Buyer’s Guide

Framing shutters have been a part of ellipsoidal fixtures for as long as anyone can remember. They consist of four separate blades that can cut into the focal path and shape the beam of light. The shutters (blades) are spaced 90 degrees apart around the fixture and can be moved inwards and angled, allowing the light source to concentrate its beam on a particular area. With the advent of the Vari-Lite VL1000, we saw a moving light with electronic shutters for the first time. Now, framing shutters on moving hard edge and wash fixtures have become immensely popular. PLSN displays what’s on the market today.

Looking back, 2008 was a magical year for concert lighting. That was the year that Claypaky unveiled their highly successful Alpha Beam fixtures on a moving yoke, dedicated to the art of the tight collimated shafts of light. A year later, Elation kept the evolution of moving light fixtures moving with units that had a smaller footprint and tiny moving beam. As LED technology continues to sweep across the world of entertainment lighting, we’ve seen more single LED Beam models pop up in the last year. This month we present the latest and best beams on a moving yoke.

In 2013, The MagicPanel-R from Ayrton hit the scene, and everyone took notice of the shape of the fixture. Someone had invented a new way for lighting designers to control pixels in an incredibly bright manner that could be used in all kinds of cool applications. This opened the floodgate for a plethora of LED products that adapted to this block shape. Whether they are moving heads, static LED panels or fixtures one can assemble into a grid of their own design, there is a lot of demand for these fixtures in today’s market. Take a look at what’s out there.

According to some historians, the first spotlights were used in Paris opera houses in 1803. They involved the use of limelight. Invented by Henry Drummond, the technique was to heat a piece of lime with a flame of oxygen and hydrogen. This produced a hot white light that, when put behind a lens, could focus a hot spot of light in a directional manner. As you can see from the latest crop of followspots listed here, we’ve come a long way in 200 years.

It’s been about 35 years since the first batch of hard edged arc sourced moving Lights were mass produced by Vari-Lite. With the advent of… Read More »Hard-Edged Arc Lights

It used to be that you either wanted a hazy mist on stage to augment light beams or billowing fog effects for masking the performers.… Read More »Hazers and Smoke Machines

The first moving LED wash lights appeared on the scene about a dozen years ago. Upstaging lighting took a couple hundred Martin MAC 300s and had them retrofitted with RGB “Skittles” LEDs on the front, replacing the arc light source. LD Leroy Bennett requested such a fixture be made. Within a couple years, GLP came up with their series of Impression LED moving wash lights. Because these lights had no base and seemed to be able to just flip over in any direction at an incredibly fast rate, LDs started to refer to them as “pancake” style fixtures. These fixtures have undergone transformations and modifications, and it didn’t take long for them to start selling like hotcakes. Today, every major manufacturer offers at least one fixture that fits within this category. Each fixture has at least one unique aspect or feature that separates them from the rest. Look here for who’s offering what this year.

It’s been more than 20 years since the first consoles designed to run automated lighting fixtures appeared on the market. Proprietary consoles for running certain companies’ light fixtures were available in the 1980s, but it took a while for someone to invent consoles that could spit out DMX and run any automated fixture as well as dimmers. Early on, there was the Whole Hog1, Scan Commander, Light Coordinator, Animator and the Status Cue to start the long learning curve. Here, we have more than a dozen top-of-the-line consoles listed. They are available to meet the needs of users with a wide range of features and price points. This month, as a bonus, we also reached out to more than a half-dozen LDs to get their perspective on the favorite features and functions of a sampling of different consoles.

LASER — “Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation.” While lasers weren’t invented until 1960, by the 1980’s they had cemented a place in the… Read More »Laser Systems

Commercial wireless devices for DMX have been around for about 20 years now. They were used for theatrical plays where running a cable to a… Read More »Wireless DMX Devices

It’s been about 15 years since media servers made a splash and one did not have to be a professional video engineer to play clips… Read More »Media Servers

To cast a light on a subject but avoid pesky shadows, you require a soft light beam. This is very important in film shoots as… Read More »Fresnels and Softlights