The closest VDL effect is “Red Strobing Willow”.

I can’t figure out the right VDL to replicate this visual. I’ve seen it in a few fireworks. It looks a bit like the red strobing sparks effect Drew mentioned to me was recently added in another post.   If you watch closely in this video, it’s the second (and alternating) shot in the premium color – green video in the link below      

I’ve got a pretty easy one – can you add the RGB value for Teal to VDL?  I’m shocked how many cannister shells I’m loading into my inventory that use that description.

Regarding the whistles issue, here’s one example:   VDL = 30mm Rising Whirls & Whistles Tail To Blue Peony  [This is silent] VDL = 30mm Rising Whirls & Whistles Tail [Works as expected]   In the first VDL, the effect editor, the star phase of “rising whirls whistles” does not have a sound element indicating whistling. I could be running into a limitation of the DOM that wouldn’t allow the effect to have only whistling on the rise and stop on the break? I’ve found a fair amount of cakes that have a shot like this, so maybe just a nice enhancement?

That was it.   I’m using the Hobbyist version and once I added the pin restriction by position, the labels made more sense. I initially used the module restriction by position, but I needed 20 modules addressing the show that way vs the 16 I needed addressing the show using pin restriction by position (I only have 16 modules). Without either restriction (my original post), I needed 12 modules and I thought I was good until I looked at the labels.   Thanks for the assist!  

Sounds good.   Let me focus on the first one to start (heights that don’t make sense to me). I built ~5 cakes where the heights are all <40m, but the combined cake is 110m. Looking back at the cakes I created today, they’re all related to my poor attempts at trying to recreate very slow flying fish effects. From your other video, I saw Meteor had a better slow movement and hence started doing a path of using the effects editor, which I’ve found to be super powerful.   The easiest way to reproduce this right now is to 1) Build a cake with the VDL below 2) Break apart the cake to see that in fact all 9 shots are 33.5m 3) select them all to make the cake again 4) when the window first opens, looks ok, but when you tab off the VDL field, it sets the height wrong.   If you’re interested in the cake, I’m just trying to do something simple like this:   VDL to Copy:   10mm 110.0m 12.00s 9 Shot Cake (a) {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} + (b) {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}, 1 Row (ababababa/STR)

Hi DB, the “e-match hint” tells you the number of e-matches on the same firing system pin and at the same position. Looking at the position names in the upper right corner of your labels, I can see that all four of the items on address 01-14 on different positions. This is why the e-match hint says 1/1 e-match for each item. By contrast, two of the items on address 01-10 are at the same position. This is why they say 1/2 e-matches and 2/2 ematches.   What I can’t say from looking at your labels is how you got to this point. By asking about your blueprint, I think NEC is more generally asking about your addressing configuration, which is a great question. The standard way to assign firing system addresses is to go to ‘Addressing > Address show’. Did you do this, or did you manually hand key addresses in to the Script window, or something else?   Your labels are slightly unusual if you addressed you show using the standard approach. I say this because to get this result, not only would you have had to increase the max. ematches per pin setting, but you also would have had to remove the constraint that restricts each module to a single position. How do I know? Because if you addressed the standard way, and didn’t remove the constraint, you wouldn’t have module 01 being used at all these different positions. This might be something to look at closely, because when you don’t restrict modules in any way, then any item (at any position, anywhere on your shoot site), may end up needing to plug into any module. This could make wiring your show almost impossible unless your entire show is set up from a single spot where any wire can reach any module.    

Hi Brett, great question. At the moment, we don’t have a dedicated system or process in place for bug reports. But we greatly appreciate you and anyone who takes the time to send feedback. Sending an email to support@finale3d.com is a great way to report bugs, especially when a file attachment is needed. The forum is also a good way to report bugs and has the added benefit of being accessible and searchable by all.   Tips on submitting actionable bug reports: 1) To make a bug report actionable, we generally need a way to reproduce the issue. If we can reproduce the issue, there’s a substantially greater chance we can fix it. 2) The most useful bug reports are ones that include specific, detailed steps to reproduce the bug (a reproduction path). 3) Screenshots, and especially a Finale 3D Show (FIN) file are also extremely helpful. A show (FIN) file is also substantially more helpful if it contains only what’s needed to reproduce the issue. We call this a Minimal Test Case (MTC).     Can you tell me the steps to reproduce each of the issues you described?   For example, I wasn’t able to reproduce the first issue with these steps: 1) Go to Effects > Create effect… 2) In the Create Effect dialog, in the ‘Visual description field (full VDL)’ field, enter 1″ Silver Comet, and then click Enter to save. 3) Add two 1″ Silver Comets to the timeline and then go to Effects > Combine as cake effect..   When I tried this, the height of the individual comets was 58.1m and the height of the cake was also 58.1m. I tried changing the Description of the cake in the Effects window and the height remained 58.1m. Where am I going wrong?     For the second issue, can you tell me a VDL phrase that I can use to create an effect that should have a whistle sound but doesn’t?

I didn’t set up a blueprint, but maybe there is one set by default? I’ll have to take a look. I didn’t specify slats or anything else.

The two purple mines on 01-10 are in the same rack and shooting at the same time, it looks like you’re allowing more than one ematch per pin when addressing, hence the 1/2 and 2/2 (matches 1 and 2 of two on the same pin in the same rack).  What does your addressing blueprint look like?  Are you using slats or duplicating module IDs?