Transformation Church (TC), a multi-ethnic, multi-generational, mission-shaped community outside Charlotte in Indian Land, South Carolina, has added Ayrton Levante fixtures to its inventory of equipment used in producing worship services.
TC acquired the Levante fixtures from SES Integration, a division of Special Event Services located in North Carolina. Levante fixtures are a dramatically miniaturized version of Ayrton’s Bora wash light offering outstanding performance capabilities in an ultra-compact format. Levante’s optics produce an extremely uniform flat beam with no hot spot, ensuring a perfect colour mix regardless of the colour combination selected.
Ayrton Levante S-TC
Jeff Cranfill, owner and lighting designer at Special Event Services, recommended the Levante to TC. “The entire line of Ayrton fixtures is very well constructed with high output and great features,” he says. “I have had great results using the Levante wash fixtures in concert and video settings. The beam is very smooth edge to edge, and the framing shutters make it easy to create a video-friendly wash across the entire stage down to a single spot.
Colour temperature adjustments are very consistent fixture to fixture, and the range of colour temperature is large. This makes the fixture very usable in many environments. All of the Ayrton fixtures have very good optics along with even colour mixing and a great variety of gobos. They are some of the best LED source fixtures I have worked with, and I highly recommend them for touring and installs.”
Zach McCrorey, lighting designer and production director at TC, admits that he arrived “slightly skeptical” at the Levante demo set up by SES Integration since he’d never used an Ayrton product before. “But after being introduced to the product line, my skepticism was a thing of the past. I was blown away by the features housed within the Levante and left the demo deciding that the Levante was a top contender among the fixtures we had researched” for the church, which was delivering its services online during the coronavirus pandemic.
Ultimately, McCrorey removed all incandescent fixtures to make room for seven Levante units. “What a world of difference these fixtures have made!” he declares. “The Levantes have been an absolute game changer, and the quality of our online experience has been raised tenfold. In conjunction with our most recent broadcast camera upgrades, our key lighting infrastructure had to be enhanced as well.
Now, our team on stage is lit so incredibly well in person, and that translates beautifully through the camera lens to those watching from home. Also, there are multiple broadcast locations within our auditorium – from the main stage to the broadcast host location to our baptistry area – and utilizing the very smooth framing shutters has made highlighting any area within the auditorium a breeze.”
McCrorey believes the Levante would be an asset to any house of worship, regardless of its size. “They would be impressed by the performance and features that the Levante effortlessly delivers,” he says. “The output is superb, the beam is incredibly flat, and there are absolutely zero hotspots thrown from the lens.
“As our community is multi-ethnic, being able to light diverse skin tones quickly and correctly is important,” he notes. “Levante’s colour palette mixes very well, and the colours displayed are crisp. The fixture is quiet and quick in response. But what is truly mind-blowing is how compact it is! We utilize a single-man lift for all strike and installation of lighting fixtures, so weight was an important factor in deciding which fixture to purchase. We were thrilled to learn that this awesome fixture came in right under 50 lbs.”
McCrorey reports that TC is “incredibly pleased with the purchase we made and the powerful performance delivered by the Levante fixtures. It’s a phenomenal light. I’m looking forward to getting my hands on a few more Ayrton products very soon!”
ACT Entertainment (formerly ACT Lighting, Inc.) is the exclusive distributor of Ayrton products in North America. www.actentertainment.com
For more information on Ayrton Levante and the extensive portfolio of innovative Ayrton LED fixtures, you can visit www.ayrton.eu
After more than a year of lockdown, the wait was finally over when the multi-platinum selling band, Six60, embarked on a massive tour across New Zealand. The Six60 Saturdays tour culminated with a historic ‘first’ when they became the first ever band to play at the iconic Eden Park stadium in Auckland, with over 50,000 fans gathering to see the live show and sing their favourite lyrics together. Video production and equipment supplier, Big Picture, provided a complete video system package both for the tour and the inaugural concert at Eden Park, which included Brompton Technology’s Tessera LED processing.
“Coming out of a year of Covid restrictions, we were excited to be given an opportunity to put together a video system package for the upcoming Six60 Saturdays tour,” says Paul Carppe, General Manager – NZ at Big Picture. “We have a close working relationship with Eccles Entertainment (promoter), Ben Dalgleish from Human Person (show design) and Global Production Partners (production management) so we were able to meet their vision and offer them a package that fitted the technical brief.”`
The package included 215m2 of ROE MC7 in TAIT Touring frames, Brompton 4K Tessera SX40 LED processing with Tessera XD 10G data distribution units, a Sony HD PPU Camera system and disguise servers to run the content.
Because of the Christmas and New Year holiday period, the team had a relatively short lead time between final confirmation and the start of the tour, which was further complicated by the need to ship extra LED product from Big Picture Australia. “The short lead time could have been a problem, but we were able to mitigate most of the potential issues thanks to the ease of use of Brompton’s processing and Tessera software features,” adds Carppe.
The massive screen was wider than the stage roof and just as tall, so building quickly but safely was of high priority to ensure all other departments could complete their jobs on time. “Utilising the Tessera XD units enabled us to easily distribute data across the 27.6m wide screen with a simple fibre link back to the SX40 units at control,” furthers Carppe.
Another challenge was the removable door element for stage/artist access, which had to move in and out during changeovers whilst fitting seamlessly into the wall during performances. According to Carppe, Brompton’s Tessera software enabled them to map the door shape into the wall with ease.
With the tour on the road for six weeks, using bulletproof, high quality equipment was key. “Our previous experience with Brompton made it our top choice,” explains Carppe. “Having a screen so big meant that Tessera’s ‘Identify’ test pattern, also called beacon, allowed us to easily identify problem panels so they could be fixed or replaced quickly and efficiently.
Also, the ability to globally colour balance and match the wall across multiple processors made life easy. In terms of the system build, it was useful to have the Tessera processors in video world and then feed out to the two XD units that were behind the screen.”
Choosing the right products definitely paid off, with tour’s technical director, MJ van Lingen, happy with Big Picture’s video system. “As Technical Director of the Tour, I am pleased with its success and how the video wall contributed to the look and feel of the show. The colour and depth of the content on the screen was spot on,” van Lingen said. Two months after the 2021 Six60 Saturdays country-wide tour, 50,000 fans flocked to Auckland stadium at Eden Park to see the beloved Kiwi band christening the stage for the stadium’s musical debut, setting records as the biggest homegrown production for many years.
“We used a large portion of our outdoor LED stock to create the giant 600m2 screen for this feat of a show,” concludes Carppe. “Following the success of the Six60’s Saturdays tour, there was no question about which LED processing to use for the Eden Park concert. Brompton Technology was our first and only choice!”
For over a decade LumenRadio has provided their wireless DMX technology CRMX (Cognitive Radio MultiPlex). With last year’s acquisition of Wireless Solution, LumenRadio now owns both the W-DMX and CRMX technology and presents a unified technology platform creating a seamless experience for all users of Wireless DMX. Since 2008 there have been two competing technologies on the market: W-DMX from Wireless Solution and CRMX from LumenRadio. This has led to an industry divided between the two major technologies, until now.
Niclas Norlen
In 2020 LumenRadio acquired Wireless Solution and together the two brands supply Wireless DMX to almost the entire Entertainment Lighting Industry. With their ownership of both major technologies in Wireless DMX, LumenRadio is now in a position where they are able to set a standard for the entire industry.
Niclas Norlen, CTO at LumenRadio and inventor of both W-DMX and CRMX, “Our strategy has been to create the best experience for the user, making it easier for all users of Wireless DMX. With our acquisition we are now able to unify the entire industry in one platform and set a standard of Wireless DMX.”
The first step to unify the technologies was the release of BlackBox G6 from Wireless Solution, which included optional CRMX. This made it possible for W-DMX users to control CRMX equipment for the first time, bringing the technologies one step closer together.
Now LumenRadio is releasing the next step to the market: a unified technology platform. LumenRadio will provide all OEM customers with modules featuring combined W-DMX and CRMX technology. This means that all fixtures with Wireless DMX will listen to both W-DMX and CRMX at the same time, and automatically select the protocol used by the transmitter.
Josef Hederstrom
Josef Hederström, Sales Manager at LumenRadio, “With this new solution it will be possible to use either protocol to control all Wireless DMX fixtures on the market, regardless if you are using W-DMX or CRMX. The user does not have to select modes of operation or configure fixtures, all will be automatically configured during linking. “With this new technology platform we are able to unify the industry that has been divided for so long. There’s no need for multiple transmitters or incompatible technologies. LumenRadio supplies Wireless DMX solution that will work with all fixtures.”
Going forward, all OEM customers integrating Wireless DMX will get support for both CRMX and W-DMX, unifying the industry into one technology platform. The solution is implemented in a selection of LumenRadios modules and is undergoing testing right now, and will soon be available for new fixtures to OEM customers under both brands: Wireless Solution and LumenRadio. LumenRadio will continue to supply the Entertainment Lighting Industry with Wireless DMX under both brands, and with one unified technology platform it is easier than ever for all users of Wireless DMX.
For more information about LumenRadio and their product line, you can visit lumenradio.com
Wycombe High School (WHS) is an Academy Grammar school for girls, located in the Buckinghamshire town of High Wycombe. The school is a centre for excellence in sciences and the arts, and takes a progressive view on the use of technology, both in terms of educating its students and engaging with the wider community. One of WHS’s recent eye-catching initiatives has been to create its own YouTube TV channel under the guidance of its Marketing and Communications Manager, Bob Massie.
Before joining the school in his current role, Bob enjoyed an illustrious career as a media executive, occupying key roles at ITV, IMG and XIX Entertainment amongst others. The knowledge and insight he brings to WHS has proved invaluable. With a brief to develop creative methods of marketing the school to prospective students and their parents, as well as to teachers and other potential staff members, Bob, as might reasonably be expected, turned to the power of television…
Harnessing every resource available to him, not least the latent talents of the school’s student population, Bob took over some empty office space and made a start. His aim was to create as professional a studio set-up as was possible, where the channel could create engaging content while simultaneously educating the students in the art of its delivery.
Headteacher Sharon Cromie was supportive of the project from the beginning, realising that the dynamics of TV content (particularly under the direction of an experienced media professional) could go far beyond the constraints of traditional marketing materials. Essentially, Wycombe High TV (WHTV) would be both marketing tool and educational experience rolled into one – a channel for the school, by the school.
A key element in the very early stage of the project was to create an effective green screen for the embryonic studio space. WHS’s site management team stepped in to create portable panels that could be moved to different locations if required.
Provided that the accompanying lighting was of a high standard, this would ensure consistency of quality across broadcasts. A chance conversation which took place whilst Bob was buying chroma key paint from specialists Scenic Supplies, led to a meeting with Barry Grubb of lighting rep company 3LR. Following a consultation with Barry, WHTV trialled one of American lighting manufacturer ETC’s fos4/PD8 LED Panels.
Bob immediately knew that the fos/4 panel was exactly what he needed. Easy to operate and adjust, and delivering exceptional light quality, the unit impressed from day one. With the channel now up and running and gaining momentum, the school, with the support of its Parents and Friends Association, invested in two of the ETC fos4/PD8 panels, which were supplied by Barbizon Lighting Company.
In Bob’s words they are: “Perfect, perfect, perfect! If we were going to do things properly and show the students how to do things properly, we needed lighting that was safe, versatile and robust, which would provide us with a completely professional look without any compromise on quality.
Barry took the time to talk me through the operation and settings, and I’ve subsequently done that with the students, all of whom embrace the technology as a matter of course. It was important that the units were easily portable to enable their widest possible use, and, as with everything in the education sector, were available at a competitive price. They’ve more than proven their worth.”
WHTV continues to move from strength to strength. Whilst undoubtedly providing the school with an important channel of communication and connection during the difficulties presented by COVID19, Bob is keen to stress that in his view, that only constitutes a small part of a much further-reaching story: “There’s no doubt that WHTV served the school very well during lockdown periods – we were able to film the end-of-term concert and put it out on YouTube, for example – but the channel is much more than a stopgap response to the pandemic.
With a combination of good judgement, some luck and the dedication and drive of the students, it has become a firm fixture of school life. The viewing figures are excellent and continue to grow, the students are brimming with ideas for new content, and as a way of presenting the school to the wider community, it would be hard to beat.”
Bob Massie’s confidence in the concept of a school TV channel appears to be well-founded. WHS has received a number of enquiries from schools in the UK (and even as far afield as Madrid), seeking guidance on how to achieve something similar. The quality of the broadcasts has also attracted the attention of several local agencies who have asked about the possibility of hiring the studio, pointing to just how impressively WHTV has developed. He continues:
“When people come to look at the facility, they are ‘wowed’ by the fact that it is a proper studio producing proper programmes, which inspires them to want to emulate it. I think we’ve shown just what is possible without spending mega money. Our introduction to Barry from 3LR was timely, and we’ve taken full advantage of the ETC fos/4 panels, which help to elevate our broadcasts to truly professional standards in a practical and affordable way.”
3LR’s Business Development Manager for Broadcast, TV and Film, Barry Grubb comments: “What Bob Massie and the students and staff at Wycombe High School have achieved with WHTV is remarkable. They have pioneered something that must surely become a template for other education settings, demonstrating that judicious use of technology need not break the bank. Screens are part of the social ecosystem of this generation of students, so creating content and understanding the technology required to do so, is entirely natural. WHTV is a brilliant way of marketing the school, offering a real insight into its ethos through dynamic and interesting content. At 3LR Lighting, we’re really pleased to have played a small part in helping them achieve their ambitions.”
Marshall has built a recording studio. “This has been a passion project for the Marshall crew,” said commercial director Alex Coombes, “our ambition was to build a versatile and flexible commercial multimedia facility to serve the modern entertainment market, and at the same time to promote young talent and give something back to the artist and producer community.”
The spacious new-build facility is on the site of an old theatre, adjacent to the Marshall factory. The live room has a stage with lighting and PA, along with an artist green room, bar and reception area with the large recording control room featuring a 40-channel vintage Neve 8048 console. The self-contained studio has the benefit of ample parking in front …and a ready supply of Marshall amps and Natal drums!
Let’s guess what’s the brand of this cabinet…
Producer Chris Sheldon (Foo Fighters, Feeder, Therapy?) has already been in the studio recording rockers Bad Touch. “I love the new Marshall Studio – a fantastic live room big enough to track a band – in fact, big enough to track a decent-sized orchestra comfortably.
The vintage Neve desk sounds glorious… anything coming through those mic pres sounds, well, better! A great microphone selection to cover all eventualities and if you can’t see something you like, lots of equipment is pretty much two minutes away in the factory ….what’s not to like?”
A loading bay with ramp leads directly to the stage in the 273m2. Marshall live room, with a reduced ceiling-height area for more intimate recording located in front of the separate artist Green Room. Over 100 microphones are available, and the entire facility is equipped with tie lines, speaker connectors and AoIP Ethernet links. Four Focusrite RedNet A16R 24-bit 192kHz 16-channel analogue interfaces feed the Dante digital network, with an Avid HDX card providing the workstation link to Avid Pro Tools | Ultimate.
The large live room.
“Every part of the building has a mic tie line, a speaker output, and an instrument output for guitar amps, plus you’ve got data via RJ45 for monitoring or remote connection via six Focusrite RedNet AM2,” explains studio manager Adam Beer. “We can take any Dante mic preamp, put it anywhere in the building, it will come into our main network and we can record it directly. It means that the whole building is effectively the studio, even the office at the top!”
Adam Beer, the multitalented studio manager.
Adam arrived at Marshall after a decade of experience in both recording and live sound. “I think we can do everything here. We’ve got a world-class recording studio, it’s a concert venue with capacity for an audience of up to 250 people and we can do video filming – for product reviews, podcasts, live concert streams – you name it, we’ve set up a place that can allow creative people to fulfil their potential, whatever they want to do. I think it’s a massive vote of confidence in the creative industry from Marshall. It’s a privilege and an honour to be heading it up.”
Front and centre in the control room is the unique vintage Neve 40-channel console, with a separate custom analogue patchbay installed to the side. Configured by renowned Neve expert Blake Devitt, the console frame came from EMI Pathé-Marconi studio in Paris and is populated by a superior selection of hand-tweaked modules. To the left are 24 channels with 1093 modules, whilst the right 16 channels include an additional eclectic mix of 1065, 1066 and 1095 modules.
An electronic masterpiece and a truly sound maker on its own.
Devitt will need no introduction to audio pros, having been responsible for several major renovations and studio installs in recent years, including the huge Neve at Adele-producer Paul Epworth’s studio, ICP studios in Belgium, and Miloco’s well-known Pool studio. A clever re-build of the desk has made space in the centre of the Neve for the all-important Pro Tools screen and keyboard, with Devitt building three new low-noise busbars, including one for solo-in-place, for the Neve summing system.
“The limiting factor for many vintage consoles is the record/overdub/mix modes in the master section – which of course only made sense during the tape era,” Devitt explains. “This mixer, as it has been re-configured, gives you two completely separate consoles which can be used for whatever the producer wants. I’ve even made the patch section ‘plug in’ in blocks of eight by changing the sockets underneath to reflect custom configurations, so the mixer can be set up without filling the patchbay with a nest of cables.” Blake explains he has applied his no-compromise ‘1% better’ audio fidelity methodology to every channel on the Neve, a concept which he says will apply to every equipment decision at Marshall.
Adam Beer
Studio Manager Adam Beer reveals that even the very first recording session was a success: “Romesh Dodangoda (Bring Me The Horizon, Motorhead, Funeral For A Friend) produced some amazing recordings on the first test session, and the band went away very happy.”
The commitment of a major MI brand to such a significant new facility holds out hope for better grass-roots artist development in the UK. “I think that having everything under one roof is such a sensible way to go for the company and for the industry itself,” says Beer.
“You need to be providing something for everyone, and every type of performance. I think that the spirit of Jim Marshall really lives on in this place. Although I wasn’t fortunate enough to meet Jim, from what I have been told, this is exactly the kind of thing he’d want us to do.”
An interview of the men behind the lighting design of the Eiffel Tower during Bastille Day. Every year on July 14, France is adorned in its most beautiful colors to celebrate the Republic and to a lesser extent to commemorate the storming of the Bastille in 1789. Of course, the Eiffel Tower forms a magnificent backdrop for a grand fireworks display.
The task of the lighting designer is to ensure that the Eiffel Tower, located at the heart of the pyrotechnics, remains visible across Paris and does not get lost in the fiery display. Projecting light in daylight-type conditions is not that easy, as you might expect. Yannick Duc and Maxime Raffin of Expert Event, led by Emmanuel “Manu” Pouget, reveal their secrets and above all their thoughts behind this memorable occasion.
(from left to right) Yannick Duc, Emmanuel Pouget and Maxime Raffin. A great understanding which gradually led Yannick, Manu and Maxime to work together on this project.
The Show
SLU : Maxime, how did you come to work on this project with Yannick?
Maxime Raffin : It’s thanks to Manu, the manager at Expert Events. We had already worked together on the lighting of the Eiffel Tower in 2011. At that time, this was one of my first major projects but I had already been able to come up with a few ideas and one thing led to another, we were again chosen in 2019 and then again in 2021. We are starting to be a little more experienced and Yannick is the director of photography.
The 79 Proteus Hybrid Elation installed on the Trocadéro side.
Following our experience in 2019, we chose to specify 188 Elation Proteus Hybrid IP65 luminaires (fitted with a Philips MSD Platinum 21R 470W lamp) to project maximum light effects without having to protect them. We could have used other projectors protected by transparent coverings but at the risk of creating a double reflection and artefacts on the beam. In addition, this very powerful projector was available in large quantities.
SLU : So your choice was a trade-off between power and quantity?
Maxime Raffin : Yes, because previously we had installed 69 devices on the ground, but there was a lack of luminous intensity. Today there are 158 on the ground : 79 on the Trocadéro side and 79 on the École Militaire side. But in total, 188 Elation Proteus Hybrid IP65 projectors were deployed for this project.
In total, 188 Elation Proteus Hybrid IP 65 projectors will have been deployed for this project.
The difficulty with this project is that, although the fixture may be very powerful, the proximity means that we lose surface reflection. There are ways to improve this point by moving the fixtures back, but we are limited by the public on one side and the shadows cast from the lampposts located on a bridge on the other side. Furthermore, the fireworks are very imposing and the Tower tends to disappear as night turns to day and the beams struggle to impose themselves.
Different tilt settings to cover the entire surface of the tower.
SLU : How did you coordinate with the David Proteau team from Ruggieri, who were in charge of the fireworks?
Maxime Raffin : The fireworks are timecoded and therefore we also had to be in sync. David gives the instruction to Yannick Duc who follows it to the millimeter. We could switch to manual for fun, but it wouldn’t really matter.
Our show has a lot of effects. Yannick detailed all the titles of the soundtrack to mark the different rhythms or atmospheres like the bells on the song “Aerodynamic” by Daft Punk or on “Think” by Aretha Franklin, which we illustrated in green after having debated on the best color to represent freedom.
In the end, David Proteau, the designer for the fireworks, decided on green. Conversely, there are times when the light becomes more discreet and simple so as not to steal the show.
SLU : How did the creative phase go?
Maxime Raffin : We only learned two weeks ago that we had been chosen for this project. Normally, we have more time to prepare and with the CQLP Awards taking place simultaneously in addition to other sites we were working on, it was really a lot, hence the dark circles under my eyes today (laughs). So we worked together with Yannick who has a console at home and I have to say that he did it. He’s a very good one; he has magic fingers.
SLU : What visualization software did you work on?
Maxime Raffin : We work with Wysiwyg. Yannick prepares reference points and then we tap on the tower, at precise points and in tight bundles, to install our show. For this project, we installed a control point at the foot of the Eiffel Tower on either side and a third at the Trocadéro. A triangle fiber optic network connects consoles and projectors located on the ground, first and second floors. This network is redundant in the event that one of the sides is interrupted.
Wysiwyg 3D of the show
Emmanuel « Manu » Pouget : We have a global system, that is to say optical fiber, which is distributed from the Trocadéro to the end of the Champ-de-Mars and which returns to complete redundancy. That is to say that all the stations, all the places where there is a console, amps, nodes for light, intercoms, benefit from a fiber box.
Emmanuel Pouget debriefs with Simon Chartier, the sound manager.
Looping makes it possible. For example, if one of the fiber segments was torn off by a truck or if one of the fiber boxes were to have a problem, the signal keeps flowing.
The consoles are also redundant so if you lose one, the other takes over and they communicate together to the NPU using the MA-Net protocol. Finally, all the projectors are controlled in Artnet and connected to the nodes in standard DMX.
SLU : Was this choice of fiber due to the distance involved?
Manu : Yes. Today, with such a distance, there is not really a choice even if we did do otherwise 15 years ago with the problems that it caused. This is almost plug-and-play with a little upstream configuration. Once we connect to the network, we send the profiles to all the workstations and it works instantly. The big advantage of fiber is that it can carry all the signals over a single cable. We can then control the amplifiers, send Dante for sound, MA Net for light, we have a dedicated port for HF Bolero intercoms, with one antenna per floor of the Eiffel Tower, one further down and one at the Trocadero.
Maxime Raffin very attentive in front of his console while waiting for the start of the show which will be punctuated by a wave of explosions above his Algeco.
SLU : It must be nice to light up such a monument, it’s one of the emblems of Paris.
Maxime Raffin : We are still just as passionate and attentive, whether it is for the Eiffel Tower or for another building. But it is true that the Tower is different because it is not made up of solid surfaces. The arches create shadows and from the helicopter views you can watch the beams pass through; it’s visually interesting.
Yannick has managed to achieve quite interesting effects, sometimes with the impression that it is moving or falling apart. We’ve even been praised for the quality of the video effects (laughs). There is obviously no video projection but Yannick loves to be extremely precise and so it can give that feeling. In addition, with the grandMA, “Align” function, which allows you to perform color gradients and alignments of gobos without having to encode the projectors one by one, it is perfectly mastered.
The powerful beams of the Elation Proteus Hybrid, equipped with a Philips MSD Platinum 21R 470 W lamp cover the entire surface of the Eiffel Tower.
SLU : How did the rehearsals go?
Maxime Raffin : There were three days of encoding in Wysiwyg and then we worked 3 nights on site. In addition, the winner of the CQLP Awards, Alexandre Marcadé, had the honor to help design the last title. He was given a base and the instruction “have fun”. For the finale, the light is not necessarily the most visible but for him it was a great experience and he was like a kid. It’s also a way for us to promote new
(From left to right) Maxime Raffin, Yannick Duc, Emmanuel Pouget, Quentin Douriez, César Féraud and Alexandre Marcadé the winner of the CQLP competition who will have the honor of signing the last title of the show.
SLU : There are also 12 projectors on each side on the first floor and two rows of six fixtures on the second.
Maxime Raffin : These projectors are intended to illuminate the public in beams, to create effects and to illuminate the Eiffel Tower in color. The peculiarity this year is that the fireworks are in front of the fixtures, whereas usually it is the other way around. We therefore raised them a little by installing them on an enormous 20-meter arch, the bridges of which are held by heavy bases.
One of the two lines of 12 Proteus Hybrids on the first floor …
… and 2 x 6 machines on the second floor.
A great show and a great atmosphere within the team. We may know it by heart and see it again and again but the Eiffel Tower never ceases to amaze us, especially when it is adorned with multiple colored dots for Daft Punk, waves on the song “3SEX” by Indochine and Christine and the Queen, or projects her beams in perfect rhythm on “Blinding Lights” by The Weekend. By the way, speaking of being in perfect rhythm, you have surely noticed that the fireworks also mark the timing. We salute the perfect mastery of David Proteau and his team and cannot wait for next year!
Original French version of interview can be viewed here.
The Eiffel Tower with pretty projections and powerful beams that rival the explosions of fireworks.
Team List
Light & Sound
VANDEWALLE Lionel : Driver TRIPON Thomas : Light Technician ROGER Nicolas : Light Technician BOCHE Patrice : Light Technician CHAUVIN Quentin : Light Technician CHARTIER Simon : Head of Sound GONZALEZ Ronan : Assistant Son TAIEB Sydney : Sound Assistant FABUREL Juliette : Light Technician TRIPON Thomas : Light Technician BOCHE Patrice : Light Technician MARTIN Rémi : Light Technician CHAUVIERE Louis : Light Technician ROGER Nicolas : Light Technician BLANCO Matthieu : Light Technician FIGUEIREDO Jeremy : Light Technician DEVAUD Fabien : Technicien lumière GARENNE Martin : Assistant Light Technician MORGAN Sébastien : Assistant Light Technician MANKOURI Soyann : Assistant Light Technician
Ruggieri Team Fireworks
PROTEAU David : Artistic Director GABILAN Jérôme : Technical Director MARTIEL Florian : Chef de tir
CUETE is the latest moving head spot light fixture from Robe is a perfect compact, high-quality solution for small-to-medium productions, performance spaces or installations.
Robe wants to address some of the demands coming from the lighting professionals with the Cuete. It’s features, includes a fast pan and tilt movement to match with all genres of electronic music, for highlighting the creative work of DJs and enhancing club environments.
The Cuete, also offers a CMY colour mixing system and an 4,200-lumen output of white light according to the manufacturer. To achieve this output Cuete utilises Robe’s patented TE 120W White LED Engine which is at the core of the Transferable Engine technology.
The Cuete‘s16-degree fixed beam lens has remote control focus and can be swapped to the optional 24-degree lenses for shorter throw and low ceiling scenarios. Within its small frame, the Cuete is action-packed with Robe innovation.
This includes a CPulse flicker-free management system for setups using HD and UHD cameras, important for live streams / broadcasts; the L3 Low Light Linearity dimming software for super-smooth fades to black and the AirLOC (Less Optical Cleaning) technology which keeps the optical elements in good conditions over long time periods.
The fixture’s effects package includes a Colour Wheel with 13 dichroic filters; a Gobo Wheel with 9 fully indexable, rotating, replaceable gobos; a Static Gobo Wheel with 10 fixed gobos including four beam reducers: there is an 8-facet bi-directional rotating prism and a 5-degree frost filter to assist with producing fabulous, smooth even washes.
Robe Cuete color wheel
Robe Cuete fixed gobos
Robe Cuete rotating gobos
With this excellent combination of speed, features, and very small footprint, Robe’s Cuete is also a perfect spot light partner to the just-released LEDBeam 350.
For more info about Robe lighting and their products line, you can visit www.robe.cz and more about Robe Transferable Engine
Fynn Kliemann, a famous German YouTuber/musician/jack-of-all-trades is everywhere on YouTube, on TV and since this year also on Netflix. Together with the no less busy musician & podcaster (“Fest & Flauschig”) Olli Schulz, Kliemann renovated Gunter Gabriel’s old houseboat and lets viewers take part in the project in the streaming provider’s own documentary series. Already here, Adam Hall supplied sound reinforcement technology from LD Systems for the integrated music studio.
Now the Kliemannsland – the name of the creative and event space in Lower Saxony – has landed another web hit: a livestream with DJ Ben Böhmer (producer and DJ, deep house, progressive house) with 15,000 live viewers – and again a lot of material from Adam Hall was implemented. Last year, DJ Ben Böhmer played his exclusive sunrise set in a hot air balloon over Turkey, which caused a worldwide sensation. The setting from Kliemannsland was not less innovative, because while Böhmer was DJing, Fynn Kliemann and his team built the “stage” around the DJ. With them: lots of event technology from Cameo, LD Systems, Gravity and Defender.
A total of 14 Cameo ZENIT P100 DTW Outdoor LED PAR spotlights, two ZENIT W600 Outdoor Washlights, three AURO SPOT 300 moving heads as well as two Cameo F4 D Fresnel spotlights with daylight LEDs and a compact F1 T Tungsten spotlight were used for the live stream.
Cameo fog machines also provided a mystic touch to the atmosphere. Since the Kliemannsland is an extensive adventure playground and not a classic event location, cables had to be laid as safely as possible via Defender cable crossovers – and also withstand an errant excavator delivering beer to everyone on the location.
Two LD Systems MAUI 44 G2 column PA systems provided the sound reinforcement for the live act, while two ICOA 12 A active coaxial loudspeakers were used for DJ monitoring in the self-built pulpit.
Whether spotlights, loudspeakers or microphones (LD Systems U508 HHD 2 dual wireless microphone system) – what was not fixed on the floor, on rigs or otherwise, stood on various Gravity tripods.
The complete set “Ben Böhmer Live @ Kliemannsland”
Powersoft has confirmed the appointment of Akira Mochimaru to serve as its new global marketing director, effective immediately. His duties in this role will be to connect dots between customers, technology, products, communication, and distribution through strategic business planning and guiding implementation.
Based in the US, he will also coordinate with Powersoft’s operations in New Jersey to help growing the company’s presence in the install market through his knowledge and network of contacts.
Mochimaru has made his move to Powersoft permanent after serving as a consultant for three months. He comes with an outstanding pedigree and track record extending over 38 years in the pro audio industry, including working as general manager for Bose Professional.
“My personal mission is to connect customer experience and products through the use of advanced technology with unique value,” said Mochimaru. “I have already experienced situations where customer problem-driven ideas met a company’s technology driven ideas. Powersoft has the capability and foundation to convert technologies to solve customers’ problems and improve their experience, so I look forward to working closely with staff across the divisions to develop a plan and execute it with excellence.”
“When I first visited Powersoft’s HQ, I was immediately impressed by their capabilities in testing and the way they ensured product quality remained high throughout the design and manufacturing process. Their combination of innovative thinking and technical excellence made the decision to join Powersoft an easy one, and the trusting relationship I was able to establish straight away with Powersoft’s senior management was very reassuring.”
The new Board featuring Akira Mochimaru standing between Carlo Lastrucci Powersoft’s Chairman on his right and the CEO and CFO Luca Lastrucci.
“We are proud and delighted to have Akira Mochimaru joining our team” said Luca Lastrucci, CEO at Powersoft. “His appointment represents an important step in the process of implementing Powersoft’s strategy of strengthening its presence in the installation sector, especially in specific vertical applications. Akira’s experience will be essential to help us to encompass the current and future needs of the market, by focusing on objectives and defining the products of the future, which will make Powersoft able to maintain a leading role in professional audio.”
Luca Giorgi, Powersoft sales director, added: “Powersoft has been successfully interacting with partners and clients since the beginning; actively listening to their points of view on everything from product design to customer service. Having Akira on board allows us to improve the customer experiences even more, ensuring we always meet their needs and move quickly to solve their common problems.”
Scottish Ballet has recently taken possession of a second consignment of Robert Juliat Dalis 860 cyclorama lights bringing its total inventory to twenty-six. The award-winning Dalis 860 fixtures were supplied quickly and efficiently by Adlib’s Glasgow branch to provide Scottish Ballet with a versatile tool that can adapt to many environments and design requirements.
The upgrading of Scottish Ballet’s lighting systems began with a focus on cyclorama fixtures. “Cyc lighting is a fairly constant requirement at Scottish Ballet, and we don’t anticipate models to change dramatically. We wanted an LED replacement for our existing fixtures that looked the part as well as doing a great job,” explains Scottish Ballet’s Technical Director, Matt Strachan. “I have been looking at Robert Juliat’s Dalis at trade shows for several years but never had a chance to use them in anger and discover what they are capable of. Then we hired them for our world premiere of Christopher Hampson’s The Snow Queen for the winter season 2019/2020, lit by Paul Pyant, and our experience was enough to convince us to buy them.
“All it took was a quick phone call to Barclay Dakers at Adlib and the process was put into action. We have known Adlib for many years and always receive good service from them.” Robert Juliat is distributed exclusively in the UK by Ambersphere Solutions (www.ambersphere.co.uk) whose Ian Green supported Adlib and the Scottish Ballet in this project.
Scottish Ballet’s curved cyclorama is 15m wide with a 6m deflection and 7.5m high. “That’s a big swathe of cloth to light but we were able to position the Dalis units just 1.5m behind the cloth and they belted straight up and covered it beautifully. I remember thinking ‘that is superb! We need to start buying these!’” The RJ Dalis 860 cyclorama lights were purchased in two batches in early and mid 2020 to fit budget availability, and each unit was supplied with Quick Rig fittings and a flight case set up with link cables, DMX, etc as a complete package. “We can just wheel them out individually as they are, where and when we want them,” says Strachan.
“The low profile and slim dimensions mean they are so neat you can squeeze them into very tight environments, and they don’t need a great throw distance either. They are silent and give out very little heat which is much safer for the dancers. The Quickrig system is very sleek! It’s very well thought through and straightforward in how it can be deployed.”
The additional Dalis 860 fixtures gave Strachan and his team the opportunity to ‘futureproof’ the Ballet’s full scale shows, which will start with The Nutcracker during the winter season tour 2021/22, and will be followed by The Scandal at Mayerling, Coppelia, and a revival of The Snow Queen in 2022/23.
“Next year the Dalis will hardly be in their cases!” says Strachan. “Not only can we now populate the top and bottom of cyc entirely with Dalis for maximum coverage in a traditional setting, but we also have the flexibility of the kind that arose when we filmed Odyssey.”
Odyssey is a new work choreographed by Scottish Ballet Soloist, Nicholas Shoesmith. Directed by Ciaran Lyons, it was a high-octane short dance film that took viewers on a journey through a gaming landscape inhabited by otherworldly beings, where the real and virtual collide.
Filmed during lockdown in a 20m2 x 8m high pop-up performance space in Scottish Ballet’s production area, Odyssey’s futuristic design proved an unconventional setting for Dalis 860. Strachan rigged 26 Dalis units vertically on the set truss, in full view of the cameras, where they became an integral part of the structure within the virtual area. “Our initial assumption was that we would have to cover them with frost and conceal the units,” explains Strachan. “but the Dalis is so beautifully crafted they are pleasing to look at, even when they are switched off, so the TV Lighting Director asked for the covers to be removed as he wanted to see the lights themselves. We ended up making a feature of them on the structure for the camera looks and the TV team just loved them, happily replacing the lighting they brought with them. It was great to use Dalis in a completely different way from what we actually purchased them for.”
Scottish Ballet’s house MA2 lighting programmer, Kieran Kenning was excited to discover the potential Dalis offered when creating a series of designs to run up and down the face of the fixtures, making full use of their range of colours and programmability, to enhance the space-age ‘holodeck’ effect and create transition scenes as actors ‘transferred’ from one environment to the next.
“Kieran loves the Dalis for the flexibility that they give him. He came up with the designs for the effects for Odyssey and there is a lot more he can do there going forward,” says Strachan. “He can quickly create states to show a film company or a designer as they give him so much scope. We now have a tool that can adapt to most environments and requirements, and, being Robert Juliat, we would expect them to last at least 10 years.
“We’ve only just started to use Dalis – as time goes on we will develop our understanding and how much more usage we can have of them. Initially, I honestly cannot fault them in any shape or form.”
More information about Dalis 860 and all Robert Juliat products can be found on www.robertjuliat.fr and for:
Zodiac The Musical is a brand-new musical produced by Peet Nieuwenhuijsen, directed by William Spaaij and staged at the Koepelgevangenis, a former prison in Breda, The Netherlands, which provides a spectacular backdrop to this compelling and entertaining piece set in 2031 … focussed on a number of human, political and environmental issues.
Lighting designer Marc Heinz was among a talented team working under the technical production umbrella of Unlimited Productions – also based in Breda – helping to deliver this captivating new work. He and technical production manager Michiel van der Zijde – representing Unlimited Productions together with Jeffrey Kranen and Luc Huisman – also designed the set, and Marc specified 32 of Robe’s recently launched new T2 Profile fixture for the project, together with 50 x Robe Spiider LED wash beams and assorted other lighting fixtures. Marc and his assistant designer Jordy Veenstra, Michiel and the entire production team were delighted to be back working on a show after a long break due to the pandemic, and particularly in such a special space.
The prison was designed by Johan Fredrik Metzelaar and opened in 1886 based on a panopticon design, whereby the activities of four stories of cells could be observed by a minimal contingent of guards stationed in the centre. The Koepelgevangenis complex was designated a national monument in 2001 and housed a women’s prison until 2013 before closing completely two years later. Since 2018, it has been temporarily used as an event space, waiting for a new owner and a renovation plan.
Peet Nieuwenhuijsen needed a circular venue for his concept to work – which included spectacular projections onto a domed ceiling – and had initially staged an exploratory show in 2019 at the Planetarium Amsterdam. The venue was already selected before the pandemic intervened. Pre-production started in August 2020, with the original plan to start the setup / get-in on the 15th of February 2021. Covid-19, despite its massive disruption worldwide, only delayed this overall plan by 6 weeks as the get in started on the 1st of April. And … it presented some fundamental challenges for the production team, primarily an unknown weight loading for the domed roof, and for lighting in particular, it brought some unexpected gifts, like the glass brick ‘shower tower’ which became a permanent internally lit set feature and vital part of the narrative.
A glass-floored basement – installed in 1999 as a recreation area – was another brainteaser with no weight loading data. Special spreader arrangements had to be made to ensure seating tribunes and the four ovular stepped ramps that intersected the space and divided it into quadrants were installed without putting weight on the glass area.
The storyline – stage play by Dick van den Heuvel with dramaturgy by Pieter van de Waterbeemd – evoked surveillance society with constant Orwellian monitoring. Thirty-eight LED screens dotted around the upper levels are a metaphor for big data recording and crunching, with over 70 drones – provided by Dronisos from France – joining the cast as a reminder that shady, anonymous governmental institutions shrouded in secrecy and subversion are in control. The faceless technicians running these operations are sealed behind closed doors in the shower tower.
With original plans unavailable and no records existing in the municipality, a full 3D laser scan survey of the building was completed – needed for the UV-mapping of the projections – was followed by a painstaking rope access examination of the roof construction conducted by the Unlimited Productions team to ascertain the roof weight loading capacities … which were judged to be ‘extremely little’. They received the go-ahead to remove around 1000kg of old house lighting and associated steel detritus from the roof which freed up just enough capacity to rig a very small top centre circular truss at the top – which is rigged with the 12 x Robe Spiiders. These are bright enough to reach the stage 30 metres below for a general layer of wash lighting, and light enough to be safe!
The only other flown element is an ‘eye’ set piece which flies in and out. It was also necessary to remove the old house lighting to get a clear path for the 7 x 20K projectors rigged in seven prison cells on level four, spaced out around the 52.5-metre roof circumference.
Everything else had to be ground or side supported
After much mind mapping, Michiel, Marc and Ruud de Deugd (head rigger and production structural engineer) produced the elegant 8 x curved leg spider-like ground support structure design which connects to a 15-metre diameter circular truss in the middle positioned 12 metres above the central performance. This provides close lighting positions for the main performance space which is 14 metres in diameter complete with a double revolve stage. Being a prison, Koepelgevangenis has only one small entrance / exit and that’s not even enough to reverse an artic, so all the production kit had to be unloaded outside and hand-carried inside. This was a painstaking and longwinded process, but compared to normal, the build schedule was relaxed and fluid, as to some extent it had to relate to how the general Dutch pandemic response and the restrictions were developing.
Once the rigging and set were solid, Marc and Jordy began properly assessing the lighting needs having joined the project towards the end of 2020. Working in the round is always galvanising, getting any side light is a constant battle, and everything must look uniform from 360 degrees of spectator seating, so the Robe Spiiders on the spider structure are critical for top light coverage.
Robe T2 Profiles
The stage stays bare aside from a few props throughout the entire performance, putting huge emphasis on the cast and lighting to get the energy ramped up and the strong emotional impact of the piece across.
Front light was another enigma as it needed to be rigged around the cell tiers, and after a test revealed that the fourth floor was the optimum position, Marc auditioned several moving lights for this part including the Robe T2s, which were still a prototype at this time … but he chose it as his preferred profile to throw high-quality light the long distance from there to centre stage. Robe’s distributor Controllux then pulled out all the stops to ensure that lighting supplier Events Light, also close to Breda, received the fixtures in time for the get in!
Twenty T2s are fixed to the steel beams around the main interior wall, each individually attached to the building by rope access riggers. A rope sits next to each light so it can be lowered for service. The other 12 x T2 Profiles are on the top circle of the spider ground support, positioned for closer front lighting.
“The output and colour mixing were perfect,” related Marc, “together with the weight (36.9kg).” He also likes the frost effects together with the overall quality and finesse of the fixture. The cast are tightly choreographed by Stanley Burleson so elements like CRI and colour mixing are important to bring out the detail in the costumes without overpowering them with light.
Marc’s lighting is intricate and complex; he layers colour variants judiciously and meticulously on top of one another to evoke the mood and accentuate the emotion and intensity of the scenes and the seriousness of the messages. This treatment encourages intense concentration from viewers, so changes in the hue or shade have massive impact. There’s plenty of long slow fades and some beautifully tight and precise shuttering throughout to highlight the cast onstage on the ramps and around some other parts of the building.
Marc was also very excited to be using new technology. “There’s always that ground-breaking buzz when using something new, and while there’s a bit of risk as well, Robe is a brand that I know I can also absolutely rely on, so all of this underlined my decision to go with T2.” In fact, he has already specified T2 Profiles onto another musical show that he will be lighting later in the year!
Twenty-two of the Spiiders are on the spider (ground support) structure. These and the T2s also on there are accessed via a person lift as it is fully loaded with lights, so no climbing is possible. Access for getting the lift in position was also a consideration when positioning the seating and staging. Sixteen Spiiders are attached to the balcony around the third level of cells, used for washing the venue’s dome and supporting the projections, with the final 12 on the top circular truss right up on the roof.
All 92 moving lights – including all the T2 Profiles and Spiiders – are working in conjunction with a Follow Me automated followspot system which is at the heart of the design, and this ensures that all the main characters in this very busy and fast-paced show always have the right lights trained on them, even when they are rotating on the revolve rings, which is essential for helping to unravel the convoluted plot. In terms of style, Marc describes his lighting as an experimental blend of cinematic and operatic! All the show’s lighting is being supplied by Events Light, who were among the first in Europe to receive the T2 Profile.
Lighting control is via a Road Hog Full Boar console programmed by Jasper Nijholt. Projectors and media servers were programmed by Ruben Boogaard, and since the show premiered on 5th July, both lights and video are being operated by Pascal Schutijser. It is a mix of timecode for the large production numbers, but mostly manually operated lighting cues according to visual line-of-sight. Audio is designed by Jeroen ten Brinke. The video design is by Arjen Klerkx and content created by Anouk Steenbakkers and Joost Gulien.
For more info about Robe lighting and their range of products you can visit www.robe.cz
In this period of the current health crisis, which is still disrupting the international trade shows, Claypaky has come out with a virtual trade show stand full of new products. Take an hour of your time to delve into the nooks and crannies of this site, where you’ll find videos of product presentations and tutorials, photos and product features.
After registering for your badge, you can enter the Claypaky virtual stand.
The 2021 lineup includes an exciting Mini Xtylos HPE, an all-weather Xtylos Aqua, an interchangeable Arolla Profile and Spot with a 470 W LED engine, a 3-layer LED effects batten, a base with limitless pan rotation for static fixtures, a precision LED PAR from ADB for the theater, and more.
Mini Xtylos HPE
Following up on the Xtylos, Claypaky is now offering its laser source technology in two new luminaires: the spectacular Mini Xtylos HPE for all types of venues and the Xtylos Aqua, which is IP66-rated to withstand outdoor weather conditions.
The Mini-Xtylos.
The Mini Xtylos HPE is more compact, much lighter (9 kg) and more energy efficient (90 VA at 230 Volts) than the Xtylos, with its 20 W source consisting of three diodes emitting in Red, Green and Blue, the mixing of which allows the creation of a full range of colors through additive synthesis. Its exclusive TURBO system allows it to emit a beam with saturated and deep colors, with unparalleled energy and a linear CTO.
This Mini Xtylos does not incorporate gobos but, in order to create spectacular aerial effects, it includes a 1°–4° zoom, continuous pan rotation combined with 270° tilt, two rotating prisms and an interchangeable frost. Its intensity can reach 24 million candelas at an angle of 1°.
Xtylos Aqua
Similar in every way to the original Xtylos, the IP66-rated Xtylos Aqua offers marine-grade protection against the elements and is equipped with a fan to eliminate condensation from the output lens, for consistent performance. It can therefore be used in any conditions, indoors or outdoors.
Xtylos Aqua, IP66.
Arolla Profile MP | Arolla Spot MP
In the Arolla range, following up on the HP (High Power) series equipped with a 1200 W LED source, Claypaky launches the MP (Medium Power) series in Spot and Profile versions with a 470 W white LED engine and a luminous flux of up to 22,000 lm, all in a very compact and light format (25 kg). The distinctive feature of this series is the eSWAP concept, i.e. the interchangeability of the framing module and a gobo module to switch from Profile to Spot or vice versa. The electronics recognize which module is installed and configure it automatically without user intervention in the control menu.
Arolla Profile MP.
Claypaky, has equipped the Arolla Profile MP fixture with a 6°–50° zoom, a linear CMY+CTO color mixing system combined with a seven-color wheel that includes an 88+ CRI enhancement filter. The source has a native color temperature of 6000 K.
In terms of effects, the Arolla Profile MP comes with a framing module, a wheel with seven rotating gobos that, thanks to the exclusive “Go-Bright” technology, do not waste light or change color when inserted into the beam.
The fixture also includes an animation wheel and a 4-facet rotating prism. For beam control, there is an iris, a variable frost, and a 24-bit dimmer with four dimming curves. To cool the LED engine, five fan speed modes are available: 1200 – 800 – 600 – Silent – Theater.
Tambora Batten
The Tambora Batten LED fixture offers advanced pixel mapping capabilities and a three-layer operation option. With this feature, the operator can choose to use three levels of effects simultaneously, such as background color, internal sequence, and mapped video content from an external source – switching between all layers quickly and easily to create complex effects quickly.
Tambora Batten
With the Tambora Batten, you can also obtain two different visual effects by choosing between two output lens options, the round lens being more suitable for graphic effects, and the square lens for aerial effects with its uniform, defined beam. The two lens options are interchangeable.
Tambora Batten with round lenses.
Tambora Batten with square lenses.
The 16 Osram 40 W RGBW LEDs are independently controllable in terms of color, intensity and strobe frequency. Multiple units can be arranged in a row or matrix while maintaining an equal distance between the LED sources, whether they are side by side or in a cluster.
Tambora Batten features a 4°–50° linear zoom with automatic retraction/repositioning in the absence of a DMX signal, a 24-bit dimmer with five response curves, a motorized tilt with a range of over 220°, color temperature correction from 2500 K to 8000 K, beam edge softening control for uniform washes, an anti-halo accessory, and four operating modes.
Panify
Panify
Claypaky introduces an innovative and useful tool for when you need to move a static fixture in a panning motion or in continuous rotation. Panify is IP66-rated and works in any position.
Fixtures without motorized pan such as the Tambora Batten or the Mini-B PARLED Aqua from Claypaky come to mind, but Panify can be adapted to most of the static fixtures of other brands on the market, as long as their weight does not exceed 30 kg. When the load is less than 20 kg, Panify can rotate at up to 50 rpm. Its maximum speed of rotation becomes 22 rpm for loads exceeding 20 kg.
The Panify has two power connectors: one input for itself and one for the fixture that it holds. Thanks to its crossbar design, power and DMX data are routed to the fixture without risk to the cables during continuous rotation. PANIFY draws about 150 W, requires only a few DMX channels to operate and can receive wireless DMX. Panify is not limited to lighting fixtures; it can be used to transform scenery, signs, displays and more.
ADB Actoris ParLed
Designed to meet the growing demand for small, quiet and efficient fixtures, the ADB Actoris ParLed weighs only 6 kilograms and is 306 mm long. The first fixture in a specialized theater line, this product features an RGBWW LED source, which produces warm color temperatures with a CRI >90, perfect for matching any skin tone or scenery on stage, as well as offering natural pastel colors. The white range is adjustable from 2500 K to 6500 K.
ADB Actoris PARLED.
The use of a special warm-white LED does not diminish the light output: Actoris ParLed is able to deliver a flux of 3,400 lumens. It provides extremely quiet operation, thanks to the use of special axial fans, and features a motorized zoom that can be varied from 4° to 53°, a 24-bit electronic dimmer with five response curves, four operating modes, and optional shutters and a frost filter holder.
CloudIO
CloudIO
CloudIO is a cloud-based IoT device that provides service technicians with full diagnostics of most Claypaky units and enables firmware updates. As of version 1.4.1.2, CloudIO can also read settings from all RDM-enabled devices, regardless of brand.
Mini-B, Midi-B, Mini-B Parled Aqua in WW (Warm White) versions
Claypaky has added a Warm White RGBW LED version to its Mini-B series, featuring a warm color temperature of 3200 K. The Mini-B WW, Midi-B WW, Mini-B ParLed Aqua WW feature the same power as the original models. They produce warm tones to properly render the skin tones of performers on stage.
Studio 9 at Porches Inn in North Adams, Massachusetts invites superlatives but otherwise defies categorization. A fully sustainable and architecturally striking structure, it was originally conceived as a dining and event venue.
However, with installation of Meyer Sound Constellation® active acoustics in 2019, it was transformed into an intimate live performance and recording space. With the addition of the Spacemap® Go spatial sound design and live mixing tool earlier this year, Studio 9 has fully evolved into a one-of-a-kind laboratory for musical innovation.
FreshGrass Foundation founder and president, Chris Wadsworth.
The principal partner in Studio 9 venture is FreshGrass Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to preserving, supporting and creating innovative grassroots music. Studio 9 is already proving a valuable adjunct to the FreshGrass Festivals — staged at nearby MASS MoCA since 2011 and now also in Bentonville, Arkansas — in developing and promoting new generations of roots music artists.
“There is a shared vision and a shared ecosystem between Studio 9 and FreshGrass,” says the foundation’s founder and president, Chris Wadsworth. “Our objective is to turn Studio 9 into a beacon of creativity and innovation. One of the wonderful things about this building is that, with Constellation, you can tune the room to the composition, so it is more like an art installation than a concert venue.”
Studio 9 Curator but also creative and technical head, Dave Dennison.
Another pivotal player at Studio 9 is Dave Dennison, a long-time Meyer Sound associate whose new title as Curator encompasses a broad swath of creative and technical roles, from artist development through studio engineering. Dennison was originally brought in to supervise 2019 recordings by the Kronos Quartet, but was convinced to stay on in a permanent role.
“Studio 9 is a great place to record,” emphasizes Dennison, “because it offers more freedom for musicians. With Constellation, they are not tied to a recording session where they need headphones. It is much more like a free-form rehearsal space.”
The MPS-488HP smart power and the D-Mitri digital audio platform of Studio 9, both needed to run Constellation.
The recent addition of Spacemap Go took Studio 9’s potential up yet another notch. “Spacemap Go is an extremely powerful tool,” says Dennison. “In a live setting it offers the engineer the ability to fly things around the venue. You are not tied to two speakers in a stereo field, or even a typical surround mix.
Here, you are completely immersed in close to fifty speakers, all individually addressable, so you can fly an instrument or voice anywhere. All the trajectories can be saved in sync with the music, so you have a beautifully spatialized mix that can be replayed here, or even at other venues equipped with Spacemap Go.”
Both Constellation and Spacemap Go use the same complement of 37 full range, self-powered loudspeakers (MM-4XP™ and UP-4slim™) and 10 MM-10XP™ miniature subwoofers. Constellation also utilizes 16 miniature cardioid microphones for ambient sensing and a D-Mitri® digital audio platform to host the patented VRAS acoustical algorithm.
Spacemap Go is driven by three GALAXY™ 816 processors. Constellation and Spacemap Go can be used separately or simultaneously, with spatial sound trajectories overlaid on flexible acoustical environments. The creative audio capabilities also can be used to augment Studio 9’s Vive Enterprise Arena VR system. The Studio 9 control room is centered around an Avid S6 mixing console with monitoring via three Meyer Sound Acheron Designer loudspeakers and an X 400C™ compact cinema subwoofer.
The remarkable integration of the various Meyer speaker references necessary for both Constellation and Spacemap Go in the conical wooden ceiling of the room.
Parsons Audio Managing Partner Roger Talkov.
System integrator for the project was Parsons Audio (Wellesley Hills, MA) under the direction of Managing Partner Roger Talkov, with Matt Dailey serving as project manager for the Spacemap Go upgrade.
“The Constellation installation was challenging because of the precision tolerances required, which was complicated by the conical roof shape and ceiling system,” notes Talkov. “That made microphone and speaker positioning extremely difficult in the 3D space. The payoff in attention to detail was quick commissioning and a fantastic textbook outcome. The musicians that played in Studio 9 when it first opened raved about how easy and comfortable it was for them to perform.”
The Porches Inn was built by the Wadsworth family and it is located adjacent to the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA). Studio 9 operates as a partnership of MASS MoCA, Dave Dennison, FreshGrass Foundation and THE OFFICE performing arts + film.
Lighting designer Tom Sutherland of DX7 Design specified 326 x Robe MegaPointes as part of the lighting rig for the 2021 season of American Idol, for which the live shows and final were produced by Freemantle Media and recorded on Stage 36 of CBS Television City in Los Angeles, California, USA. Tom was delighted to join the live show creative team for the first time, although he’s worked on the audition stages of the competition before. Award-winning director Phil Heyes approached Tom to bring his fresh modernist style to the bigger picture and he came in with a rock ‘n’ roll-style design carefully balanced for television.
He worked alongside some serious talent including creative director and co-executive producer Brian Burke – with whom Tom also collaborates on pop phenomenon Westlife – and set designer Florian Wieder, plus a trove of other smart and creative individuals with unique production skills including art director Steve Morden.
Season 4 of the show on ABC was the first time American Idol has been run without an audience – due to pandemic restrictions – although 50 x Covid-tested members of the public were allowed in for each live show broadcast, seated in club-style booths which add a touch of ‘classic ambiance’ to the aesthetic.
Robe MegaPointe
The video-based set was fully automated on 37 x moving points and hugely dynamic. The architecture of the space could be dramatically shifted at the touch of a button, and Tom’s main challenge was to accentuate the overall feeling of space and make the studio look as big, impressive and rock star-like as possible! The lighting rig was designed at maximum width, expanding into the roof and right out to each side – above what would normally be the audience – with transformed the venue’s visuality.
The MegaPointes, all supplied by Felix Lighting together with around 1300 other fixtures, were rigged in eight large trussing pods forming a ceiling above the performance area. Then there were two rows of MegaPointes all around the perimeter (back and sides) of the upstage LED screen in a ‘goal post’ configuration.
Sixteen MegaPointes per side were positioned behind the left and right band risers onstage, with a final row of these workhorse moving lights running along the front truss. To make the ‘global’ design work, the pods and horizontal trusses above them had to be millimeter-perfectly aligned as well as positioned specific to one another so the critical key lights rigged above could reach the presenter, performer, and judges’ positions below whatever the format of screens and lighting, unhindered by metalwork or other obstacles.
“It was a bit like piecing together a giant jigsaw!” stated Tom, “and all credit to Frank Dawson from Kish Rigging and Jesse Sugimoto from SGPS Showrig who coordinated all the production rigging and automation elements.” Automation was programmed by Daniel Sturman, and all the motion and lighting cues worked in unison.
The substantial upstage LED screen split horizontally and vertically into four segments and flew up into the roof, so more lighting was needed during these moves to fill the voids, especially out to the sides. Behind the back screens was a massive cross-shaped wall of light. The MegaPointes in the pods were used to ‘wrap’ the room in a layer of stunning lighting, cross-referencing with the fixtures around the screen and on the deck.
Tom enjoyed the many challenges of lighting this forever changing space including always keeping focus on the artists, even though they were surrounded by a vast amount of technology and a succession of visual WOW moments. The versatility of the MegaPointes, the big video set presence and the automation combined unleashed an ultimately adaptable environment ensuring each of the approximately 170 songs and performances – across the run of live shows – looked completely different.
While the MegaPointe was a valued “workhorse” fixture for this production offering a near-infinite range of looks, Tom is the first to credit his programmers Joe Holdman and Nate Files for their skills in crafting the array of intricate and colorful looks.
“In scenarios like this, it is essential to have multiple lights and a core fixture that is a good spot, wash and beam in equal measure,” he summed up. Six Robe BMFL Spots on six RoboSpot systems were also utilized, three for back spots, three for fill spots and one positioned at FOH for low-level spotting when the ceiling pods were in / down. grandMA2 was the lighting control platform. Tom’s FOH included associate designer Hunter Selby and media server programmer Scott Chmielewski. The gaffer was AJ Taylor and the best boy Danny Vincent, both working closely with lighting techs Dom Adamé and Brian Karol.
Nicole Barnes was the account handler at Felix Lighting. She enthused, “This was the first year Felix Lighting has been involved with the American Idol Production. Tom’s designs presented us with exciting opportunities to grow and ride along with someone who we admire and respect. “Tom’s collaboration with production designer Florian Weider has produced some next-level stuff. Rigging, automation, camera work and video content choreographed with lighting were all executed flawlessly by the onsite production and design teams. I was excited to tune in each week to see what happened next!”
Working with Tom has been “a highlight” of Nicole’s career so far. “In addition to his obvious talent, he is one of the most gracious, humble, and delightful people I’ve had the pleasure to know.” She confirmed. Nicole further explains that being a part of this season has been vital to all at Felix, helping pave a way for the industry’s return to a post-pandemic world that is getting people back to work, keeping others safe, and contributing to the overall health of the economy, “all of which have been top priority for us personally and professionally.”
American Idol’s live show production / broadcast period ran from March to May and was extremely well received. Hosted by Ryan Seacrest, with Katy Perry, Lionel Richie and Luke Bryan as judges. the executive producers were Trish Kinane and Megan Wolflick … and the 2021 winner was Chayce Beckham.
For more info about Robe lighting and their products line, you can visit www.robe.cz
Ayrton presents Perseo Beam, an IP65-rated, beam moving-head fixture with an LED source. Its ultra-tight beam can be zoomed down to 2° and it boasts a 21:1 zoom ratio. It is featured here in a video made at Aquatique Show, a spectacular ballet of beams dancing in the rain.
It offers a vast selection of gobos – totaling 48, between static and rotating gobos on two wheels – including 28 glass gobos for high-definition image projection and 20 metal gobos specially designed to sculpt aerial beams. These gobos can be multiplied using four rotating prisms, which can be combined to produce a multitude of volumetric mid-air effects. A multi-layer RGB/CMY gobo creates dynamic multi-color effects.
An animation wheel, with continuous rotation in either direction, and two frost filters round out the effects package of the fixture. Continuous rotation on the pan axis expands the possibilities for creating complex effects.
Les gobos verre rotatifs.
Les gobos fixes, verre et métal.
Roue chromatique multiposition.
The color section of Perseo Beam includes a CMY color mixing system, a linear progressive CTO filter, and an instant-access, multi-position color wheel that includes four filters for color temperature correction, plus 13 supplementary color filters arranged in two concentric circles (patent pending).
Terminated by a 168 mm output lens, the optical system uses 13 lenses, providing a zoom range of 2° to 42°. A brand new, ultra-compact 450 W, 6800 K white LED engine, specially developed for long-throw applications, delivers a luminous flux of 18,000 lumens.
We are starting to get a clearer understanding of the Ayrton product portfolio, which they are restructuring in order to limit the number of references. The stage lighting catalog is organized into four power categories:
– Category 3 : 200/300 W – Category 5 : 400/500W – Category 7 : 600/700 W – Category 9 : 1000 W
Each category will use two names, one for classic fixtures, and another for waterproof fixtures. With the exception of the creative fixtures already established in the catalog, such as the MagicPanel, DreamPanel, MagicDot and NandoBeam multi-source washes, there will eventually be a maximum of eight product designations, each with a suffix indicating its type: Beam or LT, Profile and Wash.
– “Beam” for effect fixtures with an ultra-tight beam, down to 2°. – “LT” for high-powered, long-throw stage lighting fixtures. – “Profile” indicates models with a framing module. – “Wash” indicates models with a Fresnel lens.
Perseo is the first product to adopt this approach. This IP65 category 5 fixture with a 450 W source is now available in Profile and Beam versions.
