As the pace of technological development increases, finding a software tool that is easy to understand and easy to use is becoming more challeng-ing. That’s what makes The Stage Research SoftPlot 9 lighting CAD software so appealing. It provides enough power and features to effectively create a complete lighting plot without overtaxing your brain, leaving it free to concentrate on the design.
Keep your body parts, get automated
There have been many situations when I would have given my right arm to have the ability to refocus my conventional lights. I once did an outdoor festival where we had to focus the conventionals with the truss not quite to trim because it was a ground support system, and we didn’t have a tall enough ladder to reach the truss at trim. So we basically had to guess at the focus. Once we took the truss to trim, we had no recourse, so it was critical that the focus was right. It wasn’t. When the sun went down, it became painfully apparent that the talent on stage either had to grow a foot or so, or we had to come up with a way to refocus. Luckily, we got a break when there was a set change, and the dimmer tech ran out with a short ladder and a long pole, just long enough to nudge the lights.
Read More »I attend a couple conventions every year. Of course they have to do with Lighting and video equipment. But I attend a lot more of them for another reason. To get paid.
Read More »The day when HD is everywhere is rapidly approaching. We would all do well to get a reality check. Have you given any though to… Read More »The Clear Reality of HD
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Linkin Park collaborates with Cohen on cohesive design
“There is no more fun to be had than collaborating with Production/Lighting Designer Butch Allen. He is a production-savvy, creative-solution-oriented soul. We sat down at dueling computers, rendering and passing sketches back and forth, and he really helped me find the core of the de-sign. I am not sure if the arena stuff will be realized, but there are some outside-the-box elements that wouldn’t have happened if not for Butch’s irreverent prodding. He did the first lighting design pretty much single-handedly, and onsite in Copenhagen for our first show 12 hours after load-in.”
The Company: LightParts Inc.
(www.lightparts.com)
Who: Don Pugh and Robert Mokry (owners)
What: The “first company” solely dedicated to providing replacement parts and component-level repairs for automated lights and consoles: no rentals, no system sales, just serv-ice.
Where: Austin, Texas
When: 2003
Employees: 11
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HD is rapidly becoming integrated into our world of live production. Many video and lighting professionals are saying the same thing: HD shows everything and hides nothing. What does this mean for the people who are developing the video content that is being used in our events today? Here’s a quick look at some of the issues involved with switching over to HD.
Until recently, most productions have been relying on video equipment with resolutions in the range of 1028 x 768 (referred to as 768p). Now, however, with HD, the resolution has been increased up to 1080p (1920 x 1080).
Crew Chief: “What’s this note on your plot about a 500-foot snake?”
LD: “Well…I think I need a 500-foot snake. Oh, and it needs to have at least eight DMX lines.”
Crew Chief: “We don’t have one. Can you make a 400 work?”
LD: “Did you look at the plot?”
Crew Chief: “Mmmm. Yeah. Okay, we’ll send out the fiber snake.”
LD: “???”
Crew Chief: “It’s no big deal. Don’t worry about it.”
Knowing Your Limitations
This is a simplified version of a conversation I recently had with someone at Upstaging Inc., a company I work with frequently on corporate events. With FOH stuck at the back of a gigantic Vegas ballroom and a snake run that had to go all the way around — not through — the room, I suddenly found myself very pleased to have a lighting provider that specialized in fixing these types of problems.
Snakes and Arrows is a culmination of 33 years of Ungerleider’s designs
By the time Howard Ungerleider was 20 years old, he was in his second year with American Talent International agency in New York. Already traveling the world with famous bands, his job was to ensure that the contracts he negotiated for their performances were upheld. While he was hanging out with these bands, they often asked him questions, the most common of which was, “What did you think of our show tonight?
Pick a song…any song
The lighting direction for Billboard-charting rock band 311’s Summer Unity Tour was nothing short of a guessing game. With a collection of 210 songs, none of which sound the least bit similar, 311 covers virtually every music genre: alternative rock, punk, ska, reggae, hip hop and even the occasional, gasp, mushy ballad (they cover The Cure’s classic melodrama “Love Song”). Lighting Designer Joe Paradise paused long enough to speak to us during the tour’s Las Vegas show at the Pearl Concert Theater, The Palms’ new concert hot spot.
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Over the last three years, while their Series 2 Syncrolites were out generating revenue on seemingly every production with a budget, the Dallas-based company was busy developing and patenting the next generation of Syncrolite products. Now they’re ready to trot out their Series 3 line of high-powered xenon, moving yoke fixtures with what are possibly the most innovative new features in an automated light in several years.
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From silly punk to serious vibes
When the U.K.’s leading weekly music newspaper, Melody Maker, panned a performance of Thomas Bangalter Guy and Manuel de Homen-Christo — who were performing back then under the moniker Darlin’ — they thought it was amusing that the paper referred to their music as “a bunch of daft punk.” Today, the drum machine and synthesizer duo perform under that name —Daft Punk — and they are known as much for their visual shows as their aural performances. They have a penchant for rousing an audience to a frenzy of dance, and if you happen to look at the FOH position during a show, you just might have seen the band’s lighting and set designer, Martin Phillips, getting into the act himself.
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