CAPE TOWN — South Africa’s 31st Annual Loerie Awards had the tongue-in-cheek theme, “Feed Your Ego,” and Gearhouse South Africa did what it could with lighting, video, media, rigging, sound, power and backline to pump up the self-esteem of the ad industry professionals attending the two-night event. Staged in Cape Town’s Good Hope Centre, a 6,000 capacity theatre venue, Gearhouse worked with production design company H-Factor. The first night’s awards went to those involved in print media and communication design, and the second to those working with TV, radio and digital/electronic media. Both were recorded by SABC for broadcast.
Technical production was by Steve Collins and the project was managed on site for Gearhouse by Richard Blamire and co-ordinated in the office by Cape Town branch manager, Charl Smit. They worked with a site crew of 45. Gearhouse also supplied equipment to the pre-show reception and after-party area in the Good Hope Centre foyer.
The 45-meter wide staging concept was devised by Heloise Fourie and Andrew Shelly of H-Factor and implemented by Leon Erasmus from Cape Town-based LEG Studios, to resemble a giant, abstracted PCB, complete with five projection screens.
The lighting rig designed by Phillip Chames was partially flown and supported by various elements of a ground support system. This was installed to help get points and scenery supports in the right places, and to boost the available rigging facilities, with some points also suspended from the venue’s roof.
The goal was to light both the stage — which was kept busy with awards presentations, guest bands and DJs — and the audience. The lighting was distributed between 20 sections of trussing hung above the stage and auditorium, ranging from 10 to 60 meters in length.
Chames used 70 moving lights, a mix of Martin MAC 250s, 2K Profiles and Washes and Robe ColorWash 700E ATs. The generic rig included Molefeys and 5K fresnels used for front keylighting from above, together with E/T/C Source Four profiles. Bars of 6 PARs were dotted all over the audience trussing. There were also 18 Atomic strobes onstage and 24 i-Pix Satellite LED ‘bricks’ for set illumination.
Chames controlled the rig with a Hog iPC console running in Hog3 mode.
For media and AV, Gearhouse Media’s Chris Grandin worked with show producer Andrew Shelly from H-Factor to edit and produce an animated media stream for the two awards shows. That process started nine months ahead of the event. Once the set design was completed, Grandin decided on the gear and what would work best with the screen configurations.
This year, the awards visuals were projection orientated, with some LED — a reversal of the concept for the 2008 event. Two rear projection screens were installed at the back of the stage, next to one another, measuring 12 meters wide by 6.8 high and 8 meters wide by 6.8 meters wide, with areas masked by various set pieces.
About 50 square meters of Lighthouse R16 LED panelling was integrated into the set as digital scenery, and another three 4.5-meter-by-4.5-meter projection surfaces were asymmetrically positioned to the sides of the set.
The content — including Loerie logos, other logos and awards stings — was supplied by two different agencies, juju (for the first night) and Wicked Pixels (for the second night), under the creative direction of H-Factor and The Loerie Awards. Juju also collaborated with the artists to produce graphics for the bands for both nights.
Grandin used an AV-stumpfl Wings platinum multi-display system to complete all the editing and compositing. On site, six outputs were sent from the Wings to a Barco Encore/Screen pro 2 setup controlled via the Encore, operated by Craig McGinn. Camera ISO inputs and a mix from SABC’s HD OB truck were also sent to the Encore.
The screens were fed by a total of seven Christie projectors — two HD 18Ks, two 16Ks and three 8Ks. Gearhouse Power used a combination of house power and two 300KVA RandAir generators to power the production, and the company also supplied a generic set of backline that was used by all the bands, including Jay Panik, Goldfish, The Rudimentals, Mannenberg All Stars, Lira and Mix n Blend.
The Reception/Foyer area got the party started during the pre-show gathering and was also an immediate after-party area for all attending the two nights of awards. For the stage, Gearhouse supplied a Turbo Flashlight sound system and Soundcraft MH4 console, and another backline and DJ set up. The lighting system, run by Hilton Carelse, included 12 moving lights and generics.
For more information, please visit www.gearhouse.co.za.
