Congratulations on acquiring Tally Pro III! Before using the lights with your switching system, the device needs to be configured to talk to your network and the particular video switching software/device you are using. This guide will show you how.
Overview
The Tally Pro III is powered by an internal 9 Volt battery (customer supplied). Once the power source is added, we will use the on-board webserver to add information about the local network, video switching system and the specifics of the scene/camera that this light will be associated with. This information will be stored on the light, but can be updated and changed as desired.
After configuration is completed, the light will attempt to connect to the local network and then will connect to the video switching system(s). Operation is automatic, no user intervention is needed.
Updates will be made available for download here and can be uploaded to the light through any browser – no physical connection is needed!
Preparation
Install the OBS Websockets plugin into OBS if that is your platform. Instructions can be found here. Once installed, under the Tools menu in OBS you’ll find WebSockets Server Settings. Click on it and you’ll get this window:
Make sure that Enable Authentication is NOT checked. We may amend the code at a future date to include authentication, but currently this function is not implemented and will prevent your light from communicating with OBS if it is enabled. Feel free to turn of System Tray Alerts, this will prevent pop-up notifications that new socket connections have been made.
Obtain the IP address of the video switcher you will be using and write it down. If you use your computer rather than a tablet or phone to program the light, you will get the IP address assigned by the light’s DNS server, rather than the IP from your local WiFi network. We strongly suggest assigning a fixed IP address to your video switching platform. While it is unlikely, you may not get the same IP address when you return to the WiFi network if you rely on dynamic address allocation (DHCP). Instructions for getting your IP can be found below in step 4.
You have the option to specify a static IP address for your light. We suggest that you do this only if you are experienced with networks, addressing and routers. You will need to obtain the gateway address, which is usually your router address and the network mask, which for small networks is typically 255.255.255.0. We strongly recommend that you establish a pool of dynamically assigned addresses in your router and pick an address for your light that is not in this pool. As an example:
Addresses 192.168.1.1 thru 192.168.1.16 – not assigned by the router to devices
Addresses 192.168.1.17 thru 192.168.1.255 – dynamic address pool
You should pick an address within the first set of addresses, taking care that you do not pick a previously selected address. There are tools you can use like Advanced IP Scanner to look at your network devices, or you can use your router administration application to see what is useable. There is no error checking to determine if you have set this up correctly, so please be very careful if you choose to go this route.
You may want to print this page for reference.
Now on to the fun stuff!
Step 1
Check that the light’s switch is in the off position, marked with a 0. Remove the outer shell with the white diffuser from the chassis by gently depressing the rectangular latch on top of the light. Carefully free the two parts, then slide them apart. The corners of the chip carrier extend slightly past the outer shell to facilitate this. Slide the battery compartment lid out of the groove it sits in. Push the battery clip firmly onto a 9 Volt battery and place the battery under the chip carrier with the clip at the open end of the battery compartment. Slide the battery compartment lid into the grooves in the carrier. Slide the outer tube and the carrier back together, making sure the latch engages.
Step 2
Turn the unit on by pressing the “1” side of the switch. Make sure that only one Tally Pro device is powered up while configuring. First the diffuser and then the operator facing LED should light up – first green, then red. This shows that the device has power and that the bicolor LED is working.
Step 3
Go to the network setup on your phone, tablet or other computing device with a browser and WiFi connectivity. While you can use your computer running OBS or Vmix, you may run into IP address issues and internet connectivity issues during setup.
Look through the available networks and connect to the one with a name in the format TPIII_### . The first characters will always be “TPIII”. The last characters/digits will vary with the software version currently loaded on the light. The correct network on the sample above is TPIII_086. This is the Tally Pro that is active, running release 086 software.
Step 4
Open the browser on your computing device and type 1.1.4.1 into the address window. This will bring up the configuration screen:
Here’s what each field needs:
Local WiFi Network SSID: The local network name that your switching platform is on. In our example that would be “MIMI”. Only 2.4Ghz networks are supported. The network name should not have spaces or embedded punctuation, stick to letters, numbers and underscores. This a drop-down list, click on the down arrow to the right of the entry box to see all available networks. Click on the one you want to use.
Local WiFi Password: The password for the aforementioned WiFi SSID. Again, stick to letters, numbers and underscores.
Static IP: The 4 octet dot-notation IP address you want to assign to your light.
Gateway IP: The address of your gateway, typically your router’s address.
Subnet Mask: Typically this will be 255.255.255.0 for small class C networks.
Switcher: Click on the radio button for the switcher (OBS, Vmix or ATEM) that this device will be associated with. The Switch Port box will automatically fill with the default port for the switcher.
Switcher IP Address: This is the 4 octet dot-notation address of the computer running OBS or Vmix. You can find it by opening a command window on that PC and typing “ipconfig” at the prompt. Look for a line that looks like this:
IPv4 Address………….192.168.1.163
The numbers you see will no doubt be different. If using a browser on your OBS or Vmix computer, do this BEFORE connecting to the Tally Light.
If you are using an ATEM Mini Pro or other ATEM switcher with network capability you need to enter that. Here’s a video on how to set the ATEM IP address.
Switcher Port: The default port number for your switch will automatically fill in. If you’ve specifically changed it in your switch, just enter it here, overwriting the provided default value.
Switcher Password (if used): Currently not implemented, this will eventually serve to help secure the connection against hackers.
Scene Name (OBS) or Camera Number (ATEM & Vmix): In the case of OBS, this will be the scene name you want to associate the light with such as “Cam_1”. The name must be identical to the scene name listed in OBS and the entry is case sensitive. For the ATEM and Vmix, simply put a single digit in this field to correspond to the control associated with the camera.
LED Configuration: Click on one of the radio buttons to select both LEDS, front only or back only depending on your needs.
LED Brightness: Initially the brightness of the LEDs is set to off. The sliders will allow you to set the brightness of the LEDs. The LEDs on the Tally Light will change as you move the slider. There are 10 levels of brightness, ranging from off to full on.
Step 5
Here’s an example of what the configuration screen looks like filled out:
You would, of course, substitute your own values for the ones shown here.
Click on the “Submit” button at the bottom of the screen. The following acknowledgement screen will appear:
Check the information and if correct, move to the next step. If you need to change something, there are two very small switches on the chip board. Insert a thin plastic tube like a coffee stirrer into the small hole marked with a “!” on the top of the tube over the USB port. This is the hole on the right when looking at the front of the light. A toothpick will work as well, just don’t use a metal object. You want to depress and hold the “!” switch for around a second. This will cause the light to clear its memory. You can then repeat Step 4 to enter corrected information.
Step 6
The unit should be blinking red while it attempts to connect to first the local area network and then the OBS/Vmix instance or ATEM . If successful, the light will turn green for a second. If the light doesn’t turn green after 30 seconds, click the memory clear button on the light and repeat Steps 4 and 5, checking your IP and password carefully.
Step 7
That’s it! Your Tally Pro III should now respond to Scene changes in OBS, turning green when in preview and red when in program. ATEM users will only see red when the switcher button is pressed since there is no preview mode while using the ATEM in stand-alone mode; i.e. no attached computer running the ATEM control software.
Notes:
You can reconfigure the device at any time by following the reset instructions in Step 4. The other switch marked with an “@” will restart the light without clearing the memory.