Astera Lights

Astera LED lights are battery-powered lights that can be remotely controlled wirelessly using the free Astera App (for Apple and Android), making them ideal for film, video and interactive installations. Or for more control, using a dedicated software (e.g. MadMapper, ToucDesigner, Notch), they can be remotely controlled using a CRMX transmitter.

Both the lights and the transmitter can be borrowed at ZHdK Ausleihe under special conditions (normally, the request should be made through IAS via Sébastien Schiesser).

TitanTubes

TitanTube lights configuration (these configurations are similar among Astera Lights):

1. Connect the tubes to ‘DMX’ (menu button)
   • In the menu select ‘IMPUT SELECT’
   • Then select ‘CRMX wirel. DMX’
2. Set the Profile under ‘DMX SETTINGS’, and pick the ‘PROFILE BY NUM’ (using the DMX profile .pdf code according to the profile selected). For this example, we’ll use Profile 42 rgb rgb.
3. Change the ‘DMX ADDRESS’, and set it accordingly depending on the light profile selected. E.g. if Profile = 42 then set the first light tube at DMX Address 001 and the next tube light at DMX Address 049, etc (every time adding 48 to the next DMX Address).

TriplePar

To configure the TriplePar lights, follow the instructions above (similar to TitanTubes). Recommended TriplePar profiles are 1 or 4, or search in the DMX profile .pdf for your preferred profile.

HidraPanel

To configure the HidraPanel lights, follow the instructions above (similar to TitanTubes). Recommended HidraPanel profiles are 1 or 2, or search in the DMX profile .pdf for your preferred profile.

Software Remote Control

The Astera lights can be remotely controlled via DMX using softwares such as MadMapper, TouchDesigner, Notch, etc.

The computer needs to be correctly set up to send DMX data. Refer to the DMX Art-Net guide to configure Mac and Windows computers.

Overall, it’s important that both the computer as well as the Astera Wireless Transmitter have fixed IP addresses and Subnet masks.

For example:

• Computer (Windows and Mac): 10.101.1.100 / 255.255.0.0
• ELC dmXLAN node3: 10.101.x.xxx / 255.255.0.0 (where the x, are set numbers configured on the node, if needed, they can be changed).

Control Astera with MadMapper

Go to MadMapper > Preferences… switch to the Project tab to configure the DMX Input and Output. Here are two video 1 and video 2, showcasing a MadMapper configuration.

Add Fixtures to MadMapper and configure them to suit your needs. Each kind of light will have a different configuration; consult its manual for more information. Make sure to address the correct Universe and Channel (this can change a lot depending on the light hardware setup/configurations).

In this example, we use the TitanTube lights with Profile 42 RGB RGB, the light will use 16 LED pixels in total. In MadMapper, configuring a new Fixture goes as follows:

• Open the Fixtures Editor by pressing the Edit button, and create a new configuration by pressing the + button.
• In this case, we call it Astera TitanTube Profile 42 RGB RGB.
• In the Pixel W, we set 16, since it is the total number of pixels we could address. And for the Pixel H keep it at 1
• Set Pixel Type to RGB and Pixel Size to 3.

Download MadMapper Astera lights profiles here.

The next light fixture (Fixture-2) added to MadMapper will start addressing Channel 49 automatically, since all the lights used are TitanTube with Profile 42 RGB RGB.

Control Astera with TouchDesigner

In TouchDesigner, use a DMX Out node to send out DMX data. Here is a video tutorial (from min 7:30) for TouchDesigner that shows a simple setup with one LED strip.

• In the DMX tab set the ‘Interface’ to ‘sACN’

• In the ‘Network’ tab, set the ‘Local Address’ to 10.101.1.100 (the last 2 numbers can be changed if needed) as in the example above.

Make sure to scale the DMX Channels values from 0-1 to 0-255 using, for example, using a Math CHOP.

A simple TouchDesigner patch that works with a TitanTube (based on the YouTube video), the universe might change depending on your setup.