

To create a new Scene or view and edit an existing Scene, click Automation > Scenes in the navigation bar to open the Scenes page:

A Scene that is blocked by Block Execution is shown in red. See the Block Execution chapter.

Note: The IsActive state depends on the state of all entries in the Scene. For example, if an xNode involved in the Scene is powered off, the Scene change will not be completed and the IsActive state will not change to True.

Creating Scenes

Begin by clicking Automation > Scenes in the navigation bar. On the Scenes page, click Add + to create a new Scene.

Type a Scene Name for the new Scene. To add events to your Scene, click Add +.

On the Import Ios dialog, select the router from the Import From drop-down list to populate the list of destinations:

Select the destinations to import, using the SHIFT key to select multiple destinations. When all destinations have been selected, click Import.

Note: Items from different routers may also be a part of the same Scene by clicking Add + again. Select the additional router from the routers drop-down, select the additional IOs, then click Import to bring them into the Scene.

After the import is complete, the Requested Value column in the Scene Editor will reflect the source that will be taken if that Scene item is executed. By default, it will be set to the current source routed to the destination. This can be changed by highlighting an item and clicking the RequestedSource link.

This will open a list of sources present on the selected router so you can select an alternate source as the value for the route point in that Scene item. Select the source and click Update, or click None to clear the destination when the Scene runs.

Clicking the Destination link will allow you to select a different destination for the Scene item if you selected the wrong one and need to change it.

Clicking the trash icon will delete the item from the Scene.

Once all items for this Scene are set, click Apply to save the changes and return to the Scene list, at which point the Scene will be available for use.

Property Scene Items

In addition to Route Points, any property in the system can be a Scene item. After clicking the Add + button to add a new Scene item to a Scene, you will also find an Endpoints button to switch the route destination dialog to a property selection dialog.

This is the same dialog used to select an endpoint in logic flows. In the example below, we are adding the value property of the SlotA memory slot to the Scene.

The Ios button will return to the route selection dialog.

The Select button will select the property and import it as a Scene item into the Scene. The system will remember whether the last item imported during a given Scene editing session was a property or route point and return to the last used dialog. You can switch back and forth using the Endpoints and IOs buttons from the corresponding dialog.

After importing a property, it will have slightly different links in the Scene itself. In this case, you will see a RequestedValue link and a Property link.

Click the Property link to change the property you selected if you selected the wrong one.

By default, the value used for the Property item is set to whatever it is at the time the Scene item is created. This can be changed by clicking the RequestedValue link.

This will open a value selector. The value selector may be different depending on the type of property you are manipulating. For example, if the item is a color property, it might present a color selection dialog. If the property requires text, a text box may be presented. Or it could present a drop-down of possible values. For example, a program buss assignment could either be on or off, so select the option you want the Scene item to set. Note this does not change the current state of the console in the system unless the Scene is activated. At this point, you are only editing what would happen if you activated the Scene.

Modifying Scene Order

The Scene editor also has Up and Down buttons.

These are used to organize the order in which a Scene sends its messages to the equipment when activated.

The order of items in a Scene is generally irrelevant because the system does not wait for a change to complete before sending the next change message. Changes are usually sent as a block so the actual changes may not happen in the equipment in the same order in which they were sent.

Inserting Pauses

If the execution order is important it is possible to add pause items into the Scene. This will cause the Scene to pause as it iterates through the items for a defined duration, measured in milliseconds. To add a pause, click the Scene editor Add + button. From the Import Ios dialog, click Pause.

Type the pause duration in milliseconds and click OK to add the Pause item to the Scene.

Like all items in the Scene, you may select a Pause item and use the Up and Down arrows to manipulate the order of the Scene messages and configure when pauses occur in the Scene execution.

Saving Your Scene

Once all items have been added to your Scene and have been ordered correctly, click Apply to save your changes.

The Scene Items list shows each item's Order, Type (Route, Property or Pause), Path, Property Name, Requested Value, Current Value, IsActive, Disabled and Mutability.

Disabling Scene Items

Click an item's Disabled value to switch it between False and True, then click Apply. A disabled item is left out when the Scene is activated.

Mutability

The Mutability column shows whether each item's property can be read and written:

Pause items show Unknown and always count as active. Mutability is read from the property and cannot be changed.

Current Scene State and Troubleshooting

Once a Scene has been created, the list of Scenes will show whether the Scene is active or not in the IsActive field.

If you expect a Scene to be active and it is not, you can see what items failed to change by editing the Scene.

The Requested Value column will show the expected value for each Scene item for it to be considered active, while the Current Value column will show the current value of the Scene item.

Note: To refresh the CurrentValue data, you must exit and re-enter the Scene editor.

Advanced Scene Options

Click Advanced under the Scene Name to show these options (shown here with Authoritative set to True):

Read-Only Scenes

Set Read Only to True to stop the Scene from being activated: its Activate button is disabled, and it cannot be activated by Logic Flows or the API. This is useful for Scenes used only to monitor a state through IsActive. In the API the property is IsReadOnly.

Authoritative Scenes

Set Authoritative to True to make the Scene keep its items at their Requested Values: whenever an item is out of line, the Scene sends its value again. This works like a Synchronization Master property group with Allow Out Of Sync set to false. Two more settings appear:

Nothing stops two competing authoritative configurations, such as two Scenes, or a Scene and a property group, that set the same destination to different values. They will fight, switching the destination back and forth rapidly and loading the CPU of both the device and Pathfinder Core PRO.

Changing an Item's Value from the API

A Scene item's ChangeValue property changes the item's requested value without changing what it applies to. A set message can also include $MAX_DEPTH to set a property on every object below the path, for example:

set Scenes#0.Scene#blah_auth ChangeValue="tcp://127.0.0.1:9600?l=7&d=src&i=1&t=virtual" $MAX_DEPTH=-1

From a Logic Flow, send such a message by writing it to the SubmitSapMessage property of Devices#0.

Use $MAX_DEPTH with care: set Devices#0 PinState=h $MAX_DEPTH=-1 would change every GPO in the system.

Scenes and Logic Flows

There are several properties that may be used with Scenes in Logic Flows. When an End point is selected each Scene has an ActivateScene property that can be set to true to cause all Scene items to be executed.

As a Start point, two state properties are available: IsActive and SceneState.

Both lists also include the Scene's Authoritative, AuthoritativeRetry and IsReadOnly settings, so a Logic Flow can read or change them.

The IsActive property will either be true or false depending on whether all items in the Scene are currently at their requested value.

The SceneState property extends this slightly with three options: All, Some, or None. This will change depending on the Scene items’ value, whether all items have their RequestedValue, some do, or none do.

Activating Scene Changes

Scene changes may be activated using Logic Flows using the ActivateScene property. This property is write-only and is only available when editing End points. For example, we could create a Logic Flow that executes a Scene change every time GPI port 1, pin 5 goes low.

Virtual Mixing Routers and Scene Property Selection

Virtual mixing routers are inherently different in how they function from other routers. For details on Virtual Mixing Routers, see their section in the Routers section of the manual. With Virtual mixing destinations you do not change the source that is routed to the destination. Instead you add sources that will be mixed together by the mixing destination up to the supported quantity of the destination. As a result it uses different routing properties than a normal router. For example, AddSource adds a source to the mixing destination, and RemoveSource removes a source from the destination freeing that slot up for another source. Therefore when importing a destination to a scene, you need to be able to define whether the change will add or remove a source. To support this, a drop down will appear in the import destination list when creating a scene item.

The Mixing property drop down allows you to select whether the operation will add or remove a selected source to/from the destination. For example:

In this example the scene will add Phone to the destination when the scene is executed.

The AddSource and RemoveSource properties of a Virtual Mixing Router destination are write only properties. You are applying a source to the property to change the underlying routing state, but the property itself will not have a value. Write-only items always count as active (see Mutability), so a Scene of such items shows IsActive as long as its other items are at their requested values; it cannot tell whether the source is actually on the destination.