Great question. I really don't like having to give this answer but the truth at this moment is that it's hit or miss.   Having supplier catalogs contain accurate information and high-quality simulations is extremely important to us. When it comes American consumer and Pro 1.4G fireworks, not all of the catalogs meet a high standard. Improving the quality of existing catalogs and bringing new catalogs online is one of our highest priorities. Examples of catalogs we've overhauled recently include Raccoon and Wizard Pro 1.4G. At this moment, we're working on adding Raccoon consumer items and doing an overhaul on the Dominator and Spirit of 76 catalogs.

Thank you for the detailed response, and it makes perfect sense.   I do have another question....   How accurate are the timings of effects from the manufacturers catalogs in Finale? prefire, lift time, duration etc...   Thanks  

Hi PyroExec, welcome to the Finale 3D community! Thanks for posting and for including the screenshot, that gives us a lot of useful information and makes it much easier to understand what you're seeing on your end.   To understand the difference you're seeing, the first thing to know is that the timeline duration bars take into account not only the primary effect duration, but also the nominal duration of any sparks emitted by the primary effect. To illustrate this is practical terms, suppose you created the following two shell effects:   Effect 1) 3" 2.00s Red Peony Effect 2) 3" 2.00s Charcoal Chrysanthemum   As you can see in the VDL above, both of these shells have a duration of exactly 2 seconds. This means that the time from burst to when the stars burn out will be 2 seconds for both shells.  However, as you can see in the screenshot below, the shells have duration bars on the timeline that are very different. This is because while the Red Peony stars immediately disappear after 2 seconds, the trails of charcoal sparks left behind by the Charcoal Chrysanthemum stars continue to be visible and hang in the sky (even after the stars reached the end of their life). This is an example of how two effects with the same star duration can appear in the sky for different amounts of time. The effect window lists the primary duration, while the 3D simulation and duration bars indicate the full visible duration for an effect.       You are probably thinking, okay, so what does this have to do with my silver ground strobe? The answer has to do with how Finale 3D handles "Silver". The Chinese frequently use "Silver" and "White" interchangeably when describing effects. However, in order to avoid ambiguity, Finale 3D has a distinct definition for each color. The key difference is that "Silver" gives an effect a trail of silver sparks, where as "White" does not. You're not seeing this when your strobes are on the ground, but your "Silver Strobe" is actually giving off a tiny silver trail, like a tiny fountain of silver sparks. In the screenshot below, you can see I've elevated the positions in the air which makes the silver sparks easy to see. It's the duration of these silver sparks that are making the duration bar longer, just like they do in the example with the red peony versus the charcoal chrysanthemum. To fix the issue, right click on your silver strobe, select Edit this item (VDL), and change your VDL to use the term "White" instead of "Silver".  

I have 3 effects all set to to same timing and same duration yet one of them ends at a different time?   I'm new to the software, so thanks for your help...     See this screenshot: https://app.screencast.com/iu4kp3h3P3Aav

The Firelinx script file format is a tab delimited text file with a CSV file extension. Excel simply isn't recognizing the tabs as delimiters and erroneously displaying all the data in a single column. If you open the script file in Notepad, you'll see the tab characters represented as white space between each column/field.  

Drew I sent another email about the script not looking right. I attached the files to that email. Just an FYI.  Thank You  

Thanks Drew. Totally overlooked the position descriptions. Very simple fix.   Thank You!

Your show is being addressed for StarFire even though Firelinx is selected in the Address Show dialog because your positions are configured to use StarFire. When a position is configured to use a specific firing system, that overrides the selection in the Address Show dialog. When using the same firing system/module type for an entire show (as I think is the case with this show), there's no need to specify the firing system or module type on a per-position basis. To fix your show, select all positions, right click on any selected position, select Edit position properties, and set the Firing System and Module Or Slat Type settings to the <Use Default> option. Once you've set your positions to use the default firing system, simply readdress your show and you should be all set.  

Thanks Drew, just sent it.

Hi Engineer Cat, send your show (.FIN) file to support@finale3d.com and we'll take a look right away.