Special Scene Settings and Scene Scripts

Scenes in Digital Strom systems and also in the independent P44-LC controller save the state of an output or a luminaire, for example the brightness and color settings for each luminaire. When the scene is called, the stored values are applied to the outputs/luminaires again.

In addition, there is also the scene effect, i.e. an additional action that is executed when the scene is called up. By default, only the effect "flashing", a slower transition and the don't care flag ("Do not change output when calling") can be set in Digital Strom.

However, the lights in P44-DSB and P44-LC offer much more possibilities for the scene effect, in particular dynamic scenes can be created via the scene script, for example a scene with continuously changing color. The Digital Strom standard also has more options internally, in particular the possibility to control only certain channels (such as the colors) within a scene, but not others (e.g. brightness, if this should remain the same when the color changes).

This section basically describes how all these advanced scene settings can be made via the web interface of P44-DSB/P44-LC.

!!! warning "Complex features - overview required". Scene settings on device level allow interesting use cases and nice effects, but also a good understanding of the scene concept is required to not get tangled in these advanced settings and end up causing strange behavior of the fixture instead of the desired result. That's why these settings are accessible in a somewhat hidden way - so that less experienced users don't accidentally get into them.

Calling the advanced scene setting for P44-DSB and P44-LC.

For both P44-DSB and P44-LC, the advanced scene settings can be set as follows:

1. in the device list (Devices tab in P44-DSB, Lights tab or Hardware tab in P44-LC), click the gear button to invoke the output channel setting dialog with Shift key held down (as of firmware 2.6.5, tap+hold does the same, allowing operation on mobile devices as well):

   

2. the dialog appears with additional elements after the normal channel setting sliders:

   

3. with the popup menu you can select a scene whose settings should be edited. Unfortunately the user specific scene names from the dSS cannot be displayed here, only the Digital Strom standard names in English (preset X = mood X, area Y on = area Y on, etc.). In the example the preset 1 is selected:

   

4. now the scene settings can be called with the button Edit.

   With the other buttons Call, Stop, Save the scene for this device individually, without the other devices in the room can be called, stopped or also saved changed. This can be practical, especially in large rooms with many luminaires, to make a specific correction to a luminaire.

   From firmware 2.6.5 (P44-DSB) or 1.6.5 (P44-LC) on, when selecting a scene, a checkbox appears above each output channel, indicating which channels are stored in the scene, for details see below.

   

5. now the dialog for the scene settings appears. Details see below.

Second variant to call the extended scene setting in P44-LC

In the P44-LC, where the scenes and rooms including user specific names are completely edited in the device, there is a second, possibly somewhat more comfortable way to the scene settings:

1. press the button with the star in the tab Lights at the respective light. It changes color to blue, and blue Edit buttons also appear at the bottom of the list of scenes:

   

2. the blue edit buttons can now be used to access the scene settings for any scene, but only ever for the fixture selected with the blue star.

Scene Settings.

If no special settings have already been made, the dialog will look something like this:

No change output.

If the "Calling scene does not change outputs for this device (but still runs effects) " switch is enabled, calling the scene will not change the outputs.

This can be useful to take a fixture out of a scene, or when only the scene effect (such as: Flashing of a light when the house bell is operated in the scene "bell 1") should run.

For P44-DSB this setting corresponds to the option "Do not change output when called" in the dSS configurator under "Edit activity settings".

Local priority

The switch "Calling Scene overrides local priority " is only relevant for lights that are switched on locally or as part of an area (area). These then have so-called "local priority", i.e. they do not change when another scene is called in the room (practical example: a reading lamp that should not go out when the light is switched off in the rest of the room).

However, if this switch is activated in a scene, it overrides the local priority, i.e. it also affects lights that are switched on individually or as a range. An example of a scene that overrides local priority by default and has the switch set is "Deep Off" (where the reading lamp should also go off).

Scene effect

Various scene effects can be set here:

no effect, immediate transition When the scene is called up, the outputs change their state immediately without any delay or transition effect (within the limits of the hardware's capabilities).

smooth, normal transition (100mS)

This is the standard effect - a smooth but fast (tenths of a second) transition to the new output values. In Digital Strom systems this transition is called "standard" (in the Advanced settings tab in the Activity settings).

slow transition (1min) The transition to the new output values takes place almost imperceptibly slowly, within one minute. In Digital Strom systems this transition is called "slow".

medium transition (5sec) The transition to the new output values is slow, but clearly visible within 5 seconds.

blink/alert

When the scene is called, the light flashes as a transition effect. In the field "Parameter for scene effect " the blinking can be influenced by entering a number according to the following scheme:

(number_of_repeats) * 16777216 + (percent_duration) * 65536 + (blinking_period_in_milliseconds).

Example: to flash the light five times briefly (20% duty cycle) every second:

5*16777216 + 20*65536 + 1000 = 85197800 enter in the field "Parameter... ".

custom transition time according to effect param [mS]

With this mode you can set a custom transition time by entering the corresponding value in milliseconds (thousandths of a second) in the "Parameter for scene effect " field.

run scene script

When the scene is called, the scene script (see below) is called.

Scene script.

The scene script opens a variety of possibilities for scene design. Not only are effects possible immediately upon invocation - a scene script can also run on to create a dynamic scene, such as a continuous color change, or an automatic adjustment of color temperature depending on the time of day.

!!! note "Note: The scene script starts after the scene is applied to the output". Like the other scene effects, the scene script will not start until the output channels are set according to the values stored in the scene. Exception: if the No output change option is active, then only the scene effect will be executed without changing the output first.

Selecting the channels to be controlled when calling a scene.

For lights with more than one channel (cool white/warm white or full color lights, moving lights with position or other additional channels such as size, rotation, gradient etc. for SmartLED feature lights) not all channels are stored in each scene. For example, a scene may have only brightness stored without affecting color settings.

Color scenes have either hue and saturation stored, or CieX and CieY (the coordinates in the "color shoe sole"), but not both together, because one results from the other.

To have full control here, a checkbox is displayed next to each channel name after selecting a scene. This shows whether the corresponding channel is stored in the scene or not (the stored value does not necessarily correspond to the slider position, however, only if the scene was also called up before).

!!! warning "Attention, immediate change". If the checkboxes are activated or deactivated while the scene is selected, this immediately changes the scene, without pressing the Save button!

More info

• Example scene script for a continuous color change
• Example scene script for automatic adjustment of color temperature depending on time of day
• Functions (among others) for use in scene scripts
• General information about scripts and script contexts
• For questions and exchange: the plan44 community forum