Dirty Dancing

Transcription

Dirty Dancing

Vol. 10.3
Disney Castle Gets New Coat of Color
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Road Test: Chroma-Q Color Block 2, page 26
APRIL
2009
Philips Adds Selecon
to its Global Portfolio
Video Bathes
Dirty Dancing
AMSTERDAM — Royal Philips
acquired New Zealand-based Selecon, a designer, manufacturer and
distributor of professional theatrical
and architectural lighting fixtures.
Under the terms of the agreement,
Philips will acquire the business assets of Selecon New Zealand Limited, Selecon UK Limited, Selecon
North America LLC and Aureol Lighting Limited. No financial details on
the transaction were disclosed.
“Selecon’s highly acclaimed
luminaires for the theatrical and
architectural markets will further
strengthen the breadth of solutions
Philips can offer to important professional customers such as performing
arts centers, churches, convention
centers and hotels,” said Rudy Provoost, chief
continued on page 7
The dancing may be dirty, but
video projections of rippling water
and tall grass bathed the stage, immersing the characters in the projected surroundings for Dirty Dancing: the Original Story on Stage.
For the production’s recent preBroadway run in Chicago, the crew
helped bring the movie to the stage
by bringing moving images to the
set. Jon Driscoll, video and projection designer, used an LED screen,
a projection wall and projected images on the stage floor as well.
With over 100 scenes in the fastmoving production, the audience
was treated to a production that was
faithful to the cinematic original. But
if each show was like making a movie on stage, the director and crew
faced one important difference: no
opportunity to yell, “Cut!” until the
final curtain made it a wrap.
For more, turn to page 16.
2009 Parnellis to
Include “IT” Awards
Rigorous testing proved that vivid, energy-efficient lighting wasn’t just a fairy tale.
When Walt Disney World®’s Facility Asset Management (FAM) group came to Walt Disney World Entertainment’s in-house lighting designer Charley Pogue with a query about replacing the lighting on Disney’s iconic Cinderella Castle, he had little idea what might lie ahead. FAM wanted to see what it might
take to replace the 700-watt arc source fixtures that have been lighting the Castle for 10 years. The fixtures
continued on page 6
had served their purpose and parts for the discontinued luminaires had become
Osram and Traxon/e:cue Form Joint Venture
NEW YORK — In a bid for a bigger piece of the growing global market for LED systems and solutions,
Osram has forged a joint venture with Hong Kong-based Traxon Technologies Ltd.
Called Traxon Technologies — An Osram Company, the joint venture pools the resources of Osram with
both former Traxon Technologies companies, Traxon and e:cue Lighting Controls.
The deal gives Osram a majority stake in the 135-employee company, but with Traxon retaining its branded identity under the Osram umbrella. The joint venture will continue operating primarily in Asia, Europe and
North America.
New “Indispensable Touring” Products To
Be Honored in Four Categories
LAS VEGAS —Want to know what
this year’s “IT” is? So do we.
The Parnelli Board of Advisor is announcing an important addition to the
popular Parnelli Awards. This year, for
the first time ever, four new products
will receive a special Parnelli Award, the
“IT Award” in recognition of their contribution to the live event industry.
The nomination process is open to
all readers of PLSN and FOH magazines,
live event professionals, and live event
product manufacturers. The nomination process will start July 15 and
end August 31. The Parnelli Board will
tabulate the votes and then offer a total of 20 of the top nominees, five each
continued on page 7
in these four
23
33
36
Buyers Guide
White LED luminaires add a new
dimension to Haitz’s law.
Focus on Fundamentals
Why footcandle-stacking doesn’t
add up.
LD-at-Large
Helping small nightclub bands
get into gear.
Ad info:http:// www.plsn.com/instant-info
APRIL 2009
www.plsn.com
Features
Showtime
East Coast Lighting and Production Services (ECLPS) lights up a gig for
radio station WXKS Kiss 108FM.
16 Inside Theatre
Dirty Dancing goes from the movies to the stage with the help of
a video wall and immersive projected imagery. The scenes change
frequently — more than 100 times during the course of the play.
23 Buyers Guide
If LEDs have had their sticking points in the past, the newest gear
keeps chipping away at old concerns ranging from erratic dimming
to color shadows.
26 Road Test
The Chroma-Q Color Block 2 looks very familiar at first, but along
with more output, the new units, equipped with “single color” LEDs,
are better at producing a subtle range of pastel hues.
Columns
4 Editor’s Note
Thinking “green” can help save the planet — and lighting-related
energy expenses as well.
14
31 Video World
SDI stands for more than just an old vision of a futuristic missle
defense system. It points to what’s going on inside the coax.
32 Feeding the Machines
Production Profile
W H AT ’ S H O T
CONTENTS
When it stops being fun, a day off, a change of scenery and an
awareness of your state of mind can put you back on track.
33 Focus on Fundamentals
The extreme athletes at the Red Bull Snowscrapers event in New York
weren’t the only ones braving the elements — and rigging structure.
Doubling the footcandles from stacked light sources don’t always
make things twice as bright. Here’s why.
36 LD-at-Large
Putting tight-budget bands in their best light.
Departments
20
5News
8Calendar
8In Brief
9International News
11On the Move
12Product News
14Showtime
27Projection Connection
28Projection Connection News
30Projection Connection New Products
Ad info:http:// foh.hotims.com
W H AT ’ S H O T
P R O J E C T I O N , L I G H T S & S TA G I N G N E W S
EDITOR’S NOTE
P R O J E C T I O N L I G H T S & S TA G I N G N E W S
By RichardCadena
Greenbacks for Green Fees
The Publication of Record for the Lighting,
Staging and Projection Industries
Publisher
Terry Lowe
In the interest of greening the world,
I’d like to do you a favor. Please send one
dollar (U.S. or Canadian), pound sterling,
Euro, or any currency of equivalent value,
to my PayPal account and in return I’ll send
you 3.5 percent of your money back. That’s
about the percentage of light energy you
get from an incandescent lamp compared
to the amount of energy you pay for in
electricity to operate it. By sending me
your dollar and getting back 3.5 percent of
sive ways to learn this lesson. You could
spec or use the wrong gear and then
$0.965, or 96.5 percent, of your Euro will
be chump change. Many of us are wasting
lots of money on inefficiency, and though
you may or may not be aware of it, there
are things you can do to mitigate it. For
example, you could consider using LEDs
instead of incandescent lamps. I know, I
know…LEDs aren’t quite enough of this
and they’re too much of that. That may or
Many of us are wasting lots of money on
inefficiency, and though you may or may
not be aware of it, there are things you
can do to mitigate it.
your money, it will serve as a reminder to
use energy more efficiently. The 96.5 percent I keep is the service charge for increasing your awareness. We’ll call it the “green
fee.” You’re welcome.
There are actually much more expen-
may not be true, depending on the time of
day. You see, the technology is changing so
rapidly that what is true today may or may
not be true tomorrow.
Those of us who grew up when LEDs
were no more than on/off indicator lights
on transistor radios understand just how
far and how fast we’ve come. There was a
time in the not-too-distant past when the
thought of using LEDs for brake lights was
considered nonsense. And not many of us
predicted how soon afterward they would
be used for traffic signal lights. And when
a then-unknown company called Color Kinetics debuted LED PAR cans at LDI, many
industry professionals laughed behind
their backs. Who’s laughing now? (Hint:
they are now called Philips Color Kinetics.)
But these green beauties are still not
being used for large-scale general illumination. Or are they? Wait for it…here it
comes…Okay, now. According to a press
release from Lumileds (yet another Philips
company), some LED streetlights have
just been installed in Osaka Japan. They’re
not the first LED streetlights but they are,
according to the press release, “…part of
an emerging movement to bring LED illumination to streets and sidewalks.” These
particular streetlights have 36 Luxeon LEDs
and generate 30 lux at a pole height of 4.5
meters (14 feet, 9 inches), which is comparable in brightness to the mercury
lamps they’re replacing.
Think about that. LED technology
is at the point where it can compete favorably to discharge lamps in terms of
brightness. For those of us who remember when LEDs were primarily used as
indicator lights, that’s mind blowing.
On the other hand, those low-pressure mercury vapor lamps with the amber glow that some LED streetlights are
replacing aren’t exactly the pinnacle
what we call the quality of light. Care to
take a guess what the CRI of those puppies is? Try zero. Yes, zero. They render
all objects that weird orange-yellow,
with the possible exception of objects
that really are orange-yellow.
So we’re approaching the point
where LEDs are bright enough, but is
the quality of light good enough? ETC
apparently thinks so. They just laid out
some cold, hard cash for a company
formerly called Selador, who manufactures a line of LED fixtures with the
x7 Color System™. These fixtures use
seven different color LEDs to reproduce the entire visible spectrum. To my
eye the quality of light looks an awful
lot like tungsten and renders color well
enough to be used in the theatre. And
these LED fixtures are one of two or
three that I’ve seen with dimming that
rivals incandescent dimming, which is
hard to do with LEDs.
The point of all this is to say that
we’re running out of excuses not to try
new green technology. And since lighting accounts for a large portion of the
electricity we use, you, the professional
lighting community, more than any
other singular entity, have the power
to do something good for your clients, for yourself, and the world – think
green.
tlowe@plsn.com
Editor
Richard Cadena
rcadena@plsn.com
Managing Editor
Frank Hammel
fhammel@plsn.com
Editorial Assistant
Victoria Laabs
vll@plsn.com
Contributing Writers
Paul Berliner, David John Farinella,
Kevin M. Mitchell, Bryan Reesman,
Brad Schiller, Nook Schoenfeld
Photographer
Steve Jennings
Art Director
Garret Petrov
gpetrov@plsn.com
Web Master
Josh Harris
jharris@plsn.com
National
Advertising Director
Gregory Gallardo
gregg@plsn.com
Account Manager
James Leasing
jleasing@plsn.com
Production Manager
Linda Evans
levans@plsn.com
General Manager
William Hamilton Vanyo
wvanyo@plsn.com
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Projection, Lights & Staging News (ISSN:
1537-0046) Volume 10, Number 3 Published monthly by Timeless Communications Corp. 6000 South
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ESTA
ENTERTAINMENT SERVICES &
TECHNOLOGY ASSOCIATION
IATSE Locals
Unanimously Ratify
New Hollywood
Basic Agreement
LOS ANGELES — The 15 Hollywood-based
locals representing over 35,000 members of
the IATSE working in motion picture and television production have ratified the new Hollywood Basic Agreement with the AMPTP. The
three-year contract, which will go into effect
August 1, 2009, was tentatively proposed last
November, with drafting completed in February.
“We have delivered a strong contract in
a very chaotic economic climate,” said Matthew D. Loeb, IATSE president. “We feel we
have given our members the best protection
we can at a time when the bottom is falling
out of a lot of traditional business models. We
look forward to three years of labor stability
and a commitment to keeping our members
working.”
InterAmerica Stage
Acquires Independent
Theatrical Installations (ITI)
DAYTONA BEACH, FL — InterAmerica
Stage, Inc. (IAstage) acquired Independent
Theatrical Installations, Inc. (ITI), a contractor providing stage, orchestra and organ lifts
since the early 1980s.
“InterAmerica Stage has long been a supporter of stage lift technology and lift controls
that implement industrial PLCs and software”
said Mark Black, IAstage executive president,
adding that the acquisition will further IAstage’s plans to develop methods for lift platform motion, controls and safety.
James Cherniss managing director of
ITI, has been retained as special consultant
to IAstage. A new line of lift products called
LiftDeck made their debut at USITT 2009 in
Cincinnati.
U.S. Department of Energy
Honors LED R&D
WASHINGTON, DC — The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) honored
Philips Color Kinetics with award for its
progress on an 18-month R&D project
funded with a $1.7 million DOE grant.
The LED PAR lamp, which could be
made available to mainstream lighting
markets later this year, has a performance target of 70 lumens per watt,
exceeding the efficacy of conventional
PAR lamp alternatives by four to five
times.
Of more than 50 companies receiving DOE R&D funding, only a few are
recognized with awards. Philips Color
Kinetics was honored for the second
year in a row.
DOE also honored Philips’ existing eW® Cove Powercore, eW Profile
Powercore and eW Downlight SM
Powercore with a separate award cosponsored with the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America and
the International Association of Lighting Designers.
NEWS
San Diego Convention Center Requires ETCP
Certification for Supervisors
SAN DIEGO — The San Diego Convention Center has revised its rigging requirements and now requires that all rigging installations be done under the supervision of
a rigging supervisor who is certified through
the Entertainment Technician Certification
Program (ETCP).
“As an early supporter of the Entertainment Technician Certification Program, we
at IATSE Local 122, understand the value of
supporting the vision of ETCP to provide a
benchmark set to establish the skill levels of
technicians within our profession,” said Carlos Cota, IATSE 122’s business agent.
“So, when the San Diego Convention
Center proposed a change in their rigging
policy stating that there would be an ETCP
certified rigger on every rigging call to supervise any rigging installations at the Convention Center, we were on board immediately. We are glad to see SDCC’s support
and recognition of the ETCP program as a
nationally recognized standard in the entertainment industry.”
ETCP certification can be done computer based-testing at one of 190 testing
centers around the U.S. and Canada. If a
company has 10 or more candidates interested in taking the exam, ETCP can arrange
for on-site test administration. The examinations will also be administered in conjunction with the LDI Show in November 2009
in Orlando, Fla.
NEWS
Disney Castle Gets New Coat of Color
continued from cover
scarce, while the labor to keep them working had increased. And there were far more
environmentally friendly options available.
So Pogue, with the aid of a local vendor,
coordinated a “lighting challenge” following Super Bowl XLII in Miami, where much
of the gear from the football championship,
from beam projectors to wash lights, came
to the Magic Kingdom® Park to compete for
a chance to permanently light the Castle. In
all, eight manufacturers set up on the lawn
adjacent to the Castle one night and demonstrated their wares after the park had closed
for the evening.
None of the gear was the clear winner
due to either output, beam pattern or color
palette. Walt Disney World Entertainment
had been successful using energy-saving
LEDs for a number of other lighting treatments around the property, so the team
decided to take a look at a local distributor’s
LED fixtures for the Castle as well. Since the
throw distances involved were as long as 126
feet, Pogue was concerned about using LEDs
in this type of application. So once again, a
test on the Castle was arranged.
The test proved surprising. The fixture
worked from the standpoint of both inten-
sity and color, so they expanded the test
and brought out a total of four fixtures to
compare them side-by-side with a few of
the original fixtures. “We were getting more
light out of four lights than from 14 of the
arc-source lights,” Pogue said.
LED Concerns
It was an interesting turn of events. While
LEDs were certainly the first choice from an
energy saving and maintenance standpoint,
there had been reservations about using LEDs
at the onset of the project due to concerns
about lighting output. “Based on my past
experience, I didn’t think the amber and blue
colors in the LEDs were going to be bright
enough for what we wanted,” Pogue said.
There were other concerns as well, including the color rendering and flickering.
How video rendered the lighting was “really
important,” according to Pogue. “The week
before the test, a Disney community outreach
group did a show at Epcot® to benefit local
arts organizations. I could see that the cameras weren’t balanced correctly. As I was sitting
in the audience observing, I saw the LED fixtures in use there surge in intensity on screen
and it rendered color differently than it was in
actuality.” So Pogue asked the Disney broadcast group to shoot a test in hi-definition and
standard definition, and then compared the
playback for color matching, among other
criteria. Pogue was happy to find “the result
was spot on.”
In the end, Walt Disney World Entertainment replaced a total of 34 arc-source fixtures
with 74 five-watt LED fixtures, cutting the total power requirements by at least 40 percent
(in white light) and by as much as 90 percent
or more in a primary color.
In the case of the arc-source lights, dichroic flags are put in front of white light, but
LEDs only generate the colors needed. So for
colored light, the entire system draws less
power than a standard 20-amp household
outlet at 230 volts. The new installation also
eliminates the lamp replacement costs and
vastly cuts down on maintenance.
If there was any lingering doubt about
the effectiveness of the new lighting, it evaporated when the kudos starting coming in.
Pogue is quick to point out that his tech
director, Ken Ash, helped with the project and
the local vendor did the installation. The installation couldn’t have gone any smoother,
taking only four of the six allotted days to
complete. They were able to use the same
bolt pattern as the arc sources by fabricating
a unique lighting stand for the LEDs. By using the clone feature on the PC-based control
software, Pogue and company were able to
get the fixtures up and running in about an
hour.
Cinderella Castle now changes looks every three-and-a-half minutes from dusk to an
hour after the park closes, running separate
cue lists for the SpectroMagic parade and the
Wishes™ nighttime fireworks show. All of this
is done with the lighting console software
using a SMPTE master fader and programming every show to fit within the 24 hours in
SMPTE time code.
The transition to LED fixtures has been a
major success in relighting Cinderella Castle.
Not only does the new technology provide a pleasing visual for guests, it is also a
“win” for Walt Disney World Entertainment.
Maintenance hours are decreased, power
consumption is reduced and costs are more
effectively managed. The installation is a
perfect example of how new ideas can meet
the challenges of working “smart” and working “green” while still delivering a stunning
final product.
Bill Sapsis Named
USITT Fellow
CINCINNATI —
Sapsis Rigging, Inc.
founder and president, Bill Sapsis,
has been named
a Fellow of the
USITT. The presentation was made
during the Fellows Bill Sapsis president,
address and award Sapsis Rigging
ceremony on at the USITT’s annual conference.
In his introduction, Joe Aldridge, Vice
President for Conferences for USITT and a
Fellow in his own right, noted that Bill “is an
inspiration to young technicians entering
the industry.”
The honorary designation of Fellow of
the Institute is bestowed for life upon those
members who have made a significant contribution to the theatre and the work of the
Institute.
“The Fellows are well known for their
commitment to the members of the Institute, especially the students, and I am
deeply honored to now be part of their
company,” Sapsis said.
6
PLSN APRIL 2009
Martin Professional
A/S and JB-lighting
Sign Agreement
AARHUS, Denmark — Martin Professional and JB-lighting have entered into an
agreement that allows Martin Professional to
market JB-lighting’s JBLED A7 moving head
fixture in a MAC 301 Wash version. The agreement gives Martin the right to market the LED
moving head through its global distributor
network while giving JB-lighting greater international exposure.
The JBLED A7 was introduced last fall,
and Martin just launched the MAC 301 Wash
version at the Pro Light + Sound exhibition in
Frankfurt in early April.
NEWS
Creative Stage Lighting Gears Up with JB-lighting, Compulite
NORTH CREEK, NY — Creative Stage
Lighting was named exclusive distributor for German lighting manufacturer
JB-lighting in the United States and
Mexico. CSL also became North American distributor of Compulite products,
including the Vector series of lighting
consoles. The company also named Michael Nevitt product manager.
CSL will now offer the JB-lighting
product line to North America, including
the JB LED line of LED fixtures, VaryColor
Wash fixtures, VaryScan Moving Heads,
and Licon lighting consoles. JB-lighting
also introduced its JBLED A7 fixture last
fall, featuring 108 LEDs packed tightly to
provide even mixing and a wide range
of colors.
“Creative Stage and JB-lighting embrace very similar philosophies; to provide high quality, reliable products that
are ecologically friendly,” said Kevin Loretto, CSL’s director of dealer sales. “We
feel certain that our dealer network will
be extremely excited with the entire JB
lineup.”
CSL president George B. Studnicky III
and Compulite CEO Yehuda Shukrun also
commented on the plan to add Compulite products to CSL’s dealer network.
“This relationship with Compulite is very
exciting and rounds out Creative’s portfolio of the high quality products we distribute,” Studnicky said.
“The Creative Stage Lighting approach, taking on new products, along
with its strong dealer network, have
made CSL a natural choice for Compulite,” Shukrun added. “We are delighted
to establish together a significant presence for our products in the market.”
2009 Parnellis to Include “IT” Awards
LDs, Others Support
Behind the Scenes and
Light Relief By Design Day
NEW YORK — Designers on both sides of
the Atlantic have been signing up to support
Behind the Scenes and Light Relief By Design
Day on April 24. On that day, designers with
shows around the world will be donating
their royalties to support one or both of the
two charities.
Each of the charities is dedicated to help
entertainment technology and design professionals, with Behind the Scenes benefiting
those in the U.S. and Canada and Light Relief
in the UK. Designers and others not in royalty
situations have also stepped forward in support of By Design Day with direct donations.
Light Relief By Design Day promoters Ken
Billington, Rick Fisher and Ken Posner have
already been joined in donating their royalties by Mike Baldassari, Paule Constable, Don
Holder, David Howe, Tim Mascal, Paul Miller,
Brian Monahan, Peter Mumford, Peter Nigrini,
Paul Pyant, Malcolm Rippeth, Nick Schlieper,
Kevin Sleep, Hugh Vanstone, Willie Williams,
and Ann Wrightson.
The supporters of both charities encouraged those who design video, sound, scenery,
costumes or lights to join their peers in helping the industry care for its own, noting that
in difficult times, those who have the added
burden of serious illness or injury need their
help more than ever.
More information on how to contribute to
these charities is available at www.estafoundation.org/bts and www.lightrelief.org.uk.
help live event professionals do their jobs
even better,” says PLSN/FOH publisher and
Parnelli Executive Producer Terry Lowe. “Our
readers hear about these products first and
foremost in our publications, so we wanted
to give them the opportunity to tell us of all
the products that came out in the past year,
which are truly ‘Indispensable Technology.”
“Just think of where we would be if
there had not been any product innovations over the last 20 years,” says Richard
Cadena, PLSN editor. “Product innovation
does make a difference in what we do, and
it deserves to be recognized.”
Winners will be announced and awards
presented at the 2009 Parnelli Awards being
held November 20, 2009 in Orlando (in conjunction with LDI).
Philips Adds
Selecon to its
Global Portfolio
executive of Philips’ Lighting sector. “ Today we are further strengthening the product portfolio of our
globally leading entertainment
lighting business, building on the
foundation provided by the acquisition of Genlyte in 2008.”
Headquartered in Auckland,
Selecon was founded in 1969 and
employs approximately 95 people
throughout Australia, Asia, Europe
and North America. Landmarks as
diverse as the American Museum of
Natural History, Hong Kong Science
Museum, the Sydney Opera House
and the Opera Bastille in Paris all
use Selecon lighting.
Selecon has delivered a doubledigit annual revenue growth rate
over the last four years, a performance which Royal Philips expected to continue. Selecon has become
part of the Entertainment Group
within the Philips Professional Luminaires business, which also encompasses the Vari-Lite and Strand
Lighting business operations.
The acquisition of Selecon follows Philip’s acquisitions of Italybased Ilti Luce Srl and the Australia-based Dynalite earlier this year.
categories: IT Audio, IT Lighting, IT Projection,
and IT Staging/Rigging.
Everyone is encouraged to go to parnelliawards.com/nominate and nominate his or
her favorite new “Indispensable Technology”
product, starting on July 15.
The ballot of nominees will be featured in
our October issues in our many media outlets.
The winning product in each category will be
chosen just like all other Parnelli winners —
through a voting process. Only subscribers of
FOH and PLSN magazines are eligible to vote.
They must put in their subscription code to
vote thus ensuring the integrity of the award.
Voting for the final winners will end October
31.
“Every year a dizzying array of great products are put on the market, all designed to
2009 APRIL PLSN
7
NEWS
In Brief
CALENDAR
Angstrom Lighting announced that
Lisa D. Katz won the 2008 Angstrom Award
for Lifetime Achievement in Lighting Design, presented by the Los Angeles Drama
Critics for career achievement in lighting
design…The raffle at USITT 2009 sponsored by the Long Reach Long Riders and
The ESTA Foundation netted $5,236 for
the Behind the Scenes program. A $2,500
challenge grant issued by Sapsis Rigging
and Jonathan Deull’s $1,500 donation to
support of the Long Reach Long Riders
2009 charity ride this summer boosted total donations to $9,236. Doing its part to
limit the number of potential beneficiaries,
Sapsis Rigging was also promoting its SRI
ProPlus Fall Protection System at the
show, and president Bill Sapsis also moderated the second annual “Stump the Rigger”
contest, won by University of South Dakota
technical director Scott Mollman…CAST
Software reported that Brandt Gentry from
West Texas A&M won the 2009 Annual CAST
Software Award for Lighting Design with
his WYSIWYG design for An Evening in the
Mind of Patty Ash…Kinetic Lighting now
has ColorReach™ Powercore LED flood fixtures from Philips Color Kinetics available
for rental…Upstage Video added Daktronics PST-12HD modular LED panels to
their inventory. The video panels have been
assembled and seen at major golf events…
A new Web site for Electrosonic at www.
electrosonic.com guides visitors to pages
NAB Show
Apr. 20-23, 2009
Las Vegas Convention Center
Las Vegas, Nev.
www.nabshow.com
AES Convention
May 7-10, 2009
M,O,C,
Munich, Germany
www.aes.org
J.R. Clancy ETCP Renewal Training
April 24-25, 2009
Syracuse, NY
www.jrclancy.com
ESTA/USITT Stage Rigging
May 29-31, 2009
Eastern Michigan University
Canton, Mich.
www.estafoundation.org
Palme Middle East
Apr. 26-28, 2009
Dubai International Exhibition Centre
Dubai, UAE
www.palmeonline.com
ESTA/USITT EOS Console Training
June 1-2, 2009
Middleton, Wis.
Solotech En Coulisse
April 29-30, 2009
Montreal, ON Canada
www.encoulisse.com
Cine Gear Expo
June 5-6, 2009
Hollywood, Calif.
www.cinegearexpo.com
Lightfair International
May 5-7, 2009
Jacob K. Javits Convention Center
New York, N.Y.
www.lightfair.com
ESTA/USITT Electrical Training
June 5-7, 2009
Eastern Michigan University
Canton, Mich.
related to the company’s globally-available
products and locally-oriented solutions…
PromoteSafeSets.com is the URL of a
Web site developed by J. R. Clancy, Inc. to
promote backstage safety. Separately, J. R.
Clancy announced a three-year warranty
on its equipment…Lighting sales and rental company Main Light has stocked up on
Coemar Infinity Wash S and Spot S instruments, and expects to order more Coemar
products from distributor Inner Circle Distribution in the future…MediaMation, an
entertainment technology and show control company, is working with U.K.-based
Merlin Entertainment as the operator of
Madame Tussauds and other attractions
readies Legoland Discovery Centres for
Guangzhou International Lighting Exhibition
June 9-12, 2009
Guangzhou, China
www.light-building.messefrankfurt.
com
U.S. shopping malls and storefronts…Reed
Rigging, Inc. held its first four-hour Rigging Skills Workshop for about 30 Chicagoland attendees…Renaissance Lighting
cited its support of energy-efficient lighting for its place as one of 50 private companies that are going “green” by GoingGreen
East magazine… Attendees at two seminars staged by The Stimson Group will
be eligible for renewal certification credits
from InfoComm International…Tomcat’s
hoist and truss workshop drew 70 participants to Midland, Tex., which included the
disassembly and reassembly of Columbus
McKinnon Lodestar and Prostar hoists…
Wybron’s online store is open for business
at www.wybron.com.
Pyro for the Crüe
Showtech
June 16-18, 2009
Messe Berlin
Berlin, Germany
www.showtech.de
Infocomm 09
June 17-19, 2009
Orange County Convention Center
Orlando, Fla.
www.infocomm.org
PLASA 09
Sept. 13-16, 2009
Earls Court
London, U.K.
www.plasashow.com
Mötley Crüe uses more than 300 pieces of pyro each night, including custom
pyro products from supplier Strictly FX.
The gear supplied for the band includes
one Strictly FX Rattler – a robotic articulating arm that moves gerbs, spraying
sparks left and right like a pendulum,
four Strictly FX Mini-Venom flame units,
which shoot flames about 10 feet and
four Strictly FX Venom units, which shoot
flames up to 40 feet.
THE EDITOR
The following letter was addressed to
PLSN contributor Nook Schoenfeld. —ed.
Hi Nook!
I enjoy reading your commentaries every month. Your February article
(“Recession? Bring On the Venting”) is
unfortunately very real. I have adopted
a saying from a now famous farmer in
Connecticut, Lee Bristol:
“I don’t want to do business with
those who don’t make a profit, because
they can’t give the best service.”
—Barry J. Guiot, Sales Manager, PSAV®
Presentation Services
8
PLSN APRIL 2009
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
The Killers Bring LED
Fixtures Back for
New European Tour
AMSTERDAM — Steven Douglas’
lighting design for the first European leg
of the Killers’ “Day & Age” world tour is
using LED fixtures to create looks that
depart from the more classic theatrical
lighting looks of the band’s previous
“Sam’s Town” tour.
The Killers had been the second
band to use i-Pix’s BB7s after their launch
last year, following Radiohead, for whom
the fixture was developed. This year’s rig
includes 15 BB7s and 27 BB4s.
The LEDs served as an integral part
of the floor specials package on the Killers’ summer festival tour throughout
2008, and Douglas said back then that
he intended to integrate them into the
rig for their 2009 arena tour.
He had been impressed with the
distinctive petal-like shape, brightness,
color-mixing and homogenized lightsource, giving an incandescent appearance and quality of light.
The 15 BB7s are positioned in a long
line, upstage of a ColorWeb grid used as
a back wall. The fixtures shoot straight
through the ColorWeb when it’s not in
use, throwing a series of washes onto
the stage. They also emphasize the linear and spherical stage elements on this
year’s tour.
Fifteen of the BB4s are positioned on
the front of three 17-foot-diameter circular over-stage trusses and used for audience blinding effects. The other 12 are
positioned on the deck in 8-lite formats,
attached to six vertical truss towers, also
just upstage of the ColorWeb. These are
used for low level blinding and blasting
fat slices of light through the band and
backline from behind.
“The BBs are great because they
don’t look like LED fixtures and there are
no issues with pixellated or fragmented,
blocky lightsources” said Douglas. “The
color mixing is great, you can strobe
them and they are far more robust, tourable and versatile than an 8-lite with a
scroller.”
Siyan is supplying the BBs and the
other lighting equipment on the European tour, and Douglas is running the
show on a grandMA full size console.
The rig includes 15 i-Pix BB7s and 27 BB4s for a new
series of looks.
London’s Tower 42 Lit by LEDs in Custom Housing
Architainment equipped the entrance with over 1,300 SSL iColor Cover MX Powercore LEDs.
LONDON — Architainment supplied over
1,300 LED fixtures for an installation in the refurbished atrium of Tower 42, London’ s tallest
building.
Paul Croft Studios, in conjunction with
Architects Design Partnership (ADP), refreshed the look of the main entrance and
reception area with a new lighting scheme
created by Light Bureau.
To create color-changing effects after
dark, the design team and installation crew
installed several lengthy horizontal linear
runs of LEDs spanning the full width of the
space, framed by thousands of glass panels
set at different angles.
Architainment’s Paul Hill worked with
Light Bureau’s lead designer Duncan Hamilton and assistant designer Paul Van Cuijck
on the project.
Seeking a fixture that would combine
high light output with an ability to manage
both power and data within the fixture, the
designers chose the iColor Cove MX Powercore.
Each 300 mm stick of iColor Cove MX
Powercore can be individually controlled
by the Phillips Light System Manager (LSM)
Ethernet based controller, which was also
supplied by Architainment.
Each of the 16-meter and 20-meter runs
of iColor Cove feeds back to 26no Data Enablers, which are in turn linked back to the
controller at the back-of-house via two Ethernet cables.
“We are very pleased with the effects
and controllability of the iColor Cove MX
Powercore,” said Light Bureau’s Duncan
Hamilton.
To attach the iColor Cove MX Powercore
fixtures in the right locations along the
glass panels — each grades inwards and no
two angles are the same — Architainment,
in conjunction with Light Bureau, designed
and arranged fabrication of stainless steel
trunking with couplers for fixing the LED
strips in place and angling them avoid unwanted glare.
The trunking was supplied in 2.5-meter
lengths and blends into the atrium structure in daylight. The iColor Cove MX Powercore sits in the middle for a seamless look
so that the fixtures can transform the look
at night “without altering the daytime aesthetics of the atrium,” notes Architainment’s
Paul Hill.
Electrical contractor Mala Electrical
completed the installation on site.
LEDs Set Interior of Worcester Cathedral Aglow
for future projects.”
A local business donated the money
to upgrade the lighting, with the proviso that all the sculptures and tombs
along the aisles be lit up as well.
Warm white PixelPups are installed
along the aisle and highlight the architectural artifacts. The warm tones from
the LEDs blend in with the stonework,
enhancing its visibility without distorting its color.
The cool white fixtures are mounted
on pillars and are positioned up uplight
columns and arches. The tones from the
LEDs pick out the white highlights in
the stone craftsmanship.
A mixture of warm and cool white light highlights
the cathedral’s interior.
WORCESTERSHIRE, U.K. — From the
outside, Worcester Cathedral is a striking sight, rising above the nearby River
Severn. Within, the cathedral’s features
are now lit by LEDs including 80 custom-built PixelPups.
The PixelRange fixtures all have
built-in power/control units and feature
12 white Luxeon LEDs, including 3200k
and 5600k units. That allows for a mixture of both warm and cool white light.
“ The Cathedral is very environmental conscious and the PixelPups have
not only improved the lighting, they
have also saved us money in running
costs,” said the cathedral’s head electrician, Steve Hughes. “The old lighting
system consisted of 120 watt PAR 38s.
The PixelPups are only 28W,” Hughes
added, noting that they are also “more
cost effective” and better able to help
the cathedral with its goal to reduce its
carbon footprint.
“We are delighted with the PixelPups
and are proud to showcase the latest in
architectural LED lighting,” Hughes added. “ The reaction from both the public
and other representatives from visiting
Cathedrals have been very positive, and
we will be recommending LED lighting
2009 APRIL PLSN
9
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
André Rieu’s Palatial Set Lit with King-Sized Rig
STUTTGART, Germany — With over
400 Martin luminaires used to paint a
palatial touring set, classical artist André
Rieu recently completed the European
leg of “A Romantic Vienna Night,” his
world stadium tour.
One of the largest transportable touring sets ever, requiring 80 containers to
transport, it is designed with a stage
width of 125 meters, a height of 34 meters and a palatial façade that measures
4,000 square meters in size. The set, a reconstruction of the Schonbrunn castle in
Vienna, includes a ballroom with gilded
chandeliers, fountains and ice for skating.
There are more than 400 Martin Professional automated lights in the rig,
including up of 30 MAC III Profiles, 185
MAC 2000 Washes, 58 MAC 2000 Wash
XBs, 114 MAC 250 Washes, 10 MAC 2000
Performances and 14 Exterior 200s.
The rig also includes 53 Vari*Lite 3500
Qs, 8 High End Systems Showguns, 25 Xilver Dropleds, 12 Robert Juliat D’Artagnan
2500 HMIs, 3 RJ Heloise 2500 HMIs, 4 RJ
Ivanhoe 2500 HMIs and 6 RJ Lancelot 4000
HMIs, controlled by 3 High End Systems
Hog III. Rent-All BV from the Netherlands
served as lighting contractor.
Maurice Verbeek, who has been designing lighting for André Rieu for nearly
12 years, once again served as LD, and
chose the 1500-watt MAC III Profiles to
span the set’s trim heights. “We needed a
lot of strong lights,” he said.
Before the tour started, “the MAC
2000 Profile/Performance was the strongest spot but I needed something stronger with a bigger zoom range,” Verbeek
added. “After finishing the European
tour, Rent-All informed me about the
new MAC III Profile. After seeing a demo
we decided to exchange the VL 3000
with the MAC III.”
Verbeek first used the MAC IIIs on the
Australian leg of the tour, programming
them to match the gobos and effects of
earlier shows. Gertjan Houben of Moving Lights Support, Amsterdam, served
as co-designer and programmer on the
tour, and seconded Verbeek’s plaudits
for the MAC III units. “The demo was very
impressive and we knew we had found
the light we were looking for,” Houben
said.
Luckily, Houben added, the release
date of the fixture coincided with the
shipping dates to Australia. “When the
rig came online in the Telstra Dome in
The façade is 4,000 square meters in size, and the stage is lit
with over 400 automated lights
from Martin Professional.
Melbourne and we started programming, the light kept all its promises. The
brightness of the output exceeded our
expectations and with the impressive
zoom we could get the light where we
needed it most.”
Houben was also impressed with the
new color mixing system. ”It’s fast and
mixes beautifully,” he said. “The extended range of color depth in the magenta
and yellow are a huge improvement. Together with Bart van Stiphout the system
engineer, I was also very pleased with
the relatively small channel footprint of
the light. When it comes to universes in
these big shows, more is not better.”
Panasonic-Owned Plant Gets Mexico’s “Clean
Industry” Certification
MATAMOROS, Mexico — Universal Lighting Technologies’ manufacturing plant has been
certified as a “Clean Industry” facility by the federal government of Mexico’s Industria Limpia
program.
The certification process began in May 2006 and required a variety of independent, third
party audits to verify proper handling of air, water, waste, and chemicals.
After identifying 24 areas for corrective action, Universal Lighting Technologies implemented the changes. A final inspection was conducted by the Mexican government’s Office of
the Federal Prosecutor for Environmental Protection (PROFEPA).
Now “Clean Industry” certified, the Matamoros plant has the right to use the Industria
Limpia logo and fly the program’s official green flag. Executives from Universal Lighting Technologies and its parent company, Panasonic, were on hand in Matamoros for the flag raising
ceremony.
“We are honored to receive the Industria Limpia certification from the government of Mexico, and we congratulate our entire staff here in Matamoros for this important achievement,”
said Pat Sullivan, CEO of Universal Lighting Technologies.
101 Candidates Lit for Swiss TV Quiz Show
ZURICH, Switzerland — One candidate, 100 opponents and potentially
more than $250,000 at stake — that is the
gist of 1 against 100, a quiz show from SF
(Schweizer Fernsehen).
It takes nerves of steel for the one candidate who is competing with 100 challengers vying to replace him or her, and
the challenge facing LD and programmer
Matthias Kern was no less daunting.
“The biggest challenge was not so
much the huge volume of equipment as
how we were going to implement the
rules of the game, and how we were going to program the whole thing so that
the game technology could reach all 101
candidates,” Kern said.
As the proportion of conventional
lighting is very small, with the emphasis
more on LEDs and moving lights, the TPC
specialists made a conscious decision to
program everything in to a Compulite
Vector Blue console. Their only backup
was a Compulite Vector Green.
A total of 101 cue lists, each containing five cues, were programmed for the
10 PLSN APRIL 2009
101 candidates.
The
relevant cues
are triggered
by 510 macros,
which
are
linked
via DMX IN
to the game
c o m p u t e r,
which allocates their
signals. The
show itself
is produced LD and programmer Matthias Kern used
using mas- a Compulite Vector Blue console for
control.
ter playback,
with just a few cue keys used for effects.
“The matrix programmer integrated
well into the technical side, and the corresponding GIFs gave the LED tiles a ‘video
in character’ effect,” Kern added.
1 against 100 is produced by b&b endemol Schweiz, commissioned by SF and
staged by tv productioncenter zürich ag
(TPC).
Architainment Resources has been
formed by Andy Broitman. The initial product
offering includes a range of portable roofs,
truss systems and staging systems and more.
The company can be reached at 804.798.1935.
Bandit Lites named
Chris Barbee national director of sales and installations. He had served
the company for eight
years as sales and installations design specialist.
Chris Barbee
Clay
Paky
named
Ashley
Lewis
regional
sales
manager
for the U.K. and
Ireland. Lewis is
Ashley Lewis, Pio Nahum and
pictured left, with
Emilio Cornelli
Clay Paky’s international sales director, Pio Nahum, center, and
Emilio Cornelli, sales manager for the U.K. market, right.
Creative
Stage
Lighting (CSL) recently
hired industry veteran
Michael Nevitt as product manager. His responsibilities will include
supporting Compulite
products sold in North
America through CSL.
Petrilak will assist the MultiDyne engineering
team in the development of fiber optic transport for the new DVI products.
Premier Mounts has appointed Amber Technology as its exclusive Australia
and New Zealand regional distributor.
Projec tiondesign
added Dan Miller to
its sales and marketing
team. He will promote
and train others in the
company’s
products
aimed at the professional and consumer
markets.
Dan Miller
Prolyte
announced the launch
of a new sales office in
Japan. The combined
Prolyte and Doughty
sales office is a branch
of Prolyte Asia Pacific.
Mutsuo Osawa has
been appointed as
Mutsuo Osawa
managing director for Prolyte Doughty Japan
Incorporation (PDJ). Prolyte also announced
that Gonher distribuidora has added Prolyte
products to its offerings.
PSP, a U.K.-based AV services company,
has named Chris Stigger project manager for
its London office.
ON THE MOVE
Tait Towers has opened a rental facility in
Utrecht, The Netherlands, led by Patrick Jordan.
Scharff Weisberg
has named Tony Rossello senior account
representative.
He
had been senior event
manager at Scharff
Weisberg for the last
nine years.
Tony Rossello
Wireless Solution Sweden AB has
named three new people for its R&D
team: Mats Jonsson, CTO; Kjell Johanesson, a radio engineer; and Willhelm Alhgreen, a hardware designer.
Michael Nevitt
Fisher Technical Services, Inc. named
Jeanette Farmer, an 18-year veteran of Cirque
du Soleil, as director of projects.
GLP announced separate recruiting agreements
with lighting designer
Mark Ravenhill and optical specialist KaiChang Lu.
Ravenhill was recruited to
work closely with those
marketing the Impression
KaiChang Lu
line of luminaires, which is
sold through Elation Professional in the U.S. and
through A.C. Entertainment Technologies and
TMB in the U.K. KaiChang
is working with the head
of the R&D department,
Mark Ravenhill
Markus Salm, and project managers, Oliver Klee and Marc Rapp in
Meiloon, Taiwan.
Kinesys has named
Mark de Gruyter head of
sales and business development. He has previously worked with Element
Labs, High End Systems
and PRG.
Mark de Gruyter
Liberty Wire & Cable promoted James
Blumhardt to vice president of sales for the
Eastern region, and named Kevin Peterman
and Tom O’Hanlon as territory managers for
the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions, respectively.
Martin Professional A/S named Frank
Hoehn to senior vice president — business development and marketing. Martin also named
Bruno Garros vice president — distributor
sales, and hired Morten Ørnstrand-Søborg as
business area manager — clubs and bars.
MultiDyne Video & Fiber Optic Systems
named Robert Petrilak senior staff engineer.
2009 APRIL PLSN
11
PRODUCT NEWS
Acrilex Acriglas Minerals Acrylic Sheets
Acrilex Acriglas® Minerals series line of acrylic sheets are
composed of 20 percent Muscovite Mica flakes, a naturally
occurring mineral. The series is being touted as a “green”
option. The series encapsulates Muscovite Mica flakes
in an acrylic matrix, transforming the raw material into a
machineable, formable and weather-resistant product. Offered in an assortment of colors, the sheets are lighter and
easier to fabricate than stone or glass. Available in a variety
of sizes and thicknesses ranging from 1/8” to ½”, they can
be drilled, routed, laser cut, glued, formed, hot stamped
and silk-screened. Sheets can be custom cut or configured
to meet specifications.
Acrilex, Inc. • 800.222.4680 • www.acrilex.com
American DJ Mega Bar 50 RGB
American DJ's Mega Bar 50 RGB is half the size of the
original 1-meter mega and less than half the price. The
DMX-controlled color wash LED fixture features 126 10mm
LEDs (42 red, 42 green and 42 blue), seven DMX modes,
built-in programs and six stand-alone operating modes
including a Sound Active Mode. Multiple units can be
master/slaved via 3-pin XLR. The unit draws 18 watts at
full intensity white light. It has a 4-button LED menu display. Mounting brackets are also included with the unit. It
weighs three pounds and measures 22 inches by 2.5 inches by 4 inches. The MSRP is $259.95.
American DJ • 323.582.2650 • www.americandj.com
Chauvet Colorado 2
The Colorado 2 from Chauvet is an indoor/outdoor color wash PAR-type fixture with 48 2-watt and 3-watt LEDs
including red, green, blue and white for color temperature
control. It is housed in a die-cast aluminum body to aid in
heat dissipation and it has an IP66 rating. Additional features include an LED display with password protection, 15˚
lens (MFL) with an optional 30˚ lens (WFL) and an autosensing power supply. The power and data cables are linkable with up to 10 units at 120V. A dual yoke bracket allows
for truss mounting and it doubles as a floor stand.
Chauvet 800.762.1084 www.chauvetlighting.com
Martin Colorfox VX01
The Martin Colorfox VX01 is an architectural lighting
controller for use with color changing fixtures. It allows
for creation and playback of static and dynamic scenes
using hue, saturation and intensity. Color and speed can
be changed with the click of a button and re-saved to any
preset. The controller connects to a PC via USB for editing
using PixMove design software and visual designer. Features include touch-sensitive dial with acoustic and visual
feedback, four memory buttons (run/store/adjust), color
selection by scrolling color wheel, control of up to 170 fixtures or zones (maximum 512 channels) and a wall-mount
bracket.
Martin Professional • 954.858.1800 (Sunrise, Fla.); 818.859.1800 (Burbank, Calif.);
702.597.3030 (Las Vegas); 954.858.1800 (Branson, Mo.) • www.martin.com
PR Lighting XLED 590
The XLED 590 is a new LED moving head wash light
from PR Lighting. It uses Osram’s Diamond Dragon surface mount technology (SMT) LEDs, with 90 5-watt LEDs
(30 red, 30 green and 30 blue). The standard beam angle is
22° and 10° or 35° options are also provided. It has 10 preset colors and the color temperature is linearly adjustable
from 3200K to 10,000K. Other features include dimming,
1-25 FPS strobe, 540° pan, 270° tilt with 8- or 16-bit resolution and three DMX control modes. The fixture weighs
11kg and measures 350mm by 252mm by 353mm.
US: OmniSistem Lights & Effects • 253.395.9500 • www.omnisistem.com
Canada: Erickson Pro • 514.457.2555 • www.eriksonpro.com
Mexico: Hermes Music • 52 55 55472111 • www.hermes-music.com.mx
12 PLSN APRIL 2009
Wybron Eclipse IT Mechanical Dowsers
Wybron’s series of Eclipse IT mechanical dowsers has
been updated to include a new drive mechanism and new
motors. Six versions of the Eclipse, three Iris models and
three Shutter models, will get new motors. The Iris models use a camera-like aperture and the Shutter models use
vertical blades to dowse sports lights and discharge lights
that can’t be dimmed electronically. A new drive mechanism inside the Iris models will simplify the aperture fins.
The Shutter unit, formerly called Eclipse I IT, is now the
Eclipse IT Shutter, and the Iris unit, formerly called Eclipse II
IT, is now the Eclipse IT Iris.
Wybron • 800.624.014 • www.wybron.com
ETC Element Consoles
ETC introduced their new Element™ consoles with two
versions; Element 40 and Element 60. Each supports either
250 or 500 channels and two universes of DMX. Element is
directed at smaller venues who depend on single console
operators or volunteer staffers. It is designed to handle rigs
outfitted predominantly with conventional fixtures (spotlights, PARs, Fresnels and their accessories – scrollers, mirror heads, gobo rotators, etc.), while also accommodating
some LED fixtures and/or a small number of simple moving lights. Element is based on the Eos® control system but with a simplified feature set. ETC
plans to begin shipping this summer 2009.
Electronic Theatre Controls • 800.688.4116 • www.etcconnect.com/element
Zylight IS3 LED Studio Luminaire
Zylight has introduced a new series of studio fixtures,
starting with the IS3 LED Studio Luminaire. They are fully
dimmable with no color shift, have adjustable color temperature and color correction, unlimited color control and
integrated ZyLink™ wireless control. All functionality of
the Zylight IS3 can be controlled via DMX through industry standard XLR connectors, or remotely via the built-in
ZyLink™ wireless link. A USB port is included for field upgradeability, and the fixture has a built-in carrying handle
and shock absorption. At 18 inches by 11 inches by 2 inches, the unit can be powered by either AC or rechargeable battery.
Zylight LLC • 978.244.0011 • www.zylight.com
ChainMaster BGV-D8 Rigging Lifts
ChainMaster has extended its range of BGV-D8
plus rigging lifts with a new model featuring a loadbearing capacity of 250 kg and a capability of moving
loads at a speed of four meters per minute. Excluding
the chain, the net weight of the hoist is around 22 kg
(48.5 lbs). Chains of various lengths can be made to
specifications. ChainMaster is offering package prices for the new rigging lift including either 18 or 24
meters of chain. ChainMaster is distributed in North
America by Show Distribution.
Show Distribution • 877.632.6622 • www.showdistribution.com
City Theatrical ETL Listed Custom Outdoor Enclosures
City Theatrical has launched their new 7400 series Outdoor Use Enclosures for permanently mounting lighting, sound, distribution and other control
devices outdoors. They allow outdoor installation of
indoor use equipment and are available with NEMA
3R, NEMA 4, or NEMA 4X ratings and with IP ratings
up to IP66. They may be custom ordered and will be
ETL Listed to UL Standard 508A under City Theatrical’s ETL Shop Listing. They may be manufactured
in steel, stainless steel, or aluminum and may be
powder coated in a range of colors, all designed and
manufactured in City Theatrical’s Carlstadt, NJ factory.
City Theatrical, Inc. • 201.549.1160 • www.citytheatrical.com
2009 APRIL PLSN
13
SHOWTIME
WXKS Kiss 108FM Jingle Ball 2008
ST
Venue
Paul Tsongas Arena
Lowell, Mass.
Crew
Promoter/Producer: WKXS KISS 108 FM
Production Manager: Jon Rosbrook
Lighting Designer: Nathan Almeida
Lighting Technicians: Jon Dodge, Alisha Petrucci,
Mike “Weezer” Zarbo
Gear
Lighting Console: 1Flying Pig Systems Hog
iPC control console
1 Jands Hog 500 control console
1 Jands ESP 48 conventional control
console
10 Martin MAC 250 Entour fixtures
16 Martin MAC 2000 Profile fixtures
8 Martin MAC 700 Profile fixtures
24
24
120
10
4
6
3
1
1
1
80’
107’
155’
19
2
1
1
Martin Stagebar 54 LED fixtures
Color Kinetics ColorBlast 12 LED fixtures
James Thomas PAR 64 fixtures
James Thomas 4-light Mole fixtures
James Thomas 8-light Mole fixtures
ETC Source 4 50° ellipsoidal fixtures
ETC Source 4 36° ellipsoidal fixtures
white sharkstooth scrim (50’W x 22’H)
crimson red 15oz encore drape (60’W x 20’H)
Black velour (48’W x 24’H)
Tomcat double hung pre rig truss
James Thomas 20.5” x 20.5” box truss
James Thomas 12”x12” box truss
CM Loadstar 1-ton chain motors
CM Loadstar ½-ton 32RPM high speed motors
16-way motor control
8-way motor control
Lighting Co.
East Coast Lighting and
Production Services (ECLPS)
Ferrari Scuderia Spider Reveal
Venue
Trump International Golf Course
West Palm Beach, Fla.
Crew
Lighting Designer/Production Manager:
Mark Kahn
Producer: Dimensional Communications Inc.
Lead Lighting Technician: Scotty Stuart
Gear
12
2
1
176’
Lighting Co.
Gorilla Production Group
14 PLSN APRIL 2009
1.2k Arri HMI PARs
PAR 64 MFLs
20’x20’ silk
12” black box truss
1
1
2
36
1
5
4
32’
1
ST
Acclaim 12-channel console
Strand 12x2.4kW CD80 dimmer rack
PAR Bars
PAR 64 MFLs
1K cyc unit
junior combo stands w/ double header
baby triple riser stands w/
double header
12” black box truss
500A portable generator
Theatre USF Presents: Hair
USF Theatre I
Tampa, Fla.
Crew
Promoter/Producer: Theatre USF
Production Manager: Jason
Winfield
Lighting Designers/Directors:
Beau Edwardson, Mike Wood
Automated Lighting Programmer: Mike Wood
Automated Lighting Operators:
Ryan Crowther, Roxie Gould
Lighting Technicians: Ryan
Crowther,
Gear
Lighting Console: ETC Expression
III, Hog iPC (Hog 500 Backup)
4 Martin MAC 250 Entours
2 High End Systems Studio Spot 250s
2 High End Systems Technobeams
20 ETC Source Four 19°
Footloose National Tour
Gear
Crew
Promoter/Producer: Prather Entertainment Group
Production Manager: James “Cubbie” McCrory
Lighting Designer/Director: Russell A Thompson
Lighting Technicians: Peter L Smith, Jeff Chandler,
Eric Carosiello
Set Design: Evan Adamson
Set Construction: Dutch Apple Scenic
Rigger: James “Cubbie” McCrory
Staging Carpenter: Kenny Deuel
Staging Products: Rose Brand
Lighting Console: ETC Ion
16 Vari*Lite 500D
12 Vari*Lite VL2500s
4 Vari*Lite VL3000s
12 ACLs
42 ETC Source Four 36 degrees
12 ETC Source Four PAR Medium
6 Altman sky cyc (3-cell)
5 Thomas ground cycs
24 Wybron Fourunner color changers
2 Reel FX DF-50 hazers
1 fiber optic curtain
4 Martin QFX 150s
120 ETC Sensor dimmers
2 Apollo Smart Move DMX
ESP Vision pre-visualization software
Lighting Co.
Clearwing Productions
Greendale High School Homecoming
Venue
Gear
Greendale High School
Greendale, Wis.
1
16
14
1
10
6
12
12
24
1
10
10’
4
1
1
Crew
Promoter/Producer: Greendale High School
Production Manager: Pat Doran
Lighting Designer/Operator: Ryan Barry
Lighting Director: Chris Pawlowski
Lighting Technicians: Chris Pawlowski, Erin
Swinghammer, Jamie Fahrenbach,
David Aguirre, Trevor King, Andy Jacobs
Staging Products: Rose Brand Drapes
Lighting Co.
FullSpan Productions
ST
High End System Hog iPC
Martin MAC 250 Wash fixtures
Color Kinetic Color Blast 12s
mirror ball (4’ diameter)
ETC Source Four Lekos
4-channel dimmer packs
500W PAR 64s
300W PAR 56s
PAR 46 fixtures
NSI 12 channel controller
Thomas 20.5” x 20.5” x 20’ circle truss
Thomas 20.5” x 20.5” truss
Global truss sections (8’ 12”x12”)
Barco CLM R10+ Projector
High End Systems Axon media server
ST
40 ETC Source Four PARnels
10 Altman 4-Ckt Zip Strips
57 Altman PAR64s
1,400’ Christmas lights (C9 style)
1 High End Systems Dataflash
10 Egg strobes
8 Ocean Optics SeaChangers
8 Wybron Coloram I Scrollers
6 GAM FilmFX
1 Reel EFX DF-50 hazer
1 High End Systems F-100 fog machine
1 Chauvet snow machine
Roxie Gould
Set Design: Scott Cooper
Set Construction: USF theatre
students
Staging Carpenter: Mike Mathis
Venue
ST
2009 APRIL PLSN
15
INSIDE THEATRE
Dirty
Dancing
By BryanReesman
For its pre-Broadway run in Chicago, Dirty Dancing used an LED screen on
stage, a projection wall at the back and projections on the floor.
P
re-Broadway productions are as high
tech as their Broadway counterparts,
with projections and LED walls helping to expand the scope of imagery in
a cinematic way. For Dirty Dancing: the
Original Story on Stage, which has played
around the world and recently ended its
pre-Broadway run in Chicago, such technology helped to recreate the film onstage.
Is it a Musical, or a Play?
plsn
“It’s not really a musical and not really
a play,” video and projection designer Jon
Driscoll says of the show. “A lot of people
find it hard to understand what it is. It’s
very faithful to the film. It’s a hybrid in a
way.” That hybrid utilizes an LED screen on
fast-moving production, making it like a
movie on stage.
“It’s a continuous backdrop for the
whole thing, and it allows very fast movement from scene to scene,” explains Driscoll
of the LED wall. “You can reset a location
very quickly. We used it quite a few times
for special effect, a lot of moving stuff. It
goes between effects sequences and background sequences, so it will morph from
one to another. At certain moments, it tells
a story on its own.”
Setting the Scene
plsn
When it came to finding the right LED
wall for the U.S. touring production of
Dirty Dancing, Driscoll went with P10 LED
panels from Lighthouse Technologies. The
The LED wall is “a continuous backdrop
for the whole show, and it allows very fast
movement from scene to scene…At certain moments, it tells a story on its own.”
—Jon Driscoll, video and projection designer
stage, a projection wall at the back and
projections on the floor. Two lighting consoles are being employed — an ETC Eos for
lighting and a Flying Pig Systems Wholehog III to control video — along with a
High End Systems DL.3 moving yoke projector.
The LED wall is split into four sections,
and the two center sections are able to
hinge back and slide off to allow actors
to come onstage, which is essential to the
show. There are over 100 scenes in the
16 PLSN APRIL 2009
whole display is approximately 8 feet high
by 20 feet wide and made up of 50 Lighthouse 10mm panels. And the wall is not
used merely for projecting background
images.
“The LED wall is the backdrop of the
show and one of the prime pieces of scenery,” says Driscoll. “It projects realistic images of settings, video montages and live
video feedback of the actors during the
show.” The wall shows video material related to the narrative, including the trip
from Manhattan to the mountain resort
where the story mainly occurs. The screens
provide scenic backdrops like the lake, and
there are live video feeds of the actors during key moments in the show, including a
tight shot of Baby when Johnny lifts her up
during the song “The Time of My Life.”
“The LED walls are on a motorized
track,” says Driscoll. “The far stage left and
far stage right walls are permanent while
the stage right and stage left center panels
pivot at the upstage-onstage corner and
then move straight off to clear the permanent wall. The LED does run while the walls
are moving.”
Video Triple Play
plsn
A key sequence created using the LED
wall was called “log, lake and field,” which
Driscoll says “is the bit in the film when she
[Baby] learns to dance properly with Johnny Castle. They go out in the country and
he teaches her balance on the log, which
then develops into something called ‘the
lake,’ where they practice the lift but do
it in water so they don’t hurt themselves.
Then between the log and the lake is ‘the
field,’ which is a combination of technologies because we also use a lot of projection as well. You’ve got three things going
on at the same time — LED screen at the
back, projection on the floor and projection on the gauze at the front — so you’ve
got a lot of layers of video.”
One prime example of the show’s technology synergy are the lake and field sequences, where it looks like the actors are
immersed in water or surrounded by tall
grass.
Sometimes the LED wall mirrors what
is on the back projection wall. “The projec-
tion is used less often,” says Driscoll. “That
wall is on the entire evening and there’s
barely a moment when that’s in blackout,
but there are certain sequences, like the
one with the water, where we use a scrim.
So the scrim comes in and we start telling
a story at the very front of the stage. There
are other sequences where it’s just the LED.
There is a sequence with a car journey and
the LED shows a scene with a road on it.”
Melding Technologies
plsn
An outdoor party sequence in the
show features tall trees being shown on
both the LED and the back wall. Driscoll
says that it is a real complication and adds
that in order for it all to go seamlessly together, he put in an additional element.
“Because there’s a very big cyclorama, I designed a lot of custom gobos for Vari*Lites.
I worked with the lighting designer so they
all looked part of one thing. I designed this
series of cloud gobos and tree gobos, a
whole catalog of stuff for bright arc source
Vari-Lites. The whole idea of this stage set
was that we wanted it to come together
with the light, video and projections.”
LED technology has already become
popular because of its resolution and
brightness and the fact that ambient light
levels do not have to be lowered in a theatre so much as for projection. Joe Lapchick, senior sales manager — eastern U.S.
region for Lighthouse Technologies, credits the quick set-up, fast start-up time and
processing depth as the keys to landing
the LED walls in the Dirty Dancing gig. The
company’s P10 panels are an indoor product with a brightness level of 2000 nits and
a single panel is 25.2” wide by 18.9” high,
weighing less than 20 pounds each. That
“The whole idea of this stage set was that
we wanted it to come together with the
light, video and projections.” —Jon Driscoll,
video and projection designer
Photos by David Scheinmann/Meyer Sound
INSIDE THEATRE
The video imagery in the background sets the stage outdoors. For the lake and
field sequences, it immerses the actors in water or tall grass.
makes them easier to rig in older theatres,
especially should Dirty Dancing tour.
“One of the characteristics and advantages to our product is that you
can get the brightness down so low it
doesn’t compromise the color, which
makes the product very good for theatrical use,” explains Lapchick. “We've
done numerous indoor shows with the
same product.”
Quiet Light
plsn
With over 100 scenes in the fast-moving production,
it’s almost like a movie on stage.
The LED wall is split into four sections, and the two center sections are able to
hinge back and slide off to allow actors to come onstage.
The P10 panels’ horizontal and vertical viewing angles are both at 140 degrees at 50 percent brightness. The contrast ratio is 1,000:1 and pixel density
is 10,000 per square meter with a 4 mm
pixel pitch. “For this show they're using a 10 mm SMB 3-in-1 chip Cree LED,”
says Lapchick. “Because we’re using 14bit processing depth we’re able to get
4.4 trillion colors onto the panels. A lot
of companies use different processing
depths. Some people use 16, most com-
panies use 10 or 12, but we found that
14 is the right one.”
Another advantage to the P10 panels
is the fact that they are quiet. Lapchick
says that they have a small power supply
inside for fans to cool, hence the noise
reduction that would be a problem for
the sound designer and live mixing engineer. “ They run really quietly, and all
the noise will come out the back, not the
front,” he says. “ The noise level is so low
you can't hear the fans running on the
panels. The more panels you have, obviously the more fans you have and the
more power supplies you have to cool,
so each one will create more and more
noise, whereas ours is super quiet.”
“ The Lighthouse screens are reliable and quiet,” concurs Driscoll. “In my
experience, they are a good choice for
touring because they are rugged, which
is important because my reputation is
built on my ability to put on a technically flawless show every night.”
18 PLSN APRIL 2009
An ETC Eos console controls the lighting, which
meshes with the LED wall’s imagery and projections controlled by a Wholehog III.
PRODUCTION PROFILE
Riders prepare to swoop down toward a spine-tingling landing
By LeeKomando
“
T
his is unsafe. Somebody’s going to get
hurt.”
Nick Scirocco, the 6-foot-2-inch plainspoken IATSE Local One crew chief and John
Yorke, lighting designer for the Red Bull
Snowscrapers event in New York City, were
standing at the top of a 90-foot high structure,
the wind howling all around them, when Scirocco made this pronouncement. The structure in question was the Red Bull Snowscrapers Snowboarding ramp, a thin composite of
plastic and nylon decking sheets at East River
Park in Manhattan.
On the climb, the plug-in banisters wobbled flimsily when they were grabbed. Though
they weren’t coming out, they couldn’t be
tied off to, and if anyone above slipped on the
the ramp at such an angle as to provide the
maximum speed to launch a snowboarder
of average size a certain distance in the air.
In the calm light of day, with your feet firmly
planted on the ground, this structure made
perfect sense. The big 90-foot high ramp, or
“in-run,” as it is officially referred to, had an
elegant swooping curve on the business end
from which the snowboarders would launch.
A side view revealed Stackbox Structures’
structural design of stout shipping containers
stacked and bolted together. But it was the
absence of anything “rigging like” on top of
the in-run that concerned both Yorke and Scirocco, and Yorke was glad that Scirocco was
the one who stood up and said right off the
bat what Yorke knew to be true and wise.
Red Bull may give you wings, but it doesn’t
say anything about frost protection
stairs and fell, everyone below would take the
125-foot ride down the steps. That unpleasant thought came to Yorke about 70 feet up
as several other people were climbing the
steps in front of him. As he reached the top
he knew they were in trouble.
After ascending 10 stories of ice-covered
stairs in one uninterrupted climb, Yorke proclaimed that for the first time in his 45 years
he was honestly scared to death, despite the
fact that he spent the better part of his Army
infantry service in the open door of a helicopter. It was a calm day 90 feet below, but the
wind could gust to 50 mph at the top of the
structure and there were no safeties to tie off
to.
At the beginning of the day, someone
mentioned that a physicist had designed
20 PLSN APRIL 2009
Rising Structure, Rising Doubts
The whole gig had started off when Yorke
was called and asked to design the lighting for
an Anthrax performance on a Stageline 320 mobile stage for the Red Bull Snowscrapers Event.
He had done countless shows on Stageline 320s,
and this one started out as a simple, straightforward gig. But in a conference call with the client,
Red Bull, it was brought to his attention that the
in-run needed to be lit along with the rest of the
site.
“I looked at these pretty color artist’s renderings of the 90-foot high in-run, the short and
steeply curved launch ramp, and the triangular
shaped ‘spine’ where the snowboarders ostensibly would land, and I was intrigued,” said Yorke. “It
was a pretty cool looking project on paper and I
was excited by the grand nature of the project.”
Yorke pitched the lighting design for the
ramp over the phone and created several renderings of his own, which he then e-mailed to
the client. It seemed simple. Not so.
There was a truss structure called the
“athlete’s shelter” that had to be built and secured to the top of the in-run. It was originally
rendered as a hypothetical design element
based on the dimensions of standard medium-duty 20.5-inch box truss.
Yorke had his doubts about it. “One look
at this rendering and I asked myself, ‘Why
wasn’t this built on the ground, lifted with
the giant crane that was piling up shipping
containers, and bolted to the top using whatever bolts that had been welded to whatever
plates that were secured to whatever it was
that was deemed reasonable and safe?”
But hypothetical design elements do not
require the same scrutiny as an actual structure does. It was just assumed that it was
planned out and signed off on by the same
happy physicist who had created the idea for
the in-run to begin with. Not so.
“In reality,” Yorke explained, “the athlete’s
shelter was nothing more than a pretty picture, an unintentionally deceptive one at that,
having been rendered in a CAD program and
looking all like it could safely exist on top of a
90-foot high snowboard ramp with a bunch
of lights and banners hung from it, a triumph
of man’s grasp of engineering, a statement of
the human race and its mastery of the laws
of science, for all to see and admire, in all its
glory, Amen.”
But there stood Scirocco and Yorke, one
saying what the other was feeling about the
unfolding reality of the situation. One look
at the empty nylon deck atop the ramp and
the welded bolts intended to secure the truss
structure into place and they really wanted
to be somewhere else, in a very bad way. The
rigging points existed, yes, but were “shamefully inadequate.”
“The simple fact that something was built
to that point was impressive,” Yorke said, “but
as it turned out, nobody was willing to sign
off on it. Suddenly I was filled with a sickening
horror that perhaps the whole structure was
similarly conceived, that the entire towering, improbable in-run ramp was actually the
fiendish design of a mad adolescent snowboarder, probably too young to vote, who
had hacked into Stackbox Structures’ design
database and was probably watching gleefully right now as the wind shoved us around
looking at these impossibly small bolts intended to hold a truss, lighting system and
banners without ripping the entire top off the
ramp in one fatal gust of wind.”
Luckily, the only real problem was the
point of contact; the underlying structure
was sufficient to safely support the structure.
Scirocco observed, and Yorke agreed, that
management needed to get an engineer up
to the structure to evaluate the situation and
design a safe and suitable way to anchor the
athlete’s shelter in place. Using a set of safeties, ratchet straps and additional hardware,
the problem was tackled.
“This engineer—who looked remarkably like Albert Einstein—solved the problem, making it a legitimate part of the in-run
ramp,” Yorke said.
Building at Height
Once the rigging problem was taken care
of, the athlete’s shelter truss and the deck at
the top of the in-run were redesigned and
signed off. Then came the construction of the
truss, which required a 125-foot manlift slinging the eight-foot sections of truss, two at a
time, up to the top of the ramp. Once there,
the downstage truss span was built with sectional upright supports that were removed
once the span was completed. The upstage
span was also built with additional uprights
that were not in the original design, but it
ramp was also framed in 28 six-foot long
Color Kinetics Color Blaze LED fixtures,
which provided a blue wash with pulses
of red cascading down each side of the
ramp. On the ground were 12 Robe ColorWash 1200s washing the banners on both
sides of the in-run structure, and four
4500-watt Little Big Lites were used to
“I could hardly stand facing the north. The
sleet stung.” — John Yorke
was decided to leave them in place for
extra support and ease of access to hang
lights.
Conditions made the construction
of the athlete’s shelter a punishing, 16hour job. “That upstage span edge was
over 100 feet from the ground and right
against the back rail of the in-run structure,” York said. “I have great respect for
the eight union riggers who built the athlete’s shelter. They did a great job!”
For the athlete’s shelter lighting, Yorke
specified eight PixelRange PixelLine 110s,
20 Elation LED Tri-Bricks, six Robe ColorSpot 1200s, four Thomas 8-Light Moles,
and four Martin Atomic 3K Strobes. The
sides of the ramp were lit with 72 1k PAR
64s, which were individually circuited to
provide a nice “aircraft runway” chase. The
ballyhoo at the base of the launch ramp.
BML crew chief Russell Felton and
freelancer Russ Keitel supervised the installation of the lighting in the athlete’s
shelter as well as the site lighting at the
ramp. Felton also supervised the building
of several large video arrays while Keitel managed the operation of the ramp
site lighting package. All of the lighting
systems were controlled by MA Lighting
grandMA consoles.
More Down to Earth
Across the site was the Stageline 320
performance stage. Since the ramp was in
the north end of the site and the performance stage was on the south end, it became known on radio traffic as the “South
Pole” and the ramp as the “North Pole.”
The completed Red Bull Snowscrapers snowboarding ramp.
2009 APRIL PLSN
21
PRODUCTION PROFILE
It looks pretty at night, but at the top of the 90-foot-high Snow Scraper “in-run,” winds gusted at up to 50 m.p.h.
The crew faced an eight-day build in severe winter weather, including sleet and freezing rain.
At full trim height of six feet, the area
underneath the stage was used for storage and as a crew break area that offered
shelter from the snow and freezing rain
during the week of construction. The performance stage lighting was designed by
Yorke and supervised by Mark “Fifi” Miller
(LD for Prince and Poison, among others).
Three 36-foot trusses spanned the
stage and 72 1K PAR 64s, six Martin MAC
2000s, some Martin Atomic 3K Strobes,
ACL bars and Molefays provided the lighting. According to the crew, the most important aspect of the performance stage
lighting package was the addition of
about a dozen PARs on non-dim circuits
under the stage. They served to heat the
crew shelter area under the stage, defrost
frozen boots, and, most importantly, to
heat Pop Tarts and leftover slices of pizza.
On several occasions, they were also used
to unfreeze camera boom parts and other
mechanical equipment which fell victim
to the extreme temperatures.
“Fifi and his gang of four (Jim Daly, Stephen
Halouvas, Rob Meier and James “Beef” Abrenica) did a great job,”Yorke enthused. After working all week to build the site, the “gang of four”
ran followspots (three Lycian 2ks) for Anthrax
22 PLSN APRIL 2009
in the bitter cold. The crew had been outside
for 12 hours before the band took the stage—
all of their beverages had frozen solid. The operators said the followspot housings never got
warm after running for over six hours.
“It must have been brutal up there,” Yorke
noted, “and Fifi’s gang of four deserve great
credit for a tough week of freezing cold weather.”
The North Pole lighting crew, dubbed
“The Magnificent Eight,” fared no better. They
braved a fierce snow and ice storm on Tuesday
with a relentless spray of sleet and battering
winds.
“I could hardly stand facing the north,”
Yorke recounted. “The sleet stung. The eight
men who bravely built that structure and hung
the lighting rig by hand have my solemn admiration and respect.”
The massive scale of the structure
and the harsh weather conditions during
site construction combined to make it a
memorable production. “Everyone who
worked this project deserves great credit
and praise for safely and effectively providing an event with outstanding production quality,” Yorke concluded. “Thank you!”
BUYERS GUIDE
White LED Luminaires
I
n this, our annual “green” issue of PLSN, we
are focusing on that technology which has
made not only the single biggest impact
on the industry in the last 10 years, but also
which has the most promise for the next 10
years and beyond. That technology, of course,
is LED luminaires. To gain better insight about
the current state of the art and the future of
the technology, we consulted two experts in
the field from Osram Opto, Marc Dyble and
Brian Terao.
PLSN: The problems we have faced using LEDs in the live event production industry have been several fold, including
the lack of smooth dimming, low CRI, high
cost and low brightness. There has been
much improvement in these areas; can
you put these issues in perspective with
regard to how far we’ve come and how far
we have to go?
Marc Dyble: Upon introduction to the
entertainment lighting industry, LEDs were
primarily considered for use in novelty decorative and accent applications since they did
not perform as well as the incumbent light
source. Years of continual research and development on the chip, package and system
levels have resulted in increased brightness
and efficiencies, allowing LEDs to make their
way into high-bright applications. However,
By Richard Cadena
there is a cost differential between the traditional light sources and LED-based fixtures.
Incandescent and halogen tend to have low
upfront costs and high operating and maintenance costs over the life of the fixture. In
contrast, LED-based fixtures have a higher
upfront cost, with payback coming from the
lower operating and maintenance costs of
the fixture. At the discrete level, premium
performance is associated with a higher cost;
however, as the dollar per lumen ($/lm) costs
continue to decrease, payback periods will
shorten and enable higher adoption rates.
The ability to duplicate the slow fade and
warm glow of an incandescent lamp is the
defacto standard when it comes to lighting.
With regards to color rendering (CRI), phosphor is preferred over mixed monochromatic
due to its broad spectral emission. With new
phosphor mixtures at the chip level, high CRI,
on par with halogen sources, is available today. Hybrid fixtures utilizing both phosphor
and monochromatic sources provide color
temperature and CRI tunability, allowing for
increased flexibility in lighting design. Recent
advancements in LED drivers have enabled
flicker-free, continuous dimming schemes to
mimic analog controllers with greater dimming range capabilities. In addition, plug and
play drivers are now
continued on page 26
continued from page ?
Martin Stagebar 54
Studio Due ArchiLED
Pulsar Chroma-Flood-200
SGM DL-Palco5-8
Chauvet COLORado1VW
Coemar ParLiteLed-White
Anolis ArcPAR 12
Elation ELED Fresnel
2009 APRIL PLSN 23
BUYERS GUIDE Manufacturers
Acclaim Lighting
www.acclaimlighting.com
Model
Number, Wattage, and
Type of LEDs
X-Band 300II Pro
WW+CW+WW
X-Bar HIP AC CW
11°X 38°
4 x 3 RGB
25°
ArcPad 3•48
48 LEDs; RGBCW, RGBWW, WW, CW, or
SW; Luxeon Rebel
25°
ArcPAR 12
12 LEDs; RGB, RGBWW, RGBCW, R, G, B,
A, WW, or CW; 1W Luxeon Rebel
6°, 15°, 25°, 38°
Chauvet
www.chauvetlighting.com
COLORado™ 1 VW
36 (18 warm, 18 cool) white, 1W
(350mA)
24°
Illuminance (lux or
footcandles)
479 lux @ 3m
90
n/a
n/a
45°, 45°x15°
n/a
WW: 3300K; CW: 6500K
15° installed, 30° optional
2800-7000K
3,010 lux @ 2m
70
3200
93
4000
36 LED white 6500K, 1.2W each
90
6500
70
3200
93
4000
90
6500
70
3200
12 LED natural white 4000K, 1.2W each
93
4000
90
6500
102fc @ 3’
73
2,700-6500
332 lux @ 3m
70
3,200 - 5,600k
2778 lux @ 3m
12° (standard)
30°; 50°; 40°x13° elliptical lens;
110° flood reflector
895 lux @ 3m
Color Kinetics
www.colorkinetics.com
Elation Professional
www.elationlighting.com
Martin Professional
www.martinpro.com
1000 - 10,000K
n/a
PinLite LED White InGround
5,500k
3,300k
23fc @ 9’
Coemar
www.coemar.com
Color Temp (K)
2,700 - 6,500K
70
392 lux @ 3m
ParLite Led White
CRI
665 lux @ 3m
n/a
Color Block 2
Anolis
www.anolis.eu
Lens Options
25°
36 X 1W Luxeon
X-Bar HIP AC WW
A.C. Lighting
www.aclighting.com/
northamerica
Field Angle (°)
iW Blast Powercore
n/a
23°/10°
36°, 40°, 50°
Design LED 60 Strip WA
60 x 1W Luxeon (40 x CW, 20 x Amber)
91°/20°x60° w/o
frost
n/a
10° to 50°
ELED Fresnel
1 x 50W
Impression WA
90 x Luxeon K2 (60 x CW, 30 x Amber)
Impression CW+WW
90 x Luxeon K2 (60 x CW and 30 x Warm
White)
Stagebar 54S
54 LEDs, RGBAW; 116W per bar; Luxeon
K2
Stagebar 54L
55 LEDs, RGBAW; 116W per bar; Luxeon
K2
Extube 300 mm
12 RGBW LEDs, 25 W, Luxeon Rebel
360 lux @ 3m
6,000k - 11,000k
8,000 lux @ 3m
25°
25°, 45°
11,000 lux @ 3m
75
2,800 to 6,500k
n/a
n/a
75
3500 - 4500
n/a
n/a
960 lux @ 2.5m
29° (standard)
standard or opaque diffuser
961 lux @ 2.5m
19° up to 42°
very narrow, narrow,
medium, wide
Extube 1200 mm
48 RGBW LEDs, 100W, Luxeon Rebel
Alien LED Downlight
5 or 9 RGBW LEDs, 9W standard or 18W
High-Power, Luxeon Rebel
49° (standard)
medium, wide or super wide
Pixel Range
www.pixelrange.com
Pixelpar 44
44 Luxeon K2
8°
various
n/a
70
5600
Pulsar Lighting
www.pulsarlight.com
ChromaFlood200-VW
66 Luxeon 3W
8°, 25°, 45°, 12x25°, 10x90°
355.81 fc @ 3m
93
2200 – 5600 Variable
Lustr 11
40 2.5W Luxeon Rebel LED Emitters
Lustr 21
Selador
www.etcconnect.com
Lustr 42
Lustr 63
Palco 5 IP55
36 white, 13 amber Luxeon K2 5W LEDS
Palco 3 IP65
31 white, 18 amber Luxeon 3W LEDS
Genio/Genio Mobile
12 white, 4 amber Luxeon 3W LEDS
ArchiLED 150
14 red, 12 green, 12 blue 3W LEDs, 8
1W amber LEDs
Archibar 50
16 red, 16 green, 16 blue, 16 white
3W LEDs
SGM
www.sgm.it; www.
techni-lux.com
Studio Due S.r.l.
www.studiodue.com
Archibar 151
Toshiba Lighting &
Technology Corp
www.tlt.co.jp/tlt/
index_e.htm
24 PLSN APRIL 2009
AL-LED-FS-6
n/a
90
91
20°, 30°, 40°, 50°,
60°, 70°, or 80° hor.
and vert.
n/a
800-20,000K
92
93
14,125 lux @ 2m
lensable
8°, 25°, 40° or elliptical
2000 - 6700K
10,450 lux @ 2m
9,096 lux @ 2m
23°
10°, 40°, LB 15X90° horiz or
vert
25°
10°, 40°
39°
n/a
n/a
n/a
n/a
860 lux @ 3m
85
5500
5 red, 5 green, 5 blue, 5 white 3W LEDs
Voltage
Current (A)
100-240V
50w
100-240V
LxWxH
Weight
Retail Price (U$)
11.8”x6.6”x 5.8”
10 lbs
$999
20” or 40”x24”x3.8”
1.1kg/2.3kg
$600 - $1,100
4A @ 120V (5-way P/S)
9.8”x4.7”x2.4”
2.8 lbs
n/a
60W
131x243x100mm
1.6kg
13.6W
186x170x140mm
1.5kg
.5 @ 120V
15.7”x13.4”x11.4”
9.5lbs
0.2 @ 230V - 0.5 @
8.2”x6.4”x10”
7.7
Built in power/data; DMX control, 2 channels; linkable up to 40 pcs on 10A; IP65.
100-240V
100V-240V
autoswitching
Comments
n/a
Optional built-in power supply (ArcPad 3•48 Integral); convection cooled; IP 65 rated; manual pan (40°)/
tilt(180°).
Available in black, white, or silver powder coat finish; convection cooled.
$899.99
Flicker free; ETL approved; can be trasformed to IP65; auto-sensing power, 90V-250V; “Quick Stand” yoke..
90-250V AC autosensing 50/60 Hz
4
0.18 @ 230V - 0.45 @
115V
8”x8”x10.6”
IP68; auto-sensing power, 90V-250V
11
100-240VAC
100-240V
0.412@120V
7.1”x12.5”x4.9”
6.4
n/a
140W
68”x8.5”x3.25”
24 lbs
$2,199.95
Built-in power/Data; DMX control; link up to 8 pcs.
75W
14.5”x9.84”x14.5”
11.6 lbs
$899.95
Manual zoom; barn doors included.
350VA
16”x13.3”x5.7”
16.5lbs
$7,999.95
Automated 16-bit pan/tilt plus 16-bit dimming mode on all LEDs.
420x190x105mm
5.5 kg ( 12.1 lb )
$2,680
100-240 V
100-120/200-240 V
n/a
100-120/208-240 V
(Alien LED Driver)
630x190x105mm
7.3 kg ( 16.1 lb)
$3,005
300x89x90mm
750 g (1.7 lb)
$1,360
1200x89x90mm
3 kg (6.6 lb)
$4,075
68.5x85x85mm
385 g (.85 lb)
$490 (standard); TBD
(high-power)
Functions as a pixel bar for displaying imagery/video or as a wash luminaire; multiple color control modes;
two sizes - S and L.
IP65-rated; click-together system; slides onto DIN rail; tiltable; multiple color control modes; two sizes 300mm and 1200mm.
autoranging
100-240VAC
1.1 @ 120V
8-3/8” dia. x 7” depth
15
$2,750
Tungsten dimming curve; Holofilm in 10°, 20°, 30°, 40° and 60x1°; completely serviceble fixtures.
85 – 277 VAC
1.5 @ 120 V
12.6”x13.23”x4.65”
17.1 lbs.
$3,254
Maintains color tempature in transitions; ETL listed; IP65 rated.
2.1A @ 110V
11”x7.1”x6.5”
11.5 lbs
4.2A @ 110V
21.5”x7.1”x6.5”
20 lbs.
P.O.A.
Exclusive x7 Color System™ 7-color LED array.
$4,769
IP 55; wireless DMX standard; onboard stand-alone control & clock; master/slave option; surface or clamp
(included) mountable; ETL approved.
$3,499
IP 65; onboard stand-alone control & clock; master/slave option; surface or clamp (included) mountable; ETL
approved.
$1,344/ Mobile: $2,244
IP 65; onboard stand-alone control & clock; master/slave option; remote pan/tilt; surface or clamp mountable;
ETL approved.
100-240V
8.4A @ 110V
42.5”x7.1”x6.5”
35 lbs.
12.6A @ 110V
63.5”x7.1”x6.5”
53 lbs.
2.5 @ 120V
90- 260VAC self
switching; 277V
on request
42.5cmx37.5cmx22.9cm
1.25 @ 120V
0.5 @ 120V
100-240V, 50-60 Hz
28
0.7A @ 230V
24cmx24cmx11.8cm
9
327X125X343mm
7.7kg
255X1005X195mm
8.5
255X380X195mm
3.7
404x444x420mm
15.75
IP67 rated; DMX512 or automatic w/ 8 programs in memory; master/slave function.
n/a
IP67 rated; DMX512 or automatic w/ 12 programs in memory; master/slave function.
100V
1 @ 100V
$5,131
2009 APRIL PLSN 25
ROAD TEST
By RichardCadena
A
few years ago, I toured with a
lighting system that had several
Chroma-Q™ Color Block™ LED
color mixing fixtures lighting a white
backdrop. They worked well for washing
the 40-by-20-foot surface with color and,
because they are small and draw little
power, they set up quickly and trouped
easily. Now there is a new version of the
fixture, the Color Block 2, which is supposed to be much improved in the areas
of brightness and color. We didn’t have
a tour and we didn’t have as many units
this time, but we did have a couple of
them to play with.
What’s New, What’s Not
rt
The Color Block 2 looks very familiar if you’ve ever used the original Color
Block. It has the same low profile (2-3/8
inches high by 4-11/16 inches deep by
9-13/16 inches long) and a modular, anodized extruded aluminum housing with
a latching interlock system that allows
you to connect several individual heads
as a single batten. It has the same four
LED cells per Block, but the difference
is that it uses single-color RGBA LEDs as
opposed to the individual red, green, and
blue LEDs in the original model. As is the
trend with LED fixtures, the new version
is brighter than its predecessor. Although
I never had an issue with the light output
of the original, more light seldom hurts.
Also new in this unit is what Chroma-Q
calls “theatrical grade dimming.”
Like the original, the Color Block 2
heads are connected to a central power
supply. One power supply can power up
to five or up to 30 heads. The five-way
PSU measures 11 inches by 9.8 inches by
4.9 inches and weighs 9.6 pounds. The
30-way PSU is 14.5 inches by 3.5 inches
and 24.5 pounds. There are four-pin XLR
connectors between the power supply and the heads. The power supplies
are auto-ranging from 100V to 240V AC,
50 or 60Hz, so you can plug them into
virtually any power grid in the world.
As would be expected, they draw little
power even fully loaded. The maximum
current draw at 120V is four amps, and at
240V, the maximum current is two amps.
So you can run up to four five-way PSUs
and power up to 20 Color Block 2 heads
on a single 20-amp, 120-volt branch cir-
cuit. (You might actually get away with
five five-way PSUs on a single branch
circuit, depending on the circumstances,
but it’s not recommended.)
The power supplies have a six-segment LED menu display that is used to
set the DMX address and the operating
mode. The Color Block 2 has 16 modes,
seven more than the previous model.
These modes give you the ability to
control a single cell, to group together
individual blocks, or to control the entire system as one. In addition, you can
control the LEDs in four different ways:
using hue, saturation and intensity (HSI);
red, green, blue (RGB); red, green, blue,
amber (RGBA); or red, green, blue and intensity (RGBI).
Color, Rendering and Dimming
rt
With the new single-color RGBA LED,
the color palette of the Color Block 2 has
been expanded to include more saturated reds, blues and greens, and more subtle shades, such as flesh tones, lavender,
orange, and peach. To my eye, it’s difficult to distinguish between the old saturated colors and the new saturated colors without a side-by-side comparison.
But what are noticeably improved are
the pastels, the color uniformity and the
color rendering. In the old style blocks,
the individual colored LEDs produced
multi-colored shadows with the subject at close range. That has completely
changed with the new single-color LEDs
because the red, green, blue and amber
components are much smaller and closer
together. With the frosted lenses all you
see is a solid color. The only exception is
with very saturated colors at the tail end
of the dimming curve. There, you can see
slight color separation if you look directly at the source. For the vast majority of
applications, it is insignificant.
The added amber makes all the difference when it comes to controlling color
temperature. The fixture does a beautiful
job of recreating a tungsten look in RGBA
mode by making slight adjustments to
each of the four channels. The literature
claims a color rendering index of 90, and
though I had no way of confirming that,
it does appear to render skin tones very
well. You can also take out some of the
amber to create a very nice daylight look.
The Chroma-Q Color Block 2 updates the Color Block with extra brightness and other improvements.
The dimming is truly exceptional.
LEDs are so responsive that it is difficult
to dim them smoothly. You can usually
see dimming steps with LED fixtures, but
definitely not in this case. The dimming
curve looks very much like a tungsten
source, which works very nicely with the
tungsten or with the daylight color temperature.
Using a Minolta T-10 illuminance meter, I measured 124.7 lux in white light
at a throw distance of 12 feet with one
block. The field was 13 feet wide. I then
measured 70 lux in red, 100 lux in green
and 10 lux in blue. The optics in the unit
are asymmetrical with respect to the vertical field in order to better wash a cyc
from a ground row or a truss. A single
ground row can cover about 20 feet of
height very well.
Building the Perfect Beast
late a 16-light blinder. Finally, the hinge
kit can be used to connect two blocks
and adjust the angle between them up
to 180°. You can build creative designs
using a handful of hinges and a passel of
blocks. Between the various accessories
there are an unlimited number of design
options.
The Color Block 2 manages to overcome some of the toughest issues for
LED fixtures. The color temperature adjustment, rendering and dimming in
this unit are as good as it gets. I don’t
know what “theatre grade” is, but these
LED fixtures certainly make the grade
whether it’s in a theatre, a rock concert
or a ballet.
The new Chroma-Q Web site at www.
chroma-q.com has more information
about the Color Block 2.
rt
One of the better features of the original Color Block that is retained with this
version is the modularity. Each block has
two mushroom-head pins on one end
and two keyhole slots on the other. The
pins on one block can be inserted into
the keyhole slots on another and fastened with the integral butterfly latch,
creating a sturdy batten. You can connect up to five units together to create
a four-foot batten and use the optional
batten bracket kit to stand it on the
floor or rig it in a truss using c-clamps
or half-couplers. There is also a yoke kit
for single blocks and a blinder frame that
allows you to stack four blocks to emu-
What It Is: Modular LED color wash
luminaire.
What It’s For: Any lighting system that
needs colored light or variable color
temperature white light.
Pros: Modularity, versatility, high CRI,
beautiful dimming, tungsten emulation,
daylight emulation, separate power supply makes for smaller head.
Cons: Separate power supply requires
extra piece to carry and rig.
Retail Price: $845 MSRP.
White LED Luminaires
continued from page 23
available to interface directly into existing
dimmer architecture without additional wiring.
At one point, all of these advancements
would never have been thought possible, but
today, solid state lighting is in the limelight.
There are a number of different claims
as far as the efficiency of LEDs in lumens
per watt. What is the real story? Does Haitz
law still hold? If so, for how much longer
will it be true? Brian Terao: For white LEDs in the Sun
26 PLSN APRIL 2009
White to Daylight White range (as defined by
ANSI 5000K-6500K) performance of 100lm/
W+ are reported. For "warm" temperatures,
these can be 75lm/W or higher. However, one
needs to clarify the specific color temperature
and CRI. The warmer the CCT and higher the
CRI, the less efficient the devices is, generally
speaking. In addition, lm/W for an LED component is only a reference point at a given drive
condition under specified test parameters. For example, 100lm/W @ 350mA for 25ms. In
an LED system, one can see 30 to 40 percent
in efficacy losses due to thermal, optical, and
electrical impacts. What is the real story? The
real story is that LEDs continue to penetrate
more and more applications due to efficiency
improvements and sound system design that
minimize efficacy losses.
As LED components have demonstrated levels of $/lm that enable solid state
solutions, the parameters have changed
to focus on overall lm/W in both a component and system, and quality of light. Haitz
Law only looks at price/output of a compo-
nent, and solid state lighting is much more
beyond that.*
On the previous two pages is a small
sampling of some of the latest white and
colored light LEDs on the market. Enjoy.
*For a complete transcript of the
interview, click on the Buyers Guide portion of the Current Issue posting on
www.plsn.com. A copy will also be posted on
www.prolightingspace.com.
One Hundred Million Lumens on One Hundred Million Suns
HD Projection at
The Grammys
The AV-rich set of the 51st Grammy Awards
LONDON—Snow Patrol’s “One Hundred Million Suns”
tour incorporates video into a visual swirl that also includes
lighting, digital lighting and moving truss. Lighting and Visuals Designer Davy Sherwin worked with Video Director
Blue Leach and Live Visuals Director Robin Haddow on the
overall visual mix. XL Video UK is also working in conjunction
with Blink TV to supply LED screen, digital lighting, projection, cameras, control and crew for the world tour, currently
in the U.K. and Europe. The tour is also the first to feature
Barco’s DML-1200 digital moving lights (XL supplied four).
HSL supplied lighting, a 26-point Kinesys automation system and crew.
The starting point for Sherwin’s design was running a
few ideas by the band and coming up with a general LED
and moving light “vibe” that he felt suited the mood and music of the new album.
Inside...
Publitec Becomes Europe’s Largest Pandora’s Box System Provider
ESSEN, Germany—Publitec, a German firm that rents and
supports image and media technology for live event producers, has been named a provider of Coolux’s Pandora’s Box
media server. Producers in Europe will now have access to a
rental partner with a tried and tested logistics system and an
extended range of services.
Publitec has been active in the field of image and media
technology for providers of event services for nine years. In
addition to key components such as DLP and LCD projectors,
LED video walls and displays, Publitec has also focused on
complex image processing and sophisticated image reproduction systems.
“The Pandoras Box Media Server, MediaPlayer and Media
Manager products from coolux represent the ideal expansion
of our product portfolio in the area of media servers and also
perfectly complement the services provided by our ContentCompetenceCenter,” said Jens Richter, Publitec’s managing
director. “This forms an excellent basis from which clear synergies can be used to benefit both companies and also our
customers.”
29
Video Wins at
Grand Prix
LEDVision supplied 200 square meters
of LED screen for the 2009 A1 Grand Prix
World Cup.
31
Video World
Paul Berliner talks SDI—No, not Star Wars,
Serial Digital Interface.
Snow Patrol’s “One Hundred Million Suns” tour was the first to feature Barco’s DML-1200 digital moving lights
LOS ANGELES—Audio-visual rental and staging
company American Hi Definition, Inc. marked its 12th
year supporting the live Grammy Awards telecast by
powering an array of rear-projection screens with the
Christie Roadster series of 3-chip DLP projectors. The
51st Grammy Awards show was held at the Staples
Center in Los Angeles where an AV-rich set took center
stage.
American Hi Definition, Inc. chose eight Christie
Roadster HD18K projectors to feed graphic elements—
from typography and logos to song-themed images—
to a curved horizontal band of eight 9-foot-by-16-foot
screens stretched across the main stage. With 1920 x
1080 native resolution, the audio-visual set came to life
with detailed HD images that branded the event, signaled awards categories and complemented musical
acts from top artists.
NEWS
One Hundred Million Lumens on One Hundred Million Suns
That concept extended to the metalwork
layout, and Sherwin chose to have five raked
upstage/downstage trusses referencing back
to the sun rays of the album title. These are
hinged down at the upstage end, allowing
them to be flown in and close up to the performance space for the more intimate moments.
Upstage, behind eight columns of Barco
O-lite video screen, are five lighting pods
each containing four Vari*Lite 3500 Wash
fixtures and two Martin Professional Atomic
Colors. These pods are also rigged on Kinesys
motors so they can glide in and out during
the show for “powerful old skool ACL effects,”
Sherwin said. The eight columns of Barco OLite LED screen each measure 13.5 feet high.
The 16-point Kinesys automation system lets
the screen split into a variety of different formations and move up and down. The movement cues also allow lights upstage of the
screen to blast through the gaps.
It’s Leach’s second Snow Patrol tour. “Davy
and Robin are really into a fully integrated
workflow that unites all departments, and I
am very much of that same mindset, so it’s a
complete joy to be on this,” he said, of the experimental collaboration of visual elements.
“The way Blue, Davy and Robin have developed the ‘bigger picture’ is the result of fervent imagination and crafting,” said XL Video
project managers Phil Mercer and Jo Beirne.
Live video comes from four of XL’s Sony
D35 operated cameras—two on track-anddolly in the pit, one hand-held onstage and
one with long lens at FOH—plus two robocams in the roof trusses. Five mini-cams dotted all over the stage are used very specifically, with another one beside Leach at his FOH
mix position, so he can grab it and improvise
if he wants.
Leach mixes with a GV Kayak switcher and
has two Xander flat screen preview monitors
instead of a bank of nine-inch screens. He is
also using a Medialon touch screen system to
add effects quickly and easily to the camera
feeds. Four of these are then sent to Haddow
for outputting to the O-lite screen or to any or
all of the four Barco DML 1200 digital moving
lights via the three XL-supplied Catalyst digital media servers.
For lighting control, HSL is supplying three
WholeHog 3 consoles. One, complete with
USB wing, is operated by Sherwin. The other,
operated by Haddow, triggers three Catalyst
media servers running all the video playback
content and sending all video sources to
screens or to four Barco digital moving lights.
The third is a backup. The Kinesys system,
which also lifts the eight columns of O-Lite
up and down, is piloted by Rupert Reynolds,
who uses Vector control software to make the
complex motion effects look effortless. Also
onboard from HSL are crew members Ian Lomas, Tim Oliver, Rob Starksfield, Tom Wright
and Andy Hilton, chiefed by Johnny Harper.
The end-of-show gag includes a 16 minute animated mini-movie produced by Splinter films, who developed a treatment received
from Leach based on original ideas from lead
singer Gary Lightbody. The movie accompanies the three-part song “The Lightning
Strikes” and is projected sequentially onto
the two trevira cloth kabuki surfaces, and also
onto the O-lite.
The projection system for this — and for
a short Etch-O-Graph style show intro — is a
doubled up pair of Barco FLM 20s stationed at
FOH, and the movie, along with all the other
playback footage used in the show, is stored
in the Catalysts. XL’s crew includes engineer
Gerry Corry, LED tech and camera operator
Al Bolland, projectionist and camera operator Dave Rogers, ped camera operator Darren
Montague, hand-held operator Jamie Cowlin
and screen tech Graham Vinall.
HD Visuals at
Grammys
Two Christie Roadster S+16K projectors and one backup unit displayed
graphics and IMAG of the action onstage
on a giant 21-foot-by-11-foot vertical
screen, which was placed center-stage
and above a split staircase. With SXGA+
1400 x 1050 resolution and 16,000 lumens of brightness, the Christie Roadster S+16K projectors delivered bright
images with detail and depth of color.
To complete the Grammy’s set, an
additional pair of Christie Roadster
S+20K projectors brought the broadcast
feed to the Staples Center audience on
two 13.5-foot-by-24-foot house screens
placed out of camera range.
This year’s Grammy Awards was the
fifth consecutive time American Hi Definition, Inc. selected the Christie Roadster
series of projectors for the mission-critical live telecast viewed by millions.
“The show went flawlessly,” said Ady
Gil, co-owner of American Hi Definition,
Inc. “All of the Christie projectors performed just as we knew they would” and
helped the show sing.
28 PLSN APRIL 2009
NEWS
LEDVision Supports A1 Grand Prix in South Africa
MIDRAND, South Africa—LEDVision, a
Gearhouse South Africa company, supplied
200 square meters of LED screen, microwave links and control for the fifth round of
the 2009 A1 Grand Prix World Cup. This was
staged in South Africa for the first time at the
Kyalami Grand Prix Circuit.
The seven screens included three mobile truck screens—one 40-square-meter
Chromatek 20 mm and two Barco B10s, each
measuring 10 square meters. There were also
four modular screens—one at 40 square meters and three at 30 square meters—all made
from Lighthouse R16 panels.
The LED displays were placed strategically around the track to offer optimum viewing
for a close to 90,000 spectators.
The first of the 30-square-meter Lighthouse screens was installed on top of the pit
roof by the start/finish line. Another appeared
by the track’s first turn, in view of the opposing grandstand. Another 30-square-meter
Lighthouse screen was positioned further
up at the second turn for those seated in the
Gold grandstand.
Those in the Gold grandstand could also
watch the action on one of the Barco B10s
and the Chromatek. The second Barco B10
was located at turn five. Another 30-squaremeter Lighthouse unit was at turn eight, and
at turn 10, the crew set up the 40-square-meter Lighthouse.
The crew from LEDVision included 32
for the build up and 16 for the practice day
and two race days. These were all directed by
Richard Baker and crew-chiefed by Allen Ev-
ans (JHB) and Mike Tempest from Gearhouse’s
Durban office. They were working directly for
Gauteng Motorsport, producers of the South
African leg of the event.
Broadcasters Alfacam supplied a video
feed, which was linked via microwave their
compound to the LEDVision control point
behind the pit roof screen, and these images
were then relayed to the six other screens
around the track.
The control setup included an ad scheduler, a Sony AnyCast switching station and
a series of AV Stumpfl media servers. The ad
stings were coordinated via a Medialon control platform supplied by LEDVision’s sister
company, System Solutions.
Video Gear Helps
Capture Drama at
The Oscars
LOS ANGELES—For the third year in a
row, the Telescopic Techno-Jib has been used
to cover the angles at the annual telecast for
the Academy Awards.
“We began to use this unique tool three
years ago,” said video camera operator Ted
Ashton. “The area backstage is really congested. Dollying around with a regular jib is
difficult. With the Techno-Jib, I was able to
move in an out and create extremely productive images.”
This year, Academy Award directors Roger Goodman and Allen P. Haines chose to use
two Techno-Jibs to capture as much of the reactions of award winners as possible.
“I was on the stage, following or leading
the winners as they moved center stage to accept their awards,” he adds. “The Techno-Jib is
perfect for this kind of action because of the
additional telescoping capabilities. I could
jump out quickly and capture the moment
intuitively, not only moving up and down, left
and right, but in and out, then retract the arm
so that I would be out of the wide shot.”
The T24 extends from a minimum reach
of 9 feet to a maximum of 24 feet, enabling
shots that could only be achieved previously
with the use of a telescoping crane. The arm
travels at speeds of up to five feet per second
and a unique “Soft Stop” feature is designed
to stop smootly every time. Units come standard with a Mitchell Mount adapter and can
easily accommodate most remote heads under-slung or over-slung. Adjustable weights
ensure jib arm balance with most popular
remote head/camera combinations.
Along with IMAG of the race action, the screens also relayed live
updated race statistics, local advertisements and a variety of public announcement information.
Power for three of the Lighthouse screens came from generators
supplied by Gearhouse Power, with
the fourth running off hard power,
and the three truck screens were run
from their onboard generators.
The biggest challenge for the One of seven LED Screens provided by LED Vision.
LEDVision team was the geographiBaker. “It took some meticulous pre-planning
cal scale of the event and the distances be- and great teamwork on site to produce stuntween the areas needing coverage. “Winning ning results.”
this contract was great for the company,” said
NEW PRODUCTS
Barco FSN Switcher
The FSN series is a new multi-resolution, 3Gbps-ready
production switcher that combines video switching functionality and image processing. It integrates SD, HD, 3Gbps
video, and computer graphics formats, and includes the
FSN-150, a 1.5 Mix-Effect (M/E) control console, and the
FSN-1400, a 14-slot video processing chassis. The base configuration includes one 8-channel native input card (NIC),
one 2-channel universal input card (UIC), and a touchscreen GUI. The base system also includes the M/E output
card that provides program, preset, clean-feed, and six native aux outputs. Up to five additional input cards can be
added for a maximum of 38 inputs.
Barco 866.374.7878 www.barco.com
Martin LC Plus™ LED Video Panels
The LC Plus Series from Martin Professional is a
modular system of LED video panels that integrates
light, video and set design in indoor and outdoor
staging. It was designed for the rental and staging
market but it is suitable for fixed installations as well.
Some of the features include 3000 nits brightness,
11 kg (24.25 lbs) per square meter and IP65 protection. The P3 technology platform (Pixel Push Protocol) uses gigabit Ethernet and Cat5e wiring for video
signal processing and distribution, which eliminates
the limitations of DVI, fiber optic and coax (SDI) cable connections. Up to 50 panels can be daisy chained.
Martin Professional - 954.858.1800 (Sunrise, FL); 818.859.1800 (Burbank, CA);
702.597.3030 (Las Vegas); 954.858.1800 (Branson, MO) www.martin.com
Hitachi Z-HD5000 Portable HD Studio, EFP Camera
Hitachi Kokusai Electric America, Ltd.’s new
Z-HD5000 is a portable, dockable HDTV studio
and EFP camera, with native scan in 1080/59.94i
or 1080/50i. It is the first HDTV model camera in
the Z Series product line. The two-piece dockable
camera can be docked to an optical fiber, triax or
RF wireless adapter, or a P2 HD recorder for standalone recording. It offers high light sensitivity coupled with low vertical smear, and it has three 2/3inch native 1080i CCD sensors that produce 800
TVL of resolution, F10@2000 Lux, and HD Signal to
Noise (SNR) level of 58db.
Hitachi Kokusai Electric America, Ltd. 516.921.7200 www.hitachikokusai.us
Navitar Projection Optics for 4K Projectors
Navitar is introducing custom lens making capabilities and a new line of lenses optimized for 4096 x 2160
resolution. One example of custom 4K lenses is a long
throw zoom lens offering throw ratios of 1.9 to 4.9:1 and
focal lengths of 55.6 to 141.6 mm. Designed with 12
groups of 14 elements, this lens is optimized for a pixel
size of 6.8. Another example is a 1:1 relay lens designed
for 8.5 micron pixel size resolution for a 4k projector.
Other designs include wide angle and 1:1 and 1.2:1 lenses for 1080p projectors. Navitar also manufactures stock
and custom replacement and conversion lenses.
Navitar 585.359.4000 www.navitar.com
STAGING • LIGHTING • SOUND
Your #1 Source for
continuing education.
Order online TODAY at
www.plsnbookshelf.com
Lighting for Romeo and Juliet
In this first publication in Entertainment Technology
Press Design Series, John Offord describes the making
of the production from the lighting designer's
viewpoint - taking the story through from the point
where director Jürgen Flimm made his decision not to
use scenery or sets and simply employ the expertise
of Patrick Woodroffe.
Lighting Modern Buildings
This is an important book, written by one of the top
lighting designers in the country. Written at the end of
a career as an architect and lighting designer, the
book draws on the experience gained while living
through a period of intense lighting development,
from 1956 up to the millenium. It bridges the gap
between the present day architect and lighting
engineer, from the viewpoint of the 'independent
lighting designer'.
Lighting for TV and Film
Skilful lighting involves a subtle blend of systematic
mechanics and a sensitive visual imagination. It
requires anticipation, perceptiveness, patience and
know-how. But learning through practice alone can
take a great deal of time. This book is a distillation of
many years' experience, with advice and guidance
that will bring successful results right from the start.
30 PLSN APRIL 2009
VIDEO WORLD
By PaulBerliner
apply to SDI signals? Yes, it does, but there
are certain key differences, one of which is
the “cliff.”
Take a given length of coax, plug it into
the output of an analog VTR, for example,
and connect an analog monitor at the other end. If you lengthen the cable, adding
more resistance, the signal level gets progressively worse and worse — but it’s still
visible (somewhat).
Now, take the same length of coax, plug
it into the output of a digital media server
and connect a digital monitor at the other
end. Here, as you lengthen the cable, the
signal remains pristine — after all, weak
ones and zeros are still ones and zeros.
However, at a certain point, lovingly called
the “cliff,” the SDI signal vanishes. In fact,
your image will start to sparkle the last foot
or so, and about a millimeter beyond that,
it’s toast.
The reason is that, after the distance
rating of the cable is reached, the “clocking”
pulse that essentially drives the digital signal down the cable isn’t strong enough to
generate ones and zeros. This rating varies
from cable manufacturer to manufacturer,
but for SD-SDI (using Belden 1694A Brilliance® coaxial cable) this distance is approximately 300 meters, while for HD-SDI,
the cliff is reached at approximately 100
meters. For a longer cable run, you’ll need
to re-clock the signal.
Welcome to the Cliff
Cables, Barrels and Connectors
plsn
For all of us in the biz, the more important question is — what’s inside that coax
cable, and what do I need to know about
it? Is it an SDI signal, with ones and zeros
heading down the cable? Is it an analog signal, with smooth waveforms traveling back
and forth?
There’s no way to tell, unless you look
at the target devices themselves, and even
then, most modern digital devices output
analog signals alongside the digital signals
— typically for purposes of monitoring or
displaying a “burned in” timecode window.
Only the label on the input or output connector itself is the definitive answer.
So, you grab the coax, uncoil it, and
connect the digital device to a monitor. After turning on power, you get — nothing.
What gives? Doesn’t troubleshooting 101
plsn
For the health of the video signal,
higher quality video cable yields a better
distance rating and less resistance than
inexpensive cable. For digital devices, you
will not be able to use that old 50-ohm cable from the warehouse — the same cable
with which you’ve always hooked up your
VHS decks. In addition, you’ll need to be
75-ohm throughout the path — including
the cable itself, the connectors on each end
(rated for > 1.485 GBPS) and any BNC “barrels” that you might need to connect two or
more lengths of cable together.
High quality cable is also less prone to
electrical interference, enabling you to run
it alongside power cables, if required. You
won’t have (as many) problems with hum
bars and ground loops, as with lower quality cables.
Professional audio/video cable manufacturers such as Belden
(www.belden.com) provide
very detailed specs on all of
their coaxial cables — and if
you have the budget, pay the extra bucks for the company’s digitally
rated Brilliance cable. In addition to
being more durable, it provides a better
center copper conductor, better shielding and a far better distance rating.
Something Else is Hiding In There plsn
Another useful fact about SDI signals is
that both the SD and HD signals can carry up
to 16 channels of embedded audio within the
serial stream — essentially, eight stereo pairs
of audio traveling in sync with the video.
Certain digital devices such as servers
and DVRs handle the embedding and deembedding of the digital audio themselves,
but you can also use external embedders
and de-embedders, such as those manufactured by AJA Video Systems (www.aja.com)
to inject audio into an SDI stream.
The use of embedded audio is a mainstay
at television stations worldwide, enabling
facilities to eliminate the cost of miles of audio cables. In addition, because professional
broadcast routing switchers also pass the
embedded audio, the stations don’t need to
purchase a separate audio router for embedded signals.
But the use of embedded audio is not
strictly limited to broadcast. In fact, many
rental and staging companies are currently
making use of the technology for shipping
audio (plus video) from point to point at
an event. For example, you could use one
SDI cable to send video and up to 16 audio
channels from FOH to the video world backstage.
Or, perhaps, you could send digital audio
and video from a main ballroom to one or
more satellite rooms on site. Provided that
the additional gear is on hand (such as digital embedders and de-embedders), the use
of SDI with embedded audio could be a very
handy addition to your tool box.
A Final Note
plsn
The beauty of the digital signal is that
it is purely ones and zeros and it’s either
received perfectly or it’s gone. The same
signal that leaves a digital device enters
the next device, for example, from server
to projector. And you can’t get any more
efficient than a single cable, eliminating
the need for three-wire and five-wire complexity.
For SD-SDI and HD-SDI, keep in mind
that since SDI is a 4:2:2 signal and not a
4:4:4 signal, the two color components are
compressed. It comes down to your application. If you’re dealing with high resolution graphics, DVI is still the way to go. If
you’re dealing with motion video, PowerPoint, camera feeds and server playback,
SDI is an excellent option.
One more note — if you’re at all unsure
about what’s in that video cable and where
it should be connected, leave it to the video
guys at the event.
If you’re a major video geek and interested in a more in-depth explanation of
the bit rates, synchronization packets, data
formats and other incomprehensible hightech jargon related to SDI, you can visit
www.smpte.org/standards, or search for Serial Digital Interface on Wikipedia.
Paul Berliner can be reached at pberliner@
plsn.com.
N
o, I wasn’t planning to discuss Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative, also known by the acronym
SDI. Instead, I’ll discuss a more contemporary use of the acronym as it applies to our
industry, and rest assured, it has nothing to
do with ballistic missiles.
SDI stands for Serial Digital Interface,
and as defined by two important SMPTE
(Society of Motion Picture and Television
Engineers) standards, SDI is the most prevalent video interface used for high quality
video transmission today.
The SMPTE 259M standard defines the
specs for SD-SDI, the standard definition serial digital interface.
The SMPTE 292M standard defines the
specs for HD-SDI, the high definition serial
digital interface.
In brief, both of these SMPTE standards
define how to transmit digital video signals from point to point. The signal itself
is digital component video, comprised of
a luminance channel (Y) and two chrominance channels (Cb and Cr). These three
components are digitized, packetized, and
shot down a coax cable, carrying a payload
of pictures within the packets. When you’re
sending digital video between devices,
for example, from the camera to the video
switcher or from the media server to the
projector — more times than not, SDI is the
preferred way to go.
2009 APRIL PLSN
31
FEEDING THE MACHINES
By BradSchiller
When It Stops Being Fun
I
truly love working as an automated
lighting programmer. In fact, I often say that “show business is in my
blood.” I have been driven by a strong
passion to always do my best when I
contribute my skills to a show. Furthermore, I was raised by my parents to find
a career where the paycheck feels more
like a bonus. I often forget that I am getting paid to wiggle lights or press buttons in front of a crowd. Just the simple
act of doing my job brings me great satisfaction. (Of course, getting paid is important to my livelihood, but it is not the
involved was happy in the end. No one
was fired and the show went on. However, getting to the last day was an uphill climb. It was an unusual feeling and
I truly was unsure how to deal with it in
the moment. In the midst of the turmoil
around and within me, I wrote some
notes. Here is a portion:
“Right now I feel tired, frustrated, and
I feel like I have lost all will to care about
anything to do with my work here. I really
don’t like how I feel in this moment. I really
don’t want to be involved anymore. I now
feel like I am working for the paycheck and
“Right now I feel tired, frustrated, and I
feel like I have lost all will to care about anything to do with my work here.”
main reason I am in this business.) Unfortunately there have been a few times
when a gig stopped being fun.
Going Down Fast
FTM
When this occurs it is the result of
many factors coming together against
the greater good of the production and
directly against me. No single event or
person has ever caused me to change
my attitude towards a gig. Usually lack
of sleep and proper nutrition play a role.
Thankfully, these are rare instances that
have worked themselves out, and I have
remained pleased with this industry and
continue to work on productions that
fuel my passion for lighting.
The Emotional Drain
FTM
Recently I was involved in a production where many factors came together
to knock me down emotionally. The
production was a success and everyone
not for the fun. That sucks. I feel beaten
to a pulp and that my input, experience,
and advice is ignored at every turn. I don’t
have to be correct… I just want what is
best for the show.”
The passion inside of me to create a
great show had been alive and kicking
throughout the pre-production. I had
done all I could to ensure a top-notch
production. Problems kept arising from
every angle and anything I did or said
was challenged due to politics or budget. Through it all, I continued programming and operating the lighting, as well
as covering for many other production
positions. But my passion had been
nearly extinguished when I wrote that
passage. It saddens me to think that I
was driven to that level.
Speak Up
FTM
If you are working on a show and
find yourself going down a similar path,
the first thing you should do is to speak
calmly with the production staff. It is
easy to sit around and complain, but this
never solves anything. Call a production
meeting and calmly list the problems at
hand. Explain that the production is in
trouble and that you have reached the
end of your rope. Ask for help in a calm
manner and you will be surprised at the
results. Too often people tend to let
their emotions drive them and they begin yelling. Calmness is key. In this case,
I called a meeting and I explained peacefully exactly what was going on, and we
managed to solve many problems. Other
members of the staff were then willing
and able to help resolve problems that
had existed for days.
Sensory Overload
FTM
Many years ago I learned to skydive
and jumped out of an airplane at 11,000
feet. The moment I pushed off the wing
and was free, my mind went nuts. My
instructor said this is known as “sensory
overload” because so many new inputs
from the senses to the brain are occur-
astonishing rate of about one hour of
programming for each minute of a song.
Their production was all about the light
show, so all the lights were always focused out into the audience. We were
tasked with overloading the senses of
the audience during the show.
After about a week of working 14hour days, Loz and I were bickering with
each other like an old married couple. It
became apparent that we had been in
our own form of sensory overload, staring into bright flashing lights, avoiding
the sunlight and the real world. So we
turned off the rig and headed out to the
beach. We spent the entire day soaking up the sun and sights and then had
a relaxing meal. The next day we were
refreshed and ready to go. We were able
to program the rest of the show with a
renewed sense of creativity and we both
learned the value of taking a break.
Watch Out For Murphy
FTM
When frustration, sleep deprivation,
emotional disruption and other negative influences strike, be on the lookout
“After about a week of working 14 hour
days, Loz and I were bickering with each
other like an old married couple.”
ring at the same time. I always liked that
term. In early 2001, I had the opportunity to program the lighting for The Crystal
Method with my friend Lawrence “Loz”
Upton. We were given two weeks to
pre-program the show in a small studio
in Los Angeles. The complex electronic
rhythms of their music provide many opportunities for interesting and detailed
lighting. We were programming at the
for Murphy’s Law — anything that can
go wrong will go wrong. When we are
in these states, it can be difficult to deal
with Murphy. An LD who might be adept at dealing with a power outage at
FOH could overreact if he is already had
other negative influences on the show.
In a normal emotional state, he would
be able to recover with little impact on
the show. However when he is already
drained and beaten, he is likely to make
further mistakes as he tries to recover
from a new problem.
Be Aware
FTM
The key in all of this is to be aware
of your own emotional state. There are
millions of self-help books on this very
subject because it’s not easy for us to
do. If you practice becoming aware of
your own internal feelings, it can be
a huge help on your next production.
Once you identify how the production
is impacting you personally, then you
can take action to correct it. Several
LDs and programmers that have made
the decision to walk away from a production in order to preserve their own
emotional state. Once they realized
that the conditions were harmful to
their passion for the industry and internal emotional state, they chose to
heal themselves by removing themselves from the negative environment.
Their careers have then blossomed
even further and their passion burned
stronger than ever. I hope that I can do
the same the next time I discover the
fun has come to an end.
Contact Brad Schiller at bschiller@plsn.
com.
FOCUS ON FUNDAMENTALS
By RichardCadena
W
hen I was in college, I had a
crush on a pretty girl from my
hometown. One evening, I
looked up her number in the phone book
and called. A soft, feminine voice picked
up. I said hello, told her who I was, and
after some small talk, I nervously asked
if she would like to go to a concert. She
said yes. It was music to my ears.
A few days before the show, I ran into
her on campus. “I’m looking forward to
the show this weekend,” I said. Came her
reply; “What show?” Confused, I recounted the telephone conversation we had
the week before. But she had no recollection of it. Furthermore, she said, she
already had a date for the concert. The
only light sources to which I happen to
have convenient access at the time were
two Chroma-Q Color Block 2 LED heads.
So I broke out my Minolta T-10 Illuminance Meter and the LED fixtures. I turned
one on in full white light and focused it
on the wall about 12 feet away. I measured 165 lux. I then turned that head off
and checked the other; it also measured
165 lux. When I turned them both on, I
reasoned, I should read 330 lux. But I was
wrong! I actually measured 285 lux.
I was perplexed. So I did what any
good lighting professional would do – I
called someone smarter than me. Since
I’m a product of the Texas public school
system, I could pretty much randomly pick
If you stack 100 footcandles on top of
100 footcandles and you get anything but
200 footcandles, where do the missing
footcandles go?
music in my ears was replaced by confused silence.
I ran back to my house and looked up
the phone number again. I quickly dialed
the number and another pretty, but different voice picked up. Her telephone
greeting was simply three Greek letters. It
was a sorority house. I had been duped.
Somewhere, some sorority girl was laughing so hard that she probably split her designer jeans. Ha, ha.
From that lesson I learned two things;
I’m not particularly fond of sorority humor, and you can’t always believe what
you hear. To this day, I try not to take anything I hear at face value.
One of the things you often hear when
lighting and video techs get together is
that double stacking two video projectors
doesn’t double the brightness of the display. Is that the truth or another vicious
rumor started by maniacal sorority girls?
As easy as this is to prove or disprove,
it’s a bit surprising that there are so many
questions about this. The basic premise
a switch-mode power supply, but the
DMD switches the light on and off very
quickly. Now throw in the sampling window of the illuminance meter and all of
these factors could result in a reading
anywhere between the illuminance of a
single projector to twice the illuminance
of a single projector.
Perhaps a better question might be,
could you even tell if a surface was lit
twice as bright as another? Probably not.
The human eye is a marvelously complex
instrument. It sees not by absolute measure, but by evaluating contrast. If you
stack two light sources it’s very difficult to
distinguish with the naked eye how much
brighter it is than a single source. When I
worked for a lighting manufacturer, R&D
was constantly trying to squeeze more
light out of new fixtures, but I could never
see the 50 percent increases we were constantly being told about. The only way to
really tell is to use an illuminance meter,
and most video people (or lighting people
for that matter) don’t carry them around.
They’re not cheap, and what you see and
perceive is what really matters.
What ever happened to the pretty girl?
I’m glad you asked. I seldom ran into her
for the rest of my college career and I never
worked up the nerve to ask her out again.
About 10 or 12 years after we left college,
I saw her in a grocery store in north Austin. She was pushing a shopping cart with
a baby in the seat and two young children
following closely behind. After some small
talk she told me that she was happily married to a guy with whom we both went to
high school and who happens to be an audio engineer. I told you she was pretty, but
I never said she was smart.
Thanks to Jeff Monner of Talking Tree
Creative for suggesting the topic and reopening an old wound. E-mail the author
at rcadena@plsn.com.
someone out of the phone book and they
would probably be smarter than me, provided it wasn’t one of my classmates. But
in this case I called my friend and neighbor
Mike Wood (www.mikewoodconsulting.
com). If Mike doesn’t know the answer, it’s
probably not a solvable problem.
After a short conversation, I realized
that there’s a lot more going on than
meets the eye (or the meter). Since LEDs
are driven by pulses of current, they are
constantly flashing on and off at a very
high rate. Depending on the sample window of the illuminance meter, the timing of pulses, and the pulse width, the
results of the meter reading will vary. If,
for example, the pulses are completely
out of sync with each other and the “on”
times never overlap, it’s possible that the
illuminance would never exceed that of
a single fixture. If, on the other hand, the
pulses were completely synched, then
the meter could read double the illuminance of a single fixture depending on
the sampling period of the meter. The
Perhaps a better question might be, could
you even tell if a surface was lit twice as
bright as another?
odds are that the LEDs will be somewhat
out of sync but the pulses would overlap
to a degree, leading to a reading somewhere between that of a single fixture
and twice that of a single fixture. The
same holds true of discharge lamps that
are powered by magnetic ballast power
supplies. (Electronic power supplies have
a higher frequency than the meter sampling rate and the meter is more likely to
read more accurately.)
Now consider the variables in a typical video projector. An LCD projector
uses a discharge lamp and a switchmode power supply with a relatively
high frequency, typically in the range
of tens to hundreds of kilohertz. A DLP
projector also uses a discharge lamp and
behind it is that footcandles are not additive. Intuitively, it goes against the most
fundamental law of the universe, that
energy is conserved. After all, if you stack
100 footcandles on top of 100 footcandles
and you get anything but 200 footcandles,
where do the missing footcandles go?
The answer is that light is additive.
You can prove it by taking any two lighting instruments, measuring each one individually, and then stacking them and
measuring the result. You should get the
sum of the two.
As a lighting guy, I didn’t have to
think too long before concluding that the
double stacking projectors should double
the brightness. As a part-time imaginary
scientist, I had to test my hypothesis. The
2009 APRIL PLSN 33
To Advertise in Marketplace, Contact: Greg • 702.454.8550 • gregg@plsn.com
Ad info: www.plsn.com/instant-info
34 PLSN APRIL 2009
To Advertise in Marketplace, Contact: Greg • 702.454.8550 • gregg@plsn.com
ADVERTISER’S INDEX
Employment
COMPANY
PG#
PH
URL
A&S Case Company
31
818.509.5920
http://plsn.hotims.com/23519-276
Apollo Design
7
800.288.4626
Applied Electronics
27
800.883.0008
Atlanta Rigging Systems
10
404.355.4370
Barbizon
12
866.502.2724
BMI Supply
22
518.793.6706
Bulbtronics
21
800.227.2852
Chauvet Lighting
C1
800.762.1084
Checkers Industrial Prod.
13
800.438.9336
City Theatrical Inc.
9
800.230.9497
CM Hoist
8
800.888.0985
Creative Stage Lighting Co., Inc.
6
518.251.3302
Daktronics
29
800.843.5843
Doug Fleenor Design
13
888.436.9512
EFM
12
310.808.9911
Elation/ American DJ
C4
866.245.6726
ETC
5
608.831.4116
Gear Source
2
866.669.GEAR
Gemini Stage Lighting
1
214.341.1822
Gorilla Productions
12
714.662.1449
Holowalls
17
818.735.3565
InfoComm International
28
800.659.7469
Leprecon/ CAE
14
810.231.9373
Light Source, The
4
803.547.4765
Look Solutions
13
800.426.4189
Mega Lite
22
210.684.2600
Mega-Stage
18
(01) 450.359.4000
Osram Sylvania
11
888.677.2627
Philips Lighting
32
800.555.0050
PR Lighting/ Pearl River
19
253.395.9494
PRG
C3
845.567.5700
Pro-Tapes & Specialties
33
800.345.0234
Robe Lighting s.r.o.
3
954.615.9100
SGM
C2
390.721.476477
Staging Dimensions
15
866.591.3471
Tyler Truss
23
765.221.5050
Xtreme Structures & Fabrication
21
903.438.1100
Arena Drapery Rental
34
404.713.3742
City Theatrical Inc.
35
800.230.9497
Drew’s Tickets
35
818.990.9170
In-House Production
34
702.631.4748
Light Parts
34
512.873.7106
Light Source Inc.
35
248.685.0102
New York Case/Hybrid Case
35
800.346.4638
RC4 Wireless Dimming/ Theatre Wireless
34
866.258.4577
Roadshow
34
800.861.3111
Theatrical Lighting Systems, Inc./ TLS
34
866.254.7803
Upstage Video
34
610.323.7200
Upstaging, Inc.
35
815.899.9888
MARKET PLACE
For more
info Go To
2009 APRIL PLSN 35
LD-AT-LARGE
By NookSchoenfeld
Lighting the Club Band
I
Good Things, Small Package
Illustration by Andy Au
’ve been asked several times about
what smaller bands playing nightclubs
should carry for lighting gear. These
questions come from cover bands to
newly signed acts to old touring professionals who are reuniting for a club tour.
The two things they all have in common
is a lack of knowledge and a shortage of
cash for lighting. Long gone are the days
when bands put colored PARs in coffee
cans and connected lots of wires to a foot
pedal board for the guitarist to trigger.
Moving on to Moving Lights
plsn
The good news is that lately a lot of
lighting manufacturers are helping out
with a variety of lower wattage and lower-priced fixtures. Smaller fixtures have
been manufactured for years, but I ignored a lot of them because they simply
weren’t very bright. But with new optics
and bulb technology, this is no longer
the case. The advent of LED products has
also put a new spin on things. One of the
biggest costs for club owners is buying
new lamps. This can be a huge expense
for moving lights. Thankfully, the lamps in
some of these newer fixtures are not as
expensive as the older models. But it still
is a big chunk of money to a band wishing
to purchase their own fixtures. With LEDs,
the chances are pretty good that your
band will break up before you would ever
need to replace a single diode.
At the front of this movement is a
lighting manufacturer called Coemar. Just
this year, I have seen a wide variety of instruments come out that target the buyers I am talking to now. Coemar was the
COMING NEXT
MONTH…
The Concert and
Touring Issue
How is the economy
affecting the spring
concert touring
season? The industry
speaks to the Rulers of
the Road.
Designer Profiles
Innovation in design is
their stock in trade. The
creative forces of the
industry talk about their
work.
Gimme Shelter
How do you cap the
modern ground support
truss system? Find out
in next month’s Buyers
Guide
on roof systems.
(www.gearsource.com). They have tons of
used LED products that are perfect for a
small band. This is not shabby gear by any
means. Lots of the stuff they peddle was
purchased for a single event and then the
fabrication company that purchased them
had no future use for them.
The good news is that lately a lot of lighting
manufacturers are helping out with a
variety of lower wattage and lower priced
fixtures.
first company that I personally saw with
an LED PAR. They started manufacturing it
a few years back. I’ve been using these for
years now, and they are just as dependable as the day I bought them. They don’t
need any special road cases. I often wrap
a bunch of them in packing blankets and
throw them in a box for travel. I can plug
half a dozen into one wall outlet and not
worry about blowing a breaker because
these fixtures require very little electricity.
Besides these PARs, there are some
other very cool LED fixtures. Robe makes a
mole-looking fixture called the REDBlinder 2-96 that contains eight separate cells
of red, green, and blue (RGB) LEDs. These
are great for lighting the audience at a
bar. Or if you hang them from a rear truss
at a gig, they will backlight the band with
a wide beam spread and light the crowd
as well. Coemar also makes a strip light of
LEDs, which is great for several purposes.
One, they can live on the floor of a stage
and front-light the band, or they can be
used to uplight a banner hanging upstage of the artist. Because these fixtures
have no conventional lamps, they never
get hot and they don’t blind the players
like typical theatrical lamps.
One of the things I like about these
lights is that they have RGB as well as pure
white LEDs. Some LED fixtures mix a white
color by simply turning on all of the RGB
diodes. It makes a pinkish-white color. It’s
not a true white and often makes an artist appear in a strange ghostly hue. The
Coemar version has separate white cells
that can create nice flesh tone colors,
from CTO to daylight white, that are perfect for any video recording. Coemar just
released a new compact strip light called
the StageLite that consists of six rows of
LEDs that can tilt and run an array of built
in effects, thus turning the strip light into
a moving light and a great disco effect.
Making an Impression
plsn
Elation and Chauvet have long been
known as two of the best places bands
can go to pick up inexpensive fixtures.
They have such a wide array of different club type lights that I wouldn’t know
where to begin. Last year, Elation released the Impression series of fixtures.
These are extremely bright moving yoke
LED lights. They weigh a fraction of what
many other moving lights do, and that’s a
big bonus for playing in clubs where the
rigging won’t support heavy loads. Mind
you, they are expensive, but they are dependable.
LED fixtures are great for all these reasons, but not all name brands are easy for
a less-established band to afford. For these
bands, you can talk to several dealers to
get a good price. Or look into buying used
products from companies like Gear Source
plsn
As for arc lights, Coemar has several
new fixtures that cater to the club scene.
They now build a small Infinity wash light
as well as the Infinity ACL. The wash light
has a variety of effects like gobos and
prisms that, up until recently, nobody really used in a wash fixture. Four of these
bad boys on an upstage truss can wash
out a small band shell quite nicely. Their
ACL fixture is similar, but has a very tight
beam that is punchy and quite bright.
They also make a hard edge small spot fixture that has plenty of gobo patterns and
a color wheel that will give you a splendid
array of colors.
Clay Paky’s new wash fixture, the Alpha 300, cannot be dismissed either. It is
brighter than other little light fixtures, but
the real selling point of this light is that
it can pan and tilt faster than any other
yoke light I’ve seen. It’s good for a variety
of uses, but I think it’s the perfect fixture
for any metal act. It’s also great for a club,
but is so bright that many major touring
acts are now using them as well.
Martin also released their SmartMAC
150 series last year. These are good lights
for any low ceiling venue. They have a wide
beam spread and their reliability is second
to none. Its low wattage and high output
makes a great combo for any club act.
Control Yourself
plsn
Lighting consoles can be a big problem for little bands. Within the last few
years, many companies have come out
with PC-based consoles. They take a
while to learn and operating lights with
a mouse is just not good for your sanity.
I suggest clubs look into using PC-based
consoles, but try the new ones made by
Chamsys. They have five different models, and their best model is an actual
replica of their professional series console with all the same buttons, faders
(10 of them), and DMX512 outputs (four
of them). It connects to your PC and
uses its processing power to think. It’s
perfect for any application, including
traveling in the back seat of your van if
necessary.
Having to light an act with a skinny
budget and limited physical space is
not the ideal gig. But the good news is
that there are more really great lighting
tools available today to help you do it
well. Everything from LEDs and moving
lights to consoles and wings have been
brought into the realm of affordability.
A limited budget is no longer an excuse
for having a sucky lighting rig.
Nook Schoenfeld is a freelance lighting
designer. He can be contacted by e-mailing nschoenfeld@plsn.com.

Dirty Dancing

Transcription

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