Creating Effects:
While ShowSim comes stocked with over 1100 common effects, there will eventually come a time when a certain effect or color combination critical to a specific display segment does not exist in the stock effect library. When this situation occurs, it is actually possible for you to create the required effect yourself and add it to your own personal effect library.

Effects are both created and edited from the Effects tab of the Effect Browser shown to the left. When creating a new effect from scratch, click the Add button found under the effect list. The effect library selected above the effect list is where any new effects created will be stored. To edit an existing effect, select the effect in the list and then click the Edit button.

There are several different types of effect editors available that allow you to create custom effects. The correct type of effect editor will appear based on the effect type selected in the “Type” option selected on the Effects tab.

Location- this parameter is used to control what firing position is used when you test the effect. It also represents the firing position that will be used when the effect is added to your show.

Find- the find button on both the Effects and Inventory tabs is a keyword search utility that can find effects based on words used in their description. The search will produce results from any Type category in which the keyword is found, so this is a good way to find effects when you are not quite sure what category they may be stored under. It is also a good way to find what items are at your disposal when you have a particular effect in mind. For example, if you know that you want to use crackle in a certain segment, you can do a search on “Crackle” and view all the items that employ that effect.

Testing Effects
Not only does the Effect Browser help you find effect you need for your shows, it allows you to test them visually as well. Right-clicking the mouse on any effect in the list will fire the effect on screen so that you can see it. When clicking on the list, only the burst is shown for shells rather than the entire sequence from lift to burst. This is done in order to speed up the shell browsing process, but a Test button under the list will actually fire the entire lift and break sequence if you need to see that as well.

When testing multi-break shells, the test will begin with the launch of the shell rather than with the burst of the first break. When testing cakes, gerbs, strobe pots or any other effects with a long duration, the effect will run the full course of firing all shots or burning for the duration specified for that effect. These effects will continue to fire even if a new effect is tested. If you want to stop a long-running effect before it finishes, clicking the stop button on the show player controls at the bottom of the screen will clear all running effects from the screen.