User's Manual

You will see color bars appear on the program output and you will notice that none of the
buttons on the front panel will be illuminated red any longer and that’s because none of the
sources that use the front panel buttons are on air. If you have a source on the front panel
selected on preview, you will still see that button illuminated green. You can press cut or auto to
transition between the color bars and the preview source.
However, selecting sources on the program bus is quite dangerous as they are instantly
switched to air. So a better option is to scroll to the preview LCD menu and select the source
you want, then confirm it on the preview monitor in the multi view as being the correct source
before transitioning to it using the cut or auto buttons.
A safe way to preview sources before switching them to air is to use the LCD
menu to select sources to the preview output and monitor them on the multi view
Changing to Cut Bus Switching
By default, the control panel works in program/preview mode, which is more like a traditional
switcher and means changing sources is a two step process where you select the next source
on the preview bus and then select cut or auto. However, in many cases you might like to have
the switch to the new source happen immediately when you select it. This mode is called cut
bus switching and you can change the mode in the LCD menus.
To change to cut bus mode, use the following steps.
1 Press the menu button to display the menus.
2 Scroll with the knob through the menus to the “Settings” menu.
3 Press the set button and you will see the settings menu page will be selected.
4 Now scroll down the list to the mode menu and select it by pressing the set button.
5 Scroll to the cut bus mode and select it by pressing set.
6 Press the menu button to back out of the menus back to the video preview screen.
Now the front panel will have changed how it works and switching is performed the instant you
select a source. For example, try selecting a different source using the main input buttons and
you can see that it’s immediately selected and the button is illuminated red. You will notice that
there is no green button highlighted now and that’s because there is no preview bus to select
the source as the source is simply selected the moment you push the button and it’s on air
instantly. That’s why all buttons are now illuminated red.
However, there is another change to the front panel in cut bus mode and that’s the behavior of
the cut and auto buttons. Now the inputs are selected the instant you press them, the cut and
auto buttons don’t trigger the transition anymore. What they are now used for is to select the
type of transition you want when you press the input buttons.
83Using the ATEM Television Studio HD Front Panel