BLACKBURN, U.K. — HSL supplied lighting gear and crew for Lemar’s recent U.K. theatre tour, HSL’s first tour with Production North. “It was great pleasure to work with Steve Levitt, Iain Whitehead and their team and on the road with production manager Sarah Hollis,” said Mike Oates, HSL project manager. “Production values on all their tours, whatever size, are always at the top of the agenda.”
Dave Lee created the lighting, set and production design, working to meet an initial brief from Lemar’s management, which called for a dark and moody ambience.
Lee also wanted to ensure continuity in that it fitted in to all the venues on the itinerary, so he based the rig on three straight trusses and a floor package, calling that approach “always good for more subtle visual effects like silhouetting and backlighting.”
The front truss contained 10 fixtures — Robe ColorWash 750 AT Tungstens — used for keylighting and washing the stage. It was the first time Lee had used them.
“They were great,” he said. “The intensity is well impressive, and 10 lights were all I needed up there to cover everything.” The zoom, he added, helped him adapt to different sized venues, and he called the color mixing “smooth.”
The mid truss was used primarily as a kabuki reveal. Lee had six Robe ColorWash 1200E ATs positioned on it, which he used for audience illumination. “I specifically wanted something different from blinders,” he said.
The back truss was loaded with 10 Robe ColorWash 1200E ATs and eight Robe ColorSpot 700E ATs. These produced an array of moving beams and upstage backwashes.
HSL changed some of the gobos for Lee, who uses double gobos to create custom looks.
The tour used six vertical truss towers, at heights of 5, 8 and 10 feet. The 5-foot sections were towards the middle of the stage so as not to obscure a 10 by 5 meter SoftLED backdrop, also supplied by HSL. This had a portrait-sized MiTrix LED screen in front of it, onto which was beamed an I-Mag camera mix cut by Tom Levitt using content from an Arkaos media server — all supplied by XL Video.
Rigged on top of each of the trussing towers was a Robe ColorSpot 700E AT, and spread across all six towers were eight PixelLine LED strips and 12 2-lite Moles, which were ensconced inside the trusses and used for emphasizing gentle punctuations in the music.
Five more Robe ColorSpot 700E ATs were used to backlight the musicians, positioned in front of the set risers.
Lee ran the show from his own Hog iPC console, working alongside lighting tech Dom Crookes.
It was Lee’s first tour using HSL as a supplier. “I was totally impressed by everything,” he said. “The gear was all in excellent condition and well prepped. If we needed anything, it was dealt with immediately by Mike Oates in the office, and the service was truly amazing.”
For more information, please visit www.hslgroup.com.
