Bonnaroo grounds get magical with Chauvet
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But North America’s largest outdoor festival has always been about sights as well as sounds. This year’s edition, which ran from 7-10 June, pumped up the visual excitement even more than usual with a massive off-stage lighting display that wrapped around the stages and surrounded the audience in a sea of changing colours.
Looking like a magical tale come to life, the outdoor display, which was designed by David Weiner of David Weiner Design, swept up visitors with its rainbow of coloured trees, making it easy for them to set their imaginations free. Creating this captivating colour-scape were 1000 Chauvet Professional COLORado fixtures, supplied and installed by The Design Oasis.
“Having the opportunity to bring the site to life with lighting is something that we have been interested in for a long time. The property is chock full of beautiful, giant tress just begging to be lit. When the producers came to us last fall and said ‘let’s do it,’ we jumped,” said Weiner. “There was no doubt in my mind that the result would be nothing less than transformative to the environment and elevate the fan experience.”
Weiner’s enthusiasm was echoed by Abbas Ritscher of The Design Oasis, who said, “When David told me about his vision of transforming the festival grounds into a wonderful colour canvas, I knew it was something I’d want to be involved with, so I jumped at the chance.”
Ritscher installed 200 COLORado 2-Quad Zoom LED wash lights and 800 COLORado 1-Tri IP and 1-Tri Tour fixtures throughout the festival grounds. “The COLORado 2-Quad Zooms were our workhorse,” he said. “We placed eight of them per truss, with each truss spaced 100’ apart to light the 2,400’ tree line that wraps around the venue. The effect that we got from this was nothing short of awesome. Wrapping the festival with this ring of light really made you feel like you were inside a special place.”
(Jim Evans)
