Getting Started Getting Started: LUCA Clock
Wednesday, 26 June 2024
This is intended as a beginners guide to understanding the networked clock with the LUCA suite.
LUCA benefits from a network based synchronised event clock, helping to keep all aspects of a production up to date and in time.
As the user creates bands within Master Patch and assigns them start and end times the clock will begin reporting on the upcoming moments.
The clock read out can be found in the top right of the Master Patch window with the NOW and NEXT values being found to its left.
The clock consists of four main areas.
- Time of day field
- Next moment field
- Start and stop buttons
- Now and Next fields
Time of day field
The time of day field shows the day of the week and also the live time of day.
This field is populated based on the clock settings of the machine running the instance of Maser Patch. Therefore it is possible that this field may look wrong when compared to the event.
Next moment field
The next moment field shows the remaining time until the next 'moment'.
A moment can be things that happen within the event such as the start of a changeover or band, or the time remaining until the start or end of the event.
The next moment field will change colour depending on the limits that have been set in the preferences page to give a quick overview of the time remaining on the clock. For example the user may want the clock to turn red when there is only 2 minutes remaining until the next moment.
Start and Stop buttons
The start and stop buttons allow the user to suspend or restart the clock service. This can be useful when the user is making a lot of timing changes to the event and they dont want to bombard remote viewer users with updates until they have finished their work.
Now and Next fields
The now and next fields allow the user to see at a glance what is happening right now, and what the 'next' thing to happen is.
Pop out clock window
If the user clicks on the clock area they can 'pop out' the clock into its own window. This can be useful for putting the clock on a separate screen which could be used in a backstage area or in a front of house mix structure in order to keep everyone up to date.
Clock Latency
Due to proccessing and network latency it is possibile for Master Patch and remote viewers to out of synch with each other by as much as one second.
For this reason we
do not recommend using LUCA's network clock as a show critical clock, such as for show calling at this time.
