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Infinity Chimp Series
Infinity Chimp Series
Tracking
Basic Idea
When a sequence of cues is programmed, the lighting console can store the information in one of two
ways: either it records the settings for all attributes of all the fixtures used in the cuelist, or it is only
recording the values that have changed. The latter is called tracking and was invented because
consoles in the early years had too little memory to store all the information it would have needed to
store for the first example given. However, tracking is not outdated. It has its advantages over the “Non-
Tracking” approach.
The Chimp console allows you to playback cuelists both in tracking or Non-Tracking modes.
Tracking in a Nutshell
Imagine you come home late at night and it is already dark outside:
You open up your apartment’s main door (Cue 1) and you switch on the light in the corridor (Cue 2).
You close the door (Cue 3), and go straight into the living room after opening its door (Cue 4), where you
switch on the light as well (Cue 5).
The light in the corridor is still on, and the living room door still open since you did not change the states of
these.
Here is a closer look at what happened, and at what would be stored in the cues if we think of this chain
of events as a cuelist:
Cue
Entrance Door
Corridor Light
Living Room Door Living Room Light
#1: Entrance
Open
#2: Light in corridor
On
#3: Close main door
Closed
#4: Living room door
Open
#5: Living room light
On
With tracking enabled, the final state at the end of this sequence is:
Closed
On
Open
On
Examples
General Example
The following example shows the intensities of four fixtures in three cues on a Non-Tracking console:
Fixture 1
Fixture 2
Fixture 3
Fixture 4
Cue 1
80%
80%
50%
50%
Cue 2
80%
50%
100%
50%
Cue 3
100%
50%
100%
50%
Cue 4
0%
50%
100%
50%
