What's New?

Sequencer Improvements

•Added new TextXY motion effect, which gives you the ability to rotate text and move it in any direction.

•Added rotation parameter to the PictureXY motion effect.

•Added "chase" option to Movement parameter of the Curtain motion effect. This option works great for leaping arches!

•In the Motion Effect Generator, changing the font for a Text, TextPE, or TextXY motion effect is now much easier.

SuperStar Improvements

•Added ability to copy/paste a portion of an image.

Bug Fixes

•After editing effects in SuperStar, the Sequencer would misinterpret the returned data if circuit 1 was not included in any unit id being edited.

•The "Move to Beats" button on the Manage Archived Props screen was not working, but is now fixed. Also, this button is now disabled when working on an animation sequence (beat channels are only for musical sequences).

•When doing "auto sequence singing face" in SuperStar, the sampling rate of the base file and the voice file should be the same. If the sampling rate of the base audio file is different than the voice audio file, the code now puts up a message saying, "For best results the sampling rates should be the same."

What's New in Version 5.6.4

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, playback to actual lights did not work when a non-enhanced LOR network was active.

•As playback was started in the Sequencer, a warning was issued when motion effects were present on an LOR network that was not defined in Network Preferences.

•When importing a grid configuration into the Sequencer, there is a new check to make sure channel level effects on pixel props don't get deleted. This could happen when channel level for a pixel prop is enabled in the sequence but disabled in the grid configuration import file.

What's New in Version 5.6.2

•Network Preferences Changes

•New Pixie Firmware Version 1.07

•Hardware Utility Changes

Sequencer Improvements

•Added ability to make certain bulk changes from the String Summary tab of Preview Design. Actions include setting bulb shape, and setting the dimming curve. To use, select some grid cells by dragging the cursor or using Shift-click, then right-click and choose the action from the pop-up menu. You can also double-click on any grid cell to edit the prop.

•Added "Outer Limit" and "Inward" parameters to the Ripple motion effect -- allowing it move inwards as well as outwards.

•Added option to use a picture file instead of a standard shape to the Simple Shape motion effect.

•Added a continuous rotation option to the Simple Shape motion effect.

•Added Solid Color option to the Scanner motion effect.

•Add a sparkle mode to the Twinkle effect.

•Using a WMV file in a Movie effect now calculates about 7x faster.

•Revamped Online Prop Import screen to make it load faster and be easier to use.

•The headings on the last row of the sequence grid toolbar have been updated to improve clarity:
"Select Action" becomes "On Mouse Click".
"Range" and "Slope" are now combined into "Intensity Range & Slope".
"Type" becomes "Effect Type"
"Effect" becomes "Channel Effect"
"Source" for motion effects becomes "Motion Effect Source"
"Source for SuperStar effects becomes "SuperStar Source"

•When right-clicking on the last row of the sequence grid toolbar, 2 options have been added to the pop-up menu: "Clicking Effect Type Selects Create" and "Essential Color Buttons Only". Both items are toggle features and are remembered across sessions. Turning off "Clicking Effect Type Selects Create" will leave the "Select Action" (now "On Mouse Click") selection alone when you change Effect Type. When "Essential Color Buttons Only" is enabled, the Choose and Random color buttons are hidden. In this mode, users can still click on the left or right side of the color sample to choose colors.

•Added "Maximum number of files to display on the Start Page" option on the Start Up tab of Sequencer Preferences. Added "Clean Up" button to Start Page, which can be used to remove file names from the Recently Used list.
https://forums.lightorama.com/topic/54111-recent-sequences/

•You can now add a new motion effect to multiple rows at once. You can also select multiple motion effect rows, right-click and select one of the Prompt For New Effect options, and the change will be applied to all selected effects.

•When adding new motion effect rows via the Subdivide option, naming of the new motion rows has been improved. There are new fields on the subdivide dialog that give you full control over the names for the motion rows.

•States defined in an xmodel file will now be imported as additional motion effect rows.

SuperStar Improvements

•Added ability to change between normal and wrap-around in the Preferences dialog box

•Added the "modify stretch/shrink" check boxes in the group modify spiral, and group modify fan dialog boxes

•Added SineWave effect to the smooth effects dialog box

•Added ability to view the audio waveform

Network Preferences Changes

•Simple Mode has been removed. Click on a row in the LOR or DMX tab to edit it -- as you would in the old Advanced mode.

•On the LOR tab, a check box at the top allows you to toggle between seeing just the Regular network or all networks. This check box may disabled if you already have more than network defined (Advanced or Pro), or your license only gives you access to one network (Basic, Basic Plus, or Standard).

•When editing an LOR network, the recommended speed is always displayed and will change based on whether the Enhanced box is checked.

•When editing an LOR network, a check box option will filter the list of comm ports to only those currently attached to the computer.

•When editing a DMX network, the standard E1.31 port is clearly identified.

•When editing a DMX network, you can now set up to 192 universes the same way -- in support of the PixieLink controller.

•On the DMX tab, there is now a Clear Range button, so DMX universes that are no longer in use can be quickly erased.

•Clicking the "Find/Configure PixCon16" button now opens a new PixCon16 utility. This utility has all of the same options as the previous utility, but has an improved ability to find your controller. The new utility will NOT set your DMX universes in Network Preferences, so after configuring the PixCon16 controller, you will need to set your DMX universes on the DMX tab as a separate step.

New Pixie Firmware Version 1.07

•Firmware 1.07 has been released for Pixie controllers to support the new CMB24D emulation option and a new Pixel IC: UCS1903.

Hardware Utility

•When configuring a Pixie that has Firmware 1.07 or higher, there is now an option to emulate CMB24D controllers with dumb RGB pixels. Pixie2/Pixie4/Pixie8 controllers can look like CMB24D controllers to the show director with 2/4/8 dumb RGB pixel strings. The Pixie16 looks like two CMB24D controllers with sequential unit IDs, each with 8 dumb RGB pixel strings. Sequences that use a CMB24D do not need to be updated and can be replaced with a Pixie using this option.

•A new Pixel IC, UCS1903, is supported by Pixies that have Firmware 1.07 or higher.

•Pixies that have Firmware 1.07 or higher can recognize if the JP5 Jumper is in use and will warn the user that the Jumper may override the configuration in the Hardware Utility.

Bug Fixes

•When creating or modifying a SuperStar effect from the Sequencer, the time that the Sequencer waits for a SuperStar response was Increased.

•When upgrading a sequence to S5, legacy channels defined as independent red, green, and blue channels (not inside an RGB channel), did not match up to S5 RGB channels (dumb RGB or smart pixels).

•In the Sequencer, the New Musical Sequence window is now a little smaller so it fits more easily on standard resolution laptop screens (1366x768).

•In the Sequencer, when changing the layout for a prop with a custom shape, the prop's motion row defaults were not updated to reflect the changes.

•In the Sequencer, the Playback and Audio Settings windows could dock in the center area (in the same area as open sequences). This is no longer allowed.

•In the Sequencer, when importing an S4 Sequence Editor animation from the Previews window, the Sequencer would crash if the Sequence Editor file was corrupt.

•In the Sequencer, when defining preview groups with an arrangement of "Nested", "H Stack, V Fill", or "V Stack, H Fill", setting orientation of a group member to anything but "normal" would not work correctly and could cause an error.

•In the Sequencer, fixed Sphere and Cylinder shapes when the number of quarters was less than 4 (less than 360 degrees around).
https://forums.lightorama.com/topic/54218-12-sphere-prop-not-showing-effects-properly/

•In SuperStar, fixed a crash bug that could happen in smooth effects if aspect was small

•In SuperStar, fixed a bug in rendering of spirals and fans, there were sometimes gaps in the rendering

•In SuperStar, fixed a bug where pixels would flicker when playing back to superstar screen when there are duplicate pixels and Time Layer Priority feature is enabled. This can happen when using a preview that uses hfill or vfill.

•In SuperStar, made the duplicate pixels on the sequencing grid be dynamic. Before it was only handling one duplicate pixel.

•In SuperStar, increased the maximum channel elements for a sequence from 50,000,000 to 100,000,000

•In SuperStar, increased the maximum number of pixel height for a scene from 127 to 360

•In SuperStar, fixed bug where save of a .sup file didn't save groups correctly if a group was expanded at the time of the save.

•In SuperStar, made it so instant sequence themes that contained scenes work properly for grids of length longer than 50

•In SuperStar, fixed a bug where if you have an effect dialog box up that is not the scene dialog box and you do "new" or load another sequence, then you go into scene mode, but the old dialog box stays up and may not be functional until you click on an effect type button again.

•In SuperStar, fixed a bug where auto sequence singing faces did not work properly beyond 5:28 into a sequence

•In SuperStar, fixed a bug where if you select VisEffect in the morph dialog box and deselect "Shrink visualization for visEffects" then select it again, the visualization fails to shrink

•In the Hardware Utility, when configuring a Pixie the "First Pixel as Status Indicator" check box did not change the configuration and did not always reflect the current configuration.

What's New in Version 5.6.0

Sequencer Improvements

•A new Audio Settings window controls which audio data is displayed for a sequence, and allows that data to be customized. It replaces the "Audio Filter and Scale" and "Waveform Colors" dialogs in prior versions, and does a lot more.

•In addition to the audio waveform, users with a Pro license now have the option to display the audio as a spectrogram. Two types of spectrograms can be displayed: 1) a standard frequency versus time representation, and 2) one with pitch detection applied. Pitch detection tries to find the actual notes being played in a song and eliminates many of the harmonics that clutter a typical spectrogram. See the Audio Settings topic for examples. Users can choose whether spectrograms are calculated for their sequence using the Audio Information field of the New Musical Sequence dialog. The Audio Information setting can be modified using the Sequence Information dialog.

•A new Audio motion effect is now available, which reacts to the music as it is played. It has many options, including an audio equalizer type display, as well as a color organ option. Open the new 5.6.0 sample sequence in your Sequences\Samples folder to see it in action.

•A new "Icicle" prop shape adds support for both traditional and pixel-based icicle strings.

•The Sequencer will now run as a 64-bit application on 64-bit versions of Windows. This means it can use more memory if necessary, allowing you to create larger sequences, control more lights, and/or have more sequences loaded at one time. 32-bit versions of Windows are still supported.

•Some of our favorite motion effects are now included with the Sequencer. These are listed in the favorites area of the Motion Effect Generator in a separate folder called "LOR Shared Favorites". Have some favorites that you think are awesome and want to share with the Light-O-Rama community? Export them and attach the export file to a Help Desk ticket. We will review them for possible inclusion in a future update.

•In Preview Design's Layout View, a new option can display grid lines for empty cells. This can help when trying to identify the row and column numbers for a pixel in a custom shape.

•In the sequence grid, timing marks now stop at the last prop in the grid.

•After right-clicking on an item name in the sequence grid, "Hide Item" has been renamed "Remove Item from This Grid View" to better reflect what it does.

•In the Beats, Tapper, and VU Wizards, the list of timing grids will now only show freeform grids. If no timing grid is selected when you click "Apply", you will be asked if you want to create one. Previously, fixed timing grids were included in the list, but these could not accept the newly created timings.

•You can now select files with a JPEG file extension (note the "E" in the middle) for picture effects or the preview background image. Previously, only JPG, PNG, and BMP extensions were allowed.

•The Sequence Information screen now includes the preview revision number. For musical sequences, it also shows the audio sample rate.

SuperStar Improvements

•Added snap to beat marks if you click in the timing marks area. Also made it so effects get displayed to .01 seconds instead of truncating to .05 seconds.

•In the Layout dialog box, in the Pixel Extender section, added the ability to stretch / shrink in the x direction

•For the smooth effects, added ability to stretch / shrink in the x and y direction

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, using the mouse wheel to scroll the sequence grid on a secondary monitor did not work properly and could sometimes cause a crash.

•In the Sequencer, single channel props with a custom shape would not play back in some cases.

•In the Sequencer, fixed a bug in the way motion effect rows were handled when importing a grid configuration.

•In the SpinFade motion effect with style set to "circles 3d", the edges of the circles are now transparent and have smooth edges when used with alpha blending.

•While changing colors or shape in the Prop Definition window, the channel list could go empty, which resulted in the start channel being reset to unit 01, circuit 1.

•In SuperStar, the markers for the start and end of a prop in the green grid were not working, this has been fixed

•In SuperStar, when launched from the S5 Sequencer previews were being displayed tall and skinny. Made it so they are stretched horizontally by a factor of 1.45.

•In SuperStar's scale part of "move or scale selected effects" improved the scaling of smooth effects

What's New in Version 5.5.18

•Pixie 16 Support for Props Extended to All Ports

•Hub Improvements

Sequencer Improvements

•Added Revision Number to the Preview Design screen as a read-only field. Previously, the program maintained this value but it was not visible.

•Added "Export Selected Items" to the menu when you right-click on the design canvas in Preview Design.

•In the Map Preview To Sequence Dialog, you can now specify the number of motion effect rows that will be created for new pixel props.

•Added the Circles Nested shape to Prop Definition.

•In Prop Definition, increased the maximum number of pixels per string on matrix, tree and fan shapes from 1000 to 9999. https://forums.lightorama.com/topic/53836-32-by-64-horizontal-matrix/

•In the Motion Effect Generator, shift-clicking on the Reset Effect Parameters icon now sets the effect to None.

•When starting a new musical sequence and the selected media file is outside of the Light-O-Rama audio folder, you will now be asked if you want to copy that file into the Light-O-Rama audio folder.

•If a crash is caused by the graphics system, the user will now get an error message asking them to update their display drivers.

•In the help file, there is a new Motion Effect Reference page which covers all of the controls for all of the motion effects.

Hub Improvements

•Hub will now warn the user if they attempt to create an SD Card using the 'Simple' button and any sequence in the show contains Motion Effects. In this situation, the 'Advanced' button must be used to correctly create the SD card.

•MP3 directors require SD cards be formatted as FAT16 or FAT32. Hub will now warn the user if the card is not formatted properly and needs to be re-formatted.

Pixie 16 Support for Props Extended to All Ports

•Previously, a Pixie 16 could control up to 4 LOR props (like singing trees) on the first 8 ports of the controller. It can now control up to 8 props on any of the 16 ports. Firmware version 1.06 or higher is required.

Bug Fixes

•In Preview Design, when creating the layout for a prop with a custom shape, the Crop function would stop at areas that had been deleted during the current edit.

•In the Sequencer, fixed a possible crash when copying a list of warning messages to the clipboard (e.g. warnings displayed after opening a sequence).

•In the Sequencer, fixed the check for newer versions, which was no longer working.

•In the Sequencer, fixed a crash when defining a prop with a custom shape and the number of columns exceeds 655.

•In the Sequencer, fixed a possible crash when assigning a different preview to a sequence.

•In the Sequencer, if you scrolled down the sequence grid and right-clicked on a prop/channel name, the wrong menu would be displayed in some cases.

•In the Sequencer, fixed a potential crash when creating a chase by prop.

•In the Sequencer, fixed a potential crash when upgrading a legacy sequence

•In the Sequencer, fixed a potential crash when displaying the Layout View for a preview group

•When the Sequencer opens a Light-O-Rama Store sequence in LMS format, it now downloads the latest store sequence preview before upgrading.

•In the Sequencer, when the preview for a sequence changed and new pixel-based props were added, motion rows were not created for the new props.

•In the Sequencer, when copying a prop in Preview Design, the copies were spaced far apart in the vertical direction.

•In the current version of the Sequencer, the zoom level of the playback window is saved with each grid view in the sequence file. In the new version, a change to the zoom level will now mark the sequence as modified (asterisk is displayed in front of the file name shown on the sequence tab), and you will get prompted to save the sequence when you close it. https://forums.lightorama.com/topic/53832-sequencer-saves-preview-zoom-for-each-grid-view/

•Added support for the xmodel "circle" shape when importing props. This allows the Boscoyo Mesmerizer spinner to import successfully.

•Added support for the xmodel "sphere" shape when importing props. This allows the Boscoyo ChromaStar 3D to import successfully.

•When applying MotionPaks in Hub, the program will now find older base sequences that use the naming scheme <title>-RTG-<artist> or <title>-YCM-<artist>.

•In Hub a crash could occur if ID3 information attached to the MP3 was corrupted and 'Strip MP3 Header'.option was in use (which is the default for Simple mode as well)..

•In Hub the option "Copy MP3 with header stripped" was being ignored - the MP3 was always having its header stripped.

•Previously in Hub, warnings generated by the S5 sequence engine were ignored when creating an SD card. Those warnings now prevent an SD card from being created and must be corrected before the sequence can be written.

•In SuperStar, if after a fresh installation of the S5 software the user attempted to launch SuperStar in stand-alone mode an then attempted to create a Quick Visualization, the program could crash.

•In some cases when SuperStar is launched from within the S5 Sequencer while in Morph Mode, a right click of the mouse did not properly define the 2A and 2B points.

•In SuperStar when using "Change Orientation" within the "Move or scale selected effects" dialog box:

▪The initial values of width and height were reversed

▪If the effect had a clip rectangle, the effect would no longer render.

What's New in Version 5.5.16

•New Pixie Firmware Version 1.06

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, background images are now stored internally with a maximum width and height of 2000 pixels, saving on memory and improving stability. The file used for the background image is not changed.

•In the Sequencer, fixed a potential crash when opening Sequencer Preferences.

•In the Sequencer, fixed a potential crash when saving a screen image from Preview Design or the Wiring View. You capture a screen image by clicking this icon:

•In the Sequencer, when assigning a different preview to a sequence, if a prop was archived as a result of the change, the prop's unique identifier in the original preview was mistakenly changed (affecting any other sequence associated with the original preview). Prop identifiers are used by the program internally, but are not visible to the user.

•Fixed a potential hang when the Show Player plays a song with parentheses in the file name.

•In the Hardware Utility, under some circumstances a firmware update or parameter update of a controller can cause it to hang/crash.

•In the Show Editor, allow protected sequences to be selected for triggered shows.

•In the Show Editor, the default tab is now the 'Musical' tab.

•In LOR Hub, creating a simple PC show with 11 or more sequences could lead to corruption of the list of sequences to be run.

New Pixie Firmware Version 1.06

•Firmware 1.06 has been released for Pixie controllers to support the upcoming PixieLink product.

What's New in Version 5.5.14

•Support for PixieLink Products

Sequencer Improvements

•In Preview Design, you can now undo the setting or clearing of the background image.

Bug Fixes

•In the Hardware Utility, loading of stand-alone sequences onto a controller has been fixed. This feature was broken starting in version 5.5.8.

•In the Sequencer, background images might not display during playback after editing the preview in Preview Design, or after upgrading a legacy sequence using a preview that has a background image.

•Changing a preview's background image while upgrading a legacy sequence now works.

What's New in Version 5.5.12

Support for PixieLink Products

•The Hardware Utility can now update firmware at higher speeds. The higher speed will initially only be supported on the forthcoming PixieLink product.

•New firmware for Pixie 2/4/8/16 with performance enhancements required to support PixieLink high-speed products.

•Initial firmware for PixieLink V1.02

Bug Fixes

•In the Show Editor, Protected LOR S5 sequences (.lorprot) were not being shown when "S5 Sequences" was used while adding files.

•In some cases, a preview with a large background image that also had Save Image With Preview checked would not load into Preview Design.

•In Preview Design, attempting to import online props when the computer (or web site) was offline could result in a crash.

•If Windows 'Controlled Folder Access' (also known as Ransomware Protection) was enabled, the Sequencer would close without displaying an error message to the user.

•Existing motion effect rows will no longer be automatically removed on groups with Arrangement set to none. Motion effects on such groups cannot control lights, so the user will now receive a warning when opening a sequence where such groups exist.

•In the Sequencer, the performance of Paste Special with Repeat Horizontally set to "All the way to the end of the sequence" has been much improved.

•In the Sequencer, you once again get a warning when you press one of the play buttons, and Control Lights is enabled, and there are channel conflicts in the preview. This check has failed to work properly since version 5.5.0.

•In the Hardware Utility, moving the main window on some high resolution monitors could cause the form size to grow.

What's New in Version 5.5.10

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, after finishing an edit to a motion effect or SuperStar effect, the program could crash.

•In the Sequencer, sequence windows were allowed to dock at the edges of the main window.

•In Preview Design, when editing a prop's custom or advanced layout with auto-number enabled, clicking on the row or column header of the grid would result in an error.

•In the Sequencer, audio was played back at 0 volume if the playback window hadn't been opened.

•In the Sequencer, a crash could occur if the sequence tab was closed while intensity data is being calculated.

•In SuperStar, the ability to use ctrl+left or right click to set/clear all pixels in a scene or in image mode has been removed and replaced with ctl+mousedrag in image or text mode.

•In SuperStar, added support for foreign characters in the song name and path and in the sequence name and path. (when launched from the S5 Sequencer)

What's New in Version 5.5.8

Sequencer Improvements

•When exporting as protected, you will now be prompted for a supplemental text message. When a user opens the protected sequence in the Sequencer, they will see the extra text that was specified during the export.

•Added a new menu option in Preview Design to delete groups with no members.

•Floating windows now have a maximize button. This enables you to quickly maximize the playback window (or other floating windows) on a second monitor.

•When opening a sequence purchased from the Light-O-Rama Store (LMS file), the Sequencer now offers to upgrade the sequence using the official preview for Light-O-Rama Store sequences, bypassing the upgrade screen.

•The error message "The following items have motion effects that cannot be played because they are on an LOR network that is not enhanced." has been enhanced to include the LOR network that is causing the issue.

•When creating a custom subsection in Add/Modify Motion Effect Rows, you can now flip the custom subsection horizontally or vertically.

•After creating a custom subsection in Add/Modify Motion Effect Rows for a prop with a custom shape and then subsequently changing the custom layout, it is possible to end up with nodes in the custom subsection that are no longer on a pixel. Use the new "Delete marks not on a pixel" menu item to clean up such nodes.

Bug Fixes

•In Preview Design, when defining a preview group, clicking on the radio button for the "H Stack V Fill" arrangement did not update the group size shown on the screen.

•Fixed crash when copying a prop or group in Preview Design and one or more entries in the "New Names" list is blank.

•Fixed crash when attempting to delete props when no props were selected in the Channel Conflicts & Bulk Changes tab in Preview Design.

•Fixed potential crash when closing a sequence tab and intensity data calculations were in progress.

•In the Sequencer, the user is now allowed to cancel out of deleting a loop level in an animation sequence.

•In Preview Design's Online Import screen, pressing the Refresh or Cancel buttons while the online content was still being downloaded would result in a crash.

•In the Motion Effect Generator, you could not save your first motion effect favorite. There was no issue if you already had one or more favorites already saved.

•When using the Motion Effect Generator with no sequences open, you could select groups with an arrangement of none. Motion effects on such groups are not allowed.

•When importing an S4 Visualizer file into a preview, RGB channels that left one or more channels undefined now import correctly.

•In SuperStar when using the "Move or Scale Selected Effects" window, the state was not initialized properly.

•In SuperStar when using the Scene, Morph, or Text dialog boxes, and incorrect error message was produced that said to use a value between 0-255. That should have been 0-100.

•When scrolling large images across a matrix In SuperStar, the program could crash.

What's New in Version 5.5.6

Sequencer Improvements

•After enabling channel level sequencing on pixel-based props, the prop's RGB channels are labeled with the row and column number (e.g. "r01 c01"). In order to help identify the pixel associated with that row and column:

•Row and column labels were added to the Layout View in Preview Design.

•When viewing node labels on pixel props in Preview Design, you can now format the labels as pixel numbers or row/column notation.

•On the screen that is displayed when opening a sequence and the preview has changed (the Map Preview to Sequence Dialog):

•Added the preview name and its revision

•Renamed the "revert" button to make it clearer what it does.

•There is a new button that adds the preview stored in the sequence file as a new preview.

•The Timing Grid Import screen now allows for the import of freeform timing grids directly from another S5 sequence without having to export the timings first.

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, fixed fire effect on props that are 1 pixel wide or 1 pixel high. This used to work, but was broken starting with version 5.4.0.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when sorting the sequence grid by physical channel.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when double-clicking on a channel effect.

•When changing the selected effect in the Motion Effect Generator, the controls for the new effect's parameters (e.g. sliders) were occasionally not displayed.

•In the Sequencer, fixed occasional internal error when using the Pinwheel effect with "inner and outer" color mode.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when editing the channel grid in Prop Definition.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when editing Text and TextPE motion effects.

•The Sequencer was not returning to the last selected grid view when a sequence was re-opened. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52683-554-always-opens-sequnce-with-show-all-items-view/

•In the Sequencer, DMX intensity effects were lost when upgrading a legacy sequence. This bug was introduced in version 5.5.0. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52685-lost-dmx-values-from-s4-sequence-to-s5/

•In the Sequencer, when entering the spacing for a new fixed timing grid, more than 2 digits were allowed after the decimal point, even though those digits were ignored.

•In the Sequencer, subsequences were not working correctly, and adding a new subsequence could cause a crash.

•In the Sequencer, when defining the motion effect rows for a prop or group, deleting a row's name could cause a crash.

What's New in Version 5.5.4

Sequencer Improvements

•The Sequencer starts up in less time due to faster initialization of the Motion Effect Generator. Improvement will vary from 2 to 6 seconds depending on the speed of your computer - slower computers will see a bigger improvement.

•The Playback Window zoom and scroll bar settings are now saved with the current grid view. So now if you have a grid view that deals with just a portion of your display, you can zoom into it, and that zoom setting will be restored every time you switch back to that grid view.

•Added support for node ranges specified via "face information" in Preview Design's xmodel file import. These node ranges become motion row defaults. Previously only node ranges specified as a sub-model were supported.

•The setting at Sequence > Smooth To Fades Level no longer applies to DMX Intensity channel effects. The level will always be "none" for DMX Intensity effects. This ensures that if you enter a specific DMX intensity value on a channel, it will always be that value.

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, if you clicked on a cell and then immediately clicked a shortcut key, the 2 actions could interact. An example is clicking on a cell then pressing the spacebar key to start playback - playback could unexpectedly stop. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52567-552-glitching-with-startstop-sequence-motion-effects/

•In the Sequencer, fixed an internal error when creating a new musical or animation sequence with a license level less than Pro.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when displaying the audio waveform.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when importing multiple online props at one time in Preview Design.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when updating a preview while the associated sequence is open.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when copying text to the clipboard from a pop-up message box using Ctrl-C.

•In the Sequencer, added check to see if Windows Media Player is installed, and give a specific error message if it is missing.

•In the Sequencer, fixed possible crash when displaying item names on the left side of the sequence grid.

•In the Sequencer, fixed crash if you closed a sequence tab before the audio file finished loading.

•In the Sequencer, fixed crash if the toolbar options were set to Create > Motion Effect and the user quickly pressed the Enter key multiple times.

•In the Network Preferences program, some PixCon16 firmware versions could incorrectly indicate that the LOR software was too old and needed to be updated when configuring a board.

What's New in Version 5.5.2

•Easier PixCon16 Configuration

Bug Fixes

•After upgrading a legacy sequence using an existing preview, you could receive the error "Parameter is not valid", or the program could crash when you try to edit the preview.

•The Sequencer could crash when editing a SuperStar effect.

•When a sequence was played at 1/2 or 3/4 speed, all effects appeared as shimmer effects in the playback window even though the actual effect commands in the Sequencer remained unchanged. Normal and 2x speed were fine. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52529-550-bug-shimmer-effects-at-12-and-34-speed/

•When a sequence with a fixed timing grid was displayed on a computer using a display driver from AMD (e.g. Radeon graphics), the vertical lines of the timing grid might be displayed with multiple colors. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52529-550-bug-shimmer-effects-at-12-and-34-speed/

•When creating a prop with a Custom shape and using copy/paste, the program could crash if the clipboard was in use by another application.

•Added option to the the Timing Grid menu that enables or disables the highlighting of timing marks that fall on the second. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52547-1-second-timing-lines/

•Bug fix: When importing a channel configuration, the "Enable Channel Level on Pixel Prop" setting was not being applied correctly. Going forward, the channel configuration export will also include the "Hide group members" and Motion Rows Overlay/Blend settings for each item. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52543-crosshatched-rows-in-new-musical-sequence-in-55/

•In Preview Design, using the Copy function on a group would result in a crash. In addition, the orientation of group members was not preserved in the copy.

•Hub is now Large Address Aware which should help with creating SD cards with large sequences

•Hub will now note if a sequence is protected or not not when creating an SD card. This should help with duplicate sequences being displayed (one protected, one not).

What's New in Version 5.5.0

•Support for PixCon16 MKII Firmware up to and including V2.0.25

•SuperStar Changes

•Comm Listener Change

•Sequencer Motion Effects Changes and Additions

Easier PixCon16 Configuration

•In the Network Preferences program, you must now select a Network Adapter Card to use when configuring PixCon16 controllers. This should make loading the configuration for a board easier as you no longer have to properly configure routing tables/metrics in Windows on computers with 2 or more Network Interface Cards (NICs)

Support for PixCon16 MKII Firmware up to and including V2.0.25

•For LOR PixCon16 MKII boards, the software now supports firmware versions up to and including V2.0.25. Please note that upgrading firmware on PixCon boards is not as easy as on other LOR controllers. Unless you are having an issue that is fixed with new firmware, please do not attempt to update your board. New Firmwares for the PixCon16 are available from support, but only after consulting with them about an issue.

SuperStar Changes

•New Select Effects in Clip Rectangle feature

•Fixed a bug in the "Move or Scale Selected Effects" dialog box. The initial state was not always being initialized properly.

•Fixed a bug. If superstar launched from Sequencer and click on "New" button superstar crashed. Fixed it so the "New" button is grayed out when launched from S5 Sequencer.

•Fixed a bug in the Scene, Morph, and Text dialog boxes. If you typed a large value such as 500 for a color value then it would give an error saying "enter a value between 0-255." Fixed it so it always says "enter a value between 0-100"

Comm Listener Change

•In prior versions, when the Comm Listener was unable to open an Enhanced LOR comm port, it would display "Error opening comm port: 2" to the screen. This caused some confusion because "2" is the error code, not the port number. This has been changed to now show "Error opening comm port: COM9 (code 2)" going forward - so you know which port has the problem. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/51964-s5-error-opening-com-port-2/

Sequencer Improvements

•Increased the maximum number of motion effect rows per prop, from 32 to 100. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/51663-s5-motion-effect-row-limits/

•After selecting Add/Modify Motion Effect Rows and adding a second motion row, the sequence grid now automatically expands to show the second row.

•Sequences in the S5 format (.LOREDIT and .LORPROT) are now allowed as subsequences.

•When adding a new subsequence, the subsequence row will now be turned on by default for the entire length of the sequence.

• After you have opened a sequence and have the green check-mark displayed on the top toolbar, you can now click on the check-mark, changing it to a pause icon.

While the pause icon is displayed, intensity data will not be calculated, allowing you to change motion effects without any delays. When you play the sequence, intensity data will be calculated at that point. You can click the pause icon to return to the green check-mark at any time. Calculations will then be performed after every change to the sequence.

•Added Ctrl-D and Ctrl-U shortcut keys that will apply a fade down/up to the effects in the selected area of the grid.

•The process for upgrading a legacy sequence to S5 has been completely revamped. During the upgrade process, you can now combine Visualizer, Pixel Editor, and SE animations into a single preview. You can manually draw strings or flood lights, and move props around. You also have visibility to the list of channels that will be archived before the upgrade takes place. You can choose which legacy channels to auto-create as S5 props on the preview, and undo it if you don't like the result.

•In prior versions, double-clicking on an existing effect to modify it only worked when the toolbar's "Select Action" was set to Select. In this release, you can modify an existing effect by double-clicking on it, regardless of the "Select Action" setting. However, this results in a slight loss of responsiveness when clicking rapidly in the sequence grid to create effects. If this interferes with your sequencing rhythm, there is an alternate mode that can be activated in Sequencer Preferences. On the "Editing" tab, select the "Control-Shift double-click" option. As the name implies, you will need to hold the Control and Shift keys down when double-clicking to modify an effect.

•If the Sequencer crashes, you will now get a message asking if you would like to send your report directly to Light-O-Rama. If you click "Yes", then Light-O-Rama will receive your crash report directly -- without you having to create a help desk ticket. Please note that, while Light-O-Rama will use your crash report to improve the Sequencer, the information you provide is anonymous and we have no way of responding back to you about the status of your report.

UnexpectedErrorMessage

•If the Sequencer crashes, a copy of the log file will be made so that it can be submitted to the LOR help desk if desired. Previously, the log file was overwritten as soon as you ran the Sequencer again. The copy will still be in the Documents folder, but have the date and time added to the name.

•The playback window can now be manually zoomed in and out -- letting you zoom in on any area you like -- whether that is a single prop or a particular region of your display. You can even change the zoom level while playback is occurring. Because of this enhancement, the "Zoomed Playback" feature (accessed by right-clicking on a prop name in the sequence grid) is no longer needed and has been removed.

•The Sequencer preference that allowed the background image to be hidden has been removed, as it is no longer needed. If you don't want to see the background image, just turn the image brightness all of the way down.

•Increased the maximum number of stars in the "Stars Nested" shape from 6 to 10.

•In Preview Design, you can now right-click on the design canvas and select "Save as picture" to save the preview as a picture in PNG format.

•Extended the drag edges tool to also work on RGB channels.

•Added a Sequencer preference that enables the drag edges tool when a sequence is opened (for those that like to use it all of the time).

•Added new keyboard shortcuts:

•Ctrl-Left-Arrow: scroll one screen to the left (same as S4 Sequence Editor)

•Ctrl-Right-Arrow: scroll one screen to the right (same as S4 Sequence Editor)

•Alt-Up-Arrow: make grid rows shorter (same as S4 Sequence Editor)

•Alt-Down-Arrow: make grid rows taller (same as S4 Sequence Editor)

•Alt-Page-Up: make grid rows as short as possible (same as S4 Sequence Editor)

•Alt-Page-Down: make grid rows as tall as possible (same as S4 Sequence Editor)

•Ctrl-Alt-Plus: zoom time in all of the way

•Ctrl-Alt-Minus: zoom time out all of the way

•Ctrl-R: toggle view fades as ramps setting

•Ctrl-E: toggle drag edges tool on and off

•P key: display a sequence grid tooltip (same as S4 Sequence Editor)

•Don't like the shortcuts? You can now create your own in Keyboard Preferences. It will even import S4 keyboard maps - with a few limitations.

•Select Effect (E shortcut key) now works across multiple rows.

•Clicking on the small down-arrow next to the Select Tool gives you a choice of 4 selection modes - cells, effects, rows, and freeform. Holding the Ctrl key down used to automatically switch you to Freeform select mode. Now you get the same 4 selection mode options when the Ctrl key is pressed - i.e. you get to choose which selection mode happens when the Ctrl key is pressed. The default mode when the Ctrl key is pressed has been changed from Freeform to Effects. If you don't like the new default, it is easy to change it. See the Selecting Cells topic for more information.

•Added support for wiring the Fan shape from the outside in.

•Added check so that it is no longer possible to create a group in Preview Design with the same name as a prop. Having a group and prop with same name becomes very confusing in the sequence grid.

•Increased the number of "Recent Sequences" shown on the Start Page.

•Previously, if a sequence had a Windows shell command, that command was run when the sequence was played in the Show Player and the Sequencer. A new Sequencer Preference now controls whether Windows shell commands are run in the Sequencer (they will always be run by the Show Player). http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52249-windows-commands/

•Several improvements were made to the Motion Effect Generator:

•The toolbar for the left and right effects as been updated

•The icon for resetting the effect parameters has been updated to more clearly show its purpose.

•The dialogs for selecting and managing palettes have been combined and there is now just a single icon for that. In that dialog, you can now rearrange the order of the palettes.

•There is a new clipboard that holds a single effect (left or right side) with corresponding copy and paste buttons. This allows you to copy the left or right side of one effect and paste it into the left or right side of another effect. i.e. you can now combine the left side of one effect with the right side of a different effect.

•The favorites tree has been revamped

•It looks a lot like the old one, but if you start dragging an effect you will see which effect you are dragging as you drag it.

•You can reorder effects by dragging.

•The tree stays open to the last place you were. So if you were at a particular place in the tree for one effect, the next time the Motion Effect Generator opens, the tree will still be in the same place.

•A new option on the right-click menu allows you to sort a branch of the tree.

•The star icon next to each effect was changed from yellow to blue, so that it was easier to distinguish from the yellow folder icons.

•You can export an S5 sequence in legacy format by selecting File > Export as LMS/LAS from the main menu. There are some limitations, among them that motion effect rows are excluded from the export.

•If you change a preview and then subsequently open a sequence that uses that preview, you will see a new Map Preview To Sequence dialog window that allows you to control what happens to props and groups in the sequence that do not match the new preview. This same dialog will also be displayed when assigning a different preview to a sequence.

•The classic Light-O-Rama sample sequences "LOR_CHASE_SAMPLE" and "LOR_LOOP_SAMPLE" are now included in S5 format in the Sequences\Samples folder.

•When a fixed timing grid is active, timing marks that fall on exact seconds (1.00, 2.00, etc) are displayed a shade lighter, making them easy to pick out and use as a reference.

•If you update the motion row defaults for a prop in Prop Definition, it is now much easier to get those defaults into an existing sequence -- just click the new "Merge Defaults" button in the Add/Modify Motion Effect Rows dialog.

•Added new playback marker style of "moving marker and highlight the current column".

•In Group Definition, there is a new arrangement setting of "H Stack, V Fill".

•Added a new option to the Butterfly effect that let's you specify which corner the effect should originate from.

ButterflyEffectCornerOption

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, when creating a new sequence and using the Quick Preview feature, the list of previews shown in the Previews window did not update.

•In the Sequencer, if you selected an entire motion effect row that contained existing effects, then selected "Insert Motion Effect" from the right click menu, then the new effect would overwrite the first effect in the selection instead of filling up the entire selection. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/51676-s5-motion-effect-editing-issue-video-request/

•In the Sequencer, if you selected an entire motion effect row that contained existing effects, then selected "Prompt For New Effect > Modify Existing Effects" from the right click menu, then the new effect would only only modify the first effect in the selection instead of all selected effects. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/51676-s5-motion-effect-editing-issue-video-request/

•In the Sequencer, if you deleted a subsequence, it was not reflected in sequence playback until you closed the main sequence and re-opened it.

•In the Sequencer, if a sequence was open in the Sequencer, and an LOR network was changed from not-enhanced to enhanced (or vice versa) in Network Preferences, then the open sequence would no longer control lights correctly on the affected networks -- until the sequence was closed and reloaded. Now the Sequencer will update open sequences automatically without having to close and reload them.

•In the Sequencer, in certain cases, double clicking on a motion effect would result in the Motion Effect Generator opening a second time, after the first edit was completed.

•In the Sequencer, Preview Design did not maintain the aspect ratio of a background image if "Save image with preview" was checked. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/51890-possible-bug-in-s5-preview-version-542/

•In the Sequencer, if you had a prop which was a standard AC channel with one color and defined as "channel per color", then added the prop into a group, added a motion effect row, and added a motion effect with multiple colors, then when you played back the motion effect it turned that prop on and off as expected. For example, a red prop will turn on when the color red (or another color which features red in it) plays in the motion effect. However, if you changed the prop definition to "multicolor" and left everything else the same (still one color selected for the prop), the motion effect would turn on the prop all the time at a lower intensity and it would not work as expected.

•In Preview Design, the xmodel import of custom models would sometimes fail because of incorrect data in the file. The import process has been improved such that it now ignores some of that incorrect data and imports the file anyway. Also, if the import fails in the new release, you should get a more specific message indicating the cause of the error.

•In the Sequencer, effect and row selection modes did not work when using right-click selection.

•In the Sequencer, when opening the Motion Effect Generator for an effect with custom transitions, the wrong transition could be displayed.

•In the Sequencer, after double-clicking on a motion effect to edit it, playback in the Motion Effect Generator would not start at the beginning of the effect.

•In the Sequencer, modifying small intensity values in the red, green, or blue sub-channels of an RGB channel could result in a crash.

•In the Sequencer's Add/Modify Motion Effect Rows dialog, when clicking the down arrow icon, you could not move a row to the very bottom (only second to the bottom).

•When clicking on a color swatch in the Motion Effect Generator, the Color Transition dialog would sometimes be positioned on top of the color swatch. When that happened, a double-click on the color swatch could result in an inadvertent click on a button in the Color Transition dialog. Now the Color Transition dialog will be placed above or below the color swatch.

•In the Sequencer's Prop Definition window, when switching a prop from another shape to the Matrix-Horizontal-Quad or Matrix-Vertical-Quad shapes, the program would display an error.

•With a Basic Plus license, the Sequencer's VU wizard would operate as a demo feature (should be fully supported).

•After making changes to effects on a beat channel and then playing the sequence, the color samples displayed to the right of a beat channel name during playback would not reflect the latest changes.

•The Sequencer would hang during start-up for a few users with high-end NVidia graphics cards driving multiple monitors. Changes have been made to address this problem, but testing has yielded mixed results. If you experience this problem, please contact the help desk.

•In a traditional prop with a custom shape, changing the layout of the custom shape could cause the effects for that prop to be erased.

•The Curtain motion effect would sometimes render incorrectly when the curtain edge was set to top, middle, or bottom, and the movement was set to open-then-close or close-then-open.

•For many Sequencer users, when you clicked on one of the playback buttons music would start almost immediately, but there was a 200-300 millisecond delay until the first update on the playback window. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/52349-dwell-at-the-beginning-of-songs/

•"Sort by Color" is no longer listed as an option when you right-click on an RGB channel in the sequence grid. Sort by Color is intended for props with traditional lights.

•When importing a Visualizer file into a preview, any fixture names with curly brackets { } would cause the import to fail.

•When creating SD cards in Hub, it was possible to use the same LOR network on 2 ports, but with different protocols. This could cause some shows to fail to run.

What's New in Version 5.4.2

•Installation

•New Installation Executable

Installation

•Bug fix: due to a problem during installation, when the user enabled a show they might get an error stating ”Shows cannot be enabled because of an error. ActiveX component can’t create object/LORMonitor". Also, LORHub may crash when trying to create an SD card.

Sequencer Motion Effects Changes and Additions

•Added an option for the Text motion effect to display smooth (anti-aliased) text.

•Restored the ability to left, center, or right justify text in the Text motion effect. This setting only applies when there is more than one line of text.

Sequencer Improvements

•A light bulb icon is now displayed in the lower right corner of the Sequencer -- on the status bar. It will be dark when control lights is off, and bright yellow when control lights is on. This way the user can know the light control status without having to open the Control Lights panel.

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, the new Motion Effect Row "overlay" combination mode did not work on prop subsections. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/51605-xmodel/

•When running the demo version of the Sequencer and then registering, the Control Lights panel did not update. The Control Lights check box was still disabled and the message "Controlling lights requires a license" was still shown.

•After any Paste operation in the Sequencer, all of the cells that were pasted into should be selected. However, after a Paste Special with the Flip Vertical option enabled, the paste would work correctly but the wrong selection would be shown.

What's New in Version 5.4.0

•Sequencer Motion Effects Changes and Additions

New Installation Executable

•The Light-O-Rama installer process and installer executable have been updated:

•This should eliminate some installer errors such as files not being cleaned from the LOR Programs directory when installing new versions.

•The installer size has been reduced by approximately 20 meg.

•Previously the DirectX installer was always called regardless if a machine needed DirectX 9 installed or not. Now only machines that need to have DirectX will execute the install.

•Additional files are now electronically signed by LOR to ensure their authenticity. This will allow Windows to prompt the user to obtain necessary permissions.

•The installer will now place a shortcut on the users desktop to start the LOR Control Panel. At the end of the install, you will be asked if you want to start the control panel. This should help new users get started using the software.

•The installer will not run on older Windows machines. You must have Windows 7 or newer as per the requirements of the software. Previously the software could be installed, but some programs would not work.

•When starting the Control Panel for the first time, users will be shown a new screen that briefly describes how to use the control panel and software. Again, this is an effort to help new users get started.

•Note: Should you have any issue with the new installer process, first uninstall any LOR programs, then run the LOR Registry Wipe and then re-install. This should fix most installer issues. Please contact the help desk if needed.

Sequencer Motion Effects Changes and Additions

•New motion effects added: Spinner, Spin Fade, Archimedes Spiral, and PictureXY. Spinner, Spin Fade, and Archimedes Spiral should work especially well on pixel-based stars, spinners, wheels, and snowflakes that use a Custom shape. PictureXY is a simplified picture effect that gives you direct control over image size and placement.

•Pinwheel: the rendering quality has been improved and a new color mode has been added (multicolor arms).

•Picture: added a "Numbered Sequence" check-box. Prior to this version, image sequences were detected automatically. Now they are indicated by checking the new box. If you have an existing sequence that uses numbered image files for an animation, your sequence will no longer work as originally intended until you reopen the sequence and update the applicable Picture effects.

•Color Wash: added dither and gradient options. Also, a small change was made to the "fade left to right" and "fade right to left" options, as they did not produce symmetrical results The same applies to the "fade top to bottom" and "fade bottom to top" options. This was only apparent on very small props.

•Fire: fire can now emanate from any or all sides. It was also fixed so that it now works with the "Alpha Blend" mixer mode.

•When setting colors in the Motion Effect Generator, "transparent" is now an option. This is useful in the "Alpha Blend" mixer mode and when motion rows are combined using the new "overlay" mode (see below).

Sequencer Improvements

•In the Add/Modify Motion Rows dialog, you can now specify how the rows are merged together during rendering:

•Blend: the maximum brightness for each pixel is taken from the effects across all rows -- backward compatible with prior versions, including the S4 Pixel Editor.

•Overlay: rows are overlaid one on top of the other using alpha blending (i.e. effects can have areas that are transparent). The first row listed in the dialog is used as the background, then successive rows are layered on top of it. Note that you can use the dialog to change the order of the rows, thus changing the order in which rows get overlaid.

•In the Paste Special dialog:

•you now have options to flip the pasted data horizontally and/or vertically

•you can now override the Paste Mode shown on the toolbar from within the dialog

•the maximum number of times a clipboard can be repeated horizontally or vertically was increased from 100 to 10,000

•repeating vertically to the end of the sequence is fixed

•When selecting a playback range by dragging across the timeline, the Playback Window will now display the preview at the time indicated by the cursor's location (sometimes referred to as scrubbing).

•Added the ability to embed files for the Picture Effect inside the sequence file. This makes it easier to move sequences from one computer to another because you don't have to also transfer the associated picture files. Use the new menu item Sequence > Manage Picture Effects.

•The Skew Selection and Skew Entire Sequence dialogs now remember the last settings that were used.

•Added the ability to import xLights model files (.xmodel) into Preview Design. This capability is limited to custom models.

•In Preview Design, bulb transparency can now be applied to any bulb shape.

SuperStar Improvements

•SuperStar now supports audio files with a sampling rate of 48,000 as well as the standard 44,100 sampling rate.

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, when adding new SuperStar effects to a group, the effects did not render correctly.

•Closing a sequence before the initial calculations had finished (wait icon was still spinning) could cause the Sequencer to crash.

•In the Sequencer, after importing an LPEPROP file into Preview Design, the Channel Conflicts tab was not updated.

•In the Sequencer, removing channel level from a pixel-based prop did not cause the playback on the screen to be recalculated.

•In the Sequencer, when selecting props for a new grid view, clicking a check-box did not highlight the prop name; so if you subsequently used the up or down arrow keys to navigate the list, the wrong item was selected.

•In the Sequencer, after stopping playback in an animation sequence, the ribbon's Waveform button would get enabled.

•In the Sequencer's Motion Effect Generator, the drop-down to select an effect would sometimes pause before opening.

•In the Sequencer, when the "RGB Split" Sequencer preference was enabled, pasting into a collapsed group of RGB channels would produce the wrong result.

•In the Sequencer, when the "RGB Split" Sequencer preference was disabled, pasting from a legacy clipboard file (one created with S4 or earlier) into RGB channels would produce the wrong result.

•When the Sequencer window was minimized and you used Windows File Explorer to open a sequence that was already open, the pop-up message stating that the sequence was already open could get stuck behind another window, requiring that the Sequencer be force-closed.

•In the Sequencer, starting to play a sequence while control lights was enabled could result in a message window being displayed that was larger than the screen (if there were props with motion effects that used LOR networks that were not enhanced).

•The Copy function in Preview Design will no longer create props beyond the limits of the design canvas. Also, you can now Undo the results of a Copy.

What's New in Version 5.3.14

•New N4g4MP3 (4 Port, Generation 4 MP3 Director) Firmware, V 6.7

•New CTB32LN (LOR1600g3/LOR1602g3) and CTP16PCg3 Controller Firmware, V1.17/V1.10

Sequencer Improvements

•The status bar now shows the current selection mode: cells, effects, rows, or freeform.

New N4G4MP3 (4 Port, Generation 4 MP3 Director) Firmware V 6.7

•When starting a new show, there can be a slight delay of up to 2 seconds before the first sequence starts to play. During this time, heartbeat messages were not sent to controllers allowing them to possibly loose synchronization. If the controllers lost sync, approximately the first second of the first sequence could be lost while the controller re-synchronized with the MP3 director.

New CTB32LN (LOR1600g3/LOR1602g3) and CTB16PCg3 Controller Firmware, V1.17/V1.10

•When running in Enhanced mode, which does not support LOR Advanced commands like Twinkle and Shimmer, the controller could unexpectedly place channels into Shimmer or Twinkle mode. For LOR160xg3 controllers this is fixed in Firmware 1.17. For CTB16PCg3 controllers this is fixed in firmware V1.10. Only G3 controllers support enhanced mode, so other controllers do not need to be updated.

Bug Fixes

•When creating a Simple PC show in Hub, the time entry form incorrectly allowed for typing in a start or end time. This could lead to incorrect start/end times being displayed and scheduled shows not starting/ending properly.

•When creating an SD card show in Hub for G3 or later MP3 directors that had 2 or more ports with firmware 5.36 or below, the files created did not have the correct extension.

•In the Hardware Utility it was still possible to configure and change both DIO boards and X-10 settings. Support for both was removed for S5. The contents of these tabs has been removed, and the tabs themselves will be removed with a later release.

•On the Sequencer's Prop Definition screen, pasting invalid data into the Unit ID or Circuit fields could result in a weird error message or a crash.

•In the Sequencer, added a preview check to ensure only groups with arrangement of 'none' can contain members that are groups with an arrangement of 'none'. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/51061-arithmetic-overflow/

•The Sequence Compressor tool now handles shows that contain S5 sequences (LOREDIT files). You can also select an LOREDIT file when compressing a single sequence. This can be used to prepare an entire show for playback before its scheduled start time.

•In the Sequencer, the program could hang when inserting a SuperStar effect on top of an existing Motion Effect.

•In the Sequencer, inserting SuperStar effects on motion rows that use only some of the pixels of a prop or group (i.e. a subsection) was not working correctly.

•When playing a sequence in a show, performance was improved for channel effects on DMX networks. For sequences with many channel effects on DMX networks, you will want to regenerate the playback files. Use the Sequence Compressor with the "Force Compression" option enabled to do this.

What's New in Version 5.3.12

Sequencer Improvements

•In the Motion Effect Generator, there is a new button that allows the user to reset all of an effect's parameters back to their default values.

•Users now get a warning if they are about to overwrite existing SuperStar effects with a new SuperStar effect.

•Users now get a warning if they try to insert a SuperStar effect that is less than 1 second long.

Bug Fixes

•When creating an SD card in Hub, you could not select S5 files for filler or starter sequences. An option on the open dialog has now been added.

•When creating an SD card in Hub, if any time (scheduled start or end) started with '12', the time could be incorrectly set in the SD card configuration file. The show would not then start/stop at the correct time.

•When creating an SD card in Hub, if you were using an S5 Filler, Hub would correctly call the conversion of the file to S4 but then would validate the 'start' sequence file name. If a start file did not exist, Hub could then crash.

•When creating an SD card in Hub, while creating a new show on an new SD card show, if a SHOW01.CFG file existed on the SD card AND that configuration didn't actually contain any sequences, Hub would still attempt to use it even though it was not valid. Later on, Hub would attempt to use the bad configuration and in some instances crash.

•When creating an SD card in Hub, the program was not checking to see if any error was returned from the S5 Sequencer pre-process. If an error was returned, and depending on what the error actually was, subsequent calls to the Sequencer from Hub could be made to functions that were not initialized and hub could crash.

•In the Sequencer, users with a demo license for SuperStar could not save effects to a motion effect row in the Sequencer.

•In the Sequencer's Prop Definition screen, added validation when entering a start circuit/channel to prevent a crash.

•When running the Sequencer for the first time after a fresh install, the user would get this erroneous message ‘The master list of previews, palettes or motion effect favorites has been changed by an external program. Restart to load the updates.’

•In the Sequencer's VU Wizard, moving the threshold slider is now more responsive

•Motion effects that respond to the music (musical note icon next to the slider) worked correctly in the Sequencer, but not in the Show Player or when written to an SD card.

•In SuperStar, the name of images could revert back to "image xx" after doing "manipulate images".

•In SuperStar, a degree symbol in the image name would cause the sequencer to fail to save the file.

•In SuperStar, increased allowed DMX size from 100 to 200.

•In SuperStar, added the ability to add or subtract from color values in an image by pressing the '+' or '-' key while clicking on image pixels

•In SuperStar, when servicing a SuperStar Request, if we fail to load the data file then display a "failed to read file" error.

What's New in Version 5.3.10

Bug Fixes

•On some Windows Systems, usually but not limited to Windows 7, the LOR Show Player would crash upon trying to start a show. When it crashed, the LOR Control Panel would attempt to recover and restart the Show Player. This would cause the Show Player to loop on these machines and not actually play a show.

•In the Sequencer brightness adjustment on the Playback window was disabled when the background image was embedded with the preview.

•In the Sequencer the title bar of the playback window showed "Playback stopped" during playback after a sequence loops and continues to play back.

•In the Sequencer new sequences lose motion effect rows with "custom" subsections that were defined in the preview. Custom subsections appear often on props loaded using the Boscoyo import. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49712-motion-effect-rows-disappear-536

What's New in Version 5.3.8

•Generation 4 MP3 Director Firmware Updates (N1 & N4)

Sequencer Improvements

•In Preview Group Definition, there is a new arrangement setting of "custom". When set, 2 additional columns (TOP and LEFT) will appear in the group definition grid. This allows you to specify where each prop is placed in the effects buffer for the group. This is especially useful for SuperStar users with complex layouts. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47742-matrix/

•New Chase option: Same Row Type. If selected, the chase will only occur on rows of the same type as the first row. For example, if the first row is a regular channel, any RGB channels or motion effect rows will be skipped. If there is no check mark next to this option, then the chase will proceed through all selected rows, regardless of type. Requested by Drew Hickman.

•Changed the way SuperStar effects are stored in the Sequencer in order to handle larger SuperStar sequences, like those created using Instant Sequencing.

SUPERSTAR EFFECTS STORED USING THIS VERSION OF THE SEQUENCER CANNOT BE LOADED INTO PREVIOUS VERSIONS OF THE SEQUENCER.

SuperStar Improvements

•Added a "Change Orientation" section to the Move or Scale Selected Effects dialog. It changes a sequence from vertical to horizontal or horizontal to vertical.

•Added the "Prorated" button to the "Manipulate Selected Images" dialog box. Rotation Angle, Brightness, Move, and Scale can be applied the same to all images, or can be "prorated" across the selected images.

•Added "Clip Rectangle" as an option in "Move or Scale Selected Effects." Previously if you moved or scaled effects it did not move or scale the clip rectangle. Now, if "Clip Rectangle" is selected "Move", "Scale", and "Change Orientation" change the clip rectangle as well.

•In the "Image Setup" dialog box "Rotation" has been added as an option for an Image Action. Rotation can be 0, 90, 180, or 270.

Generation 4 MP3 Director Firmware Updates (N1 & N4)

•The firmware for the N1uMP3g4 MP3 Director (One Network, Black Plastic Case, Generation 4) has been updated to resolve an issue which caused the director to sometimes lock up on boot, as well as an update to fix issues with trigger inputs.

•The firmware for the N4MP3g4 MP3 Director (Four Network, Linkable, Metal Case, Generation 4) has been updated to resolve an issue which caused the director to sometimes lock up on boot.

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, when assigning a different preview to a sequence and there were preview groups that share the same name in the old and new previews, the new groups would not render effects until the sequence was closed and then re-opened. Reported by Drew Hickman.

•In the Sequencer, when changing among the bulb and various line shapes of a prop in the Prop Definition screen, the points that define the shape are now preserved.

•In the Sequencer, when changing the shape of a prop in the Prop Definition screen, parameter values will no longer revert to their default values when the parameter for the prior shape and the new shape have the exact same meaning.

•In the Sequencer, when upgrading a legacy sequence to S5, RGB channels would not import unless the "Split RGB" Sequencer preference was enabled. Now they will import correctly regardless of the preference setting.

•In the Sequencer, if a secondary monitor has been unplugged since the time the Sequencer was last run, any floating windows on the secondary monitor will now be re-positioned onto one of the remaining monitors. Reported by user TitusCarnathan. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49700-tc-73-playback-windows-disappears/

•In the Sequencer, when a prop used the Tree 360 Up & Over shape with pixels and a starting location that specified a clock-wise wiring order, the pixels were offset by 180 degrees in the effect buffer. Reported by Drew Hickman.

•In the Sequencer, when adding an LOR device in Preview Design, if you entered a name and then changed the device, the name you entered would get overwritten. Reported by user ndutton. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49762-automation-bugs-in-prop-generation/

•In the Sequencer, sorting the current grid view was including the prefix character. Now the prefix character is ignored so everything sorts in alphabetical order.

•In the Sequencer, trailing spaces in prop names are now ignored when the Sequencer decides whether to archive a prop or not.

•In the Sequencer, when you open a protected LMS file and then save it (not "save as" but "save") the file name shown on the tab goes away. Reported by Drew Hickman.

•In Superstar, fixed a bug where the Clip Rectangle was not being drawn when in Image mode. This bug was introduced in the previous release when drawing in image mode was optimized.

•In Superstar, fixed a bug where a large grid with 100 ribbons or more would not create a scene using ribbon 100

•In Superstar, fixed an issue where creating a 7 tier, 360 degree of traditional lights could cause a crash.

•In LORHub when creating SD cards, an incorrect (old) version of an S5 .LID (enhanced file) could be detected and incorrectly used.

•In LORHub when creating SD cards using some sequences, the MP3 file attached to the sequence was not copied to the SD card

•In LORHub when creating SD cards that used a trigger, the 'Normally Closed' switch option was not working.

What's New in Version 5.3.6

Sequencer Improvements

•A new Sequencer Preference on the Channel Effects tab controls whether an RGB channel is displayed with its red / green / blue sub-channels or not. Turning this option off can save memory, allowing larger sequences to be loaded. Requested by user dougd. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49460-reverted-back-to-524

•You can now specify a "default paste mode" on the Startup Tab of Sequencer Preferences. The Default Paste Mode will be shown whenever a sequence is opened. Requested by user User dgrant. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49611-editor-preferences/

•On Preview Design's Channel Conflicts & Bulk Changes tab, you can now use the "Set LOR Network" and "Set DMX Universe" to change props from LOR to DMX or vice versa. Changes were also made to the "Select All" check box on this tab to make it more intuitive.

•On Preview Design's Design tab, you can now choose to save the background image with the preview (see the Background tab). If you export such a preview and send the export file (LORPREV extension) to someone else, the background image will be included. The background image will also be included if you send a sequence to another user and the sequence uses such a preview.

SuperStar Improvements

•Added "rotation angle" to the "Manipulate Selected Images" dialog box.

oIf one image is selected then it sets the rotation angle of that image

oIf more than one image is selected, the angles get applied proportionally to each image. For example, if you selected 4 images and apply 33 degrees, then 0, 11, 22, and 33 degrees get applied to the 4 selected images.

Bug Fixes

•When nothing was set in Network Preferences, it was possible for the Sequencer to initialize with the Control Lights box checked and no obvious way to turn it off. Going forward, when nothing is set in Network Preferences the Control Lights button will be unchecked, and a message will remind the user "Network Preferences must be set before you can control lights". Reported by Drew Hickman.

•In the Sequencer, when you created a prop with the custom shape using version 5.3.4 and earlier, the autonumber function had a maximum value of 16,000 and would crash when it tried to insert 16,001 in the custom grid. Going forward, the maximum value has been increased to 999,999 and the program will not crash if you exceed that number. Reported by Jeff Banbor via the help desk.

•The Sequencer could crash when clicking on a motion effect in the grid or when opening the Motion Effect Generator. Reported by Jeff Banbor and others.

•In the Sequencer, in certain situations, clicking any of the play buttons on the Playback Window would result in a message of "Unable to Start Playback", whereas the play buttons above the sequence grid would recalculate data and then start playing the sequence. Reported by user stevehoyt. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49605-unable-to-start-playback/

•In LOR Hub, when editing or creating a computer based simple show, the 'remove' button would not remove a selected sequence properly.

•In LOR Show Editor, only legacy (.LAS, or .LMS) sequences could be selected for interactive shows and cleanup sequences. This has been fixed to include S5 Sequencer (.loredit and .lorprot) files.

•In Superstar, if you switched to large grid and then did Instant Sequence the program would crash.

•In Superstar, the progress dialog box was not updating.

•In Superstar, enhanced the "Set group time range" button on the toolbar so that it proportionally sets the start and end time of all selected effects. This is particularly useful if you have a bunch of adjacent image actions and want to change the time range of the entire group.

What's New in Version 5.3.4

•Sequencer Enhancements

Sequencer Enhancements

•Added a text filter to the Online Prop Import dialog, so you can filter the listed props by their description. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

•The timeline now uses a little less vertical space, and is displayed with a better font. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

•Converted the "Timing" select action to a lock icon on the timing grid toolbar. This allows a user to create effects and adjust timing marks without having to go back and click on the toolbar. Requested by Drew Hickman.

•Added a new playback marker style: show moving marker and highlight timing marks. Selectable in the Playback tab of Sequencer Preferences. Requested by users at Christmas Expo 2019.

•The portion of the toolbar related to the timing grid can now be positioned on the left or right side by right-clicking anywhere on the top toolbar and picking an option from the pop-up menu. Requested by users at Christmas Expo 2019.

•Clicking an effect "Type" button on the toolbar will automatically change the select action to "Create". Requested by users at Christmas Expo 2019.

Bug Fixes

•In the Sequencer, resizing the Effect Samples window when color favorites are displayed can cause the color samples to be redrawn incorrectly (stutter pattern). Reported by Light-O-Rama.

•In the Sequencer, with license levels of Advanced or below, the Color Favorites buttons at the top of the Effect Samples window do not wrap around if the window is too narrow to display them all. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

•In the Sequencer, disable the background brightness slider on the playback window when a motion effect is playing, or if the sequence's preview doesn't have a background image. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

•In the Sequencer, tick marks on the timeline and timing marks on the sequence grid were misaligned by 1 pixel in many cases. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

•In the Sequencer, subsequence names were not being displayed on the grid. Reported by users at Christmas Expo 2019.

•In the Sequencer, when creating color fade effects, the Slope setting is now taken into account. The "O" shortcut key simply selects the Color Fade effect type on the toolbar, it doesn't actually create an effect. To create color fade effects with shortcut keys, use "A", "I", "D", and "U". Reported by users at Christmas Expo 2019.

•When playing a show or creating an SD card, fixed issue with playback file creation checking the preview revision. As a fix, the preview revision number is now part of the playback file name. Reported by user default. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49511-bug-report-pm02-show-player-processes-all-files-and-updates-playback-files-every-time-it-restarts-even-if-the-base-files-have-not-changed/

•On a very limited number of computers, LOR Hub could refuse to open and/or crash with a runtime error 50003. This error was related to certain graphics used in the application, and those graphics have been replaced. Many thanks to Monty C. for helping us track down this issue.

•When creating SD cards with LOR Hub using Sequencer '.loredit' files, Hub would refuse to create the card with a generic 'There was a problem creating your SD Card' error. Hub was improved to display a more descriptive error, and the bug preventing the creation of the SD cards was fixed.

•When creating SD cards that use triggers and the 'Round Robin' style of play, an incorrect configuration was created on the SD card.

•In LOR Hub, when creating a simple PC show, S5 sequences were not sorted properly.

•In Superstar, if you have two screens with the main screen in one monitor and the sequencing grid in another monitor and the main screen is shorter in height than the grid screen, then the click and drag drawing in image mode on the grid screen stops working when you go beyond the height of the main screen.

•In Superstar, scene elements with a Y coordinate beyond 128 were not working.

•In Superstar, when adding images from a gif, it was not remembering the rotation angle.

•In Superstar, "image" now works in group modify.

•In Superstar, fixed it so you can use "large grid" in the "image setup" dialog box when superstar is launched from the S5 Sequencer. Also allow setting the size of the "large grid".

•In Superstar, optimized the "click and drag" drawing speed on the green sequencing grid so you can more easily draw images on pixel grids with large numbers of pixels.

•In Superstar, improved layout of green pixel grid so it fits onto the screen for large numbers of pixels.

•In Superstar, changed the terminology for the license level from things like "2_CCR" to "100_pixels".

What's New in Version 5.3.2

•Creating Shows/SD Cards/Controller Stand-Alone sequences with Native LOR Sequences

Bug Fixes

▪In LOR Hub, certain store web pages would generate Javascript errors. Instead of opening these pages in Hub itself, now an external web browser is opened.

▪In the Sequencer, the user now has a choice of displaying the tool buttons along the right side of the grid, or immediately above it. User can right-click in the tool button area to access available display options. Reported by user PhilMassey and others.

▪In the Sequencer, a new select action of "Timing" has been added. It replaces the "Lock Timings" option that was present in a couple of menus in prior versions. The new Timing button is only enabled when a Freeform Timing Grid is selected. If the new Timing button is selected, then timing marks are unlocked and right-clicking on the grid opens directly to the Timing Mark menu. For any other Select Action, timing marks are locked, and right-clicking on the grid opens the context menu present in previous versions (Timing Mark is a sub-menu). Reported by user PhilMassey. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49037-thoughts-on-s5/

▪Sequencer bug fix: when chasing an RGB color, for example green, the chase becomes white when the chase crosses from one grid view group to the next. Reported by user PhilMassey.

▪In the Sequencer, you can now right-click on the toolbar that includes the playback buttons to set the maximum size of the buttons. Choices are: large, medium, and compact. Reported by Drew Hickman.

▪When dragging effect edges in the Sequencer, if you drag the beginning of an effect to the right past the effect's end, the effect will now be deleted. Similarly, if you drag the end of an effect to the left past the effect's beginning, the effect will be deleted. Reported by Drew Hickman.

▪In the Sequencer, when the motion effect source is set to "Samples", the Effect Samples window will be made visible if it is hidden. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

▪Sequencer bug fix: after modifying a preview, you might get the following error while opening a sequence: "An entry with the same key already exists". Reported by NJ Malenke via the help desk.

What's New in Version 5.3.0

•Support for N4G4 Linked Directors

•New Firmware for N4G4 Directors

•Upcoming changes to LOR Hardware Utility

•Auto Sequencing of Singing Faces in Superstar

•Sequencer Motion Effect Changes and Additions

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49296-s5-suggestions/

Creating Shows/SD Cards/Controller Stand-Alone sequences with Native LOR Sequences

In previous versions of the software, you could not directly schedule, load to a controller (stand-alone mode), or create SD cards with native (IE .loredit) files. Instead, you first needed to create legacy files (IE .LMS or .LAS - sometimes referred to as 'playback files'), and then use those. The suite can now instead take native .loredit files for all of these functions without the need for manually creating 'Playback' files, and use them directly.

LOR Hub, LOR Show Editor, and LOR Hardware (stand-alone loading only) can now accept native S5 files.

Support for G4 Linked Directors

With the newest generation of LOR MP3 directors (Generation 4), some directors have the ability to be 'linked' together - allowing for a show with an almost unlimited number of networks or DMX universes to be run from these directors.

LOR Hub is required to create the SD card sets for linked directors, and you must use the Advanced SD Card Wizard to create them. N4G4 Directors require at least firmware version 6.2 to use director link.

New Firmware for N4G4 directors

New firmware for N4G4 directors has been released to support Director Link mode.

Upcoming changes to LOR Hardware Utility

LOR Hub has now taken over all SD card creation tasks for MP3 directors. In the future, the SD card creation process that is available in the LOR Hardware Utility will be removed. You should be using LORHub for ALL SD card creation tasks.

Auto Sequencing of Singing Faces in SuperStar

A new feature has been added to auto-sequence singing faces in SuperStar..

Sequencer Motion Effects Changes and Additions

Added new parameter to the Meteor motion effect called "Speed Mode". Speed mode has 2 values: "pixel rate" uses the existing fall rate calculation; "scaled rate" will cause meteors to fall at a rate that scales with the size of the prop. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added a new parameter to the Meteor motion effect called "Drop Mode", which adds new patterns to meteor drops (in addition to the existing random pattern). Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added new option to fill corners on the Marquee motion effect. Requested by Steve Warner.

Added additional options to pre-scale an image in the picture effect: fit-to-width and fit-to-height -- which maintain the image's aspect ratio. Also increased maximum horizontal and vertical scale values from 100% to 400% so images can be stretched if needed. Requested by Steve Warner.

Added movement options to the Picture and Text effects that are essentially the second half of the Peek-a-boo movement. The options are: reverse, exit_left, exit_right, exit_top, and exit_bottom. Reverse is the default and replicates the functionality of prior versions. Requested by Drew Hickman and user Little_b.

Added ability to adjust red level, green level, and blue level independently in the picture Picture effect. Also added the ability to adjust transparency of the picture. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Made picture and movie effect references stored in a sequence file relative to the sequence directory. This makes it easier to move the sequence to another computer, as long as the picture and movie files are stored in the sequence folder or in a sub-folder below it. Implemented in response to a help desk ticket.

Sequencer Improvements

You can now select S5 sequences (LOREDIT extension) when creating a show. They can also be selected when creating an SD card in LOR Hub. Playback files are now created and updated automatically behind the scenes. "Create Playback Files" has been removed from the Sequencer File menu, as it is no longer needed. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

The motion effect toolbar button has been combined with the motion effect selection window. Now, when the motion effect toolbar button is selected, the motion effect tool window will open; and when another toolbar button is selected, the window will close. This works in a similar manner to the Color Fade tool. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added the ability to drag the ends of channel and motion effects to adjust timing or create a fade. This feature is enabled or disabled by clicking on a new toolbar button next to the "nudge" tools. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

On the toolbar, the channel effect selection has been changed from a drop-down, to a series of buttons. A new "foreground" button allows you to change the intensity of existing effects. Requested by Drew Hickman.

Changed the preview name on the toolbar from a drop-down menu, to a button. Now clicking on the preview name takes you directly into Preview Design. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

The preview name is now displayed on the toolbar in a fixed width box, so that toolbar button location won't vary based on the length of the preview name. If the preview name is longer than the box, you can hover your cursor over it and a tootip will the full name of the preview will be displayed. Requested by Drew Hickman.

Moved audio wizard items on the main menu from the Sequence menu to the Tools menu (to be more consistent with the S4 Sequence Editor). Menu items have also moved one level up, so they take one less click to access. The audio wizards can also be accessed from various context (right-click) menus -- and those remain unchanged. Requested by Drew Hickman.

Converted the right-click menu of the playback window (play, stop, and background image brightness) to a toolbar, to make it more user-friendly. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Increased the number of tiers on a "Tree 360 Panels" shape from 12 to 25, and added a pixel offset parameter for each tier. Panels with traditional lights are now supported. Requested by Drew Hickman.

"Tree 360 Wedges" using traditional strings (megatrees) will now display their channels in the correct order when a sequence is first created. Requested by Drew Hickman.

Megatrees and segmented arches with traditional strings will now avoid the r/c nomenclature in their names and instead use "string" or "bundle". Requested by Light-O-Rama.

In File References, allow the user to change a file name, not just a directory. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

In prior versions, space-bar playback moved the selection when stopping, but clicking the stop button on the toolbar did not. Now, clicking the stop button during playback will also move the selection (like the S4 Sequence Editor). You can prevent the selection from moving by shift-clicking on the stop button. Requested by Drew Hickman.

Changed "Unit #" to "Unit ID" in Prop Definition dialog to be consistent with controller documentation. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

On the "Channel Conflicts & Bulk Changes" tab in Preview Design, renamed the "Renumber Strings" menu item to "Reorder Circuit/Channel Numbers". The new name better reflects the function. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

On the "Channel Conflicts & Bulk Changes" tab in Preview Design, added the "Add Leading Zeros To Numbered Prop Names" menu item. Any selected props that have a number in their name will have leading zeros added to the number. This can aid in sorting the props in the desired order on the sequence grid. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

On the "Channel Conflicts & Bulk Changes" tab in Preview Design, added the "Replace Text In Prop Names" menu item. This function gives you the ability to search for and replace text in prop names, just like you would in a word processor. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added ability to sort the current grid view. Sort option is on the grid view menu. Requested by Drew Hickman.

Added ability to sort channels by physical channel settings. Requested by Drew Hickman.

When opening the motion effect generator with more than one motion effect row selected, you will now get an error message. Also, when editing a motion effect in a sequence, you can no longer change the prop/group drop-down. Requested by Drew Hickman.

When the toolbar tool is set to Motion Effect or SuperStar, the cursor is now sensitive to the type of row it is over and will only display the pencil cursor when over a motion effect row. Requested by Drew Hickman.

Improved the display of Motion Effect thumbnails for the built-in effects. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

The SuperStar toolbar button now has an option to always apply the effect to the entire row. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

The "Add/Modify Motion Effect Rows" dialog is now resizable, along with other tweaks. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Importing Boscoyo props will now create Motion Row Defaults where they exist in the Boscoyo data (e.g. Chroma Bulbs). Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added ability to create and edit custom motion effect subsections (subsections no longer have to be rectangular). Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Made it easier to start dragging timing marks on the grid -- the mouse pointer no longer needs to be directly over the timing mark, it can now be within a few pixels of it. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

The motion effect and SuperStar buttons on the toolbar are now disabled when the current grid view does not contain any motion rows. Requested by Drew Hickman.

If have a Pro license: after changing the preview assigned to a sequence, if there are pixel-based props without a motion effect row, you will be asked whether you want to add a motion effect row to each of those props. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

The sequence file name on the tab header had an asterisk suffix when there were unsaved changes in the sequence. However, being at the end, the asterisk wasn't always visible. So the asterisk indicating unsaved changes has been moved to the front of the file name. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

When selecting a region of the grid using the mouse and you reach the grid's edge, the screen will start automatically scrolling. Now the scroll speed will increase the further outside the grid boundary you get (like SE). Requested by user dgrant.

Bug Fixes

For LOR Sequencer:

The pencil cursor now scales with Windows scaling. Reported at Expo 2018.

After selecting "Add/Modify Motion Effect Rows" and then changing the size of a row's subsection, then clicking OK to close the dialog, the preview did not recalculate and display effects using the new subsection size. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

"Add/Modify Motion Effect Rows" and "Delete Motion Effect Row" (and a few other entries on the Item List's right click menu) are now disabled while calculations are running, as this could cause data corruption. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Animated GIF images used in a Picture motion effect may flicker. Reported by user default.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/49129-ver-524-problem-with-picture-motion-effect-animated-gifs/

Text in the title of the Playback window was changing appropriately when the window was docked to the main form, but not when it was undocked/floating. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

When the Playback window was undocked/floating and had focus, the space bar would not start sequence playback. Reported by Drew Hickman.

When double-clicking on a cell in a motion effect row, then cancelling out of the Motion Effect Generator, the playback window no longer displays a motion effect. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

When upgrading a sequence and using the Sequence Editor animation for the preview, for any RGB channels in the sequence that were not in the animation, S5 created an RGB channel prop as well as props for each of its red, green, and blue components. Now it correctly creates a single prop in this situation. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

When creating a new preview group, sub-props (props where the "Uses the same channels as" field is set) were allowed to be members of the group. Reported by Drew Hickman.

If a sequence had beat channels or loop rows, it was possible for the yellow box indicating the selected area to be incorrectly drawn and overlap between fixed rows at the top and the main part of the grid. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

In the Motion Effect Generator, you can now mute and un-mute during the middle of effect playback.

Clipboard files (.LCB file extension) created in S4 (or earlier versions) that contain RGB channel data now paste correctly into S5 RGB channels. Reported by Stephen Chapman via the help desk.

What's New in Version 5.2.4

▪LOR Hub now supports all SD card options

▪LOR Hub can now turn off SD card schedule days if desired

▪Improvements in LOR Hub for creating SD cards with PC configuration

▪Simple Show Builder is being removed with the next release

▪Superstar Improvements

▪Sequencer Improvements

▪Sequencer Bug Fixes

▪Bug Fixes

LOR Hub now supports all SD card options

The LOR Hub program can now create SD cards with a full range of options, including triggers, filler sequences, starter sequences, etc. In a future release, SD card building will be removed from the Hardware Utility and the Simple Show Builder will be removed from the suite.

LOR Hub can now turn off SD card schedule days if desired

Previously there was no way to stop an SD card show from running on a particular day, except by using a workaround of setting the start and end times for a particular day the same. LOR Hub can now properly turn OFF a schedule for a particular day.

Improvements in LOR Hub for creating SD cards with PC configuration

When creating an SD card in Advanced mode in Hub, a new option has been added to configure the MP3 Director's ports the same way as those ports are defined on the computer. This can help with ease of setup of MP3 directors.

Simple Show Builder is being removed with the next release

LOR Hub has taken over all functions of the old Simple Show Builder program. In the next release this program will be removed from the suite. Instead, use LOR Hub to create your shows.

Superstar Improvements

•Added support for group modify of "average time length of effects" and "skip inactive grid squares"

•Added the "Do Scene Thinning" option in the "Move or Scale Selected Effects" dialog box

•Added "Orientation" setting in the Preferences dialog box

•Added support to convert 6 channel star effects to white effects on RGB stars from other vendors (previously it only worked for the standard 200 pixel RGB star)

Sequencer Improvements

All 3 windows on the Motion Effect Generator now update simultaneously, which is also a performance improvement. Previously they could update slightly out of sync for very large props. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

If the user selects Create Playback Files from the menu and the sequence hasn't been saved, the user is now offered a chance to save it (without having to cancel, save the sequence, then try and create playback files again). Requested by user ndutton.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/48065-reduce-the-clicks/

Enhancement: when opening a sequence, archived props will automatically be un-archived if a prop with the same name has been added back to the sequence's preview since the sequence was last opened. Same logic will also apply when you change the preview assigned to a sequence. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Enhancement: more accurate conversion when assigning a different preview to an existing sequence. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Performance improvements to the Picture motion effect. Requested by user jamills706.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/48263-spinning-orange-circle-forever/

In the New Animation Sequence dialog, show the sequence length as words, and give a warning when OK is clicked and the length is more than an hour. Requested by user Rabeiler.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/48288-animation-sequence-will-not-preview/

In the sequence grid, the drop-down list of grid views would previously display views in the order they were created. Now, the system grid view (Show All Items) is listed first, and then user-created grid views are listed in alphabetical order. Requested by user Jade Rymkos.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/48687-is-there-a-way-to-reorder-grid-views/

Increased the maximum number of bulbs in a bulb shape to 999. Requested by users dibblejr and gsmith37064.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/48682-moving-s4-to-s5/

In the Paste Special dialog, you can now specify the spacing between horizontal copies. A negative value yields an overlap, a positive value leaves a blank space between each copy. 0 is always the default value (it is not remembered between uses). Requested by user spascall.

Added new "hold" effect, which freezes the state of the prior effect. For example, you can freeze and unfreeze a spiral effect to the beat of the music by alternating spiral and hold effects on the same motion effect row. The hold effect must be touching the prior effect to work. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

In Prop Definition, added "Arm Thickness" parameter to the Star shape. A value of 1.0 is the normal thickness. Smaller values make the arms thinner. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

New tab on Sequencer Preferences that allows the user to choose among 3 edit cursors. Previously, only the yellow pencil was available. Requested by user bdwillie.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/48787-sequencer-pencil-pointer/

"Custom Chase" options are now available on the toolbar via a new drop-down arrow next to the chase button. The chase options will also get saved with the sequence, and recalled the next time the sequence is opened. Requested by Jack Richter via help desk.

Add the "+" shortcut key for the Repeat function (to match SE). Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added the Enter shortcut key to place an effect in the grid (to match SE). Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added option in preferences (Channel Effects tab) to view fades as ramps. Requested by multiple users.

Added option in preferences (Channel Effects tab) to adjust background color of channel rows in the grid. Requested at Christmas Expo.

In Prop Defintion's layout tool for custom and advanced shapes, there is a new "Crop" function that removes extra rows and columns. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added Help buttons ("?" icon) to Preview Design, Prop Definition, Group Definition, and Custom Grid screens. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Increased the max width and height on the SimpleShape effect to 1000% in order to allow shapes to expand beyond the prop boundaries. Requested by user Mike Baldwin.

Sequencer Bug Fixes

Bug fix: in the sequence grid, right-clicking on a "member props" or "member groups" node and selecting "Hide Group Members" from the pop-up menu disabled further highlighting of prop names as the mouse pointer was moved. Reported by John Johnson Jr via help desk.

Bug fix: in rare cases the Sequencer could crash if 1) the LOR Control Panel was running when the Sequencer started, and 2) a Schedule was enabled or Show on Demand was running, and 3) the option to Control Lights when the Sequencer started was enabled. Reported by Jim Wright via help desk.

Bug fix: S5 Verifier checked for application files that don't exist in S5, which resulted in "Message Number 7" errors that were not really errors. Reported by stevehoyt, TitusCarnathan, richmuller and others.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47959-tc-72-verifier-losing-its-mind/

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47777-52-verifier-errors/

Bug fix: when using music to control a slider in the Motion Effect Generator, the audio data was being pulled from the wrong part of the sequence. The effect used the correct audio data when placed in the sequence grid -- the error was only when the effect was displayed in the Motion Effect Generator. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: when you imported an S5 prop file in Preview Design, clicked the "Set Channels" button, then changed the name of the prop while setting channels, the resulting list of props and groups to lthe left of the design canvas would no longer be in alphabetical order. Reported by user ndutton.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/48041-preview-design-bugs-and-suggestions/

Bug fix: if a sequence gets moved to another folder or to another computer and the media file is in the same folder as the sequence, then playback files created from the new location could point to the wrong folder for the media file. Reported by user ndutton.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/48059-missing-files-bugs-and-suggestions/

Bug fix: when the sequence length was changed, the sequence was not marked as containing unsaved changes. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: in rare cases, effects could exist in sequences past the end of the sequence. When using playback files for such sequences, the Show Player would refuse to play the song with the message "ERROR STARTING SEQUENCE (Invalid end centisecond for last replacement event: 78195; channel is 55210 centiseconds)". Reported by NJ Malenke and stevehoyt.

Bug fix: if Holiday Lights Designer was enabled in S4 and then the user upgraded to S5, the Show Player would display errors in the log like "ERROR PLAYING SEQUENCE (Address in use Trace: UDP SetIntensity Trace: HandleIO)". Reported by Derek Flint via help desk.

Bug fix: certain combinations of removing and renaming props in a preview could leave a sequence unable to be opened (error message "An entry with the same key already exists"). Reported by Michelle Lovering via help desk.

Fix crash when Windows policy "System cryptography: Use FIPS compliant algorithms for encryption, hashing, and signing" is enabled. Reported by Dave Webb via help desk

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/811833/system-cryptography-use-fips-compliant-algorithms-for-encryption-hashi

The LOR SC485 serial port adapter (not USB) now works with the S5 Sequencer. Reported by several users via the help desk.

Fixed the online import of "Boscoyo ChromaStar 36 3 ring". Reported by Mike Baldwin via help desk.

Bug fix: in the Motion Effect Generator, double-clicking on a slider did not fully unlock it. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: in the Motion Effect Generator, effects with alpha transparency were not displayed correctly in the left and right windows. The combined window was correct. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: if the user right-clicked on a cell in the sequence grid, and then right-clicked on another cell in a different row, several cells in the clicked column would be selected. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: when doing Repeat, then Undo, then Redo, the Redo was done in the wrong place. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Fixed a bug with clipboard files, where files created as part of the "Papagayo to LOR" process could not be pasted. Reported by Dennis Holliday via the help desk.

Bug fix: in the Control Lights window, unchecking a box for an enhanced LOR network or for DMX, did not actually stop output from going to those networks. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Other Bug Fixes

•In LOR Hub and Hardware Utility, sequences with DMX Fades when written to the SD card could cause the MP3 director to go out of sync.

•LOR Hub was not able to properly create an SD Card schedule. The schedule would always revert back to the defaults instead of what the user specified.

•LOR Hub would crash if the user attempted to create an SD card show with no sequences in the create list.

•During installation, the Post Install process was not creating 3 new superstar visualization samples.

•In Superstar, text masks were not working in visualizations where some of the mask is outside of the matrix.

•In Superstar, fixed a bug where the white color control was not appearing if the only white that existed was in images.

•In Superstar, changed it so you can do "merge intensity data files" even in the demo version

•In Superstar, fixed a bug where scene pixels were getting clipped out if the clip region was on the right half of the wrap around screen

What's New in Version 5.2.2

•Superstar 'Add +' button

Updates to the Sequencer

A "Where Used" function has been added to the File References dialog, so you can find the effect that uses a missing reference. Requested by Michael Lenbom via help desk.

In the Prop Definition screen, when defining a "Tree 360 Up & Over" shape using pixels, the shape diagram will now indicate the location of the first pixel on each string. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

The user now has control over how "smooth to fades" is applied with a new sub-menu: Sequence > Smooth To Fade Level. This setting controls whether adjacent effects are merged together or not. Previously, the level was fixed at the "mild" setting; however, with the mild setting it is impossible to create DMX intensities that are 2 steps apart (for example: 65, 63, 61). Requested by Drew Hickman.

Updated the pencil icon to be more visible, and moved the tip to the upper left. Requested by Ernie McAnally via help desk.

If the user had a Pro license, when they created Playback Files an intensity data file (.LID extension) was always created. Now an intensity data file is only created if the sequence has props that use DMX or Enhanced LOR networks. Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Added a "How Do I Get Started?" link at the top of the "Start Page". Requested by Light-O-Rama.

Superstar 'Add +' button

In the "Image Setup" dialog box, a new button was added called "Add +". The "Add+" button adds the current image to the image action, selects the next image, and bumps the time ruler selection forward. This makes it easy to add a series of images for an animation.

Bug Fixes

•In certain circumstances, LOR Hub could create a computer show with incorrect sequence entries. When enabling the show, LOR Show Player would not be able to find the correct sequence.

•In certain circumstances, LOR Hub could create an SD card with sequences that in the future could not be edited. The SD card would however work.

•If a MotionPak in LOR Hub did not have the same upper/lowercase as the base sequence, LOR Hub would not be able to find it.

What's New in Version 5.2.0

•New Program: LOR Hub

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47295-video-playback-issue-in-shows/

New Program LOR Hub

A new program for the Showtime Suite has been added called 'Hub'. Hub currently has 2 main functions.

1.It enables our new MotionPak technology which allows you to modify LOR Sequence Store sequences for use with props the LOR Hardware Store will sell. The first props will be 'Singing Faces'

2.It is the replacement for Simple Show Builder. Simple Show Builder is still available in this release, however it will be removed in a future release. If you previously used Simple Show Builder you should move to Hub.
Hub can create both simple computer shows, as well as SD card shows for MP3 directors.

In future releases, Hub will continue to grow and will be taking over all 'show' type functionality including things like the Show Editor, Show Scheduler, and Building advanced SD cards for MP3 Directors from the Hardware Utility.

Updates to the Sequencer

If the content of the Start Page extends beyond the bottom of the window, the vertical scrollbar that is displayed now spans the entire right edge of the window - making it easier to scroll. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: if the user made the Start Page a floating window, then selecting Window > Reset Window Layout would close the Start Page. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

The first 4 items on the Windows menu have been renamed: "View Playback Window", "Viiew Motion Effects Window", "View Previews Window", and "View Control Lights Window". Also these items will only be shown if the respective window is currently hidden ("X" in the upper right corner of the window has been clicked). This should make it clearer what these menu items do, particularly the Control Lights item. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

If the content of the Control Lights window extends beyond the bottom of the window, a vertical scrollbar is now displayed. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

The Start Page can now be hidden, unhidden, and floated just like the Previews and Control Lights windows. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: the TextPE effect did not display the text specified by the user. Reported by user Dave Trollope via help desk.

Bug fix: if a sequence used video media and Loop At End was enabled for playback and video playback was set for full screen, the video window would often get resized instead of remaining full screen. Reported by user Bry.

When you right click on the sequence grid, there is a new sub-menu under Timing Marks > Insert Timing at Selection, with options for Left, Right, and Both. This will insert timing marks at the left and/or right edge of the grid selection. Reported by user Luke Kamp via help desk.

Bug fix: on Preview Design's Channel Conflict tab, clicking a column heading in the conflict list would crash the program. Now clicking a column heading sorts the table according to the values in that column. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

On Preview Design's Channel Conflict tab, there are now fields for the user to enter text to filter the list by name or by channel. A "Select All" checkbox was also added. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

When dragging a favorite or subfolder in the Motion Effect Generator, the favorites tree will now auto-scroll when the cursor nears the top or bottom edge. Reported by user NJ Malenke via help desk.

Bug fix: when moving a timing mark with "Drag events with timings" enabled, the Sequencer could crash in some cases. Reported by user Peter Dusaitis via help desk.

Bug fix: the "Create an empty freeform timing grid" check box on the New Animation Sequence dialog did not actually create a freeform timing grid. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

You can now right-click on the Playback Window and change the brightness of the background image (if there is one). Reported by Light-O-Rama.

RGB aggregates with one or more sub-channels (red, green, or blue) left undefined, could cause the Sequencer to crash when modifying effects. Reported by user Keith Henrickson via help desk.

Added new dimming curves to the Prop Definition screen: Linear_30pct, Linear_40pct, PixelCurve_30pct, PixelCurve_40pct. Reported by user jamills706.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47355-dimming-curves-question/

Windows Shell Commands get shared between sequences if you use File > Save As to create a new sequence. Specifying a new command from the revised screen will only affect the sequence that is open. Reported by user k6ccc.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47372-windows-command-changes-affects-multiple-sequences/

In rare cases where 2 props in a preview have the same name, the entire preview file would not load at startup. Now the preview is loaded and a warning about duplicate names is shown on the "Other Warnings" tab of Preview Design. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Fixed playback issues when sequences are arranged side-by-side. Reported by user NJ Malenke via help desk.

A "Copy to Clipboard" function has been added to the File References dialog. For sequences with many motion effect file references, this can allow you to paste the list of files into a spreadsheet or word processor for further analysis. Reported by user Stephen Chapman via help desk.

Bug fix: title bar of Playback Window was not showing the name of the current motion effect when one was clicked on in the sequence grid. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

During sequence playback, the Color Fade tool is now grayed out like the rest of the toolbar. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

If a comm port is unable to be opened, added a tip to the error message: "Make sure shows are disabled and the Hardware Utility is closed". Reported by user stevehoyt.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47470-problem-enabling-comm-port/

Added new menu items when right-clicking on the Preview Design canvas: Add, Modify, Copy, and Delete. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Improvements when upgrading Pixel Editor previews and sequences to S5 for non-US customers -- problem occurred on PC's configured to use a comma as the decimal separator in numbers. Reported by user Niklas Adolfsson via help desk.

Bug fix: When using the space bar in the Tapper Wizard -- if you go one tap past when the music ends, the space bar defaults to the “exit” button and closes the wizard (thus erasing all of your “beats”). Reported by user Steve Warner.

Bug fix: the Sequencer could crash when the toolbar channel effect was set to DMX Intensity and you tried to add a motion effect. Reported by user Steve Warner.

Bug fix: clicking the Refresh button on the online prop import screen did not display the updated data correctly. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

In Archived Prop Management, added button to select all props with no effects. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug Fixes

•The Post Install process failed to copy 3 new examples for Superstar.

•The configuration for PixCon16 MKII devices was incorrectly showing 32 ports.

•In Superstar, if the preview uses horizontal orientation and you go into "floating windows" mode, the program could crash.

•In Superstar, the first time beat marks are created they are created without issue. Creating beat marks a second time incorrectly deleted them.

•In Superstar, if you changed timings the program may not prompt you to save your work.

•In Superstar, when using Text Masks along with scenes or morphs, it was possible that the mask was not applied.

•In Superstar, when using a Text Mask or an Image Mask, if Layer Priority was disabled, foreground effects would be incorrect and background effects would not be rendered.

•In Superstar, if the program was launched from S5 changes would not be saved if "Save" or "Save As" was used to save the sequence as a .sup file.

•In Superstar, when using Autosequence effects, the displayed timings may be incorrectly changed to the most recently used Autosequence settings.

•In Superstar, when using Autosequence if "average the time length of effects" was selected then the last few seconds of an autosequence effect may not generate triggers.

•In Superstar, when using Autosequence if "Burst and Return" was used, there could be a compile issue. This happens most frequently with low sensitivity settings such as 1 or 2.

•In Superstar, when using Autosequence morphs with transparency set to transparent were not being saved properly.

•In Superstar, when shrinking using the pixel extender and smooth effects, the shrink did not occur properly.

•In Superstar, the "Center X,Y" control in the Smooth Effects dialog box the buttons were not oriented properly when creating a horizontal sequencing grid.

•In Superstar, if the pixel extender is enabled and a visualization with a sequencing grid was imported with a "max length" , a crash could occur.

•In Superstar, if the pixel extender is enabled and a sequence was being shunk, only half of the effects would get applied.

What's New in Version 5.1.4

•Registry Wipe can now clean Program Files folder

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47021-cant-delete-duplicate-channel-button/

•Updates to SuperStar

Registry Wipe can now clean Program Files folder

Some versions of the LOR S4/S5 uninstaller can leave behind unwanted programs in the user's Program Files(x86)\Light-O-Rama folder. This can lead to installation problems the next time the user tries to install the software. Registry Wipe can now clean those entries up.

Updates to the Sequencer

Performance improvements:

1.The Sequencer starts about 20% faster. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

2.Improved the calculation time of Text and Picture effects. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Countdown effect changes:

1.Added a "MM:SS" display option and allow a max of at least 1 hour. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

2.Text can now be positioned in both the X and Y directions. Forum request.

Changes to Preview Design:

1.you can now double-click on a prop in the design area to open its Prop Defintion. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

2.The "Tree 360 Spirals" shape could display an erroneous message regarding the number of folds when the number of revolutions was set to a large number. This message has been removed and the revolution limit restored to 25. Reported by Drew Hickman and user ukoberon. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/46953-spiral-360-prop-tree-issue-512/

3.Created new "Cylinder Spiral" shape for spiral-wrapped tree trunks and columns. Reported by user jamills706. http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/46949-wrapped-tree-trunk-propmodel/

4.On the Prop Definition screen, if the diagram area was taller than it was wide, many of the shape diagrams would overflow. Now they are properly scaled. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

5.Bug fix: a prop made of pixels that uses the "Tree 360 Spiral" shape could crash the Sequencer. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

6.Bug fix: the Prop Definition window was expecting the "Arial Narrow" font to be installed, but that font is not on all computers. On some computers this could cause the program to show a continual stream of error messages. The program will now check if the font is installed before using it. Reported by user Norm Bowman (via help desk).

7.The "Tree 360 Up & Over" shape now supports folds in the string. When used with pixels, the layout has been redone to represent pixel strings that go up and over the top of the tree. Reported by Drew Hickman and Jesse Tryon.

8.If there are any unsaved changes in the Preview Design screen and you click the Cancel button or click the Windows "X" button to close it, then you will get a message confirming that you want to continue without saving the changes. Reported by user Gordon Varney (via help desk).

9.You can now delete props from the Channel Conflicts tab in Preview Design. Select Change Seleced Props > Delete Props. All of the actions on the Change Selected Props menu are also now available by right-clicking on the selected props in the Channel Conflict list. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

10.When copying a prop in Preview Design (Item > Copy), channels will no longer be renumbered if the "Uses the same channels as" field is set on the source prop. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Changes to freeform play ranges:

1.Bug fix: when you were defining a freeform range for playback and you moved the cursor to the left - past the left edge of the grid - it cleared the selection. This made it difficult to select 0:00.00 as the starting point. Reported by Drew Hickman.

2.The following menu items have been added when you right-click on the timeline or the waveform (reported by user spascall):

a.Set Play Range Start - if no freeform play range exists, it creates a range from the selected point to the end of the sequence; otherwise it moves the start point of the existing range.

b.Set Play Range End - if no freeform play range exists, it creates a range from the beginning of the sequence to the selected point; otherwise it moves the end point of the existing range.

c.Clear Freeform Play Range - clears an existing freeform play range.

Do not allow channels to be copied in the "Show All Items" grid view. This grid view is system generated - items can be moved, but not hidden or copied. Reported by user daughjs.

In the sequence grid, when you right click on a channel name for a prop that has multiple strings, a new "Set Channel Name" option will appear. This capability will primarily help custom props with multiple strings which get channel names like "Horatio Hornblower: r64 c31". The channel name will be stored with the preview, so it will apply to all sequences that use that preview. Reported by Robert Brescia.

In the Skew All and Skew Selection commands, the maximum offset has been increased from 10 seconds to 600 seconds. Also, the user will now have the option of skewing the current timing grid or all freeform timing grids. Reported by user NJ Malenke.

Bug fix: changes made to the sequence while calculations are occurring (icon in the upper left is spinning), might not be reflected during preview playback. Reported by user k6ccc.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/46930-modifying-motion-effects-sometimes-not-taking-the-change-until-after-opening-and-saving-the-effect/

After clicking on a slider in the Motion Effects Generator, you can now fine-tune the value using the left or right arrow keys. If the slider is unlocked, shift-left-arrow and shift-right-arrow can be used to change the ending value. Reported by Drew Hickman.

When you right-click on the timeline or the waveform and select "Zoom In" from the menu, the zoomed sequence grid is now centered on where the right-click took place. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

In rare cases, a preview could get saved that had a prop with an invalid circuit number (like 0). In prior versions, this would result in a popup error message as the Sequencer opened; and if the preview were subsequently opened in Preview Design could result in a crash. Going forward there is no popup message when the program is opened. The preview can then be opened in Preview Design and the error will be reported on the "Channel Conflicts" tab - where it can be corrected. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: you are no longer allowed to drag beat channels into the list of preview props and vice versa. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

The 3 versions of the chase tool (intelligent, by prop, and by row) have been condensed into 2: regular chase and custom chase. Regular chase is the same as intelligent chase (chase by prop when the first row is a motion row, and chase by row for anything else) with the addition that the selected area for the chase is now cleared. For a custom chase, the user is prompted whether they want to chase by row or prop, and whether the selected area should be cleared. A new keyboard shortcut shift-H initiates a custom chase. Custom chase is also accessible from the right-click menu. Reported by user spascall.

When exporting the grid configuration and "Show All Items" is the current grid view, the user will now get a warning stating that "Show All Items" is a system-generated view and will not be included in the export file. Reported by Drew Hickman.

In the Paste Special window, the "All the way to the end of" drop-down box now includes the last item in the selection and the last row in the grid view. The last row in the grid view is now the default. Reported by user spascall.

Bug fix: motion effects on props should override effects on groups that they are a member of. However, that was not happening in all cases. Reported by user John Trp (via help desk).

Bug fix: the Fill tool would display the message "Trying to fill between effects, but the row is empty!" when the sequence row was not empty. Reported by user lkcubsrule.

http://forums.lightorama.com/topic/47070-s5-fill-error/

Bug fix: Ampersands (&) in prop names would not display correctly in the sequence grid. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

When playing back a sequence to real lights and when saving playback files, the Sequencer now checks if motion effects have been placed on props connected to an LOR network that is not enhanced. If so, then the action is cancelled until the condition is fixed. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

The music is only supposed to play one time when you click the play button in the Motion Effect Generator. However, due to a bug, if the loop button on the toolbar for the sequence was enabled, it would cause the music to repeat in the Motion Effect Generator as well. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

The Motion Effect Generator now has a mute button so users can turn off the music while creating their motion effect. Reported by NJ Malenke.

When using the Max Intensity, Min Intensity, Fade Up, or Fade Down tools, the message "'Motion effect' is selected on the toolbar, but no motion effect is currently displayed in the playback window. Would you like to create an effect using the Motion Effect Generator?" will now only get displayed when motion effect rows are part of the selection. If the effect shown on the toolbar is "motion effect" but only channel rows are selected, then the toolbar effect is changed to the ON effect. Reported by Drew Hickman.

The checkbox to enable or disable looping of effects in the Motion Effect Generator has been replaced by a toggle botton (press on, press off). Also, the loop icon shown there and on the sequence toolbar will now show a red slash through it when disabled. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Bug fix: when attempting to open a playback file (.play.lms), the program would display an error message, then go ahead and open the file anyway. Now no attempt is made to open the playback file after the error is displayed. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Fixed the File References dialog so that long sequence names, media file names, and preview background file names wrap if they extend beyond the width of the window. Reported by Light-O-Rama.

Updates to SuperStar

FEATURES:

•Several new options and effects have been added to Superstar's Auto Sequence tool including effects 'Folding Ricochet', 'Snake Up/Down', along with options to 'Skip Inactive Grid Squares' as well as 'Average the Time Length of Effects'.

•The Sequencer now sends the current timing grid to SuperStar when inserting a SuperStar effect. This allows SuperStar to display the same timings as the Sequencer.

BUG FIXES:

•Exporting as intensity data could cause the program to crash

•Text masks and image silhouette masks were not keyed on their clip rectangle. Any effects that fall entirely with in the mask's clip rectangle get applied to the mask.

•In the Auto Sequence dialog box if the user did not select one of the 8 custom colors, a message is now displayed.

•When saving in the Demo version, the file added to the recent files dialog was incorrectly specified as ',supe.sup'.

•When saving in the Demo Version, the suggested filename was incorrectly defaulted to '.supe.sup'.

•In some cases, opening a valid .supe file would cause an error stating the file was not created on this computer.

•Improved export speed of sequences that use large Visualizations

•Increased the number of images allowed from 1500 to 3000.

•When automatic modification of Star Scenes occurred, it was incorrectly changing the archive status of the file.

•Increased the width of every 5th long tick mark on the edge of the sequence grid

•In sequences with effect groups, after a 'select all' effect groups could no longer be expanded.

•Increased available memory for both 32 and 64 bit systems.

•The number of channel elements has increased from 8 million to 50 million.

•When using Single Step, if the stop button was pressed the first selected effect was not made active. This could lead to a warning or error.

•Writing large images could cause the program to crash.

•The number of fonts has been increased to 30 to allow for user created fonts to be used.

•While using the Pixel Extender, if the Layer Priority feature was active pixels were extended too far.

•When using the Move or Scale effects tools after selecting effects that have a group in the selection, the effects would not be applied.

•When using the Move or Scale effects tools while in wrap around mode, some effects were not wrapped properly.

What's New in Version 5.1.2