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A timer to control assetts

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glittle
Posts: 3
Joined: Wed Jun 27, 2018 3:24 am

A timer to control assetts

Post by glittle »

Greetings!
I am very new at this and not a CS Major, but I have some experience.
I would like to be able to create a timer in magic, that would, at predefined times, change events, load and unload assetts, control alpha, just as examples.
I did not find many references to "timer" on the forums, I found one reference to a counter....but the author said the code was wrong...
I know I can do this with a scene playlist, but is that the best way if you are changing scenes a LOT. ( at a rate of 5secs to a couple mins)

thanks
Gregory Little
Sadler
Posts: 1139
Joined: Sat Aug 02, 2014 7:10 pm
Location: London, UK

Re: A timer to control assetts

Post by Sadler »

I find the playlist adequate for sub-second precision based on experience with a two hour set in which (over 100) scene changes were seconds apart and (intended to be) locked to audio. Of course there are some ways to time things within a scene. You don't need to be a CS major just a little arithmetic. Many parameters/modifiers/sources have a time based cycle and so you can adjust them with scaling and offsets (or expressions). For instance you could modify the Index of an input selector based on a ramp, or have it react to audio and hold it. Times for each modifier are in the user guide or a quick help in the application.
glittle
Posts: 3
Joined: Wed Jun 27, 2018 3:24 am

Re: A timer to control assetts

Post by glittle »

Thank you very much, good to know that you find the playlist to be more than adequate.
Can you cite any specific example files that I could look at that make use of "parameters/modifiers/sources have a time based cycle?
By the way, this is a very cool app!
Greg
Sadler
Posts: 1139
Joined: Sat Aug 02, 2014 7:10 pm
Location: London, UK

Re: A timer to control assetts

Post by Sadler »

If you're running a fairly recent version of Magic, open up the Timer.magic. This example runs off of an Increase modifier applied to a Global named seconds which counts in seconds (duh). This is then converted for each digit into 10x seconds, minutes and 10x minutes - it breaks at 99.99.

This example might be a little tricky to understand since it creates the counter by sliding vertical strips of digits down the screen as the clock ticks, masking the unused digits. It could possibly be improved with the new Text module which now supports line numbers.

So, to summarise, the Increase modifier counts in seconds (and hundredths of seconds). You can use the Increase modifier on any parameter.
glittle
Posts: 3
Joined: Wed Jun 27, 2018 3:24 am

Re: A timer to control assetts

Post by glittle »

Thanks I will check it out tonight
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