Q: I want to put a couple of sconce style lights on a moving set piece.  They are just for ambience so they don’t have to be bright. I was hoping to use just a regular bulb (led or incandescent) to match the time period of the 1930s.  So I need a battery and a way to control the lights wirelessly.

A: If you keep the wattage of the two lamps to under 50W each, and you don’t mind some wiring within your platform, you can run both sconces on a DMX2dim 2-channel dimmer.  Each will be individually controllable, but the wiring would come back to the one device with two outputs on it.

If you prefer to minimize wiring, or you want to use a higher wattage lamp, then you could put a separate 2-channel dimmer in each sconce location, and gang the two dimmers as a single output for up to a 100W load.

A single DMXio transceiver puts an entire universe out on the air, up to 512 channels.  That leaves 510 channels for other things if you expand your system in the future.

The dimmers operate over a wide voltage range, from 5V to 35VDC.  For what you’re doing, 12V lamps are probably what you’ll find.  Look at lamps for automotive, RV, and marine use — there are lots of things available from Amazon and specialty shops.

Then you’ll need one or two 12V batteries.  They power the dimmers and the loads (the lamps), so you have to size the batteries based on the total running time between charges.  If the lamps are only on for a minute, that requires a much smaller battery than lamps that will be on for a 90-minute 1-act play.  On a platform, you probably have plenty of space to hide a large battery, so you might want to go with a marine battery.  If space is tight, or you also want to use your system in costumes or small mobile set-pieces, them definitely look at NiMH rechargeable batteries.  Again, Amazon and specialty battery suppliers are where to go for that stuff.