South Africa - The 2023 Brixton Light Festival in Johannesburg delivered its third – and largest to date – event filled with the magic, mystery and imagination evoked by light. It started during the covid lockdowns as a community-led and driven art-based lighting experience to unite the already tight-knit, lively and diverse neighbourhood of Brixton. The goal is to celebrate the spirit and importance of community, and the power of art and empathy.
Sound designer and Brixton resident Fried Wilsenach from Working Dog helped implement several lighting installations this year, including one illuminating the impressive Sentech Tower, a landmark that dominates the Brixton skyline and that of the surrounding Auckland Park suburb. The Tower is part of SABC’s (South African Broadcasting Corporation) broadcasting HQ which is also located there.
Fried in turn asked lighting designer Oliver Hauser – who works across a broad base of lighting sectors including television, live events and theatre, drama, comedy, opera, musicals, avant-garde dance contemporary music & conceptual performance which is where his career started – to join the team and provide ideas for the Tower illuminations. The two have been friends and colleagues for many years.
Oliver utilised Robe fixtures – two Tarrantulas, two Esprites, a Forte and a MegaPointe – as he needed serious power to throw to the top of the 237-metre-high Tower. The lights were supplied to the event by DWR as part of their sponsorship package.
He needed the most powerful lights he could source t
Canada - Matthieu Larivée and the team at Lüz Studio have been relentlessly pushing the envelope of late, driving technology in new directions to transform stages in ways that would have been unimaginable not long ago. So, it should come as no surprise that following their widely acclaimed work on last year’s Jason Aldean tour, when they turned the entire upstage wall into a stunning 3D video screen, these creatives dramatically changed their plans for 2023.
Unlike its predecessor, this year’s just concluded Highway Desperado Tour had a production design that was dominated by a single vertical, centre stage video screen. Measuring 24’ high by 18’ wide by 6’ deep and angled at 20-degrees, the 8mm blow-through wall displayed captivating IMAG images and dynamic patterns accentuated by pixel mapped light from Chauvet Professional Maverick Storm2 BeamWash fixtures, which, like the rest of the rig, were supplied by Bandit Lites.
“We wanted to change the screen design for a different look, but beyond that, our desire was to trigger new creative ideas for the content,” said Larivée, who worked on this production with the Lüz team of David Rondeau, Philippe Marquis, and Pierre-Luc Bedard. “So, we came up with the idea of using a monolith that we playfully called the ‘cereal box,’ because in actuality, it’s a 3D physical box.”
Run by LD Andy Knighton, the show took the convergence of video and light to a new level, as the cereal box merged graphics and effects into a compelling blend that conveyed the raw, powerful energy of Aldean
Italy - Prolights products illuminated the Marrageddon festival, a celebration of Italian hip-hop, conceived and hosted by hip-hop artist Marracash.
With two dates between Milan and Naples, the festival hosted a line-up that included Fabri Fibra, Salmo, Guè Pequeno, Lazza and Madame, attracting more than 130,000 tspectators.
To support such a large entourage of guests it was necessary to design a lighting setup that was up to par with the live performances of the festival; the lighting design was entrusted to Giorgio De Cassan, alongside Lorenzo De Pascalis, who oversaw the entire artistic direction of the festival.
For the lighting setup, the team relied on rental company Mister X Service, selecting a wide range of equipment, including 130 Prolights projectors: 40 Sunblast 3000FC, 50 Astra Wash19Pix, and 40 VersaPar.
USA - ADJ is preparing to showcase its newly evolved range of professional lighting products designed for concert tours, festivals and special events at the 2023 LDI tradeshow in Las Vegas.
Alongside new products that will launch exclusively at the show, ADJ’s booth (#1443) will feature a lightshow designed by experienced concert LD, Steve Kosiba. This will showcase select fixtures from the brand’s existing range of fixtures.
A partner at Squeek Lights, the concert lighting specialist based in New Jersey, Steve Kosiba has extensive experience in the lighting industry. He joined Squeek Lights after six years at Starlite Productions, where he was head of the automated lighting department, and, before that, spent years working as a house LD at many venues in and around Philadelphia.
“My first experience with the ‘new’ ADJ gear was, as with many people in the concert market, the 32 HEX Panel IP,” comments Steve. “It is a great fixture, which is very versatile and suitable for side light, foot light or drape light, and can also be used as a blinder, a strobe, or for pixel FX. It fills a lot of roles in the Squeek Lights rental inventory, and we recently sold a small venue a whole rig of ADJ HEX fixtures as well. This also included 15 HEX Bar IP and 7P HEX IP units and completely transformed the space.
“When the new Encore Lime fixtures came out, Squeek Lights picked up both the Encore Z7LP and Encore LB15IP. The lime bars are far brighter than our previous generation pixel strips and far sturdier. The zoom pars are fantastic: punc
Germany - Robe Deutschland, a wholly owned subsidiary of Robe Lighting s.r.o., has taken over exclusive responsibility for the sales and service of all Avolites products on the German market as of 1 November 2023.
Dieter Gross, CEO of Robe Germany, commented, "Following the acquisition of Avolites by Robe it was a logical step to hand over sales in the region to Robe’s German subsidiary. We respect Trendco's excellent work over the decades and thank them for their harmonious cooperation during the handover period."
Tillmann Schulz has been appointed sales and business development manager for Avolites at Robe Deutschland.
He notes, "Robe has been using Avolites control products internally for a long time and I am delighted to be representing these new, user-friendly solutions in the German market."
In collaboration with Robe Germany’s product specialist and technical sales Martin Opitz and business development manager Jens Langner, Tillmann will also offer Avolites training and create further tutorial and learnership opportunities.
Technical support will be provided by the service department of Robe Deutschland in Neuching near Munich.
"This is a great opportunity for us with an outstanding set of products, and we’ve appointed a hugely talented and enthusiastic individual in Tillmann and look forward to a great long-term working relationship," stated Martin Lönner, COO of Robe Deutschland.
"Integrating Avolites' strong products into the Robe lighting ecosystem enables us to respond comprehensively to ever-increasing
USA - At this year's Live Design International (LDI) from 3-5 December, Cameo - the lighting technology brand of the Adam Hall Group - will be presenting various innovations and product highlights that will significantly expand the range of professional lighting designers, operators and rental service providers.
In addition to the OTOS IP65 models SP6 (Spot Profile) and B5 (Beam) and the PIXBAR G2 IP65 LED bars, the focus will be on the new products of the AZOR series, which will be presented to the public for the first time at LDI. Cameo will be showcasing its product portfolio at LDI 2023 together with its North American partner Theatrixx at booth 1145.
Cameo can look back on more than 10 years of experience in the professional lighting industry and impresses professionals all over the world with lighting technology for live, event, theatre and architectural lighting applications.
The Cameo product range covers all professional requirements - from ambitious beginners designing their first light show to the largest rental providers with an international focus. This year alone, lighting designers around the world staged some of the biggest festivals and events with Cameo lighting solutions, including the major EDM events Nature One and World Club Dome, the Lent cultural festival and the official live concert for the coronation of King Charles III.
The compact and highly efficient moving heads in the AZOR series have been a firm favorite on live stages, in clubs and many other applications since their launch. A new AZOR era is now dawning at t
UK - Whitecroft Lighting has secured the contract to supply the internal lighting to Everton Football Club for its new Bramley-Moore Dock Stadium in Liverpool.
The deal will see the commercial lighting specialist manufacture around 14,000 luminaires for the stadium's main areas, including the concourse, concession areas, press areas, stairwells, corridors, player and staff areas and corporate hospitality.
Whitecroft Lighting was awarded the contract due to its experience in successfully delivering complex and high value prestigious projects across the UK, as well as its commitment to supporting the Everton project from initial design to project handover.
Due for completion in late 2024, the 52,000-capacity stadium is currently under construction, with the lighting installation set to start in autumn 2023. Whitecroft will be working with main contractor Laing O’Rourke, M&E contractor Crown House Technologies and design consultants Buro Happold.
There are several challenges due to the project’s maritime location, with 60% of the luminaires requiring water ingress protection and sustainable lighting suitable for a corrosive saline environment. Whitecroft will supply a tailored lighting product that will be saline resistant and support 24/7 operations at the new stadium.
Whitecroft’s Avenue Metro Surface, a modular linear LED system, will create a bright, safe environment in the concourse, corridors, corporate and several other areas, while its Mirage LED Surface range, an elegant circular suspended downlight with a cast aluminium
USA - Right from the start, Papa Roach fans at Newark’s Prudential Centre knew that the trailblazing metal masters were going to be coming at them in full force. Walking onto a dark stage, the band started to play Between Angels and Insects as the background behind them suddenly erupted with strobing images from a massive video wall that ran almost the entire width of the stage.
The menacingly raw and powerful images on the wall were repeated on the extended riser, making the band members on it look as if they were being absorbed into the foreboding video. It was exactly the kind of evocative narrative that German lighting designer Mathias Kuhn and the band from northern California envisioned when they sat down to plan the production for the Revolution Live tour in support of Shinedown.
“Video is by far the biggest part of the show,” said Kuhn. “The band just wanted to step back from the usual couple of lights on a pole, and create a visual part of the show, that sucks the audience right into their narrative. On previous tours, I used a bookend shaped videowall to create the look of a band that is surrounded by the video content, so they are playing ‘inside’ the wall.
“We talked a lot about the start of the show, how we wanted to glue the first three songs together but make them look totally different -- and that worked out pretty well. A lot of people in the audience were just blown away by the band’s energy.”
Kuhn created this magic with the help of this ChamSys MagicQ MQ500M Stadium console and a PC wing backup.
UK/USA - Three leading West End/Broadway theatre lighting designers are using GLP’s new impression X5 Wash - all supplied by Paul Anderson at Sparks Theatrical Hire - to light current or upcoming shows.
Leading the charge was Paule Constable, who originally requested them for Guys and Dolls at London’s Bridge Theatre. This has been followed by Tim Lutkin, who is responsible for lighting The Crucible at the Gielgud Theatre, and Paul Pyant, who is in production for Noises Off at the Theatre Royal Haymarket.
“These are three highly respected designers,” observes Anderson, himself a premier theatre lighting design specialist. “Early on in the [Guys and Dolls] process we approached Paule to see what equipment she would desire. As she had just lit a show on Broadway where she used the impression X5s, she requested them.”
Sparks ordered the 30 units well in advance, knowing there was a global component shortage, as Anderson himself was also keen to put them through their paces: “We knew the impression X4 Washes and obviously we have tons of impression X4 Bar 20 battens in our rental stock. But in the end the X5s were only in the warehouse for two days, for barcoding and testing, before going straight out onto the show.”
However, that was all he needed to test drive the next generation Wash, with its innovative iQ.Gamut algorithm and lime chip representing a huge step forward. The chassis also contains 19 powerful 40W LEDs to provide enormous power output and provides a super-fast zoom.
“I put them t
UK - Lighting design studio Michael Grubb Studio is celebrating a decade in business, having been set up by founder and managing director Michael Grubb in 2013.
Like most fledgling enterprises, Michael Grubb Studio began with just one solitary employee – Michael Grubb – working from a desk in a back bedroom. Now, 10 years on, the studio has grown to become an international winning lighting consultancy.
From the outset, Michael set out to assemble a team of creative and ambitious designers. His current team of 12 experts in their field demonstrate these skills and capabilities.
“I sought a team that possessed self-motivation, audacity, a willingness to take calculated risks, and a commitment to educating our clients about the possibilities that light could offer,” says Michael. “Our DNA and ethos remain at the core of everything we do, creativity, education, and environmental protection.”
In the early years, the team ventured into unconventional endeavours, including dressing their marketing manager as a lobster, pitching the concept of George Clooney dressed as Santa opening their Gardens of Light Festival, and illuminating Durdle Door from a tiny vessel at sea. These bold and creative escapades helped establish Michael Grubb Studio's reputation and define the company's identity.
Confidence in the company’s vision and approach played an integral role in Michael Grubb Studio’s early successes and rapid growth. This paved the way for several high-profile, significant award-winning projects, including the Guinness Storehouse
France - The CHAUVET Professional team has built its spaces at JTSE (29-30 November) around the theme ‘Frame your scene: immersion in the frame’.
Visitors to Stand #85 and Boîte Noire (Black Box) #14 will find a wide range of new Chauvet Professional projectors designed to help them create striking visuals, enabling them to ‘frame their productions impeccably’. Among them are new additions to the Maverick Storm and COLORado families, all IP65-rated to suit all conditions.
The COLORado range is enhanced by the COLORado PXL Curve 12, an innovative new spotlight with 12 zooms and 12 individual tilts. This fixture is also to be presented at the JTSE Awards. Lighting designers will appreciate how this groundbreaking projector offers them new ways of creating a moving frame and conveying emotion through all their pictures. The controllability of each of the 12 fully dimmable sources gives designers access to new curves and wave patterns that can't be achieved with traditional LED battens.
A new addition to the Maverick Storm family is the Maverick Storm 3 BeamWash. With its two independent zoom control zones, it opens up new creative perspectives as a result of its completely unique beam, wash, and pixel mapping effects. Its full pixel mappable16-lens outer zone and 12-lens inner zone can be combined to create intense and varied images.
The Maverick Storm 4 Profile is capable of creating a universal frame, even in the largest arenas or amphitheatres. Thanks to its powerful LED motor and advanced optics, it projects an intense light over a v
France - Lightware Visual Engineering has announced the opening of its new Experience Centre in France, located near Paris.
The new facility, situated in Vélizy-Villacoublay, serves as both the new office for the Lightware France team and a central hub for partners and customers throughout France, offering sales, customer, and technical support for all of Lightware's products.
Customers enjoy direct access to Lightware's comprehensive product range, which includes Vinx, MX2M, TPX, LARA, as well as their award-winning technologies such as Taurus UCX and UBEX. A training room, equipped with the latest Lightware devices, provides customers with a platform for product testing, roadmap discussions, and the exploration of emerging technologies.
The opening of this new facility in France marks a significant strategic move in Lightware's global expansion, says the company. It aligns with the company's strategic growth objectives and offers customers a convenient platform to experience the advantages of Lightware's products.
“This Experience Centre represents our commitment to providing a superior customer experience and encouraging collaboration and innovation," said Dominique Bonneau, Lightware’s France director. "We're excited to welcome visitors to our showroom, and we believe it will make working with Lightware and our products even better."
In 2023, the company also launched Experience Centres in London and Sydney, and next year it will be opening more local offices and demo centres worldwide.
UK - Hugh Vanstone, acclaimed lighting designer and supporter of The Vanstone Scholarship for Production Arts at Guildhall School, was made an Honorary Fellow in graduation ceremonies on Friday 3 November.
Others awarded fellowships were Geoff Harniess (Head of Centre for Young Musicians London between 2013 and 2023), Ashley Zhangazha (Acting, 2010) and Roger Wilson (co-founder and director of operations of Black Lives in Music, an initiative dedicated to addressing better representation in music)
The graduation ceremony was held in the City of London’s Guildhall, and was attended by graduands, honorands, prize-winners, guests and staff.
The School’s special prizes were also awarded over the course of the two ceremonies including; Gold Medal (Music) Alexandra Pouta, Sheriffs’ Prize Camille Daya Lucie Said, Gold Medal (Acting) Abdul Rahman Tariro Sessay, Gold Medal (Production Arts) Thomas Jack Licence, Lord Mayor’s Prize Alexander William James Harris, Lady Mayoress’s Prize Ebenezer Gyau, Sheriff’s Prize Roslyn Savannah Chase, Principal’s Prize Rylee Erin McDaniel, Chairman’s Prize Luna Ingrid Louise De Mol and Lutine Prize Thomas Percy Young.
UK - Celestial delivered a spectacular drone show on 4 November in partnership with Frome Town Council for a fundraiser event in the place of a more traditional fireworks display. The ticketed event saw over 7,500 people gather to see the drone show.
Close Encounters of the Frome Kind was an extra-terrestrial extravaganza that celebrated the colourful character and quirk of Frome with its blend of innovative drone light show technology, UFO intrigue and touch of celestial magic. The show was designed and delivered by Celestial who, since their last Frome display (the first with a live audience), has gone from strength to strength delivering shows all over the world for some of the biggest brands, including Eurovision, London New Year’s Eve and many more.
The company, based in Frome, specialises in aerial storytelling, performed by hundreds of brightly coloured drone lights in the night sky. This year’s show also gave members of the local community, such as Frome Community College, a chance to get involved too. Five students were selected to form part of Celestial’s operations team and were able to experience first-hand what goes on behind the scenes to deliver a drone show.
“It's been great to get some insights of how the company works and how it operates. It's been really exciting and a great opportunity,” says Max, Frome Community College student .
“We proudly replace unsustainable fireworks with mind-bending ‘lightworks’ shows. We were thrilled to be able to bring a show to Frome again – we live and work here, and
USA - The annual Billboard Latin Music Awards is the biggest night of the year for Latin American music and this year lighting designer John Daniels employed a selection of Elation lights to create captivating effects and aesthetic looks on the show.
Aired live on 5 October from the Watsco Centre in Coral Gables, Florida, Daniels creatively incorporated Elation Proteus Rayzor Blade, Proteus Excalibur and Smarty MAX luminaires as some of the most impactful lights on the event.
Daniels, in his fifth year working the show, designed lighting looks for 16 performances from top talent like Bad Bunny, Peso Pluma and many others, as well as numerous award presentations. The Elation luminaires played key visual roles in his lighting design and were instrumental in the dynamic camera looks created throughout the show. Lighting supply for the event was from 4Wall.
Opting for a streamlined approach this year, Daniels strategically selected fewer fixture types, allowing greater creativity with each light while enabling lighting programmers Chris Fernandez and Felix Peralta to delve deeply into each fixture. Fernandez concentrated on key lighting for talent and audience, while Peralta handled programming for effects and environment, both serving as lighting directors for the show.
Fernandez, co-founder of Limitless Design Group, collaborated with Elation’s Ryan Stumpp to source the Elation lighting units used for the event and was instrumental in connecting Daniels with Stumpp and 4Wall account rep Sebastian Yepes. “It was a team effort, and we all wor
USA - Tedeschi Trucks Band (TTB) is a popular contemporary blues band, known for musicianship and gripping live performances, so Nashville-based lighting designer Tony Caporale of design studio InfinitusVox was delighted to be asked to design a new lighting scheme for their live shows.
Tony has enjoyed an action packed 2023 schedule and TTB is a new client. They reached out to him after seeing some of his other work, particularly the Goose tour earlier in the year, for which he was lighting programmer, working closely with LD Andrew Goedde.
A long-term Robe advocate, when Tony started drawing up the plot, he looked to some of his most trusted moving lights - Fortes, Spiiders and MegaPointes - to help add that special magic and sparkle for TTB’s stage presentation.
It started as a summer shed and theatre tour and crossed over to arenas towards the later US dates, so the rig needed to be scalable and adaptable. Tony’s lighting also had to accommodate a raft of guest musicians and singers, all adding to the general stage dynamic.
With a 12-piece band to cover, he needed some bold and large lighting looks to complement their impressive set-up.
“I decided to effectively ‘wrap’ the trusses around their stage set up, including the floor lighting carts on the deck as well, so it could envelop them on one hand, but I could also have lights shooting out to the audience and transferring the energy offstage,” he explained.
When he showed Susan Tedeschi - a band founder together with husband Derek Trucks - the initial ideas, she lov
Croatia - A feature of this year’s Špancirfest, a Croatian street festival held every August since 1999 in Varaždin, was the appearance of the tribute band, The Croatian Pink Floyd Show. An array of Claypaky Sharpy X Frame/FD and Midi-B fixtures illuminated the dynamic live show.
Špancirfest took place throughout Varaždin’s city centre and featured various street performers, theatre shows, stand-up comedy, concerts and more.
The Croatian Pink Floyd Show is a project led by producer and sound engineer Johnny Grudić who founded the band in 2016 and launched performances two years later with the mission to give the audience the most authentic Pink Floyd experience possible. That's where Dino Petrina stepped in as a lighting designer. Production manager Denis Fulir was responsible for the show on the main stage with production by Croatian rental company IVAS Group and stage design by Miloš Pavičić. It was one of Croatia’s biggest local productions ever.
Petrina, who is known for his dynamic concert lighting and well-synchronised busking, realised the challenge of lighting the show considering the complexity of Pink Floyd performances. But he felt he could relax a little when he discovered that Claypaky fixtures were available to him knowing the brand’s reputation of never disappointing when used in a performance.
He used 20 versatile Claypaky Sharpy X Frame/FD fixtures as spotlights to deliver “a nice output, great colour mixing, great zoom range and focus for highlighting individual musicians, nice gobos and prism for ambient
UK - The team behind Optikinetics - a leading innovator of specialist lighting projection effects - has launched a Kickstarter project to help introduce [OPTI] Kino, a limited-edition ‘70s-inspired psychedelic light projector.
Created in celebration of the company’s 50th anniversary, the Kino projector takes inspiration from the past whilst utilising modern manufacturing materials and techniques. “Imagine you are in the ‘70s and not afraid to let your imagination flow,” say Kino’s creators. “Opti's newest projector is here to take you back in time on a vibrant and mesmerising journey. It's all about love: love for the past, love for creativity, love for colours and above all, love for your imagination.”
Offering a retro-modern style, the limited-edition effects projector is designed to work with Optikinetics’ range of analogue lighting effects, such as the company’s iconic liquid wheels - a trippy mix of coloured oils randomly moving and interacting in a lava-style projection. This effect was made famous in the ‘70s and ‘80s by many well-known psychedelic bands of the era.
Made using LEDs and sustainable materials like wood, the Kino projector is available at three special, exclusive price points as part of the Kickstarter project.
“If you are inspired by influences from the past - be it in fashion, art, design or music - then the Kino is for you, and we would love to welcome you to our creative family - together inspiring a whole new generation of creative minds.”
Visit the Kickstarter project by clicking
UK - Ever since Manchester UK-based fac365 secured the Optocore dealership in 2016, the pro audio RF and comms rental specialists have enjoyed increasing success with the brand, culminating in this year, with most notably the Festival Box.
Originally set up in the UK’s Greater Manchester area by Mike Hayes, fac365 supplies solutions right across the broadcast and entertainment spectrum - on both a sales and hire basis - including many interactive devices from the Optocore portfolio.
Festival Box itself is a point-to-point converter, which enables all signals and protocols to tunnel over the same fibre. It quickly established itself on tours by Billie Eilish and the Spice Girls and subsequently on Coldplay tours.
Having first debuted Optocore’s AutoRouter on the Head Full Of Dreams tour at the end of 2015, Alex Hadjigeorgiou introduced Festival Box to the band’s rig in 2019. Since then it has been the backbone of the control package infrastructure, touring the globe twice over.
Today, four Festival Boxes make up the Coldplay control package - one pair serving the FOH/Stage, while a second pair hooks the FOH infrastructure together.
The device itself comes in two versions - the Festival Box Grand (with 12 SFP ports) and Petite (with six SFPs). According to fac365 operations manager, Richard Newall, his company has recently built a deployable Grand system loaded with sufficient fibre and CAT ports to cater for most festival and multiple artist requirements. This intuitive set-up has been configured for hires as a simple ‘plug and
Europe - During the busy August festival season, Europe’s largest stages called upon the timing and audio spatialisation prowess of TiMax SoundHub to manage immersive soundscapes, as well as vocal and orchestral localisation, on the vast productions which draw the summer crowds.
In the UK, Edinburgh Military Tattoo is a pinnacle of the Edinburgh festival and pulls in a 9,000-strong audience every night to watch a spectacular and dynamic performance featuring military bands from all over the world. In new creative hands this year with sound designer Scott Willsallen of Auditoria heading up the audio team, TiMax SoundHub and TiMaxTrackerD4 were still a requirement to spatially reinforce and track hundreds of military musicians through the nightly, multi-act, performances. Referring to the high calibre technology deployed for the tattoo, creative director, Michael Braithwaite, confirms: “It’s not just gratuitous use of effect, it’s using technology for the right reasons.”
A 64-channel TiMax SoundHub drives a spatialisation system of distributed loudspeakers through the auditorium in the castle grounds. Several sets of TiMax Trackerd4 Tags were revolved through multiple acts of military musicians, monitored by 18 TiMax Tracker sensors placed high in the castle walls, providing inherent robust redundancy across the vast performance area, as only two sensors are required to locate the movement of any Tag.
Over in Switzerland, the audio management, and also the lighting, for the Basel Tattoo, was once again in the firm control of sound designer a
UAE - Technology from LSC Control Systems is at the centre of the dimming and power distribution installations at two of Dubai’s latest fine-dining experiences. Specified and installed by Loud DXB for Solutions Leisure Group, the APS (Advanced Power System) and GEN VI systems from the Australian manufacturer provide both quality of performance and peace of mind for client and supplier alike.
At Dubai’s new En Fuego restaurant, a colourful and vibrant Latin American-themed dining destination at the Palm Dubai’s Atlantis resort, Loud specified both an APS configurable power system and GEN VI intelligent dimming/direct power system from LSC Control Systems. Meanwhile, for another of Solutions Leisure’s latest attractions, the Asia Asia restaurant and lounge with its ancient Spice Route theme, sited on Dubai’s stunning Business Bay, they again specified LSC’s GEN VI system.
As Loud’s lighting designer and consultant for the project, Ben M Rogers explains, these are not simple eateries, but full-on entertainment environments. “The aim is to craft an engaging narrative that delivers an outstanding and memorable guest experience,” he says, “so the décor, lighting and styling need to match up to the food and drink on offer. We work to ensure the environment is dynamically lit to adjust to the daily operational needs, often transforming from a high-end dining experience into a late-night party and show venue.”
He continues: “Our systems all have a theatrical DNA, with colour changing and high fidelity dimming to allow this precise sc
Finland - Singer Kaija Koo celebrates an impressive 40-year career as one of the country’s most popular artists, and anniversary activities have included staging a massive show at Helsinki’s Olympic Stadium.
The high-profile one-off event featured an elegant and eye-catching production design evolved by the combined talents of Ari Levelä (set & video) and Pekka Martti (lighting), who chose to use a full grandMA3 system for lighting and video control.
The two have worked together as a visual team since 2016 and enjoy the creative benefits of pooling ideas and experiences to produce unique shows and spectaculars. This show followed an arena tour they completed at the end of 2022 featuring four powerhouse Finnish female singers, one being Kaija Koo.
Her management team was clearly impressed with their work and invited Ari & Pekka to present a design for this special show. They received a brief, and the goal was to produce a maximum visual impact design that was also practical enough to implement, build and break down for a one-off concert.
The video-fronted double decked stage risers, set elements and striking curved, leaf-shaped LED screens surrounding the stage defined the look. This architecture came first and as it shaped up, Pekka started work on the lighting design and placement of trussing and fixtures.
He was also thinking that this would be a good time to make the switch to all grandMA3.
“I had full confidence in the system,” he stated, a fact evidently backed up by choosing to do it at such a prestigious e
Italy - It may not have rivalled the 200,000 or so spectators who used to watch chariot races there in ancient times, but the 70,000 fans who turned out at Rome’s Circus Maximus for Imagine Dragons’ show recently constituted a pretty good-sized crowd.
Making the only Italian stop on their Mercury World Tour, the Grammy- winning band from Las Vegas, didn’t disappoint.
Reflecting the mood of music and the stage ebullient persona of the band was a lively and upbeat light and video show by the Milan design studio Blearred that featured 100 Chauvet Professional Color Strike M motorised strobes from Zalight with service from Agora.
The Color Strike M fixtures were arranged on the upper frame of the three LED walls, as well as being aligned across the entire width of the stage deck and fixed to the trusses of the delay towers. From these positions, the multi-formatted fixtures were able to unify the diverse elements of the production, which included two large vertical video walls, located stage left and stage right, as well a horizontal video wall that stretched across the entire stage.
Thanks to their 180-degree tilt range, the horizontally-hung Color Strike M fixtures covered a range of different areas, which added variety to the light show. Also enhancing the show was the fixture’s 16-bit dimming, which allowed smooth fades between songs. The fixture’s IP65 rating was an essential feature, given that the concert was held outdoors.
The high output of the Color Strike M fixture’s two central light tubes provided ample output to l
USA - Floridian rockers Tedeschi Trucks’ summer 2023 tour staging was dominated by soaring horizontal LED battens which displayed pixels of video content, driven by Hippotizer Karst+ MK2 media servers. The battens were interspersed with LED fixtures to create a dazzling series of audience blinders, colour and sweeping effects to set the scene for the band’s brand of American blues rock.
The lighting design and programming was delivered to the tour by Infinitus Vox, headed by Tony Caporale, who used a Hippotizer Karst+ MK2’s NDI feed to his Depence R3 pre-viz software. This meant that during pre-production, he could view all of the lighting and video design together, before controlling the Media Server via a grandMA3 console.
“Since pixel mapping was the main focus here, the Karst+ MK2 was the right Hippotizer for the job,” says Caporale. “It offers flexibility - I’ve used this machine on heavily timecoded shows to doing a good old fashioned rock show like this one without timecode. I’m comfortable with it in many situations we face in production.”
For a show requiring large amounts of video content displayed via LED battens, Caporale took advantage of the Hippotizer PixelMapper feature, which was designed to bring creative video to lighting fixtures. The content was created by Danny Clarke from Gateway Studios and Production Services, as well as stock content manipulated for the creative design of the show by Caporale.
“I discovered a lot of ways to blend the pixel mapped content with the existing programming in the Pixel