MOSCOW – The Alfa Future People 2016 electronic music and technology festival attracted 50,000 fans from 20 countries to Bolshoe Kozino, near Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, about 400km east of Moscow. Alfa Bank served as the title sponsor for the three-day, five-stage event. The lineup included a variety of internationally-known DJs including Martin Garrix, Armin Van Buuren, Axwell and Ingrosso, and Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike. LD Marina Larikova and video designer Yury Vorontsov worked with rental companies Laser Kinetics, Light Logic and LED Group and production company MF Group. Larikova used a Hog 4 to control Clay Paky, Martin and Chromlech fixtures, and Vorontsov used a Catalyst media server and LED DMX strips.
More details from Alfa Future People (www.afp.ru):
A cyborg woman holding a colossal beating heart with a DJ mixing console became the central part of the huge nine-story high festival’s main stage. Alfa Future People 2016 was not only about music. The 50-hectares festival grounds included the Technology zone with the dedicated lecture hall, a number of play-fields for master-classes and competitions in 15 sports and more than 30 cafes and bars representing worldwide culinary traditions.
The design team included Lighting Designer Marina Larikova and Video Designer Yury Vorontsov, who worked with rental companies Laser Kinetics, Light Logic and LED Group – along with production company MF Group (under technical director Dmitry Klimov). The equipement list included 300 moving light fixtures from Clay Paky, Martin by Harman, Chromlech, along with a Catalyst media server and LED DMX strips. The show was preprogrammed with LightConverse Visualization. All the visual technologies of lighting, video, LED pixels and lasers were controlled with Hog 4 console systems.
LD Marina Larikova explains the design brief: “The original task was to make the show look great both during the days and nights. The concept of a festival was ‘We are people of the future. We here to open to you (to) truth. The truth is simple – love.’”
Larikova further explains that the complexity in the lighting and installation was furthered by the open-air environment. “It was necessary to provide protection of all devices against a rain, but not to allow an overheat from sunshine since air temperature reached 33 degrees C in the afternoon.”
The festival’s Technology zone, dubbed the ‘Future City,’ has doubled its size to 5000 square meters. It was divided into special sections representing key elements of the urban infrastructure. For the first time in Russia’s festival history a full operational “Smart House” was built at AFP grounds. Besides that, there was a demonstration of the world’s best gadgets, including the HoloLens Russian debute, Bluesmart intellectual suitcase, Glyph portable cinema and more than 100 other gadgets. The entertainment center displayed the leading virtual reality technologies like HTC Vive, Oculus Rift customer version and Fibrum virtual shooter developed in Russia.
The scientific laboratory invited guests to know more about the neural networks and to learn how to control the living insects with the human mind. In the transportation zone the attendees had opportunity to test-drive 20 types of modern transportation – from electric scooters to the one-wheel hover board. The flight zone included drones piloting lessons and a chance to overlook the festival grounds from the birds-eye view using the FPV helmet.
Viktor Shkipin, head of the Alfa Future People festival, says, “Once again we succeeded to arrange a world-class festival, both in terms of its line-up and organization level. World’s most desired DJs performed this summer near Nizhniy Novgorod, so it isn’t necessary to go to Europe to hear them now. Actually, the European EDM fans came to us and we had something to surprise them. The most comfortable festival ground in Russia, the world’s leading technologies, rich entertainment and sports program, outstanding food, and, of course, one unforgettable weekend with the ‘future people’: what can be better?”
