Understanding Attributes in MaestroDMX

As you may know, DMX fixture channels have many attribute types. For example, pan, tilt, color wheel, gobo, etc. It is important to understand that MaestroDMX classifies attribute types into either Dynamic or Static. Dynamic attributes are controlled in an autonomous fashion by MaestroDMX’s intelligent algorithms while Static attributes are set to an editable single value for the lifetime of the Stage.

NOTE: As MaestroDMX develops, the following list will evolve and more attributes will come under the control of MaestroDMX.

List of Dynamic Attributes
The following attributes are autonomously controlled by MaestroDMX:

LED Color Control

• RED, GREEN, BLUE, COOL WHITE*, WARM WHITE*, AMBER, UV

• CYAN, MAGENTA, YELLOW, KEY

• HUE, SATURATION, VALUE

Other

• DIMMER, PAN, TILT, ZOOM, ACTIVITY, COLOR WHEEL**, GOBO**, PRISM**

*COOL WHITE and WARM WHITE are currently the same attribute

**All dynamic attributes have FINE channels except for these.

Description Of Dynamic Attributes

The LED color control attributes such as RED, GREEN, BLUE etc, map the internal colorspace of MaestroDMX to the given LED-based light fixture. Most LED fixtures will operate in RGB(WUVA) while some will operate in CMYK or HSV.

DMX channels set to the ACTIVITY attribute will simply scale the Activity Level to a range of 0-255 unless otherwise scaled. Activity is a great way to express the ‘excitement’ of the music into specific DMX channels. 

Any DMX channels connected to the ZOOM attribute will oscillate sinusoidally between 0-255 at a rate proportional to the excitement level of the music. You can also scale or invert the 0-255 range if desired.

Static Attributes

The following attributes are set to a single static value for a given stage:

• MASTER DIMMER, STATIC VALUE, LASER, STROBE, ROTATION, SPEED, ZOOM, SHUTTER

Static attribute values can be set either at the Fixture Profile level or on the Stage on a per-fixture basis (via Patcher or Controls).

Effect Attributes

• FOG ON/OFF, FOG VOLUME, FOG SPEED, BLINDER, EFFECT

The ‘Blinder’ and ‘Effects’ attributes can be controlled in real-time via the corresponding Trigger Button parameters on the Show page.