NEW YORK — Major public radio station WNYC wanted more than a broadcast studio when it relocated to a new Manhattan facility earlier this year. So the station devoted the ground floor of its building to a multi-media room where concerts, theater performances, Webcasts and radio broadcasts could be held before live audiences. The 125-seat gathering place, called the Jerome L. Greene Performance Space, opened its doors earlier this year. One of the biggest design challenges was developing a lighting system that would be flexible enough to handle the many activities that would occur in the space while working within the physical constraints imposed by an older urban building.
“This building had a very limited amount of power and cooling available. To add any additional electrical or air conditioning capacity would have involved tremendous expense,” said Mark London, vice president of systems at The Lighting Design Group, Inc.
London and project designer Michael Steinberg designed the lighting system and the repertory performance lighting for the Greene Space, which has the “equivalent of three wall outlets worth of power, or 60 amps single phase.” Given those limitations, he and Steinberg knew right away that the project could benefit from LEDs.
They opted for Elation Professional’s Opti Tri Par intelligent RGB color-mixing LED Par cans. Designed like a theatrical-style PAR can and powered by 18 3-watt LEDs, the Opti Tri Par provides brightness without excessive heat and energy consumption. Each unit draws only 70 watts of electricity.
The Opti Tri Par also features Elation’s Tri-Color Design. Each of its LED lamps is composed of three different-color LED sources — a red, green and blue. This allows color mixing to be done within each individual lamp, reducing color shadows.
A total of 30 Opti Tri Pars were installed. “We used Opti Tri Pars around the perimeter of the room to provide ambient color washes on the walls — to give the room some life and color when people see it from the outside when it’s not in use. We also installed a system of Opti Tri Pars over the stage as backlight and sidelight color washes for the performers.”
Along with their low power draw and less need for air conditioning, the Opti Tri Pars reduction in color shadows is a boon for videotaping and Webcasting.
“We were a little concerned about them being bright enough, but they actually have surpassed our expectations,” London said, adding that the pricing helped the gear fit into the nonprofit client’s budget. “For the output and color-mixing capabilities, we thought (the Opti Tri Par) was a very cost-effective choice.”
For more information, please visit www.elationlighting.com.
Photo by James B. Petrusson
