EDINBURGH, Scotland – Scotland’s annual Edinburgh Festival Fringe, held every August, is always a busy time for lighting manufacturer ETC. This year, rental company Pleasance has teamed up with dealer Black Light to install in every one of its spaces ETC lighting and 26 ETC control desks.
More details from ETC (www.etcconnect.com):
EDINBURGH, Scotland – Scotland’s annual Edinburgh Festival Fringe is always a busy time for lighting manufacturer ETC, and the company is already gearing up for this year’s event, with more lighting and control desks on stages there than ever before.
The Festival, which runs each August, has almost 300 venues that can vary as widely as upstairs at a pub or in a conference room to an otherwise vacant store room or a shipping container in a parking lot. In addition to independently run venues, 21 rooms that are normally part of Edinburgh University’s student association are being rented out by companies such as Pleasance.
This year, Pleasance has teamed up with dealer Black Light to install ETC lighting and control in every one of its spaces — including 26 ETC control desks. Pleasance’s head of lighting Dom Knight explains, “Our venues range from the 50-seat Cellar and Hut to our flagship Pleasance Grand, which seats up to 750. Each venue hosts about ten shows a day for 27 days, and we had over 200 companies performing last year, during which, for the first time, we only used desks from ETC.”
“We decided to install ETC control desks – a variety of SmartFades, Ions, a Gio and, for our biggest venue, an Eos — because they would be familiar to many of the incoming lighting operators, or, in the case of student operators, are very likely to be the type of desk they’ll end up working on when they finish their studies.”
Each year ETC staff visits the festival, offering training to the many operators who will be using ETC equipment, and ensuring everyone has all the support that they need. Because so many operators are needed, many will have never used a lighting desk before.
“The great thing about having ETC staff on hand is that they can make sure everyone is up to speed working the equipment when we’re so busy getting everything else set up,” says Knight. “The beauty of ETC consoles is that they are very easy to work with and troubleshoot.”
Student David Johnson, who used an Ion for the first time at the Festival in 2012, says, “I worked my way through some of ETC’s Tea Break Tutorial worksheets to help teach myself how to use the desk and also had some training. This was my first experience working on theater lighting, and while programming can seem intimidating at first, the Ion makes things really easy.”
Yvette Sedgley, who worked on a Gio in the 150-seat Pleasance One, adds, “I’ve used an Ion before but never something as advanced as this, and I love it. It was easy to use and even enabled me to do some impressive effects. I learned it as I went along. What I particularly liked, when compared against other desks, was the backlit keys. I’ve found that Littlites, which I’d otherwise have to use, can cause reflections on my glasses.”
Two of the biggest problems for found venues such as those at Pleasance are excess heat and the lack of available power. Most of the venues are without air conditioning, and electric fans would be too noisy to use during the show.
“Last year, we installed ETC Source Four LED Lustr+ fixtures in our biggest venue, the Pleasance Grand,” says Knight. “They worked fantastically well, providing coverage that is as good as any conventional we’ve used, but at a fraction of the heat and power usage. And of course, with the color-changing possibilities, we added an extra layer of versatility for the incoming companies. We’re looking forward to using them again.”
Photo: Digital Deluxe
