What a Chase Is and How to Create One

A chase is a light sequence: several “frames” (steps) that the program cycles through. Each step is a snapshot of the light, like a scene; the chase steps through them at a set tempo — and the light “comes alive”: running colors, alternating groups, turning heads.

📍 Where: the bottom panel → the “Chases” tab (the lightning icon). The “+ Chase” button opens the editor.

How to create a chase:

  1. Click “+ Chase” and give it a name (for example, “Strobe effect”).
  2. Fill it with steps — in two ways, which you can mix:
Way How
From ready scenes Click scenes in the list — each one is added as a step
Capture the current state Set the light by hand in the Programmer → the capture button — the current fixture state becomes a new step
  1. If needed, set the tempo (by default — to the BPM beat).
  2. Click “Save” — the chase appears in the list. Click it to launch, click again to stop.

Editing steps (in the same editor):

Action How
Reorder steps The ↑ / ↓ arrows on a step
Rename a step The rename button (the default is the scene name or “Step N”)
Delete a step The ×
Tweak the light inside a step Expand the step — the channel faders are right there in the editor
💡 Tip: when editing a step, watch the visualizer — it’s right there (the chase editor opens to the side, like the scene editor) and shows exactly the expanded step live: move a color/brightness/position fader in the step and the light picture changes at once. Collapse the step and the visualizer goes back to the usual view.

Head movement on top of the chase (the “FX Engine” block). In the chase editor, if the project has moving heads, an “FX Engine” block appears below the tempo settings — the same smooth beam movement as in the scene editor:

  1. Click ON.
  2. Pick a figure (circle, figure-eight, panorama, etc.) and set the amplitude and speed.
  3. The heads start sweeping their beams right in the editor — the movement is visible in the visualizer.

This movement is one for the whole chase (not tied to a single step): it runs on top of whichever step is playing. When you save the chase, it’s stored with it and turns on automatically every time the chase is launched. By default the movement targets the heads that take part in the chase steps.

💡 Tip: movement and steps are independent layers. You can build a chase out of color changes and switch on an FX “figure-eight” on top — the heads will change color step by step and sweep their beams at the same time.

Movement aim (where the chase points). If the chase steps contain movement along the axes, a “Movement aim” block appears below. It answers two questions at once: where the heads point and how far they roam while doing it.

Click “Off” to switch the setting on and pick a method:

Method What you do When it fits better
Stage point Click the venue plan where the heads should hit; the frame sets how far the movement spreads around it Fixtures are placed on the plan — the program works out each fixture’s own angles
Axis limits Set the limits directly: Pan from … to …, Tilt from … to … There is no placement, or thinking in percentages of travel is simpler

The key difference from setting Pan/Tilt by hand: the angles are worked out for every fixture separately — from its spot on the plan, its rigging height and the way its body is turned. That is why a head on the left and a head on the right really meet at the same place instead of getting the same Pan. A fixture with several independent heads (a motorised bar, a twin head) gets its angle for each head separately, from that head’s own place on the body — so aiming and the sweep limit work on it exactly as they do on single heads.

The movement pattern is preserved: a circle stays a circle, a figure-eight stays a figure-eight, just smaller and around the place you need. The setting rewrites nothing in the steps — it is applied on the fly, so moving a fixture in the visualizer re-aims everything automatically.

⚠️ Note: the working sector of the axis, set for the fixture in its settings, still wins. If the target lies outside the sector, the fixture travels to the end of its range and no further — it will not light up the wall.
💡 Tip: to delete several chases at once — Ctrl/Shift+click the chases in the list, then Delete (as described for scenes).
💡 Tip: a classic of the genre is a chase of 2–4 simple scenes: “red on the left / blue on the right”, then the other way around. Even that gives you a living picture. Don’t make your first chase complicated.
⚠️ Note: right-click a chase in the list for the context menu (edit/delete). Deleted one by accident — Ctrl+Z.
Fig. 05.01.1 — The chase editor: steps and the ways to add them
Fig. 05.01.1 — The chase editor: steps and the ways to add them