:LIVE Training Question

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

For those of you just getting on board with :LIVE/ESP. How much training did it take to become comfortable with the system. We are getting it very soon. Is a few hours a day for two weeks with the trainer plenty of time. Plus, a week of online prior.

Thanks.

[Stormtracker_Tony]

For the general :LIVE, it took me a little while to get adjusted..but I tend to have concentration problems, so after several days of training, I still remembered practically nothing about it..It took me playing around on the system for a while myself to really get the hang of all the features...As far as my coworkers go, some seemed to catch onto a lot of things over the first week, while some were struggling for a couple weeks to get used to the changes...I think ultimately it depends on how well each individual is at grasping onto new concepts, how photographic your mind is and how well your concentration level is...I wasn't too happy at first, but once I got the hang of it, it made graphics preparation go much faster

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

I'm usually a quick learner, and take lots of notes. Hopefully, that will be plenty of time.

[CISK]

We just got ours last spring. The trainers are awesome, and you will be able to "get bye" rather quickly. When it comes to using all the bells and whistles, that takes practice. Just learn as much as you can, and I would make sure at least one person is with the trainer for their whole 8 hour day.

Also, I went to Wisconsin for a week before they ever came to the station. That helped out a lot. If your station is up for paying for that, it is DEFINITELY worth it.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

Our chief is going for a week. I figure if I miss out on anything, I could come in and play around on the weekends. Thanks for the info!

[Nyquist]

Golfball, who is your trainer?

You're getting it right as the new release of ESP:LIVE 2.5 is coming out too. We've been beta-testing it and have been happy with the improvements made to it.

As for the :LIVE suite, once you learn one interface, you pretty much have the others figured out with the exception of some of the layering in ESP.

I saw you referenced the on-line tutorials that WXC has. Go through them! They are very helpful in learning. There are a ton of air checks on there too so you can get ideas.

PM me if you would like to know some more details.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

Cool, thanks, Tim is the trainer.

[swingman]

Cool, thanks, Tim is the trainer.
Good Guy if it is the Tim that I know from college.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

I don't know, is it?

[Bob Sakamano]

Like with most things, hands-on practice will help you learn and retain more things. Play around with it as much as possible. There isn't much you can do to screw up the system. You've got the advantage of all the stuff on the on-demand site, so take advantage of them! Don't expect to learn everything at once. I still learn some things now and again and I've been using :LIVE since 2003. If you are getting the entire :LIVE suite (:LIVE, 3D:LIVE and ESP:LIVE), it will be a little overwheling, especially on the ESP:LIVE. There is some great demo data for ESP, however, so make sure they get you those DVDs. There definitely needs to be one person who is a :LIVE expert.

Most are the trainers are pretty good. They each have their own style. Some are not as knowledgeable as others. But, they are good at calling in for help if they run across something that they don't know or a problem that they can't fix. There are some short-cuts us pros can show you when you get used to the workflow and how it all comes together, so feel free to ask more questions as you get into it.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

Sweet, thanks.

[Nyquist]

If it is Tim Bush, he is pretty cool. We had him for our training, and things went smooth as butter.

[wx or not]

Since you've got a week of online prior, try to figure out ways to break it. That was advice from my trainer, who suggested that, if you do "break it," he's right there to help you through it. We've had ours about three months now, I love it, and I could not for the life of me find a way to screw the thing up. Maybe you'll get lucky and share with us your newfound solutions!!!:)

[Nyquist]

I will say that "breaking things" is half the fun of being a beta-tester for WXC. You really have to work to get some stuff to crash. Are you going with the SD or HD stuff?

[forecastguy]

:(

Now if only WSI was like that... All you have to do to get the WSI app to crash is leave it open for 6-8 hours.

*sigh*

[SevereClear]

Good Guy if it is the Tim that I know from college.

Since you have a Jayhawk as your Avatar... I would say that it is him!

Golfball...Tim is the man! Take him to a Sushi bar while he is there...

If you need any help with the systems, shoot me a message. Also, use the forum on the WXC website. It is very helpful!

All the best!

[TT82]

Ya... the weathercentralondemand.com forums are great. It's cool to see what the others are doing with their system, too.

Same as severeclear here, if you need anything with :LIVE, shoot me a message. I'm on there as wjactvwea.

[Nyquist]

If you want to know some good hacks for getting external data into it, I'll help you out too. We are ingesting all sorts of good stuff here. :D

[SevereClear]

If you want to know some good hacks for getting external data into it, I'll help you out too. We are ingesting all sorts of good stuff here. :D

Scary... But probably true.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

Sorry guys, it's not TB, it's Timothy P. I think it will be good though, and I believe we'll have plenty of time to get things situated before the debut. Thanks all for the input. I do like the ondemand site. I will be stealing much from you all very soon:D

[mowx]

I just went through training three months ago. I got the basics of the system, especially the rundown interface within a day or two, 3D took me a bit longer, and ESP even longer. It was great having the trainer, Mike Stepaniak, here especially when we rain into a few of the systems quirks and he could work us around them.

I still don't know why in the :LIVE rundown you can't do something like right click to add a layer instead of having to choose from a list of preloaded templates. I am no computer programmer, but that would be nice! I'm tired of forgetting a layer when choosing a template and then having to start over. I guess that won't happen after a few more months of using it. Otherwise, I love Weather Central.

And why we're on the subject...is MicroCast or Super MicroCast worth the extra money? Thoughts?

[Bob Sakamano]

I just went through training three months ago. I got the basics of the system, especially the rundown interface within a day or two, 3D took me a bit longer, and ESP even longer. It was great having the trainer, Mike Stepaniak, here especially when we rain into a few of the systems quirks and he could work us around them.

I still don't know why in the :LIVE rundown you can't do something like right click to add a layer instead of having to choose from a list of preloaded templates. I am no computer programmer, but that would be nice! I'm tired of forgetting a layer when choosing a template and then having to start over. I guess that won't happen after a few more months of using it. Otherwise, I love Weather Central.

And why we're on the subject...is MicroCast or Super MicroCast worth the extra money? Thoughts?

I don't know if they will ever completely get rid of template scenes; however, it wouldn't surprise me if they developed a program for you to build your own scene and select the elements you want. ESP already has something similar and there are a few of us who know how to alter template scenes to get what we want.

MicroCast is good, because it is an extra tool that you have as your disposal. It is basically your own computer model you run in house. I don't have SM yet, but I hear it is a nice improvement over the traditional MicroCast. If you are going to get either of these, I'd go ahead and get SM. There are times when MicroCast is on crack, but I have seen it preform very, very well at times, too.

[TT82]

If you want to know some good hacks for getting external data into it, I'll help you out too. We are ingesting all sorts of good stuff here. :D

Nyquist... You've peeked (or is it peaked or piqued?) my interest. Maybe you can shoot me a PM with some of the stuff you're doing. I'm always looking for more to do with :LIVE.

Thanks,
TT

[TT82]

I don't know if they will ever completely get rid of template scenes; however, it wouldn't surprise me if they developed a program for you to build your own scene and select the elements you want. ESP already has something similar and there are a few of us who know how to alter template scenes to get what we want.

MicroCast is good, because it is an extra tool that you have as your disposal. It is basically your own computer model you run in house. I don't have SM yet, but I hear it is a nice improvement over the traditional MicroCast. If you are going to get either of these, I'd go ahead and get SM. There are times when MicroCast is on crack, but I have seen it preform very, very well at times, too.

Nobody will admit to building their own scenes, though I have a feeling there are quite a few of us who do it... even though we're really not supposed to. :shifty: There is so much more you can do when you know how to edit them.

MOWX, I know the feeling of having built a scene and then realized you need some other layer. If you are a proficient editor, you can learn how to even add in what you need. If you know HTML & XML, it's easy to learn. That's saved me plenty of times. Until you learn, make use of your FAVORITES. They are your best friend!

As far as Microcast goes, I like mine, but it struggles with the elevations sometimes. It does do well in normal situations, though. I'm actually using it as my accumulation map for this system moving through now. I am using 3 microcast maps... clouds/rain/snow/ice, snow totals, and freezing rain totals. It's awesome for stuff like that.

Again, can't stress enough the Weather Central on Demand website. The WXCentral tech people are always on there and replying to posts. If it isn't a major issue, just post there and it'll probably be answered within a couple of hours, if not sooner.

(Why does it sound like I work for WXCentral? I don't, I swear! I'm starting to sound like Bob Sakamano! :D )

[Al Bedo]

Just got through one week of expert training in Madison and then two weeks of on-site. Our trainer (Bryan) was awesome...made us do most of the work so we learned how to use the ins and outs hands on. Once your chief learns the stuff...have him work with you on designing things, but make sure (s)he puts you in the driver's seat. You'll learn more that way. Also, the tutorials are priceless...I could go to expert training and dive right in after watching them. We basically got enough done in that week to launch.

Microcast has been great so far. The fact that it keeps track of each task's biases is extremely helpful. It is 1/2 with lake effect so far. Still learning. It is relatively quick too. You can run the model in 3 hours and get just about any variable you would ever need and then some.

By no means do I feel I am an expert, but we ran into some roadblocks in the installation, so I got to learn a LOT more about the inner workings that i think will help down the line. After 3 weeks of training, I feel comfortable launching in a week.

Best feature? Favorties and copy/paste function in Live/ESP. We probably saved hours because of that in the install/training. Good luck...just play with it...play, play, play and you'll learn lots!

[SevereClear]

There sure are a lot of new WXC customers out there. I know our company just switched one of our stations and hopefully more will change in the future...

[offshore moflo]

I don't know if they will ever completely get rid of template scenes; however, it wouldn't surprise me if they developed a program for you to build your own scene and select the elements you want. ESP already has something similar and there are a few of us who know how to alter template scenes to get what we want.


You have my word that we will certainly add the ability to add/delete elements at some point in a future version. This is high up my list of things to do on :LIVE.

Andy Rice
Senior Product Manager
Weather Central

[LCL]

Word.

And thanks for the comments about our trainers. You just made some folks' days for sure.

Joe Bagley
Customer Development Coordinator
Weather Central

[Bob Sakamano]

Word.

And thanks for the comments about our trainers. You just made some folks' days for sure.

Joe Bagley
Customer Development Coordinator
Weather Central


I am hoping to get to Madison in 2008, Joe!

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

Just finished some short and intensive training. Love the system, debuted well today. Did lots of fun things, and showed off many of the system's abilities. Viewers and coworkers already love it too! Especially Puddleducky and many of the Holiday special graphics!!

Our trainer is fairly new to WXC, but props to Tim P. They must train the trainers well in Madison. Worked hard, worked me hard. He put up with me and my pickiness and anal retentiveness when it comes to our look, and got me right where I needed to be for a good show today. All in all, I feel pretty comfortable and happy with all the software. Plus, anything we wish we could have, they seem to take seriously and take note of for future development.

There are a few scene templates I would desire, Severe I may need a few tips from you on that.

Can't wait until I come in like an hour later from now on...go :LIVE!!!

...and yes, I was paid to say all this, but I support this message:D

[SevereClear]

just email me or PM me. I will likely have the scene or I can show you how to make it.

If anyone from WXC is reading this, please disregard anything I just said...

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

:D I'll hit you up soon on that. Look the other way WXC. :cheers:

[Bob Sakamano]

just email me or PM me. I will likely have the scene or I can show you how to make it.

If anyone from WXC is reading this, please disregard anything I just said...


You know we can tell him, but then we might have to kill him! :D

[PackerlandWx]

I came to our station and we had ESP so I didnt get time with the trainer. There are plenty of things to learn in fact I am still learning. There are a lot of things you can do with the system. Particularly, spend an hour a night I would say for the next week and get comfortable with the severe weather stuff because that is what I use it for the most. Once you get past that it isnt to bad.

[FSU Weather]

WxCentral's crew rocks! Everyone from the sales rep to the trainers (and, of course, to Andy Rice). Only another week to go on WSI, and then our WxCentral system is ready for air!

While I'm at it -- Joe/Andy: finally have a way to get all of the WRF gribs into one large grib file that will be suitable for display in :LIVE. Going to test it out this weekend and get back to you on it after Christmas.

[SevereClear]

Man! A lot of people are switching to Weather Central!

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

Hey, if you save a weatherman some time, that's big!

[TT82]

just email me or PM me. I will likely have the scene or I can show you how to make it.

If anyone from WXC is reading this, please disregard anything I just said...
Just watch with what you make now because Andy was saying on the WXC board that the new program to make your own scenes will have some sort of logic that will not allow certain scenes anymore. That's really gonna stink when that happens!

[SevereClear]

Yeah... but Andy will tell me how to get around that, too!

Just kidding... kind of.

Anywho, you will not need to make your own scenes in the future. They will take care of that too... because WXC rocks. :)

[TT82]

Yeah... but Andy will tell me how to get around that, too!

Just kidding... kind of.

Anywho, you will not need to make your own scenes in the future. They will take care of that too... because WXC rocks. :)
Ya, I'll second that... "WXC Rocks!"

I'm just worried about those scenes that I already made by myself. I guess I'll just have to wait and see.

[offshore moflo]

Trust me.... it won't be that bad.... and the functionality you will get will obviously supersede and will blow you away.....


You won't miss the couple of scenes that won't work :)

Andy

[offshore moflo]

WxCentral's crew rocks! Everyone from the sales rep to the trainers (and, of course, to Andy Rice). Only another week to go on WSI, and then our WxCentral system is ready for air!

While I'm at it -- Joe/Andy: finally have a way to get all of the WRF gribs into one large grib file that will be suitable for display in :LIVE. Going to test it out this weekend and get back to you on it after Christmas.

FSU... look forward to seeing the airchecks!

Andy

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

One of my issues so far is no pause or stops in the show. Within the scenes yes, but no between them in the show if that makes sense.

[TAFKA wacowx]

One of my issues so far is no pause or stops in the show. Within the scenes yes, but no between them in the show if that makes sense.

Do you happen to have your scenes on Auto-Advance? I mean, there will be a pause before you hit the green button to advance, no? What exactly are you saying? What kind of scenes?

Let's say you are playng back movies for some reason. Each movie will play through as many times as you specify then be paused until you hit the advance button. NOW, if you for some reason have that particular scene on Auto-Advance, after the movie plays through the specified number of times it will immediately go on to the next scene. Same thing goes for imagery loops...you specify how many time they loop (I always used infinite) so if you chose 3 times, it will loop 3 times, they wait for you to hit the green button, UNLESS you have Auto Advance clicked.

Check you Auto Advance boxes to make sure they are not clicked in the scene you desire a pause. Also, check your playback number (times) and if you do have an auto advance scene, the number of seconds in the box in the very first layer of that scene is your duration for THAT scene.

Not knowing specifics, I'm throwing a lot out at you.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

No, I don't have them on auto advance,

For instance,

I want to start with a movie, then have a weather page slide in after like 30 frames. Now, I can have the movie not start when I play the scene, but the weather page with fly in after 30 frames. If I'm starting with this scene, I'm sitting at the desk, and my weather page has already flown in...not a big deal, see what I'm saying. I'm probably missing how to do this. Still learning.

What I did do that worked, is start off with a still of the movie, then advance to the next graphic...the movie plays and weather page slides in.

[TAFKA wacowx]

No, I don't have them on auto advance,

For instance,

I want to start with a movie, then have a weather page slide in after like 30 frames. Now, I can have the movie not start when I play the scene, but the weather page with fly in after 30 frames. If I'm starting with this scene, I'm sitting at the desk, and my weather page has already flown in...not a big deal, see what I'm saying. I'm probably missing how to do this. Still learning.

What I did do that worked, is start off with a still of the movie, then advance to the next graphic...the movie plays and weather page slides in.

Or you can click 'pause at start' on your movie scene and that would behave exactly like taking a still of your first frame of the movie. It will start when you click your advance button.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

Pause at start will only pause the movie, not the weather page that comes in later. That's my current issue.

[TAFKA wacowx]

I guess I would have to be there to see, but unless you have the movie 'auto-advance'ing, your weather page scene should not slide in at all until you click.

These are two seperate scenes (three if you include your still frame at the start) correct? A movie scene, playing for about 30 seconds, THEN a weather page? If so, there is no reason why the weather page should automatically start after the movie plays unless the movie scene is auto-advancing.

Or, are you talking about one scene which would be a weather page (x-day, etc) OVER a movie background?

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

The latter....xday over movie. That's my issue. I just need to make them separate.

[SevereClear]

Options:

If you just want to delay the text AND it is NOT the first scene in your show, there is a "delay frames" option under the motion and order.

If it is the first scene, load the scene twice and delete all of the text on the first scene. Then, your background will animate until your text comes on... unless it needs to be paused too... then just use the image still like you are currently doing....

Lastly, check out www.weathercentralondemand.com (http://www.weathercentralondemand.com) It's a great forum to discuss WXC stuff.

[Bob Sakamano]

This has been an issue a few others have brought up on the on-demand site. I've done severe's solution in the past, which is to load the scene twice, then get rid of all the stuff on the wxpage or xday elements.n Loading the scene twice is the only way around it.

[TT82]

I think I know what you're talking about. For example, I have my football and baseball forecasts. The text can't come on too early or else it'll look strange. For that reason, I start with a still of the movie, then when I'm ready for the next graphic, I can hit advance and it'll do what its supposed to.

If it were the first scene in the show, there's no way to tell how long the 'delay' would have to be on the scene.

I hope I explained it well enough. Either way Golfball, I know what you mean.

[SevereClear]

One other option is to make the entire thing on 3D :LIVE and render a single movie. You can make the text do some sweet things, too.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

I think it would be easiest with just some manual stops you could put in the "show" like the old RT system. But, I'm really not complaining, no big deal.

By the way, I did a crazy fly down to the surface, looked up at the clouds, then up over the clouds and back down. Cool stuff.

[Golfball_Size_Hail]

Oh ya, thanks for all your guys's help!!