iPad not included.
The ADJ LINK is a four-universe DMX lighting controller released by ADJ Lighting earlier this year. The ADJ LINK consists of a dedicated hardware controller that interfaces with a compatible iPad running the Airstream DMX LINK iOS App.
While running stage lighting from an iPad is not new, the ADJ LINK has more DMX channels (four DMX universes) and is reported to cost less than other hardware consoles that connect directly to an iPad app for control.
For a church with mostly LED wash fixtures and a few moving lights, this could be the solution you’re looking for.
In the box
When you make your purchase of the ADJ LINK, you will receive the console, a USB console light, power supply, and a USB cable. What is not in the box is the required Apple iPad running iOS 12.0 or later. This is a separate purchase, however, the iPad app is a free download at the Apple app store.
The hardware
The first thing you notice as you take the console out of the box is how heavy it is. Weighing in at 13 pounds, the console has a solid feel to it and seems to be well built. The buttons have a good tactile feel, and the 100mm faders have a nice smooth long throw to them. The four rotary encoders are nice and smooth and feature a push action that gives you additional functionality depending on the mode you are in.
The console has an integrated iPad mount to hold your iPad, but you don’t have to use the mount and you can even walk the room with your iPad and control your fixtures, because the primary connectivity from the iPad to the console is via WiFi.
One of the drawbacks to this system is that if your iPad crashes, breaks, or is stolen, you are mostly dead in the water. I say mostly dead since there is the ability to store eight looks into the hardware controller, but the system must be power cycled with one of the keys pressed to activate this barebones backup mode.
All the show files are saved onboard the iPad and can be backed up and exported via a cloud service like Dropbox or iCloud.
The software
The Airstream DMX LINK iOS App that drives the LINK console is a well thought out piece of software, and it has a generally intuitive workflow for those with lighting console experience. For those not familiar with lighting consoles, it presents a low learning curve, and ADJ offers a great YouTube video tutorial to get you started.
The software is divided into six different functions: Fixtures, Channels, Effects, Scenes, Shows, and Subs. Each section can be accessed through an icon on the iPad or via a direct select button on the console hardware.
Fixtures
The fixtures section of the console is where you patch and select your fixtures. The ADJ LINK has a limit of 2,048 channels of DMX across four universes or 768 fixtures, whichever you hit first. Patching is done through a built-in fixture library that currently only has select fixtures from the following manufacturers: ADJ, Elation, Chauvet, Eliminator, JMAZ, Martin, and Blizzard, as well as a staple of generic fixtures, or you can build your own profile. Also, ADJ is constantly adding to the fixture library so there are more fixtures yet to come.
Channels
The channels section of the console is where you can access all the different parameters available for the fixture. These parameters can be manipulated in a variety of different ways, giving the user a choice in how they operate the console. However, the primary means of control is through the faders and the encoder wheels.
When I first started working with the faders to manipulate the parameters, I was a bit skeptical as you always hit that point where more is too much and less is too little, but ADJ has you covered. This situation is where the rotary encoder for each fader comes into play. Turning the rotary encoder for that function finely adjusts the parameter, allowing you to precisely dial in exactly what you want. So, while you may be using the faders for the bulk of your control, you don’t sacrifice fine control while you are doing it.
Scenes
Scenes are where you store the different looks you create in the ADJ LINK. Scenes can be as minimal or as complex as you want them to be. You can save scenes of just individual parameters and then stack them altogether to create a big look that you can then save, or just build and save a big scene exactly how you want it to play back.
In addition to the parameters of each fixture being stored in a scene, you can also set a fade in and a fade out time for each scene to be used when the scene is executed.
Scene storage is generous on the ADJ LINK, and you can store 32 scenes per page across 99 pages for 3,168 scenes available in the console at any one time.
Subs
Subs mode ties in directly with scenes in that it provides another method of playback. In subs mode the scenes load in to the eight playback faders on the console. Which scene you want of the 32 that can be stored on each page is selected by arrowing up or down through the scene numbers.
When playing back a scene with a submaster, you can play the scene back with the preset time, you can manually execute it in whatever time you run the fader, or you can speed up and slow down the scene playback in the case that the scene has chase or motion effects in it.
Effects
The ADJ Link software has a robust effects generator that allows you to do numerous motion, color, and intensity effects.
All the built-in effects are customizable for timing, phase, and fan, and you can create your own effect shapes by drawing the shape you desire on the iPad. This opens an unlimited number of possibilities.
Effects can also be manipulated with tap to temp for effect speed as well as using audio triggers that utilize the iPad’s built-in microphone.
Shows
Shows are scene lists that run on a timer and play automatically. This allows you to take any scene that you have programmed and link them together in time, and then have them either play looping continuously, or you can set the number of times you want it to play.
I would have liked to see this feature support a more theatrical cue stack type playback, and who knows, maybe ADJ will add this in a future firmware release, but not having this isn’t a deal breaker.
Overall, the ADJ LINK console is a very solid offering from ADJ in the small, automated lighting console market.
In conclusion
The console is easy to learn and easy to use for the basics. If I was trying to do very precise programming that changed often, I might consider looking at something that was a bit more sophisticated, but for a church with mostly LED wash fixtures and a few moving lights, this could be the solution you’re looking for.
- ADJ
- Link Lighting Controller
- www.adj.com
- $1,399.95 (list price)
