![]() ![]() Beginning in 1989, a group of interested theatre professionals headed by Charlie Richmond of Richmond Sound Design in Vancouver British Columbia began discussions on the USITT MIDI Forum Callboard Network. MIDI, an acronym for Musical Instrument Digital Interface, was originally designed in the early 1980s as a means of controlling multiple keyboard synthesizers from different manufacturers. MIDI generally is a simplex asynchronous serial data transmission standard with the circuit being an opto-isolated current loop type. The MIDI Show Control (MSC) standard is an open, industry-wide international communications protocol through which all types of show devices can communicate. These early objections have been overcome with the use of full-duplex switched Ethernet running at 1000BASE-T speeds on a dedicated local area network (LAN). Ethernet was originally disqualified from consideration for show control because it was slow, non-deterministic, and lacked sufficient bandwidth to handle certain show control functions. Most manufacturers of entertainment control equipment now include Ethernet ports on their equipment. Modern systems are increasingly based upon Ethernet networking. This is primarily due to the maturation of the larger information technology (IT) computing industry, which, due to its scale and dominance, has produced standards, equipment and software which is less expensive than older show control equipment and methodologies and increasingly more reliable and usable in entertainment applications. ![]() Show control networks have largely supplanted older show control typologies. Shows with or without live actors can almost invariably incorporate entertainment control technology and usually benefit from show control to operate these subsystems independently, simultaneously, or in rapid succession. An example of show control would be linking a video segment with a number of lighting cues, or having a sound cue trigger animatronic movements, or all of these combined. ![]() A typical entertainment control system would be a lighting control console. It is distinguished from an entertainment control system, which is specific to a single theatrical department, system or effect, one which coordinates elements within a single entertainment discipline such as lighting, sound, video, rigging, or pyrotechnics. Show control is the use of automation technology to link together and operate multiple entertainment control systems in a coordinated manner. A screen capture of a common Windows-based show control program. ![]()
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