Introduction
Deus ex machina changes lights, sound and video while the actors perform: it listens to the lines and, when it recognises a phrase you marked in the script, it starts the cue. If you need to, you can always move the show forward by hand.
The program is designed for a computer in the control booth, with a screen at least 1280 pixels wide. Voice recognition runs on the computer, so you don't need internet in the theatre.
Words to know
| Word | What it means |
|---|---|
| Script | The text of the show, with the points where something changes |
| Department | Lights, audio or video: each one has its own cues |
| Scene | A lighting state, a sound or a video, with a name. It lives in the script and doesn't depend on the theatre |
| Cue | The phrase that starts a scene |
| Venue | A theatre, with the tools and lights you find there |
| Setup | The show adapted to a theatre: it says what each scene does there |
| Output | The tool that runs a department: DMX, Lightkey, QLab, a MIDI mixer… |
| DMX channel | One of the 512 numbers used to control a light. 512 channels make a universe |
| Fixture type | A model of light, or of a device such as a smoke machine |
| Lamp | A real light hung in the theatre |
The path
- Install the program and choose the microphone.
- Load the script and mark the phrases that make something change.
- Describe the theatre in a venue, if you'll use it more than once.
- Create a setup and choose the outputs.
- If the lights go out through the internal DMX: choose the light models, assign the DMX channels and draw the light map.
- Draw the scenes, and prepare sounds and video.
- Check everything with the simulation, then go to the control booth.
Finding your way around the program
The main pages open from the bar at the top, or from the Go menu: Scripts, Venues, Configuration and Fixtures. This manual opens from Help → Manual. The program version is in Help → About.
On the Regia (control booth) page and during the first launch, the Go items are turned off: during a show you can't leave the page by mistake.
The program speaks Italian, English, German, French and Spanish: change the language from View → Language. In this manual the program's labels are written in bold, exactly as you read them on screen.