More details from Philips Vari-Lite (http://www.vari-lite.com):
AUSTIN, TX – The Austin Film Society’s (AFS) Texas Film Hall of Fame honors the best in Texas film-making and entertainment. After 10 years of producing the show in their Austin Studios, event organizers relocated to The Moody Theater. Now needing to increase the production values to complement the new facility, the AFS turned to Houndstooth Studio to design the events motion graphics and exterior lighting package, using six VL3500 Wash FX luminaires from Philips Vari-Lite.
“Houndstooth’s primary focus is motion graphics design, but we have moved into the event design market as well,” said Executive Producer/Founder David Crumley. “We’ve been doing more lighting packages for other Austin-based companies so when the AFS contacted us about the awards ceremony, I wanted to integrate lighting into the event.”
Crumley continued, “Because the theater already has a great house lighting rig, we thought it would be a great idea to bring lighting to the outside of the space to really show off the exterior of the building.”
With the lights he needed to create his concept, Crumley and his team of Matt Camden, Brad Mathis, and Gideon De Villiers got to work. Their first challenge was finding a clear line of projection, deciding that their best shot would be the 9th floor of an adjacent parking garage more than 300 feet away.
“We needed to be able to illuminate a large area; two of the theatre’s exterior walls, the sidewalk, the street surrounding it, plus the Red Carpet arrival area for the guests. Knowing we had the VL3500 Wash FX fixtures, that distance wouldn’t be a problem. I love the power of the VL3500 Wash FX. With these lights we were able clearly shoot the 300 feet and cover the entire façade of the theater along with all the other areas needed.”
Crumley also wanted custom gobo projections designed to match the event’s graphics package moving throughout the space as well. With the throw distance no longer an issue, it was the dark exterior of the building itself that caused an additional design challenge.
“But it wasn’t a problem. I was surprised with the clarity and intensity of the gobo projections when using the ultra clear lens and was amazed at how well they looked on the theatre façade. As an added bonus, there was a fine mist in the air from an earlier rainstorm so we got some amazing beam effects that you could see all over downtown.”
Crumley added, “There simply aren’t many fixtures out there with over 50,000 lumens that can do pattern projections like this. We were blown away. This year the producers really wanted to draw focus to the outside of the event, and with these lights that is exactly what we did, we created drama in downtown Austin.”
