Spectacle of Lights - PLSN.com

Club Installs: Miami page 34 

PROJECTION 

CONNECTION 

Starts on page 37 

Vol. 7.11 

www.plsn.com 

Dec. 2006 

Spectacle of Lights 

ORLANDO, FL — Walt Disney World, in Orlando, 

has introduced “Spectacle of Lights” for the holiday 

season. To accomplish this task, lighting designer 

Mark O’Connor and co-designer/programmer Susan 

Rose laid out more than five million LEDs and other 

fixtures over 27 buildings lining Main Street as well 

as one 70-foot-tall moveable tree. 

The program, run by SMPTE, consists of two songs 

at the moment, with the likely addition of a third. 

At the moment, one song uses approximately 300 

cues, while the other uses 200, and each song is only 

Courtesy of Walt Disney World 

three and a half minutes long. Specialty boxes with 

dimmable relays and control cards from Animated 

Lighting were also implemented, so the entire show 

was completed without dimmers. 

With more than five million units to control 

spread over 27 buildings and more than 1000 

desk channels, the WholeHog 2 reached its memory 

limit, which necessitated the use of a Whole- 

Hog IPC. 

To see video of this show, head over to 

www.plsn.com. 

ESTA Secretary Erik Magnuson Dies Suddenly 

ATLANTA, GA Erik Magnuson, secretary of ESTA since 1989 and owner of The Magnum 

Companies, Ltd. in Atlanta, Ga., died suddenly Thursday, November 30. There were 

few details at press-time, but someone close to the situation reported that it was the 

result of an unexpected medical issue that arose during the workday, possibly related 

to a heart attack or embolism. 

continued on page 5 

TOMCAT 

Aquired 

MIDLAND, TX — Mitch Clark, 

president and CEO of Texas-based 

TOMCAT Global, Inc., announced 

November 10 that he has signed 

an agreement selling the stock and 

assets of the company to the UKbased 

Vitec Group. 

TOMCAT, a manufacturer of staging 

and lighting support equipment 

for the entertainment industry, has 

called Midland its international 

headquarters since the company’s 

founding in 1987. The company 

lists the Rolling Stones, U2, Janet 

Jackson, Disney and Cirque du Soleil 

as clients. 

TOMCAT Global is the parent 

company to continued on page 5 

Shares Ready 

for Market 

BOSTON, MA — Color Kinetics, 

Inc. has announced that it 

has priced a public offering of 

3,609,000 shares of its common 

stock at $19.00 per share, of which 

2,000,000 shares are being offered 

by Color Kinetics and 1,609,000 

shares are being offered by stockholders. 

Certain of the selling 

stockholders have also granted the 

underwriters an option to purchase 

up to an additional 541,350 shares 

to cover over-allotments, if any. 

Net proceeds from the offering 

are expected to be used for working 

capital and general corporate 

purposes, including possible acquisitions 

of assets or businesses, 

increased research and development, 

product development and 

m a r k e t i n g continued on page 12 

26 

30 

45 

Grinch Greets 

Great White Way 

For the past several years, Dr. 

Seuss’ How The Grinch Stole Christmas! 

The Musical has been running 

in San Diego in the weeks leading 

up to Christmas. This year it came 

to Broadway with the same manic 

energy with which its pre-teen 

target audience approaches the 

holiday. There are about 250 cues 

packed into each 70-minute show, 

and they do 12 shows a week — 

seven of those on Saturday and 

Sunday alone. Cletus Karamon, 

head electrician and board op for 

the show sits down with PLSN and 

tells us how to make all Grinch’s 

cues three times in a day. See the 

full story on page 22. 

The 2006 Parnelli 

Awards Gala 

It was a perfect night in Las Vegas. 

The Year In Review 

PLSN looks back on 2006. 

Lo-Res LEDs 

Whether in a curtain or a cube 

or framing the stage, our product 

Gallery goes in-depth on Lo-res. 

Ad info:http:// www.plsn.com/instant-info

Ad info: www.plsn.com/instant-info


TABLEOFCONTENTS 

What’s New 

26 

32 

Production Profile 

The 2006 Parnelli Awards use a perfect evening to 

recognize the best in the business. 

PLSN Interview 

Cameron Yeary transforms the abstractions of his clients 

into the manifestations of his visions. 

Features 

24 Vital Stats 

Selecon Performance Lighting tells us 

how they do it across the globe and 

around the world. 

30 The Year in Review 

2006 offered up big moves and 

big milestones. 

34 CSI: Miami 

[Club Scene Installation] 

A stalwart gumshoe inspects the mysterious, 

elusive “nightclub” installation. 

36 Product Spotlight 

Swisson Sine Wave dimmers threaten to 

take out the console. 

42 Art in Design 

At the heart of all the switches, buttons 

and knobs, inspiration still reigns 

supreme, and it creeps in through only 

the calmest of places. 

45 Product Gallery 

Lo-res LED displays bring solid images 

to solid ideas. 

48 ‘Twas the Night Before Curtain 

Santa ain’t the only one workin’ 

Christmas Eve. 

49 Product Spotlight 

Wybron Info Trace RDM brings the 

flying cars to live event lighting. 

Columns 

04 Editor’s Note 

Life lessons from a cabbie who’s 

been there. 

22 Inside Theatre 

With rhyming couplets and a hyperactive 

cue sheet, The Grinch 

goes Broadway. 

41 Video Digerati 

Frame interpolation smoothes us out. 

44 Video World 

Figuring out how projector lumens 

stack up. 

50 Feeding the Machines 

If you go tradeshowin’, do some 

test-drivin’. 

51 The Biz 

Everybody loves direct purchasing 

from the manufacturer — except 

the resellers. 

52 Technopolis 

How many universes could you 

possibly need? 

53 Focus on Design 

Some sharp ideas on how diffusion 

works. 

56 LD-at-Large 

The dessert has arrived, and our 

conversation over sushi concludes. 

Departments 

5 News 

14 On the Move 

16 International News 

18 New Products 

20 Showtime 

37 Projection Connection 

38 Projection Connection News 

40 Projection Connection 

New Products 


TECHNOLOGY ASSOCIATION 

EDITOR’SNOTE 

The Publication of Record for the Lighting, 

Staging and Projection Industries 

Publisher 

Terry Lowe 

tlowe@plsn.com 

Editor 

Richard Cadena 

rcadena@plsn.com 

By RichardCadena 

Editorial Director 

Bill Evans 

bevans@plsn.com 

Ad info:http:// www.plsn.com/instant-info 

thing put me out of business.” 

The cab driver was pointing to 

“That 

the computer on the dashboard of 

his cab. On the way to the airport, he told me 

the story of how he went from sign painter to 

cab driver. He apprenticed for a couple of years 

under the tutelage of a journeyman before becoming 

one himself. But when the era of computers 

and computer-generated graphics made 

it cheaper and easier to produce billboards and 

signs with a mouse and keyboard, the value of 

his skills went the way of the mullet — just as the 

typesetter, blacksmith and powdered wig-maker 

before him. 

There’s nothing wrong with driving a cab; 

I would gladly do it if I had to in order to support 

my family. But my fear is that a changing 

economic environment, erosion of job skills, or 

advances in technology might force me to drive 

a cab — or wash dishes, mow lawns or whatever 

— instead of doing what I really love to do. 

A couple of days after meeting the cab driver, 

I met another man who used to sell real estate. 

When the market went flat he started selling 

some of his personal items on eBay to supplement 

his income. Now he goes to auctions and 

sales, buys things, and resells them on the Internet 

as a full-time job. He’s amazed, he told me, 

that he can do work for himself, use this great 

new technology and make a good living at it. 

He’s been doing it for three years now, and when 

he talks about it he lights up and becomes very 

If you can read, listen, ask questions and use your 

hands, then you can do just about anything in life. 

animated. Still, he says, every day in the back of 

his mind, he’s wondering when this gig will be up. 

One day, he said, people are going to stop offering 

him $30 for an item he bought for $5. 

When one door closes, sometimes another 

one opens, and sometimes you have to force one 

open. But, how can you be sure to open the right 

door? How can you avoid having to open the 

driver’s side door of a cab and open the door to a 

job you really love? 

You probably have all the right tools to do so. 

It’s simply a matter of using them. 

If you have eyes, use them to read and keep 

up to date; learn about upcoming trends, and 

find out where your future lies. Read trade publications, 

books, newspapers, literature, brochures 

and user manuals to keep you at the top of your 

game, and ride the wave of new technology. 

If you have ears, use them to listen to the 

voices of experience. It’s amazing what you can 

learn just by listening. Seek out those who are 

successful and listen to what they have to say 

about what makes them so. Listen hard and listen 

long. Just listen. 

If you have a mouth, use it to ask questions. 

If you really want to learn, don’t be afraid to expose 

the width and depth of your ignorance. 

You might think that everyone will be shocked 

to learn that you don’t know everything, but the 

truth is, most people aren’t concerned enough to 

even notice. 

If you have hands, put them to work doing 

what you love to do. Get them dirty with the 

grease of your trade and wash them in the water 

of your sweat and toil. 

If you can read, listen, ask questions and 

use your hands, then you can do just about 

anything in life. You can adapt to the changing 

times, learn how to do new things, and 

find out which opportunities are available 

to you. 

How do you know if you are doing it right? 

You have the tools for that as well. If you have a 

stomach, you’ll sometimes have butterflies — not 

so much that you get ulcers, but enough to know 

you’re alive and that your adrenaline is flowing. 

You’ll accomplish more by living on the edge of 

your comfort zone and stretching yourself. If you 

have a brain, it will tell you that you’re absorbing 

all that you can handle. Learn to almost overdo it 

without really doing so. And finally, if you have a 

heart, it will tell you that you’re on the right track. 

If you use the tools given to you by 

your Creator, then you’ll end up shaking 

your head because you can’t believe your 

good fortune. If you don’t, then you might 

end up shaking your head for an altogether 

different reason. 

Managing Editor 

Jacob Coakley 

jcoakley@plsn.com 

Associate Editor 

David McGinnis 

dmcginnis@plsn.com 

Contributing Writers 

Vickie Claiborne, Phil Gilbert, Rob 

Ludwig, Kevin M. Mitchell, Bryan 

Reesman Brad Schiller, Nook 

Schoenfeld, Paul J. Duryee 

Photographers 

Steve Jennings, Bree Kristel 

Art Director 

Garret Petrov 

gpetrov@plsn.com 

Production Manager 

Linda Evans 

levans@plsn.com 

Graphic Designers 

Dana Pershyn 

dpershyn@plsn.com 

Michelle Sacca 

msacca@plsn.com 

Josh Harris 

jharris@plsn.com 

National 

Advertising Director 

Gregory Gallardo 

gregg@plsn.com 

Account Managers 

Holly O`Hair & Warren Flood 

hohair@plsn.com & wflood@plsn.com 

General Manager 

William Hamilton Vanyo 

wvanyo@plsn.com 

Executive Administrative 

Assistant 

Dawn-Marie Voss 

dmvoss@plsn.com 

Business and 

Advertising Office 

6000 South Eastern Ave. 

Suite 14J 

Las Vegas, NV 89119 

Ph: 702.932.5585 

Fax: 702.932.5584 

Toll Free: 800.252.2716 

Editorial Office 

10305 Salida Dr. 

Austin, TX 78749 

Ph: 512.280.0384 

Fax: 512.292.0183 

Circulation 

Stark Services 

P.O. Box 16147 

North Hollywood, CA 91615 

Projection, Lights & Staging News (ISSN: 

1537-0046) Volume 07, Number 11 Published 

monthly by Timeless Communications 

Corp. 6000 South Eastern Ave., 

Suite 14J Las Vegas, NV 89119. It is 

distributed free to qualified individuals in the 

lighting and staging industries in the United 

States and Canada. Periodical Postage paid 

at Las Vegas, NV office and additional offices. 

Postmaster please send address changes to: 

Projection, Lights & Staging News, PO Box 

16147 North Hollywood, CA 91615. Mailed in 

Canada under Publications Mail Agreement 

Number 40033037, 1415 Janette Ave., Windsor, 

ON N8X 1Z1 Overseas subscriptions are available 

and can be obtained by calling 702.932.5585. Editorial 

submissions are encouraged but must include 

a self-addressed stamped envelope to be 

returned. Projection, Lights & Staging News is a 

Registered Trademark. All Rights Reserved. 

Duplication, transmission by any method of 

this publication is strictly prohibited without 

permission of Projection, Lights & Staging News. 

ESTA 

ENTERTAINMENT SERVICES &

NEWS 

Folger Theatre Back Up with Industry Help 

MIDDLETON, WI —When a fire recently resulted 

in water damage to the theatre in the 

Folger Shakespeare Library, ETC and dealer 

Barbizon Capitol, as well as the stage community 

at large, went into high gear to make sure 

that the theatre would not be dark for long. 

Fabric ignited in a third-floor costume storage 

area above the theatre on Saturday, October 

14. The fire was swiftly extinguished and 

contained, but the theatre’s dimming systems 

were only 20 feet away from of the fire and 

were directly affected by the downpour from 

the sprinkler system. The 13-year-old dimmers 

had also been on at the time, in preparation for 

a tech run-through of the upcoming production 

of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and would 

have to be immediately replaced. 

Barbizon Capitol technician Blair Van Oot 

inspected the damaged dimmers that day. On 

Monday, Barbizon Systems division manager 

Barry Gawinski surveyed the damage and 

contacted ETC. Phil Sens and Ted Ozimek at 

ETC quoted new dimmers, secured owners’ 

approvals on Tuesday, and set in motion the 

air shipment of two ETC Sensor+ racks populated 

with 72 modules, with another 24 modules 

to arrive later by ground. The new ETC 

racks were installed on Friday by contractors 

from Cooper Electric and were ready that afternoon 

for a new tech run-through. 

Eric Grims, Folger production manager 

and technical director, voiced gratitude to 

those who rallied around the Theatre: “There 

was never any doubt about whether or not 

they would be able to get us back up and running 

in what seemed like a nearly impossible 

amount of time.” 

Van Oot adds that the response of the 

local stage community was also extraordinary 

and laudable: “Theatre techs from 

almost every theatre in the area showed 

up to help out with the damage and to get 

the show up – Kennedy Center, Arena, Lincoln, 

Woolly Mammoth, Shakespeare, Signature, 

Center Stage of Baltimore – just to 

mention a few.” 

The rescheduled first preview of Folger 

Theatre’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream took 

place on Tuesday, October 24. Folger is confident 

that no lasting damage remains to 

the landmark. 

Erik Magnuson Dies 

continued from cover 

A memorial service took place Sunday, 

December 10 at the Atlanta Botanical 

Garden. 

The family requests that in lieu of flowers 

donations be made to the new industry 

charity Behind the Scenes (http:// 

www.estafoundation.org/bts.htm), or to 

the Appalachian Trail Conservancy. 

ESTA issued a statement saying that 

Magnuson “will be greatly missed by all 

of us. Our thoughts and prayers are with 

his wife Linda, his son Todd and daughter 

Ingrid, and with the staff of The Magnum 

Companies.” 

Public Proposed 

Standards 

NEW YORK — ESTA has extended the 

public review period for a standards proposal, 

and has announced another’s deadline. 

The deadline for the review period for 

both BSR E1.27-2, Entertainment Technology-Standard 

for Permanently Installed 

Control Cables for Use with ANSI E1.11 

(DMX512-A) and USITT DMX512/1990 

Products, and BSR E1.6-1, Entertainment 

Technology–Powered Winch Hoist Systems, 

is now December 25. 

The BSR E1.27-2 draft standard describes 

the types of cable to be used to 

interconnect products that comply with 

ANSI E1.11-2004 (DMX512-A) or with USITT 

DMX512/1990 in permanent installations. 

The description includes definitions of acceptable 

cable and connector types and 

the ways in which they may be used. The 

draft standard and its supporting public 

review materials are available at http:// 

www.esta.org/tsp/documents/public_review_docs.php. 

The next meeting at which the public 

comments will be considered, is scheduled 

for Saturday, January 20, at the Dallas/Ft. 

Worth Airport Marriott South in Ft. Worth, 

Texas. 

The draft standard, BSR E1.6-1 deals with 

powered winch systems that do not use 

serially manufactured electric chain hoists, 

and is intended to establish requirements 

for the design, manufacture, inspection 

and maintenance of powered winch hoist 

systems for lifting and suspending loads 

in theatres and other places of public assembly. 

The public review materials are 

available on the ESTA website at http:// 

www.esta.org/tsp/documents/public_review_docs.php. 

For more information, please contact 

Karl G. Ruling, Technical Standards Manager, 

ESTA, 875 Sixth Avenue, Suite 1005, New 

York, NY 10001, standards@esta.org 

TOMCAT Aquired 


TOMCAT USA, Inc., TOMCAT UK, Ltd., TOM- 

CAT de Mexico and TOMCAT’s sister company, 

Brilliant Stages, in Hitchen, Herts, United 

Kingdom, acquired in 1998. The company 

also has two distribution hubs: one in Las Vegas, 

Nev. and one in Nashville, Tenn., where 

the company plans to expand its manufacturing 

capabilities. 


NEWS 


New Pre-Viz Studio Opens In Nashville 

NASHVILLE, TN — Bandit Lites is using 

the Martin ShowDesigner (MSD) for various 

programming needs. Recently, Bandit added 

a media/training room to their Nashville facility 

that is equipped with a 12-foot by 20-foot 

screen. The room allows lighting designers 

access to the software for both training 

and programming. 

Martin ShowDesigner (MSD) is a lighting 

and set design software package. MSD allows 

the programmer to create realistic set and 

lighting design renderings using reflection, 

transparency, lighting, shadow and smoke. 

A stand-alone 3-D lighting design/control 

Niagara Views New Big Top 

NIAGARA FALLS — Robe moving lights 

have been specified for the Canadian premier 

of Cirque Niagara’s Avaia, staged in 

the 60,000-square-foot Celestial Palace big 

top tent at Rapidsview Park, Niagara Falls. 

Avaia was created by Russian circus impresario 

Mairbek Kantemirov. 

The Robe’s were supplied to Soundbox 

Productions — who are coordinating and 

overseeing the show’s technical elements 

— by Robe’s Canadian distributor Intellimix 

Lighting and Ontario sales rep Randy 

Segeren. The fixtures were specified by 

system, there is no additional CAD software 

required. The program primarily consists of the 

following items: Modeler, ShowDesigner, Paperwork 

and 3-D Visualizer sections. Modeler 

enables designer to build libraries of objects 

and set pieces. ShowDesigner includes set design, 

place fixtures, control fixtures, program 

cues, preview, show and allows the creation of 

realistic renderings of a scene. Paperwork allows 

print fixture layout, instrument schedule, 

patch list and customizable layout. And the 3-D 

Visualizer allows visualization of a variety of effects 

using DMX from a controller/video input. 

In a related story, Hollywood-based Design 

Soundbox’s lighting and design team of 

Tran Langford and Jeff Lavallee. 

A total of 18 Robe ColorSpot 1200 ATs 

and 24 ColorWash 575 AT fixtures are being 

utilized for the show as the main effects 

lights. 

The Robe’s are rigged off the king 

poles of the tent, around the cupola grid 

in the roof and also on the ground. In the 

main grid hang 10 CS1200ATs and 10 CW 

575ATs. Each of the two front king poles 

features three 1200s and three 575s, leaving 

10 lights for the deck. 

Partners Inc. is offering ShowViz Lite Lab to the 

industry, a lighting design technology intended 

to allow designers to pre-visualize and pre-program 

light cues and effects. 

Producers, directors and production designers 

can view renderings in advance of 

production. Renderings and animations of 

light cues, including LED video effects, can be 

recorded and copied for distribution for preproduction 

staff review. 

Any and all designers are welcome 

to develop and program with DPI’s experts 

in their dedicated ShowViz Lite Lab. 

(www.ShowVizLA.com) 

The Robes — plus a large generic rig 

— are controlled from a grandMA lighting 

console. The show was programmed by 

lighting director Cooper Smith and programmer 

Jason Jennings, and it is operated 

each day by Laura Toombs. 

The tented environment is very 

dusty and also subject to temperature 

extremities, from cold to hot. The 

three-week pre-production period 

featured an around-the-clock schedule, 

and the show is running for six 

days a week. 

Who Back 

on the Road 

LOS ANGELES — The Who’s world tour 

has contracted a grandMA as their lighting 

console through A.C.T Lighting, the exclusive 

distributor of the grandMA in North America. 

The tour, which has been dubbed “Uncut. 

Uncensored. Unrepentant.”, features 14 B52 

Syncrolites, 40 Martin MAC 2000 washes, 22 

Martin MAC 700 spots, 32 four-way Molestrips, 

10 ETC Source Four Lekos, 20 Coemar Parlite 

LED fixtures, 10 Pixeline 1044 LED strips, 29 

Atomic Strobes, and 6 Lycian M2 truss spots. 

The lighting crew for the show includes 

crew chief Jason “Attaboy” Stalter; lighting 

techs Ty Brooks, Mike Mehmert and Carl 

Horahan; and Syncrolite tech Glenn Rupert. 

Roy Lamb is the production manager, Scott 

Williams stage manager and Aubrey Powell 

video director. 

Farm Aid 

Back in 2006 

CAMDEN, NJ — Bandit Lites was recently 

involved in Farm Aid 2006. The 

event took place on September 30, 2006, 

at the Tweeter Center at the Waterfront, a 

25,000-capacity outdoor amphitheatre in 

Camden, New Jersey. The show featured 

Farm Aid president and founder, Willie 

Nelson, board members Neil Young, 

John Mellencamp and Dave Matthews, 

as well as Jerry Lee Lewis with Roy Head, 

Los Lonely Boys, Arlo Guthrie, Gov’t Mule, 

Steve Earle, Allison Moorer, Steel Pulse, 

Shelby Lynne, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Jimmy 

Sturr & his Orchestra, Pauline Reese 

and Danielle Evin. 

Lighting designer Jason Robinson 

used Compulite Vector Blue and 

Red Consoles to control equipment 

for this event. His equipment included, 

32 Martin MAC 2000 Profiles, 52 

Martin MAC 2000 Washes, 18 Martin 

MAC 600s, 22 Martin MAC 300s and 10 

Coemar Halos. 

Designer 

Cuts to 

the Chase 

BAHAMAS — In Casino Royale, the 21st 

Bond film, 007’s very first assignment kicks off 

with a high-octane chase set in Madagascar. 

This opening sequence of Casino Royale 

was actually filmed in the Bahamas in a derelict 

hotel that had never been finished and 

had been abandoned for 30 years. Art director 

Steven Lawrence assisted the design of 

the sequence using VectorWorks Designer. 

Explains Lawrence. “I added our own steel 

structure — designed from the ground up in 

VectorWorks — to the drawing, then sent the 

drawings out to the structural engineers.” 

For such action packed scenes, the art 

department often designs models in Vector- 

Works and exports them to LightWave, an animation 

software program intended to create 

animations and fly-throughs. For this scene, 

Lawrence handed the 3D model to concept 

artist Julian Caldow, who animated the scene 

in LightWave. Then, Lawrence compiled a 

DVD containing the VectorWorks 2D drawings 

and 3D models of the set within the site, 

along with the animations and fly-throughs. 

After viewing the DVD, the director was able 

to get a feel for the site before he even arrived 

on location. 

For Casino Royale, Lawrence used Vector- 

Works Designer to produce 2D drawings and 

site plans to assist the production designer 

and director in mapping out how action 

would take place within an area and create 

3D models of sets to help the team get a feel 

for a set before they arrived on location. He 

used VectorWorks design layers to build up 

drawings and moved into VectorWorks viewport 

technology to block out the plans and 

elevations. 

Lawrence was also asked to create an 

airplane from scratch for another big action 

sequence in the middle of the film. The production 

company wanted to create a new 

airplane, so the art director had to create one 

from scratch, patching parts of an existing 

out-of-service airliner with a new fuselage 

and engines, fuel pods, etc. 

Lawrence states, “We developed the airplane 

by first drawing the plans and elevations, 

and then, with the help of the 3D side 

of VectorWorks, produced the 2D cross sections 

(profiles) for the fuselage, wings, etc. 

These were then emailed to the CNC cutting 

company and then taken back in house to our 

model makers to start the process of building 

the twelfth-scale airliner. Everything was 

also given to the visual effects team to start 

the CGI version, too. Certain elements, such as 

engines and fuel pods, were built full size in fiberglass 

and attached to a real ‘out-of-service’ 

airliner that was used for close-up filming. The 

twelfth-scale model and CGI and live action 

elements components were then composited 

by the visual effects team into what you 

see on screen in the chase sequence.” 

High production output and interoperability 

were critical for Lawrence when art 

directing the set for the film’s final sequence, 

which takes place in a Venetian palace. 

The structure was designed to be gimbaled 

so it could move on all axes—it was 

essentially a moving house with a collapsing 

lift shaft. Lawrence converted some original 

pencil drawings into VectorWorks. He imported 

into VectorWorks drawings created in Autodesk 

Inventor from the special effects team 

for the twelfth-scale exterior house rig and 

AutoCAD drawings from outside contractors 

for the full-size interior version. 

 

PLSN DECEMBER 2006 

www.PLSN.com

NEWS 

Lighting Goes Back in Time 

ATLANTA, GA — Stage Front Presentation 

Systems (SFPS) supplied a Jands Vista 

S3 lighting console and 72 Chroma-Q 

Plus color changers for the new Medieval 

Times Atlanta Dinner & Tournament. 

Georgia-based Stage Front has been the 

design and build contractor for Medieval 

Times since providing the lighting and 

special effects for the original Florida 

Castle in 1986. 

The 1,200-seat arena shows include 

equestrian events, tournaments and 

games, jousting, hand-to-hand combat 

scenes, a Wizard sequence and a lighting 

overture in between opening scenes. 

LD Marty Huntoon commented: “Being 

able to program the lighting to a 

timeline for this show was a real breath 

of fresh air.” 

Huntoon also found the programming 

able to import audio. After noticing some 

difficulties in other Castles’ running segments 

that required co-ordination with the 

audio engineer, he knew he could easily 

resolve these by simply playing back both 

the pre-recorded audio track and lighting 

steps from one button on the console. 

Following Marty’s recommendation, 

Medieval Times purchased a Vista S3 for 

the Atlanta show rig, which is connected 

to an Apple Intel iMac and provides control 

for 154 ETC Source Four PARs, 35 ETC 

Source Four ERS fixtures, nine Coemar 

iSPOT 575EBs, 16 Coemar Prowashes 

250, Reel EFX DF-50 hazers and Le Maitre 

G300 Fog. 

Marty also specified 72 Chroma-Q 

Plus color changers for the Atlanta Castle, 

based upon the Chroma-Q units installed 

and maintained over the years in previous 

Castles by the company. 

Since completing the installation, 

Stage Front’s Vista S3 has been used for 

various concert, corporate and house-of 

worship-events in the Southeast. 

The cast prepares for battle at Medieval Times. 

McEntire 

Honored 

at Kodak 

HOLLYWOOD, CA — Greg Brunton 

of Design Partners, Inc. (DPI) designed 

the live-to-tape concert tribute CMT 

Giants: Reba, which premiered November 

18, 2006 on Country Music 

Television. 

Eleven live performances of Reba 

McEntire’s songs were taped in front 

of a live audience at The Kodak Theatre 

in Hollywood on October 26. Reba’s 

songs were performed by female 

artists including Martina McBride, 

Kelly Clarkson, LeAnn Rimes, Jennifer 

Nettles, Wynonna, Faith Hill, Dolly 

Parton, Trisha Yearwood and Megan 

Mullally. 

The more than 250 moving lights 

included Vari*lite VL5, VL 2416, VL 

3000 and 3500 and VL6C. Versa TUBES 

back-lit the bands, and the orchestra 

was side-lit by Coemar LED PixelPars. 

The Morpheus XR2 wash was used to 

side light the beaded curtain and various 

swags of fabric. 

For the finale, which Reba performed, 

Stealth LED Panels from Element 

Labs were used to create a video 

wall that bled through to highlight 

and reveal her entrance. A fan of Five 

Syncrolite 10K searchlights appeared 

behind her. 

Live guest appearances and tributes 

included Beau Bridges, Barbara 

Mandrell, Andie MacDowell, Dakota 

Fanning, James Denton and from Reba’s 

successful television series, both 

Melissa Peterman and Christopher 

Rich. 

Tom Forrest, was executive producer; 

Jillian Ellis was line producer, 

and Mike Swinford acted as 

production designer. Brunton, of 

DPI, was assisted by Kim Killingsworth, 

also of DPI, and Harry Sangmeister 

served as lighting director 

and programmer. 

www.PLSN.com 

Ad info: www.plsn.com/instant-info 

PLSN DECEMBER 2006

NEWS 

Atomic Tour 

Incites Panic 

LITITZ, PA – Panic! at the Disco launches its 

American tour with a set by Atomic Design, Inc. 

The band and their artistic director and lighting 

designer, Robb Jibson of Robb Jibson Design, 

created the concept for the tour set based on 

the video’s gothic circus theme. 

Jibson brought the concept to Atomic Design, 

Inc. where it was put in the hands of scenic 

designer Mike Rhoads. Jibson and Rhoads 

fine-tuned the design and brought in long-time 

friends and associates Tait Towers to handle 

staging and custom risers. Central to the theme 

is a large circus big top and tenting, a lion cage 

keyboard riser and a merry-go-round drum riser 

that opens to reveal an entrance for dancers. 

Working from a concept that Jibson and 

the band put forward, Rhoads created the Victorian-era 

audience digitally. This image was then 

hand colored by Joanna Davis, a fellow Atomic 

designer, and finally printed in large format to 

create the look the band desired. 

The tour kicked off in Fort Lauderdale 

on Tuesday, November 7, and has 

stops throughout the US and Canada until 

mid-December. 

NEW YORK — ESTA (the Entertainment 

Services and Technology Association) 

has announced the winners of the 

2006 Dealers’ and Manufacturers’ Choice 

Awards. 

The Dealers’ Choice Customer Service 

Awards offer ESTA’s Dealer Members 

the opportunity to publicly recognize 

those Manufacturers that provide 

superior performance in four main areas: 

Customer Service, Shipping and Billing, 

Technical Support and Quotations/ 

Project Management. Dealers cast their 

votes for Manufacturers in each of three 

categories, based on the Manufacturers’ 

number of employees: 1-6, 7-25 and over 

25. The winners for 2006 are: 

Doug Fleenor, Design, Inc. 

Pathway Connectivity Inc. 

Apollo Design Technology, Inc. 

The Manufacturers’ Choice Dealers of 

the Year Awards offer ESTA’s Manufacturer 

Members the opportunity to publicly 

Weller Strings Pearls 

LONDON — An Avolites Pearl Expert is on 

tour with Paul Weller - specified by LD Pip Rhodes. 

When Weller told Rhodes he wanted the show to 

be operated “live,” rather than pre-programmed 

or replayed in a cue list style, this seemed an ideal 

opportunity to road-test the new console, which 

is designed for flexible “hands-on” operation. 

The desk is controlling 16 Martin MAC 700 

and 12 Martin MAC 250 moving lights, 12 4-Lite 

DWE Moles, four ARRI HMIs with Wybron Color- 

Rams and Eclipse dimmer shutters plus four Martin 

Atomic strobes with color-changers. There 

are also four bars of six PARs for the downstage 

wash, all supplied by Neg Earth, along with trussing 

and rigging. Most of the lights are hung on a 

raked upstage box truss structure. 

Rhodes says that he is effectively using the 

ESTA Announces Winners Of 2006 

Dealers’ and Manufacturers’ Choice Awards 

An Avolites Pearl runs a Paul Weller concert. 

moving lights as if they are generics, and is keeping 

things simple with just six color palettes and 

four gobo palettes in the desk, used as the basic 

show building blocks. Everything else is mixed 

and layered on top completely live – and as a result, 

often slightly different each night. 

recognize superior performance in four 

main areas: Staff, Sales and Marketing, 

Inventory and Financial Responsibility. 

Manufacturers cast their votes for Dealers 

in each of three categories, based on 

the Dealers’ number of employees: 1-6, 

7-25 and over 25. The winners for 2006 

are: 

Indianapolis Stage Sales & Rentals, 

Inc. 

Production Advantage, Inc. 

Stage Equipment & Lighting, Inc. 

The Dealers’ Choice Product Awards 

recognize outstanding entertainment 

technology products in three categories: 

Expendable, Widget and Equipment. The 

winners for 2005 are: 

Expendable Category — Faux Snow 

from SnowMasters Evaporative Snow 

Systems, Inc. Faux Snow gives the visual 

effect of snow cover on the ground. 

It’s biodegradable, non-toxic and 

environmentally friendly. 

Widget Category — Lex Eectrol 

Plug-in Splitter from Lex Products Corp. 

The new Lex Electrol 512 DMX Plug-in 

Isolator Splitter/Repeater (ISR 1.2) is a 

plug-in unit that provides one-in, twoout 

isolation and buffering of DMX signals. 

The PISR rebuilds very weak signals, 

while isolating ground loops, reducing 

static electricity problems and providing 

high-drive for long cable runs. 

Equipment Category — Power Assist 

from J.R. Clancy, Inc. Allows you to 

motorize your counterweight sets with 

a retrofittable winch. 

The Customer Service and Dealer 

of the Year awards were presented 

at ESTA’s annual dinner held in conjunction 

with the LDI 2006 show on 

Thursday, October 19, and the Product 

awards were presented during 

the LDI 2006 awards ceremony on 

Saturday, October 21. 

Elation Hosts Students at LDI 

LOS ANGELES — Elation 

Professional welcomed a group 

of four lighting design students 

as their guests to the first Elation 

Education Experience at the LDI 

Show in Las Vegas. Students 

Marie Yokoyama, Jason March, 

Scott Evans and Leah Austin 

were selected by a group of 

educators and journalists, based 

on their enthusiasm for, and potential 

in, lighting design. These 

students, along with lighting 

professor David Jacques, were 

provided with an all-expense 

paid trip to the LDI show by 

Elation Professional. 

The lucky students, from L-R: Jason March, Scott Evans, John Lopez 

(sales manager for Elation Lighting), Leah Austin and Marie Yokoyama. 

Upcoming 

Events 

Stage Lighting Super Saturday seminars/workshops: 

Jan 13, 2007, Pace 

University, Michael Schimmel Center for 

the Arts, New York, NY 

(www. stagelightingseminars.com) 

The NAMM Show: Jan 18-21, 2007, 

Anaheim Convention Center, Anaheim, CA 

(www.thenammshow.com) 

Rigging Seminars: Las Vegas, February 12– 

16; Boston, April 10–13; Chicago, July 9–12; 

Seattle, October 8–11. ( www.riggingseminars.com) 


TOMCAT Hoist and Rigging Workshop: 

February 21–24, 2007. TOMCAT Advanced 

Hoist & Truss workshop: February 23 and 

24, 2007. (www.tomcatglobal.com) 

Mountain Productions 22nd Annual 

CM Hoist School: March 26–29, 2007, 

Wilkes-Barre, Pa. (www.mountainproductions.com/hoistschool.html) 

 




NEWS 

Letters to the Editor 

Hats off to you guys. I have worked 

as a stagehand, runner, production 

secretary, monitor engineer, assistant 

audio tech, camera operator, spot 

op, as well as lighting tech and LD. I 

was honored to spend many years 

working for Kirby Wyatt at ShowCo 

creative services. He taught me more 

than many of the college instructors 

I’ve had since (three lighting 

and three set design courses among 

others). I learned from him by building 

his designs, and then going out 

on show sites, putting it all up and 

watching it run! I also learned from 

the plethora of designers that came 

through several house gigs and the 

many countless stagehand gigs I 

have worked over the last 25 years. I 

still try to learn something new every 

day that I work. I worked for almost 

20 years in the business before I took 

classes. God love these kids that I deal 

with on a daily basis, but there are too 

many in lead positions that do not 

need to be there, but they are related 

or connected or have that degree and 

think they know it all! Not all of them, 

mind you, but way too many for comfort. 

Needless to say, I just wanted to 

say thank you for printing what I want 

to say on at least a weekly basis. Once 

again you’ve hit that great big nail on 

the head! 

Cindy Chandler 

My name is Keith Nestor. I wrote to you 

some time ago about the condition of the 

New Orleans music industry. I used to be 

the operation manager for the Orpheum 

theatre in New Orleans for 10 years. When 

Katrina flooded the city and closed all the 

Theatres, I went to work for the Corp of Engineers 

to pay the bills for 14 months. At the 

time the industry looked really bad. Well 

things are looking really good for us these 

days. I went to work for Pace Systems doing 

audio, working in the art department and 

what ever else they have for me. The city has 

just had a couple of large conventions. The 

movies are shooting all over town, and there 

is music in the air again. The city is still really 

messed up, and a lot of rebuilding has to 

be done. But it’s getting done. All the large 

theatres are still closed, and no repair work 

has started on them. But, in spite of our 

stupid government leaders, it’s starting to 

come alive. The last time I wrote to you I was 

really down on the whole scene! 

So I just wanted you to know things are 

looking good. The first gig I did lasted 20 

hours, and when I came home the wife said 

I had a smile from ear too ear. A number of 

my friends in the industry have come back 

to town, and I hear that more are on their 

way. So I believe there is a God in heaven 

who does not want the music to die in this 

old city. 

Thanks and God Bless. 

Keith Nestor 

New Orleans 

Dear Fellow Theatre Technicians, 

I recently received a grant from The ESTA 

Foundation’s Behind the Scenes program, 

and I want you to know how important and 

helpful that act of generosity was. 

I am Michael Maag, the master electrician 

at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. 

Founded in 1935, the Tony Award-winning 

Oregon Shakespeare Festival is among the 

oldest and largest professional non-profit 

theatres in the nation. Each year OSF presents 

an eight-and-a-half-month season of 

11 plays in three theatres in rotating rep, 

OSF presents more than 780 performances 

annually. So you know that means I have a 

few things to do. Unfortunately, while taking 

a break from the OSF Lighting Department, 

I was struck by a car while riding my bicycle. 

The resulting spinal cord Injury paralyzed my 

legs, and permanently damaged my right 

shoulder. I also faced a deteriorating condition 

and spreading paralysis that would require 

more surgery to halt. 

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival was 

amazingly accommodating to my new situation; 

they allowed me to return to work as 

the master electrician. The Festival even held 

a benefit performance to help with my enormous 

medical expenses. However, beyond 

the financial difficulties, I had many practical 

problems to overcome. To get to work I had 

to have someone drive me, unload my wheel 

chair and help me into it. I also had a very difficult 

time moving between our three theatres 

and getting where I needed to be to 

do my job. My wife and I were overwhelmed 

with the many financial and practical problems 

my new situation presented to us. 

That is when I wrote to The ESTA 

Foundation after a friend (Dinna Myers at 

Musson) suggested that I do so. The ESTA 

Foundation-Behind the Scenes program is 

a brand new granting agency, and I think 

they might have been a little overwhelmed 

by the list of expenses that I need help 

with. However, they sent me a check for the 

expense that would be most helpful to me, 

the motorized wheelchair. With the chair I 

have a lot of independent mobility options 

that I did not have before. This chair is so 

amazing; it has a 10–12 mile range, and 

climbs the steep hills of Ashland like it is a 

mountain goat. Most importantly, I can get 

in and out of the theatres on my own now. 

I cannot find enough ways to express 

my gratitude for this grant. The ESTA Foundation’s 

Behind the Scenes program has 

given me independence and the ability 

to continue in the work I love. The support 

and love of the people at OSF, and through 

Behind the Scenes, the people in our industry, 

gives me the courage to fight this 

battle every day. 

I urge you to make even a small donation 

to Behind the Scenes if you have the 

means. There are many theatre technicians 

in need, whose lives can be changed for 

the better as mine has been: http://www. 

estafoundation.org/bts.htm 

Thank you to The ESTA Foundation - 

Behind the Scenes for your generosity. The 

gift you have given will have a long lasting 

positive effect on my life. 

Sincerely, 

Michael K Maag 

Oregon Shakespeare Festival 


10 PLSN DECEMBER 2006 


BRANSON, MO — Illuminating Concepts (IC), 

architectural and themed lighting designers and 

consultants based in Farmington Hills, Mich., was 

called upon to create all exterior architectural 

lighting, theatrical and show lighting design, light 

tower design, audio integration, control systems, 

implementation, project management, procurement 

and logistics throughout Branson Landing, 

a waterfront development that occupies 95 

acres, including 1.5 miles of waterfront on Lake 

Taneycomo. 

The shopping and entertainment promenade 

is divided into six districts, each with differing 

architecture and activities. IC chose Martin 

Architectural IP65-rated Exterior 200, Exterior 200 

long barrel and in-ground 200 luminaires to visually 

enhance the pedestrian level of the mile-long 

promenade and fountain water shows. 

NEWS 

Show Moves Outdoors In Branson 

Along the promenade’s length are 112 Holophane 

streetlamps, whose design differs in 

each district. The streetlamps are a combination 

of Holophane luminaires outfitted with a Martin 

Exterior 200 CMY color-changing module. The 

idea was to turn a roadway lighting fixture into a 

color-changing fixture in order to provide a customized, 

defining look to each district. In a design 

effort split between Holophane and Martin Architectural, 

modifications were made to both the 

streetlamps and the CMY modules to produce a 

color-changing streetlamp. Because of fixed design 

elements however, when mounted into the 

Holophane fixture, light exited the CMY module 

directly down, simply creating a “hot spot” on the 

luminaire’s glass instead of replicating the shape 

of a normally used ED17 Metal Halide lamp. Illuminating 

Concepts worked with Holophane on 

an optical control solution, utilizing a prismed 

“pseudo-lamp,” distributing the colored light 

properly within the glass Holophane refractor. 

The Holophane color-changing lamps operate 

in white mode to light the pedestrian walkway 

the majority of the time, and then initiate the 

changing of color for events and themed shows. 

The MediaMorphFX control system, developed 

by IC, is meant to allow street performers to locally 

change colored illumination. Additionally, 

IC developed audio speakers concealed in each 

streetlamp base, along with the control gear for 

the CMY module housed in a custom enclosure. 

Retail facades and trees along the promenade 

are uplit using Exterior 200 and in-ground 

200 color changers. “We wanted to illuminate 

the facades and trees that were most visually 

important,” states Kenneth Klemmer, IC’s design 

director on the project. Located in flowerpots, 

and spaced approximately every 40 feet, are inground 

200 color changers used to uplight stone 

and brick columns. “The flowerpot idea grew out 

of a construction issue with the building footings 

in which we couldn’t place the lighting as close 

to the building as we needed to for coverage 

purposes, so this was the solution,” says Kenneth. 

A two-and-a-half-acre town square, with 

a 1,500-seat amphitheatre and an illuminated 

water fountain featuring jet streams and fireballs, 

is located at the area’s culminating point 

and serves as the project’s entertainment headquarters. 

Further down the promenade is another 

fountain with a white light water show. 

Also at the town square area are four IC-designed 

light towers meant to anchor the open 

space. The towers also provide sound reinforcement 

positioning for stage shows. Material at 

the top of each tower, acrylic tubing woven 

through the steel tower structure, is lit by LED 

lighting from Color Kinetics, while the rest of the 

tower is lit by Martin short and long barrel Exterior 

200s mounted on the tower’s center core. 

Lighting control for the Branson Landing 

promenade is from IC’s MediamorFX audiovisual 

and lighting system. Martin’s Maxxyz PC 

controller with Maxxyz Manager has been integrated 

into the MediamorFX system. The system 

utilizes four satellite control rooms and a main 

control room distributed around the project. 

Crew included owner/developer HCW 

Development, City of Branson, Urban Retail 

Properties; IC designers included Kenneth Klemmer 

(DD), Michael Shulman (SD), Ron Harwood 

(principal) and Sonia Noble (designer); 

audio and controls were by Jeremy McDaniel, 

Larry Schirmer, Adam Winter, Jim Anderson and 

A street in the new Branson Landing development. 

Brandon Youells, with onsite PM Kurt Henry and 

programmer Eric Wade. 

One of the color-changing street lamps. 


NEWS 

Ad info:http:// www.plsn.com/instant-info Ad info:http:// www.plsn.com/instant-info 

In Brief 

Look Solutions’ Power-Tiny battery-operated fog generator and the palm-sized Tiny- 

Fogger lent their special-effects capabilities to two recent films, Spider-Man 3 and I Now Pronounce 

You Chuck and Larry, starring Adam Sandler… Bandit Lites will be providing lighting 

for the six-date Curb College of Entertainment and Music Business Showcase Series. 

Bandit has also purchased some Coemar Infinity lights from the team at ICD-Gary Mass, 

Noel Duncan and Nick Freed… ETC has introduced a new interactive graphic tour on their 

Web site, highlighting the features and functionality of their new Eos control system, at 

www.etcconnect.com/minisite/Eos…Audio Visual Innovations has announced that InfoComm 

International awarded the AVI Tech Academy© program with CTS renewal 

units… LD Systems has purchased many new automated fixtures, LED fixtures and control 

boards. The new equipment includes a number of the High End Systems DL.2s and 

Studio Command 1200s, MA Lighting’s grandMA control consoles and Coemar LED 

fixtures… Northern Sound & Light (NSL) was recently chosen to sell Coemar intelligent 

lighting products by Inner Circle Distributors. The arrangement became effective 

November 1, 2006. 

Shares Ready for Market 


expenses related to the expansion of the 

company’s product line, including new 

“white light” products and capital expenditures. 

At the completion of the offering, 

assuming no over-allotment, Color Kinetics 

will have approximately 21,189,405 shares 

issued and outstanding. Color Kinetics will 

not receive any proceeds from the sale of 

shares by the selling stockholders. 

The sole book-running manager of 

the offering is Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. 

The co-lead manager is CIBC World Markets 

Corp., and the co-managers are ThinkEquity 

Partners LLC and Canaccord Adams Inc. Copies 

of the final prospectus relating to the offering 

may be obtained from Deutsche Bank 

Securities Inc., 60 Wall Street, 4th Floor, New 

York, NY 10005, from the offices of any of the 

underwriters identified above or from the 

SEC’s Web site at http://www.sec.gov. 

The offering is being made pursuant 

to an effective registration statement. 

This press release shall not constitute an offer 

to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy, 

nor shall there be any sale of these securities 

in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation 

or sale would be unlawful prior to 

registration or qualification under the securities 

laws of any such jurisdiction continued 

from cover. 

Widespread Options to 

Widespread Panic 

LOS ANGELES — Gener8Xion Entertainment, 

Inc. has announced that it has 

signed an exclusive sales agreement with 

Burbank-based, LEDZ, Inc. The agreement 

will add the “LED Mini Par” daylight and 

tungsten lighting system to the current 

product line of lighting equipment offered 

through Gener8Xion’s lighting division, 

Cinemills (http://www.cinemills.com). 

The solid-state semiconductors are 

typically used in automobile dashboards 

Double-Deckers 

Move Beyond Busses 

DENVER, CO — The Wright Group Event 

Services, in partnership with MSR (Mobile 

Stage Rentals) by Stageline, has introduces 

the ProMobile Double Decker Super Stage. 

The ProMobile Stage is a mobile marketing 

tool featuring two accessible levels and 2000 

square feet of vertical space. 

The ProMobile Stage is a multi-purpose 

unit with varied applications. The stage features 

a hospitality deck and viewing platform 

twenty-four feet above ground level, a corporate 

event stage, promotional touring unit, 

skybox for sporting events, VIP area for sports 

and concerts, mobile broadcast booth, multilevel 

exhibit booth and more. The ProMobile 

Madama Butterfly 

Finds Larger Audience 

NEW YORK — A giant screen, with projection 

equipment provided by Scharff Weisberg, 

was set up in the Lincoln Center plaza 

for a simulcast of the Puccini opera, Madama 

Butterfly, staged by director Anthony Minghella. 

The Panasonic, NASDAQ and Reuters 

screens at Times Square also beamed the 

production to a blocked-off section of Times 

Square. The outdoor crowd at Lincoln Center 

was estimated at 3,000 people. 

The opening-night performance, the 

first new production to inaugurate a Met 

season in two decades, marks the beginning 

for Peter Gelb as the general manager 

of the Met. 

Planning for the evening began with 

Scharff Weisberg consulting with the Met’s 

technical department on the screen type 

and construction. They opted for Gerriets 

International Gray Screen on a 36x20-foot 

frame, built by the Met’s scenic department. 

Scharff Weisberg specified, installed and 

aligned two Christie Roadie 25K projectors, 

Widespread Panic 

LOS ANGELES – When drawing up plans 

for Widespread Panic’s 28-date U.S. tour this 

fall, lighting designer Candace Brightman, 

who served as LD for the Grateful Dead for 

20 years, worked with Andrew Gumper of AG 

Light & Sound, who assisted in the programming 

and visual design of the show. 

The duo chose a gear package built 

around eight Power Spot 575IEs and 32 Power 

Wash 575Es from Elation Professional. Three 

truss arches were constructed over the stage, 

with the eight Power Spots being positioned 

on the center arch. The Power Washes were 

placed eight each on four separate strips of 

trussing encircling the stage, two extending 

diagonally at the front and two running 

along the sides of the stage perpendicular to 

the arches. 

“Candace was looking for something different,” 

said James Watral of AG Light & Sound. 

Among the Power Spot 575IE’s effects: an iris, 

11 colors plus white and UV, 16 replaceable 

gobos on two wheels with gobo overlaying, 

a built-in 4.9mW red laser, and a 3-facet rotating 

prism. The Power Wash 575E wash effects 

are used to splash color around the stage and 

out into the audience with CMY color mixing. 

The tour’s first stop was Radio City 

Music Hall in New York. 

Companies Sign LED Agreement 

and electronic devices, such as mobile 

phones. LEDZ, Inc. has developed proprietary 

LED lighting products with motion 

picture, broadcast and sanctuary applications. 

LEDZ, Inc., founded by Karl Schultz, 

holds the patent-pending rights to the 

“LED Mini Par” (LMP). The LMP is intended 

to allow for interchangeable lenses, choice 

of beam angles, 60,000-hour life span and 

low power consumption. 

has a strong enough roof to rig most types of 

equipment and has banner hanging capabilities. 

It allows for product and talent showcasing 

as well as brand visibility and promotion. 

The upper deck allows for a VIP area or 

can serve as an area for special displays and 

presentations. 

which were chosen for their light output 

and resolution. 

With the sun scheduled to set at 6:40 

pm that evening, and the curtain at 6:30pm, 

there was plenty of apprehension that light 

output from the two projectors would not 

be sufficient to offset the remaining daylight. 

In actuality, the image “was certainly 

acceptable during the first act, and, as it 

became darker, the image was truly cinematic,” 

recalls Scharff Weisberg president 

Josh Weisberg. 




ONTHEMOVE 

A l t m a n 

Lighting, Inc. 

announced that 

Victor Wittmann 

has joined the 

company as VP 

of sales and marketing. 

Wittmann 

will oversee both 

national and international 

Victor Wittmann 

sales, as well as helping to develop 

Altman Lighting in new markets. 

AV Concepts has hired Robert Rios as exhibitor 

sales representative. Rios will manage 

solicitation and on-site exhibitor operations. 

In addition, Tim Olson will be taking over their 

lighting department. 

CITC announced 

the 

a p p o i n t m e n t 

of Kelly Satterlee 

to lead their 

sales team. 

Bill Koehler 

has accepted the 

position of western 

dealer sales manager 

at Creative 

Stage Lighting. He 

joins CSL from TCS 

Audio of San Diego, 

CA, where he 

served as general 

sales manager. 

D a - L i t e 

Screen Company 

appointed 

Mark Erickson to 

the position of 

marketing manager. 

Mark will 

oversee Da-Lite’s 

i n t e r n a t i o n a l 

and domestic 

Kelly Saterlee 

Bill Koehler 

Mark Erickson 

marketing activities for both the commercial 

and home theatre markets. 

Digital 

Projection 

International 

(DPI), has hired 

Paul Gomes 

and Steve 

Sherk as DP 

sales managers 

on the U.S. West 

Coast. Gomes 

and Sherk bring 

over thirty 

combined years 

of A/V sales 

experience to 

the DPI organization. 

Leviton 

Manufacturing promoted 

Joel Manjarris 

to the position of 

southeast regional 

manager for the 

company’s Lighting 

Management 

Systems division. 

Paul Gomes 

Steve Sherk 

Joel Manjarris 

Lex Products 

Corp. has hired Cynthia Carraway as part of 

their technical sales staff. 

LMG, Inc. 

promoted Joseph 

Freeman 

to Orlando accounts 

manager. 

In his new 

role, Joseph will 

manage and 

direct the sales 

and coordination 

Joseph Freeman 

teams for 

the show services department in the firm’s 

Orlando headquarters. They also hired Rafael 

Rivera as accounts 

manager 

at its Orange 

County Convention 

Center 

(OCCC) location. 

Rivera’s responsibilities 

will include 

the overall 

management 

Rafael Rivera 

of LMG’s onsite office at the OCCC. 

LSC Lighting 

Systems recently 

appointed 

Jaz Harrison to 

the role of marketing 

officer. Jaz 

will provide LSC 

distributor communications 

and 

information on 

new products. 

N o r t h e r n 

Sound & Light 

(NSL) added 

Amy Parks to 

their professional 

staff. 

Parks will provide 

front-line 

support for in- 

Amy Parks 

Jaz Harrison 

coming calls and visitors to NSL’s business 

administration office, as well as 

audit customer orders for accuracy, audit 

vendor invoices and provide general 

administrative assistance as needed. 

Ocean Optics appointed Richard 

Pollard to the position of vice president 

of operations. Pollard is tasked with 

managing the company’s engineering 

and manufacturing processes, developing 

new systems, and guiding the strategic 

growth of the company. 

Pelican Products hired Todd Walden 

as southeast regional sales manager. He 

will be responsible for the business development 

and management of all Pelican 

sales activities in Alabama, Florida, 

Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina 

and Tennessee. 

TBA Global Events has announced 

that Ron Kelly was named general manager 

of the Miami office and Elaine 

Keller was appointed to the new role of 

senior account executive. 

To g e t l i s t e d i n 

O n T h e M o v e s e n d y o u r 

i n f o t o P R @ P L S N . C O M 

INTERNATIONALNEWS 

London’s South Bank 

Center Lights It Up 

LONDON — Lighting designer Willie Williams 

was asked by the South Bank Center’s 

creative director Jude Kelly to create a lighting 

design for the Center, both to give it its 

own identity and to ensure that it wasn’t 

overshadowed by the lighting design now in 

place at its neighbor, the National Theatre. 

Williams devised a fixed look for the 

buildings, and White Light supplied MBI 

floods and ETC Source Four fixtures to implement 

the design. The scale of the site 

— a collection of buildings spread over 20 

acres along the River Thames — proved a 

challenge, as did the absence of up-to-date 

drawings of the Center, leading Williams to 

produce what he feels may be “the first lighting 

plot in history to be drawn using Google 

Earth.” In the final scheme, the floods were 

concealed in the Center’s many corners and 

crevices, with the Source Fours shuttered 

into slots to catch edges and corners in 

tungsten color. 

The lighting team included crew chief Alex 

Murphy and Henry Barbour, Harry Haywood 

and Dai Mitchel. This design was originally 

scheduled to run until the end of August, but 

it has been extended into the autumn, with 

the designer and White Light investigating 

weatherproofing options to keep the equipment 

running through the winter. 

The South Bank Center with its new lighting. 






National Theatre Rigs Up Kinesys System 

ESSEX, UK — Large format projections specialists 

E\T\C UK created a 150-meter-wide highimpact 

image across 350 meters of water onto 

Caernarfon Castle for a massive “son et lumière” 

event, Merlin’s Magic Quest, a show celebrating 

Welsh history, heritage and community. 

The event follows a pilot project staged in 

2004, in which E\T\C UK projected onto a portion 

of the castle walls from the bottom of the hill on 

LONDON — Rigging Specialists Nippy 

Industries has supplied London’s National 

Theatre with a 14-way Kinesys automation 

system featuring Liftket vari-speed motors. 

The system will be primarily based in the 

Lyttelton Theatre, but will also be available 

for use in the National’s other venues. 

Nippy has been a rigging supplier at the 

National since 2001 and works closely with 

the National’s rigging department, including 

Rigging Resources technician Matthew 

Wheeler and his colleague Rob Barnard, 

head of Stage Facilities. Wheeler and Barnard 

first saw the Kinesys system on the Nippy Industries 

stand at the 2005 ABTT show. 

“The demands of the theatre are really 

quite considerable” says Wheeler, and with 

sets and productions getting more ambitious 

and changeover times more compressed, 

they were interested in a compact, 

cost-effective system to help them move 

large set pieces quickly, easily and safely. 

They also wanted a ‘”plug and play” system 

— something that came out of the box, 

plugged in and worked without any fuss or 

compatibility issues. 

They initially tested the Kinesys system 

with a rental from Nippy Industries. Then, 

when the decision came to make the purchase, 

they also needed to act extremely 

quickly, as an incoming production needed 

to utilize the system immediately. 

The deal was completed for Nippy by 

Hannah Sneath. The full system consists 

of the 14 Kinesys Elevation 1+ controllers, 

the 14 20-meters-a-minute Liftkets, a Kinesys 

Array PD-ES power distro 

and a laptop running Kinesys’ 

proprietary Vector software. 

The Elevation 1+ mounts 

close to the motor, and has a 

32A 3-phase inlet and outlet 

allowing units to be “daisychained” 

together. Data is 

provided via an RS485 data 

link, and an LED display on 

the front and full menu system 

are integrated, together 

with movement and speed 

controls. Nippy industries coordinated 

training sessions 

on the new kit between Kinesys 

and the National’s staff. 

The new system went straight into use 

the town side of the Seiont River. This time, the 

projections, fed by five PIGI 6Kw projectors with 

double rotating scrollers, filled the entire side of 

the castle, including three towers and two “curtain” 

walls facing the water, and were beamed 

from across the far side of the river. 

The 35-minute show involved over 200 of 

images and filled the 40-meter PIGI scrolls. It was 

set to a specially composed soundtrack by Malcolm 

Rowe, and also featured live acting by a reenactment 

society. 

Merlin’s Magic Quest was organized and produced 

by John Thirsk of Y Grael Cyf (The Grail), a 

not-for-profit organization aiming to use lighting 

and visuals to boost Caernarfon as a visitor attraction, 

the idea being to stage regular shows. 

Thirsk storyboarded the show, which was 

then pictorialized by E\T\C UK’s Ross Ashton, 

working with Paul Chatfield who turned 

them into PIGI artwork. The giant images 

made a filmic backdrop for everyone watching 

the show. With no narrative track, each 

on two Lyttleton productions: Voysey Inheritance 

and a production of the Chekhov 

classic, The Seagull. 

Caernarfon Castle Adjusts Image 

Imposing projections of Merlin’s Magic Quest 

projected onto Caernarfon Castle. 

Matthew Wheeler sets the Elevation 1+ controllers 

in the grid of the Lyttelton Theatre. 

image had to speak for itself, as the show recalled 

a millennium of Welsh history. 

Ashton comments, “The castle is a fantastic 

building on which to work, augmented by fabulous 

surrounding scenery — all adding to some 

real ‘magic’ in the end result”. 

The E\T\C UK team of Ashton, Phil Pieridis 

and Karen Monid arrived onsite five days before 

the first show. Monid did all the onsite programming 

using an OnlyCue PC-based system. With 

only one PIGI machine per surface section of the 

castle, the fade-ins and -outs had to be staggered 

to effectively emulate two complete cross fading 

images. Four solid nights of programming 

were required, working closely 

with the soundtrack. 

The projectors were housed in 

specially built weatherized scaffolding 

hides, located in a garden across the 

Sieont, donated for the duration by a 

resident. Generator power was supplied 

by Golden Triangle. 

Two shows were run for two nights, 

with audiences choosing to view either 

from just below the castle on the town 

side or across the water. 


Bridging the Gap 

OXFORD, UK — The Bridge, a dance 

club in Oxford, recently updated with Element 

Labs VersaTILES, supplied by Projected 

Image Digital. The dance floor now 

features three sections of VersaTILES: a 6 x 

1-meter strip of VersaTILES along the end 

wall of the dance floor, flanked by two 2 by 

1/2-meter strips on the side walls. James 

Ussher designed and installed this new 

scheme, which saw the removal of most of 

the waggling disco lights and effects. 

Ussher first saw VersaTILES on the 

PID stand at PLASA 04, when they were 

launched. However, it was 

not a cheap option for the 

proposed lighting upgrade, 

and so that element of the 

overall project went on the 

back burner for a while. 

By May of 2006, the 

club was ready to make 

the investment. PID’s David 

March undertook several 

demos, started talking 

with Ussher on a quantity 

of eight square meters of 

VersaTILE. 

The TILES are programmed with a series 

of effects and run off 8A of power. The ceiling 

has been painted in high gloss to maximize 

the TILE effects, which are beamed up 

into the ceiling and bounced back onto the 

dance floor. They are also in the process of 

installing additional glass surfaces around 

the room for enhanced “bounce.” 

PID supplied an Element Labs C1 controller 

to run the installation. All the content 

has been created by Ussher using a combination 

of Apple Motion files and those supplied 

by a contracted programmer. 

A VersaTILE wall at The Bridge. 



LIVERPOOL, UK — Liverpool Culture 

Company’s Special Events team staged three 

fireworks displays city-wide on November 5. 

Traditionally Liverpool’s November 5 celebrations 

have been a hectic night. They have 

been staged in triplicate for some years, and 

usually two displays are park-based with the 

third on a prominent river site, but this year, 

due to redevelopment, there was nowhere 

to accommodate the audience for a river display. 

Instead, LCC took on a new park venue at 

Temple Newsham in the Tuebrook area. 

To add depth to the overall visual image, 

the trees and foliage in the parks were illuminated 

this year for the first time — using Studio 

Due City Color lighting fixtures. These and 

the sound systems for all three parks were 

supplied by Manchester based Audile. 

The fireworks themselves contained 

multi-color effects and aerial arrays. They 

were all fired from Pyromate controllers, with 

Sefton Park featuring a Pyromate Nighthawk 

digital system and the others standard analogue 

systems. 

All three displays were designed and coordinated 

by Steve Boothman of Fantastic 

Fireworks, working closely with the Culture 

Company team, including event manager Bill 

Howard. Boothman ran the Sefton show, Andy 

Howarth ran Walton Park and Charlie Purton 

ran Temple Newsham. Generator power for all 

three sites was supplied by Pyramid, barriers 

by Event solutions, cabins from Search, stewards 

from Paramount, and SES looked after 

the security. 


Enter the Beam of the Ball 

LONDON — Production Plus has purchased 

16 Robe ColorSpot and ColorWash 

575 AT fixtures — eight of each type. One 

of the first outings for the new 575 AT 

fixtures was a gala ball at the Hilton International 

Hotel, Park Lane, London, for 

the Hilton Community Foundation Ball 

charity. The gala was staged in the Grand 

Ballroom and featured a lighting design 

by Dave Gibbon. Gibbon is a regular on 

the Production Plus live event team. 

The stage was built in the center, and 

the 16 Robe 575 Spots and Washes were 

flown on the front and back trusses over 

the stage — Washes on the front and 

Liverpool Gets Fired 

Up for November 5 

Spots on the back. Gibbon also specified 

a further sixteen Robe Spot 250s and 

Wash 250s. These were joined by Source 

Fours with break-up gobos for illuminating 

the audience and pinspots, with 

LED PARs used to illuminate the upstage 

drapes and the drum kit. 

The front truss ColorWash and Spot 

575s produced general and effects lighting 

of the band while onstage. The 250s 

were used dotted around the room during 

dinner and for dance floor lighting 

and effects after dinner. 

Gibbon ran the show lighting from an 

Avolites Pearl 2004 console. 

Robe lights the performers at the Hilton Community Foundation Ball. 


Fireworks detonate for Nov. 5.



1/3 SQUARE AD 

»ETC Congo jr 

Electronic Theatre Controls, Inc.’s Congo jr is the 

compact version of its larger Congo console, with identical 

channel and output counts, as well the same operating 

software. Congo jr is meant to handle lighting rigs 

with conventional lights, moving lights, LEDs, media 

servers and other DMX-controlled multiparameter devices. 

Congo jr also features an optional Master Playback 

Wing and is intended for space-compromised venues. 

Coinciding with the release of Congo jr is ETC’s introduction 

of Congo software version 4.2.1, which serves as 

a patch, primarily supporting the new Congo jr hardware. 

ETC, Inc. • 800.688.4116 • www.etcconnect.com 

NEWPRODUCTS 

»Acclaim Color Ray Indoor/Outdoor LED 

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Acclaim Lighting’s Color Ray LED luminaire features three high-power 

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The Color Ray draws 5-watts maximum power consumption at full RGB 

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»Atomic Design Honeycombs 

Atomic Design Inc.’s Honeycombs are individual dimensional and collapsible 

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»Chauvet COLORado 3 indoor/outdoor 

wash bank 

The COLORado 3 is a multi-faceted intelligent wash 

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»Wireworks LumaVue Custom Panels and Plates 

Wireworks LumaVue Custom Panels and Plates are a custom panel 

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»Elation’s Power Spot 700 Blasts 

Elation Professional’s Power Spot 700 is a moving yoke fixture 

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»GoboMan Color Filters 

GoboMan Color Filters consist of 116 colors in 20” x 24”sheets, 

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»Medialon Manager 4 Software 

Manager 4 software controls and synchronizes digital 

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wizard. The workspace can be adapted to users’ needs by displaying all show elements at a glance. 

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»Morpheus Lights XR2+ 

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»Martin Architectural Exterior 1200 Wash 

The Exterior 1200 Wash has a 1200W lamp and a full range color 

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»Road Ready IntelliStage Portable Stage System 

IntelliStage Portable Stage Systems consist of modular, 

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1/3 SQUARE AD 


»Syncrolite Series 3 

Syncrolite’s series 3 fixtures, SXB-52D / SXB-82D / SX10KD, feature 

a 5000W, 8000W and 10,000W Xenon bulb respectively, a 14” 

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PLSN DECEMBER 2006 19

SHOWTIME 

Tribute to the Latin Grammy 

Venue 

Univision Network, Miami,FL 

Crew 

PromoterProducer: Cisco Suarez 

Lighting Company: Zenith Lighting 

Production Manager: Tony Parodi 

Lighting Designer: Carlos Colina 

Lighting Director: Ramon Furelos 

Automated Lighting Operator: Chris Nathan 

Lighting Technicians: Philip Zammit, Ben Fisher, 

Luis Portela, Ale Carnizares 

Set Design: Will Rothfuss 

Set Construction: Jupiter Scenic 

Rigger: Walter Dominicis 

Staging Company: Roc-Off 

Staging Carpenter: Jesus (Chuy) Fragoso 

Video Director: Jason Rudolph 

Video Company: Roca Video 

Gear 

18 Martin MAC Profiles 

12 Vari*Lite VL3000s 

30 Coemar iWash Halos 

30 High End Systems Studio Beam 

w/ Fresnel lenses 

20 Coemar LED Parlite fixtures 

6 4’ MR16 mini strips 

4 Robert Juliat followspots 

2 Lycian 1290 followspots 

2 MA Lighting grandMA consoles (plus 2 backups) 

2 ETC Insight 3 consoles 

4 19-inch flat screen monitors for main consoles 

2 15-inch flat screen monitors for spare consoles 

1 5-port Hub 

1 Network Signal Processor (1 active/1 backup) 

2 8-port Ethernet switches 

2 4-Port DMX switches 

6 UPS power supplies 

2 Reel EFX DF-50s 

2 Real EFX Turbo Fans 

6 box fans 

21 1-ton motors 

2 spot chairs 

60 Element Labs VersaTubes 

1 45-foot x 14-foot Stewart screen 

3 DPI 28SX DLP projectors 

3 12-foot x 4-foot columns of D7s 

4 42-foot plasma displays 

Sweeney for Congress 

Venue 

Hall of Springs, Saratoga Springs, NY 

Crew 

Promoter/Producer/Lighting/ 

Staging: Adirondack Studios 

Production Manager/Lighting 

Designer/Set Designer: Ken Mark 

Lighting Technician: Chip Viele 

Set Construction: Joel Hudson 

Staging Carpenter: Dylan Murphy, 

Staging Products: ADKStudios Parallels 

Gear 

2 Leprecon LP-612 consoles 

25 Chroma-Q Color Block DB-4s 

24 ETC Source Four PAR 64 575W NSPs 

5 ETC Source Four ParNels 

6 ETC Source Four Jr. Zooms 

12 TMB DecoPars 

4 Genie SL-24 towers 

1 Thomas and Xtreme Truss 

Kawasaki New Product Showcase 

Venue 

Anaheim Convention Center, Anaheim, CA 

Crew 

Promoter/Producer: Kathy Matyniak, Kawasaki 

Consumer Events 

Lighting Company: Brite Ideas 

Production Manager: Greg Christy/Janelle Fredericksen 

Lighting Designer: Eric Hanson 

Automated Lighting Operator: Ariel Mouzo 

Lighting Technicians: Jay Martin-ME, Servando Huerta, 

Terry Smith, Ray Chacon, Dominic Sewell, Mike Fuller Sr., 

Mike Fuller Jr., Tom Folden, Frank Armenta, William Bennet, 

Nich Phillips, Dana Casey, Jerrod Hettler, Mike Camarena 

Set Design/Construction: Exhibit Works /Champion 

Expo Rigger: Champion Expo 

Gear 

1 Flying Pig Systems WholeHog iPC with Wing 

65 Martin MAC 2000 Profiles 

55 Martin MAC 2000 Washes 

8 Vari*Lite VL 3000 Profiles 

50 575-watt Sky PARs 

6 ETC Source Four Lekos w/400-watt HMI lamp 

12 ETC Source Four Lekos 

8 Altman 575-watt HMI Fresnels 

36 ETC Source Four Pars 

1 SGPS Equipment 

1 1,096 feet of 12-inch box truss 

8 10-foot radius by 45-degree curved truss 

6 1 1/2-Ton hoists 




Crew 

Promoter/Producer: Sonicflood Inc./IMB 

Lighting/Video/Set Design: UpLight Technologies 

Production Manager: Stan Shilliday 

Lighting Designer/Director: David Surbrook 

Automated Lighting Operator: David Surbrook/Lynsey 

Glassbrook 

Lighting Technicians: Lynsey Glassbrook/Collin Barnes 

Video Director: Todd Hershberger 

Gear 

1 MA Lighting grandMA UltraLite 

10 Coemar iWash Halos 

6 Coemar iSpot 575s 

10 Coemar iWash LEDs 

16 Coemar ParLite LEDs 

4 Coemar MiniCycs 

12 ETC Source Four Pars on floor base 

Sonicflood “This Generation” Tour 

2 Leprecon ULD 360 dimmers 

1 AC Lighting 3-phase power distro 

1 Swisson DMX Splitter 

1 2-Universe WDMX Wireless DMX system 

1 Reel EFX DF-50 Haze machine with fan 

5 Genie ST-25 Super Towers 

1 60-foot Applied PRT truss 

6 Applied 12-foot tall vertical truss 

1 8-foot Applied 8-foot-tall vertical truss 

15 Custom translucent PolyGal backdrop panels 

1 Custom 10-foot Round Dual Vision screen 

2 DaLite 7.5-foot x 10-foot Dual Vision screens 

3 Christie 5K video projectors 

1 NewTek VT Live switching and media 

1 server system 

2 Spy Cams 

Darryl Worley’s Tennessee River Run 

Venue 

Pickwick Landing State Park 

Savannah, TN 

Crew 

Promoter/Producer: Ted Hacker for 

the Darryl Worley Foundation 

Lighting Company: Radiant Designs, 

TLS Inc. 

Production Manager/Set Design/ 

FOH engineer: Darrin Snyder 

Lighting Designer/Director, 

Lighting Operator: Jim Cozad 

Lighting Technicians: Brian Palmer, 

Glenn Zimmerman 

Set Construction: Southern Aluminum 

Rigger/Staging Carpenter: Tony Pizzoferrato 

Staging Company: Concert Staging 

Monitors: Josh Walton 

Backline: Bucket 

Tour Manager: Joe Morris 

Pyrotechnics: Pyroshows 

Video Director: Spencer Thomason 

Video Company: Sutherland Video 

Gear 

1 Flying Pig Systems WholeHog 

2 with Wing 

11 PRTs 

140 ETC Source Four PARs 

2 ETC Source Fours 

2 8-light Mole fay 

5 4-cell cyc lights 

12 High End Systems 

1 Studio Spots with CMY 

6 Pixel Range PixelLine 

1044s 

2 48-way ETC racks 

3 Lycian 1275 followspots 

5 Risers 

2 15x20 screens 

2 Barco projectors 

3 Cameras 

20th Catalina Island Jazztrax Festival 

Venue 

Catalina Island Casino Ballroom, Avalon, CA 

Crew 

Promoter/Producer: Art Good, Jazztrax 

Lighting Company: Pacific Coast Entertainment 

Production Manager: Gregg Hudson 

Lighting Designer/Operator: Mike Diocson 

Lighting Director/Set Design/Video Director: Ryan Steidinger 

Lighting Technicians: Brandon Domercq, Ted Berkey 

Riggers: Joe Ward, John Koukios, Chris Dodd 

Staging/Video Company: Pacific Coast Entertainment 

Gear 

1 Show Designer 2 

8 High End Studio Spot 575s 

4 High End Studio Command 1200s 

2 Martin MAC 500s 

2 Martin MAC 600s 

6 Elation Power Spot 575s 

12 ETC Source Four Lekos 

6 ETC Source Four PARs 

1 Martin P-2000 Fogger 

2 Midget followspots 

4 CM Lodestar 1-ton motors 

30 30’ 12-inch Black 

box truss 

1 14-foot 12-inch box circle truss 

2 Eiki LC-1100 video projectors 

2 Da-Lite 9x12 screens 

1 Folsom Presentation Pro 

1 Sony DVCAM 

2 Dell Laptops 



DECEMBER PLSN 2006 JULY PLSN2006 21 21

INSIDETHEATRE 

Capturing the Magic of 

Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch Who Stole Christmas 

is a classic children’s book that 

was adapted into an animated television 

program, and in recent years has also 

become a hit movie with Jim Carrey and a 

popular musical theatre production in San 

Diego for eight years running. Now Dr. Seuss’ 

How The Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical 

is tantalizing Broadway in its first limited 

holiday run. 

Grinch head electrician/light board operator 

Cletus Karamon certainly 

has his hands full with 

this special engagement, 70- 

minute production, which runs 

12 times a week, including four 

shows on Saturdays and three 

on Sundays. But Karamon 

— a 12-year veteran of touring 

Broadway shows who subs 

over at The Producers — also 

did A Christmas Carol the previous 

two years at Madison 

Square Garden, and that show 

ran 15 times a week. So he’s 

used to intensity. 

What is immediately striking 

about The Grinch is how it 

works as a whole rather than 

merely as another Broadway 

spectacle. “I think lighting designer 

Pat Collins has done a 

wonderful job of enhancing 

Cletus Karamon the show and not making it a 

light show,” remarks Karamon. 

“Pat’s a seasoned veteran. She 

knows shows, and that it’s about the show.” 

It also helps that there’s a strong ensemble 

“It’s so subtle that people don’t 

realize that snow is falling a lot 

during the show.” 

–Cletus Karamon 

cast and that Patrick Page hams it up and 

commands the stage as that lovable curmudgeon 

the Grinch. 

“Patrick is definitely great,” concurs Karamon. 

“He’s wonderful to watch night after 

night. John Lee Beatty’s set design is wonderful. 

They stay real true to the book. It’s 

based on The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, but 

it’s not word for word. It wasn’t a musical, so 

now they’ve got these wonderful songs to 

play with. It’s not over the top tech-wise.” 

That being said, there is plenty of technology 

at work to make The Grinch the grand 

show that it is. Prep commenced on September 

15, and load-in began September 28. 

Karamon and Collins worked together during 

the tech period in the Hilton Theatre, 

which began with three days of dry tech and 

a whole week of tech rehearsals prior to the 

first preview on October 25. Since they were 

dealing with a show that had a history, the 

creative staff knew what they wanted, but 

there were still some nips and tucks done up 

to opening night. While Karamon runs everything 

— lights, moving lights, effects and 

projections — from his position at the back 

of the orchestra section, there were separate 

programmers present for each during tech. 

Karamon runs four boards for The Grinch. 

“I am triggering all cues off of the Obsession 

By BryanReesman 

2, sending MIDI to the moving light board, FX 

board and triggering the projections off of 

DMX,” he explains. “I have a backup Hog iPC 

that’s MIDI-ed through, so they’re constantly 

in sync with each other. So if I have a problem, 

I just have to switch the A/B DMX back 

up and be right on line still with the backup 

Hog iPC. The Obsession is the main conventional 

board, and I’m firing the projectors off 

of that also. Scharff Weisberg put in a DMX 

converter control into their towers so I could 

fire their projectors from the Obsession, plus 

I MIDI out to the iPC board, which is running 

Hog 2 software. The Obsession is also MIDIing 

out to an Expression 2X for the effects, 

but that’s running Expression 3 software.” 

The stage for The Grinch features a high 

arch framing the center of the action, flanked 

on either side by smaller, rotating set pieces, 

which allows for a lot of action to take place 

in a short period of time. The arch includes 

dozens of light bulbs that come on at various 

times. The foot lights in the front of the 

stage are small PAR 38 cans with red lamps. 

Little Who eyes light up in the show curtain 

in the beginning, and there are also Diversitronics 

Finger Strobes in the black backdrop 

and in the Christmas tree. A small set piece 

that represents a faraway view of the Who 

village, with little Who puppets that come 

out and sing during the first and second 

halves of the show, features LED light rope, 

of which Karamon is not a fan. “I had some 

issues with trying to fade it up at low levels,” 

he admits. “I had issues with it flickering 

compared with something smooth like an 

incandescent rope light.” So he spent some 

time trying to solve that problem. 

In total, The Grinch has over 450 running 

lights. “A lot of the front of house stuff 

is 19° (ETC) Source Fours 750 watt,” reveals 

Karamon. “The over stage stuff is PAR 64 PAR 

cans, basically narrows and some mediums 

on the ladders. Pat’s also using a bunch of 

mini-strips over stage.” [See sidebar for full 

instrument list. –ed.] 

Projection on The Grinch is solely used 

to generate a snow effect on a mesh screen 

inside the arch. Mark Mongold did the projection 

design, and Scharff Weisberg supplied 

it. The two projectors are Barco RLM 

R6+ Performers, they run throughout most 

of the show. “It’s so subtle that people don’t 

realize that snow is falling a lot during the 

show,” notes Karamon. “There’s gently falling 

snow, faster moving snow and a still 

snow that is used. There’s a little cloud effect 

with the fast moving snow that’s also 

used.” These projections add to the atmosphere 

of the production. 

The main Who house presented a challenge 

for the production team, as it integrated 

all the different technological aspects of the 

show. It is built on an automated turtle and 

spins, and it has Color Kinetics LEDs and some 

Arris. There is smoke for the chimney, a Christmas 

tree that lights up, and hanging balls. “It 

required a lot of aspects from different departments 

— effects, moving lights — even 

though there are no moving lights in the unit,” 

explains Karamon. “The Color Kinetics were 

programmed using the Hog console. It all 

wound up running through the Hog because 

22 



Gear List 

3 Lycian 1293 X3K followspots 

4 10° ETC Source Four 750W 





8 ETC Source Four PAR (NSP) 750W 

2 ETC Source Four PAR (MFL) 750 W 

6 PAR 64 (VNSP) 1kW 

84 PAR 64 (NSP) 1kW 

48 PAR 64 (MFL) 1kW 

94 PAR 64 SN (NSP) 1kW 

3 2’-8” ETC Source Four MultiPAR 

(VNSP) [4 ckt] 750W 

2 8’-6” ETC Source Four MultiPAR 

(VNSP) [4 ckt] 2250W 

31 8’-3” MR-16 Ministrip EYJ [4 ckt] 

750W 

we could just put the hot power feeds in the 

Who house, and we took the WDS system from 

City Theatrical to supply the DMX for a Leprecon 

six-pack dimmer that runs the LED window 

boxes, the tree, the hanging garland and 

the Arris plus the Color Kinetics. We also interconnected 

it so that the smoke for the chimney 

would program through the Hog. Usually 

the effects board, the moving lights and the 

conventional units would all be separate, but 

the Color Kinetics were already being done by 

the Wholehog. For that situation it was best for 

the Hog to take it all.” 

Even though there is plenty of modern 

technology used for The Grinch, “we still do 

a little old school,” says Karamon. There are 

seven dimmer racks because they are using 

1K PAR cans, so they could not do any multiplexing. 

“There’s a little more technology there 

with the Color Kinetics, the WDS system, LSG 

machines, finger strobes, tiny foggers and a 

few other tricks. On the sleigh we have wireless 

dimmers. The WDS system has some Color 

Kinetics on there besides cute little hanging 

hurricane lanterns on either side of the sleigh. 

That’s all wireless, too.” 

Effects-wise, the show has confetti (for the 

climax) and fog, for which Look Solutions Tiny 

Foggers and Le Maitre Power Foggers are used. 

Karamon says that each chimney has its own 

little Tiny Fogger in it, and they have a Power 

Fogger for the snow puffs behind the Mount 

Crumpet set. One stagehand randomly puts 

little puffs of smoke out with a hand held, battery 

operated fogger. 

“We’re also using the MDG Atmosphere 

Haze Generator a little bit in the show, and 

we’re also using four LSGs, low smoke generators,” 

continues Karamon. The LSGs operate off 

of 350-pound CO 2 

tanks, and the show goes 

through about 12 to 15 a week. He estimates 

that they go through a quarter tank per show, 

per machine. “There are two LSGs upstage and 

two downstage. The upstage ones are just 

hoses laid on the deck, and the other ones are 

ducked into the floor, into the show deck, with 

PVC and a grating so it gets it right out towards 

the center of the stage. The LSGs have a Power 

10 8’-3” MR-16 Ministrip EYC [4 ckt] 

750W 

5 8’-3” MR-16 Ministrip EYF [4 ckt] 

750W 

3 8’ PAR 64 Strip (WFL) 1kW 

3 8’ PAR 64 Strip (MFL) 1kW 

15 Vari*Lite VL3000 Wash fixtures 

1 3.2” Arri Fresnel 

1 4.2” Arri Fresnel 

7 4.2” Arri Fresnel 650w 

6 Color Kinetics iColor Cove MX 

15 Diversitronics Finger Strobe 

1 Snow Shaker 100W 

2 Ropelight 100w 

2 RAM/10° 

64 RAM/P64 

4 LSG Low Smoke Generators 

1 Le Maitre Power Fog 

9 Look Solutions Tiny Fogger 

6 Snow Machine 

1 City Theatrical WDS Dimmer 

Fog Industrial 9D Fog Machine by Le Maitre 

that supplies the smoke. The LSG is just about 

the CO 2 

.” 

For those who don’t know how an LSG 

machine works, Karamon offers a quick 

primer. “Basically instead of dry ice, a regular 

smoke machine, in this case the 9D, shoots 

into the LSG. The LSG has a chamber that is 

receiving the CO 2 

to cool down the smoke so 

that it lays flat to the stage like fog, and you 

don’t have that dry ice issue of the stage getting 

wet and dancers slipping. We are using 

a little bit of dry ice with a Tiny Fogger. When 

the Grinch comes in from his cave, we shoot 

a Tiny Fogger into a dry ice bin that has a fan 

that pushes it out. Its stays a little low to the 

ground, it’s kind of like a rolling fog. Nowadays 

people are mainly using the LSG for a 

full stage effect, for low fog effects.” 

The production team behind The Grinch 

did not want the smoke to overwhelm the 

stage, but humidity can throw a monkey 

wrench into that plan, as evidenced two days 

into the show’s official run when the November 

weather was unseasonably warm. “Believe 

it or not, the weather will have an effect on the 

fog day by day,” remarks Karamon. “I’ve had 

the LSG machine on an inhibitive submaster. 

Yesterday I was pulling it down, all the way out 

at times, because it was too overpowering and 

wasn’t going anywhere. It would come out to 

the sixth, seventh or eighth row in the audience, 

so I would pull it back and start riding it 

manually in the cues. The past two days have 

been real tough. From opening night on it was 

just humid, and the fog would just hang there 

and not dissipate.” 

With everything going on, the Grinch’s 

light board op has his hands full. It’s a challenge 

he relishes. “This show is pretty cue intensive,” 

confirms Karamon. “A lot happens in a 

70-minute show with 22 scenes, I have roughly 

250 light cues and 220 call cues. There are 40 

light cues in the Whatchama Who song alone. 

There are so many different beats to hit with all 

of the flashing and craziness going on, you really 

need to be with the orchestra on that. Who 

has time to get bored?” 


PLSN DECEMBER 2006 23 


VITALSTATISTICS 

Selecon HQ 

Selecon’s Scott Church and Jeremy Collins 

Selecon 

Performance Lighting 

Selecon’s Scott Church, Jeremy Collins, Andrew Nichols and 

Phil Sargent pose around one of Selecon’s Rua followspots. 

Scott Church in New Zealand 

A Selecon worker in their manufacturing plant 

Who: 

Selecon Performance Lighting 

What: 

Design and manufacture of theatrical and entertainment lighting fixtures. 

Where: 

Auckland, New Zealand — HQ, R&D, manufacturing; Forest Hill, Maryland — sales, 

stocking and distribution; Enschede, The Netherlands — sales, stocking and distribution; 

with additional market support personnel located in the UK, Germany, Australia 

and Asia. 

When: 

Founded in 1969. Bought by Jeremy Collins, managing director, and Andrew Nichols, 

director of research & development, in 1985. 

Full time employees: 

45 

Number of products in catalog: 

39 

Clients of Note: 

Frederick P. Rose Hall; Jazz at Lincoln Center, NY; Cirque du Soleil’s Ka, Luc LaFortune, 

LD; The Blue Man Group, Marc Brickman, LD. 

Recent Projects of Note: 

Smithsonian; Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts; Canadian Opera Company, 

Canada; Royal Opera House, Stockholm, Sweden; Chita Rivera, The Dancer’s Life 

on Broadway. 

Recent Company Highlight: 

“We’re pretty happy that further stock and customer service investments in the States 

are meeting the growing U.S. market demand for Selecon theatre lighting products.” 

Claim to Fame: 

Association of British Theatre Technicians Awards for Rama and Performer ranges; 

2005 EDDY Award for Lighting Product of the Year for the Hui Cyc; ETS-LDI Product 

of the Year: Lighting Entertainment 2004 for the Pacific 45-75 Zoomspot. 


People might be 

surprised to know: 

That Selecon Acclaim Fresnels are the fixtures on the stands lighting the “body” 

lying on the Louvre floor during that pivotal scene in The Da Vinci Code. “Move over, 

Tom Hanks and Jean Reno!” 



These companies made this event, and the opportunity to educate 

the next generation of live event professionals, possible. 

Gold 

Sponsors 

Silver 

Sponsors

By Kevin M. Mitchell 

By KevinMitchell 

Photos By LisaMarieHall 

On a perfect Las Vegas evening, a recordbreaking 

audience gathered in a Venetian 

Hotel Ballroom to pay tribute to the 

very best of the year in our annual “Oscars of the 

Live Event Industry” affair. 

“When you think about it, it’s against our 

very nature to attend an event like this,” observed 

master of ceremonies and president 

of Timeless Communications Terry Lowe during 

the ceremony’s opening moments. “We 

tend to be the kind that shuns the spotlight. 

We’d rather be pointing it. We’d rather EQ than 

speak into a mic.” 

With that disclaimer noted, a few laughs 

had and the announcement of the PLSN/FOH/ 

Parnelli Scholarship to the University of Nevada, 

Las Vegas, the ceremony began. The star-studded 

list of those handing out the awards included 

Carol Dodd, Buford Jones, Marilyn Lowey, 

Michael Tait, Nook Schoenfeld, among many 

others. Toby Keith’s tour was a big winner, garnering 

three Parnellis; other tours and events 

recognized include the Rolling Stones, Rascal 

Flatts, Billy Joel and Tool. 

Longtime Bill Hanley fan Dave Shadoan of 

Sound Image introduced the Hanley tribute 

video highlighting the life of this great, influential 

man who was honored with the Sound Innovator 

Award. A visibly moved Hanley took the stage, 

thanking his family, most of whom were in attendance. 

PRG’s vice president Darren DaVerna took 

the stage in another highlight and spoke of Lifetime 

Achievement Honoree Jere Harris’ relatively 

young, but inspiring career. Harris, who had many 

friends, family and coworkers in attendance, gave 

thanks to his parents, family and all those who 

worked with and for him over the years. 

There were two new awards handed out 

this year: Video Rental Company of the Year and 

Sound Designer of the Year. 

• Lifetime Achievement Award: Jeremiah “Jere” Harris 

• Audio Innovator Award: Bill Hanley 

• Production Manager of the Year: Dale “Opie” Skjerseth, for his 

work with the Rolling Stones. 

• Tour Manager of the Year: David Milam, for his work with the 

Toby Keith tour. 

• Lighting Designer of the Year: Steve Cohen, for his work on 

the Billy Joel tour. 

• Lighting Company of the Year: Bandit Lites 

• Regional Lighting Company of the Year: Delicate Productions 

• Set Designer of the Year: Bruce Rodgers, for his work with 

the Rascal Flatts tour. 

• Staging Company of the Year: Brown United 

• Set Construction Company of the Year: All Access 

• Rigging Company of the Year: Branam West Coast 

• Video Director of the Year: Breckinridge Haggerty for his 

work with Tool. 

• Video Rental Company of the Year: Screenworks NEP 

• Pyro Company of the Year: Pyrotek Special Effects. 

• FOH Mixer of the Year: Dirk Durham, for his work with the 


• Monitor Mixer of the Year: Earl Neal, for his work with the 


• Sound Designer of the Year: Mick Potter, for his work on 

Phantom: The Las Vegas Spectacular. 

• Sound Company of the Year: Sound Image 

• Regional Sound Company of the Year: Clearwing Productions 

• Coach Company of the Year: Hemphill Brothers Coach Company 

• Trucking Company of the Year: Upstaging 

• Freight Forwarding Company of the Year: Rock-It Cargo 

The 2006 Parnelli Awards were made possible by Timeless Communications and its sponsors. Gold Sponsors: All Access; the Harman Group: AKG, 

BSS Audio, Crown, dbx, JBL and Soundcraft; Martin Professional and Precise Corporate Staging. Silver Sponsors: ASI, Apollo, Brown United, Littlite, 

PRG, Rock-It Cargo and Sound Image. The 2007 Parnelli Awards will be held in conjunction with LDI in Orlando. 

A shot of the pre-show cocktail party, featuring a reunion 

of Showlites employees. 


The awards banquet, with stage in the background. 



Money will help fund new entertainment technology program 

Joe Aldridge of UNLV, announcing the new Parnelli/PLSN/FOH Scholarship. 

President of Timeless Communications, publisher of PLSN, FOH, and now Stage Directions 

magazine, Terry Lowe, announced at the Parnelli Awards Dinner the launching of a 

one-of-a-kind Entertainment Engineering and Design program at the University of Nevada, 

Las Vegas ,and the Parnelli/PLSN/FOH Scholarship Fund that will be supporting it. 

“We have sought and received advice and support from the industry leaders, and the 

response has been overwhelming,” Joe Aldridge, UNLV’s head of the Entertainment Engineering 

program, said from the Parnelli podium early in the evening. “The establishment 

of the Parnelli/PLSN/FOH Scholarship is evidence of that support.” 

Aldridge explained that the goal of the program, which will be a degree program in 

both the Colleges of Engineering and Fine Arts, will admit its first students in the fall of 

2007 and will offer a curriculum including elements from Mechanical, Civil and Electrical 

Engineering, Computer Science, Art, Architecture, Film, Music and Theatre. 

“The goal is to find a way to address a growing need in the entertainment industry for 

a new breed of students who would be well-versed in engineering principles while understanding 

the artistic demands of the entertainment industry,” Aldridge said. “We sincerely 

appreciate Timeless Communications, and the Parnelli Awards and its sponsors, for investing 

in the future of students in the Entertainment Engineering and Design program.” 

Jere Harris, of PRG, accepting the 2006 Lifetime Achievement Award. 

Doug Adams from Pyrotek Special Effects, accepting the 

award for Pyro Company of the Year. 

Dizzy Goslein of Bandit Lites, accepting the award for Lighting 

Company of the Year. 

Terry Lowe (L) with Bruce Rodgers, winner of the Parnelli 

for Set Designer of the Year. 

The Delicate Productions crew with their award for Regional 

Lighting Company of the Year: (L-R) Stephanie Smyth, 

Delicate moving light tech; Gus Thomson, vice president and 

Bill Sage, Delicate Electronics’ sales manager. 




John Brown of Brown United, smiling after taking home the 

award for Staging Company of the Year. 

Doug Masterson of Rock-It Cargo showing off his award for 

Freight Forwarding Company of the Year. 


Robin Shaw of Upstaging, holding her award for Trucking 

Company of the Year. 


Mark Haney (L) of Screenworks NEP, presenter Carol 

Dodd and Danny O’Brien (R) of Screenworks NEP, after 

Screenworks was recognized as Video Rental Company of 

the Year. 





Turmoil, Change, Re-Organization and Growth in the Industry 

2006 will go down as one of the most 

evenly divisible years in recent history. 

But other than a nice, round number, what 

will we in the live event production industry 

remember about 2006? 

For most of us in the business, 2006 

started out as a very busy year and then got 

totally out of hand. When it was all said and 

done, what, exactly, was accomplished by all 

of those marathon meetings, endless travel 

miles, countless phone calls, stacks of e-mail, 

tiring late nights, hair pulling sessions and 

cups upon cups of Starbucks coffees? For 

starters, the good people at ESTA have succeeded 

in making Architecture for Control 

Networks, or ACN, a standard. Considering 

the project was started more than 10 years 

ago when Steve Carlson informed the Technical 

Standards Committee of ESTA that ACN 

does not stand for “Acme Control Network,” 

(Minutes, Technical Standards Committee, 

October 22, 1997), this is the entertainment 

lighting equivalent of bringing peace to the 

Middle East. 

In addition to ESTA, many of us were extremely 

busy, judging by the events and highlights 

of 2006. Looking back, it’s been a wacky 

year in an industry that is known for its wack. 

The year started with 

the traditional fireworks, 

except this pyro was 

industry-fueled. 

Copyrights, Copywrongs 2006 

In March, Prolyte successfully defended 

its intellectual property when it filed a claim 

against Guangzhou Kingway Performance 

Equipment during the Pro Light + Sound exhibition 

in Frankfurt, Germany. The claim resulted 

in a preliminary injunction and the confiscation 

of catalogs and promotional banners, some of 

which contained pictures and drawings lifted 

from Prolyte’s own catalogs. Marina Prak, 

marketing manager of Prolyte Products Group 

commented; “Copyright issues and intellectual 

property rights have become a big issue for our 

industry.” 

IP has been an even bigger issue for manufacturers 

of LEDs and digital luminaires. In May, 

the United States District Court in the District of 

Massachusetts awarded Color Kinetics court 

costs and attorneys’ fees in its patent litigation 

against Super Vision International, Inc. The 

Court had previously granted all of Color Kinetics’ 

motions for summary judgment against 

Super Vision, finding that all five of Color Kinetics’ 

asserted patents are valid and that each of 

five Super Vision product lines infringes those 

patents. Color Kinetics estimated the costs and 

fees to be approximately $1.4 million. 

Meanwhile, Robe Show Lighting continues 

negotiations with PRG and High End Systems 

in hopes of arriving at an agreement to license 

the intellectual property with regards to their 

digital luminaire, the Digital Spot 5000DT. The 

luminaire was on display at PLASA in London 

last September and it has been used on a show 

in Germany. But, due to licensing issues, the 

company chose not to show it at LDI and is not 

yet ready to market it in North America. 

You Spin Me Right Round 

2006 

In the department of mergers, acquisitions, 

and spin-offs, PixelRange stands out for its surprising 

departure from James Thomas Engineering 

in the U.S. shortly before LDI. The new 

company, led by Dave Thomas and Blaine Engle, 

relocated a short distance from their former 

parent company in Knoxville, Tenn. 

Arrivals, Departures 

and Gate Changes 

Packers versus Cowboys 

The Technology Ticker 

2006 

The year started with the traditional 

fireworks, except this pyro was industryfueled. 

After Kristian Kolding vacated his 

position as the CEO of Martin Professional 

in Denmark, eleven-year veteran Troels 

Volver followed suit and left his position 

as CEO of Martin USA. It’s only conjecture, 

but the fact that he has not been seen or 

heard from since might lead one to believe 

that he has bid adieu to the industry. 

Brian Friborg was brought in as his replacement, 

and a short time later, then-VP 

of Sales Eric Loader left Martin for more 

western pastures. Loader landed in la-la 

land as the director of sales for Elation Professional 

and Acclaim Lighting. Although 

Loader’s position at Martin was not to be 

refilled, PJ Turpin left his sales position at 

2006 

Thanks to Genlyte’s acquisition of 

Strand Lighting late this season, the industry 

is poised for the greatest playoff between 

a Wisconsin team and a Dallas team 

since the 1967 Ice Bowl between the Green 

Bay Packers and the Dallas Cowboys. Genlyte 

has been building its franchise since 

long before the days of acquiring Vari-Lite 

in 2002, and their $1.25B line will be blocking 

for their newest player on the roster. 

Though Strand comes with an historic 

name and some impressive stats, it still has 

some work to do to get into game condition. 

Already, though, they’ve connected 

on some long passes with their Palette 

console line hooking up with the Marquee 

2006 

LEDs and media servers may have been 

grabbing the lion’s share of the headlines, 

but how they’re used was the real story in 

2006. Bon Jovi was reportedly the first to 

tour with 1080i high-definition video. Their 

video system included three Vista Systems 

Spyder 353s, seven Thomson/Grass Valley 

LDK6000 and Ikegami HDL-40 HD cameras, 

a Grass Valley Kalypso video switcher, a 

custom-built 40-foot wide Saco V9 HD LED 

video wall, Main Light Industries SoftLED 

curtains, Saco V9 LED “fingers” and Barco 

G8 projectors. 

And though LEDs are making great 

strides in price and performance, they are 

still more popular for displays than for general 

illumination. Two new LED products 

that captured the imagination of the industry 

in 2006 were the Element Labs’ Stealth, 

which debuted on Madonna’s Confessions 

tour in the summer, and Barco’s MiStrip, 

Clay Paky and went to Martin to become 

the national sales director of show, TV, and 

theatre. At the same time, Ray Whitton returned 

to Vari-Lite after a five-year stint 

with Martin. 

Not to be outdone in the re-org department, 

High End Systems moved Jeff Pelzl 

from his position as head of technical service 

to VP of sales. He took over for Bill Morris, 

who became executive VP of business 

development. Later on in the year, Tony 

Magana left High End and went to work for 

Robe Show Lighting. 

The industry bid adieu to two vetrins 

this year, Rocky Paulson and Tony Gottelier. 

Paulson retired in January after 40 years 

in the industry, while Gottelier passed away 

in July, leaving behind a rich legacy of design, 

innovation, new product development 

and other industry contributions. 

software. Now their dimming line is getting 

some great blocking from Entertainment 

Technology’s IGBT technology. 

Strand’ biggest rival, ETC, recently celebrated 

their 30 th year in the league. As 

the defending champions of dimming and 

control, ETC only has to protect the ball and 

keep from making any big mistakes. But 

they’re not ones to play prevent defense. 

Fred Foster, who is playing Bart Star to 

Steve Carson’s Don Meredith, and his team 

are not content to run out the clock. Instead, 

they are marching down the field with the 

new Eos console, the Congo jr, and a number 

of other new plays. The real winners here 

will be the entire industry, who will benefit 

from one of the most exciting matchups in 

recent history. 

which debuted on the aforementioned Bon 

Jovi tour. 

Under the heading of “A Whole New 

Light,” High End System’s Collage Generator 

breathed new life into their DL.2 digital 

luminaire. The ability to combine multiple 

fixtures with edge blending should all but 

silence critics who say the 5K ANSI lumen 

projectors just aren’t bright enough. 

And the single technology advance 

that has the most potential impact could 

be the arrival of ACN, or Architecture for 

Control Networks protocol. The newest 

control standard, which was approved in 

October, opens the door to a multitude of 

possibilities for future control and devices. 

With networking and talkback capabilities, 

the sky is the limit in terms of the data 

that can be passed back and forth. Just as 

no one really understood the full implications 

of the approval of DMX in 1986, we 

believe that ACN will produce far more 

developments than we know. 

Company re-org score card. 

With Genlyte’s acquisition of Strand Lighting, 

the industry is poised for the biggest 

playoff game between a Wisconsin team 

and a Dallas team since the 1967 Ice Bowl 

between the Green Bay Packers and the 

Dallas Cowboys. 

Bon Jovi hit the road with a 

1080i HD video system. 



Fred Foster...is playing Bart Starr to Steve Carson’s Don Meredith... 

The Stones Live at the Super 

Bowl, Plus Keith Richards 

2006 

When books are closed on 2006, at least 

two mega events will stand alone: the Rolling 

Stones at the Super Bowl and the Winter Olympics. 

The Super Bowl event is notable for the 

sheer amount of equipment moved on and off 

the field during the course of a few commercials; 

the Winter Olympics for the sheer amount 

of equipment. 

In the case of the Olympics, lighting designer 

Durham Marenghi and production designer 

Mark Fisher worked for several months 

with a team that included lighting coordinators 

Eneas MacKintosh and Nick Jones, and programmers 

Ross Williams, Mark Payne, Pryderi 

Baskerville and Emiliano Morgia. High 

End Systems supplied programming support 

in the form of Chris Ferrante, Frank Schotman 

and Jason Potterf. The lighting included 

124 Coemar iSpot eXtremes, 64 ProWash 

250LXs, 370 iWash 575 MBs, 130 Martin MAC 

2000 Wash fixtures and 250 Robe ColorWash 

1200 ATs. Four programmers using Flying Pig 

Systems Wholehog 3 lighting consoles networked 

to each other and to three WYSIWYG 

systems, and each with its own backup, were 

used for control during the opening and closing 

ceremonies. In all, there were more than 

900 moving heads, almost 1,000 LED fixtures 

and 400-odd dimmers from various manufacturers 

for a total of 24,500 DMX channels, 

which required the use of 21 DP2000s (data 

processors) to distribute the data. 

ABCs (Anniversaries, Birthdays 

and Circles on the Calendar) 

When Showco built the first 

Vari*Lite fixtures in 1981, they had little 

idea of the impact it would have on the 

lighting industry. Now, we think that it 

might be the single most important 

event in the history of entertainment 

lighting. September 27 marked the 

25 th anniversary of the Genesis Abacab 

show when the first Vari*Lite system 

was used. 

And if you’ve ever used a CM Hoist, 

then you’ve contributed to a milestone 

in hoist history. In February, CM shipped 

its one millionth Lodestar chain hoist. 

Finally, in October, USITT recognized 

Steve Terry by honoring him 

2006 

as a USITT Fellow. Fittingly, the honor 

comes 20 years after Terry was instrumental 

in helping to make DMX512- 

1986 an industry protocol and in the 

same month that ACN was accepted as 

a new protocol. 

The industry is but a microcosm 

of the universe. Every so often the underbrush 

needs to be cleaned out and 

the clippings recycled to provide the 

nutrients for new growth in order to 

produce more fruit. 2006 was a very 

fruitful year. 

Here’s to an even more fruitful 

2007. 





PLSNINTERVIEW 

Visionary, Visualizer, 

Visualist 

Cameron Yeary makes sure 

everyone else sees the light. 

By RobLudwig 


Working for UVLD, Cameron Yeary 

has the opportunity to work with 

some great minds in our lighting 

industry, including the company’s principal 

partners, John Ingram and Greg Cohen. 

But as the resident visualist, he brings 

something special to the team. In our PLSN 

Interview, he explains the importance of previsualization, 

media servers and why better 

results are a function of how much control 

we have of the production. 

Q How did you get into the business 

and end up at UVLD? 

A Cameron Yeary: I grew up at a lighting 

company in Dallas, Texas, called Gemini 

Stage Lighting. At the time, Ingram Associates 

would have shows that came through 

Gemini, and I would see them doing these 

huge corporate shows, which was kind of 

new to me at that point. I always thought, 

“Why would Coca-Cola spend hundreds of 

thousands of dollars to ship all this gear for 

a show?” 

Once I started doing shows, I was fortunate 

to meet John Ingram and Greg Cohen. 

And after 9/11, when I got laid off from Gemini, 

I ran into Greg while I was doing freelance 

work as a Syncrolite tech at a small car show. 

He said they needed a programmer, and I 

had spent a lot of time programming. I ended 

up doing one gig with John Ingram, and 

it was all a whirlwind from there. I started doing 

more shows as a programmer for them, 

and I think it was October of 2004 when they 

asked me to join the firm. We stayed Ingram 

Associates for about six months and then 

brought in more and more people to end up 

where we are now, which is UVLD. 

At UVLD, I’m the young one, and a bit on 

the geeky side. I’ve really been more of an asset 

since they’ve gotten into the media stuff 

because I kind of devoured it, and I spent a 

lot of my spare time understanding all of the 

different things it takes to create media and 

get it to work. 

Q You’re a big proponent of that, 

digital media and pre-visualization, 

aren’t you? 

A Yes. As far as pre-visualization, we don’t 

use it all the time, but we try to use it on aspects 

of the show that really need it. For instance, a 

lot of the 

car shows 

that we 

do are intensive 

in 

their cueing, 

so we 

use it. On 

the other 

hand, other shows that we have are basic, 

like a drug company product launch, and 

don’t have talent sections to them, so we 

don’t use it unless the load-in is really tight 

and we have no programming time whatsoever. 

Our firm really tries to focus on our programming 

speed and being able to cue the 

show quickly. So, on our smaller gigs we can 

deal without the pre-visualization. But on 

“In years past, the lighting people 

have had control over a large majority 

of the visual aspect of a show.” 

–Cameron Yeary 

our cue-intensive gigs we definitely use it. 

And as far as media is concerned, it’s 

been a crazy year. I can only think of a few 

shows that haven’t had some type of media, 

whether it’s a simple Main Light Industries 

SoftLED curtain or using Barco MiPix and 

MiSphere to build custom shapes and stuff 

like that. 

Q Do you create a lot of that content? 

A Yeah, we create some. We’ve really got a 

good 40 or 50 gigs of stuff that we’ve purchased 

as a firm. Some of it we’ve manipulated 

a bit, and some of it we kept intact. We 

have made some content, because there are 

those gigs that have special needs, like a pill 

bottle for a drug show or spinning wheels 

to represent cars. But a lot of it is stock stuff 

that we believe represents the ideas, or the 

looks, that we are used to providing on every 

show. It also depends on whether the 

production wants to provide more money 

to make content that’s custom to that show, 

or if the producers themselves decide to get 

involved in the process and make their own 

stuff and provide it to us. We carry a good 

stock. Besides the stuff that comes with the 

High End Systems Catalyst, DL.2 or the Green 

Hippo Hippotizer, we probably carry a good 

40 to 50 gigs. 

Cameron Yeary 

Q How does using media change 

the design timeline? Are you meeting 

earlier with clients to discuss it and sell 

them on the benefits of using media? 

A It’s definitely a learning process. The 

production clients that we’ve done several 

shows with have really gotten the idea. So 

now we’re talking about it a little earlier, and 

we’re discussing different ideas. They’ll give 

us a budget for creating media and they’ll 

ask us what they can do to get the most out 

of what we do. Then we have other clients, 

where this is their first or second time using 

any type of media server on a gig, and we 

pretty much just use the stock stuff for them 

and kind of show them the idea. We might 

float some words across the background 

so they get an idea of what media can do 

for them. In years past, the lighting people 

have had control over a large majority of 

the visual aspect of a show, and now we’re 

not only taking care of the visual aspect, 

but we’re taking control of the video aspect. 

We’ve taken control of just about everything 

except the actual PowerPoint aspect and I- 

Mag. And in some shows we’re actually providing 

PowerPoint background support on 

the I-Mag screen. The more seasoned the 

client, the earlier in the process we try to get 

together with them. 

A show that we just finished was a basic 

meeting, except for the first 20 minutes, 

which was this big extravaganza with flying 

performers, dancers and the whole nine 

IBM IOD Users Meeting held at the Anaheim Convention Center. Produced by Drury Design Dynamics, Lighting Design and Media by UVL 



FedEx National Sales Meeting 2006 , Held in Las Vegas at the Venetian Hotel. Produced by Pinerock. Lighting Design and Media by UVLD. 

IBM IOD Users Meeting held at the Anaheim Convention Center. Produced 

by Drury Design Dynamics , Lighting Design and Media by UVLD 

yards. We really tried to concentrate on customizing 

that portion of the show and let 

the rest of the show go to stock content. 

Q How do you interface with the 

video crew and PowerPoint specialists 

— has that changed? 

A It has changed. Now, a lot of times on 

shows, where we are supporting the PowerPoint 

person, we are emphasizing certain 

points. They may say something like, “This 

year, we had 200 percent growth in sales,” 

and we’ll show something that says “200%.” 

For the most part, we’ll get a graphics 

person that is used to doing PowerPoint, and 

they will be at our disposal. As we’re working 

through different speeches, they can be 

creating things in Photoshop that we can 

load into the server. Then, if one of the creative 

directors has an idea, they can quickly 

create a graphic, and in five minutes we can 

have that graphic ready for them to see. We 

really focus on using custom programs that 

have been created for the different media 

servers, and using people that have been 

involved in the production for years, in a different 

way. Instead of them working directly 

for the client, they are working for the lighting 

designers, so we can get the most out 

of the media server technology, and show 

the client the stuff as quick as possible. It’s 

very streamlined. 

Q What is your primary function at 

UVLD — how much is design work 

and how much is media support and 

programming? 

A It’s split about 25/75; 25 percent of the 

time I design the show and do the gig myself, 

and about 75 percent I’m programming 

and doing a lot of the visual media stuff. A 

large aspect of our shows depends upon media. 

When a client decides to sign off on the 

visual media stuff, it’s usually an important 

part of the show. To have that portion not 

work would be like having your set designer 

fall through, which would be detrimental to 

the show. 

Q If you had to give yourself a title, 

what would it be? 

A A visualist. As weird of a word as it is, it’s 

the word that best describes what we do. 

Now, we’re in charge of the entire visual aspect 

of the show. 

ALL PRODUCTION ALL THE TIME 

YOUR PASSION IS PRODUCTION. 

SO IS OURS. 

At Timeless Communications our staff includes 

production company owners, audio mixers, 

lighting programmers & designers. 

We understand your world because we are a part of it. 

Stay passionate. Read the industry’s #1 trade magazines. 




INSTALLATIONS 

CSI: Miami 

[Club Scene Installation] 

The Case 

By PhilGilbert 

We here at the installation offices 

of PLSN are always looking out for 

you, the reader. 

It was with that in mind that my crack 

team of installation researchers and I recently 

risked life and limb to get the dirt on what 

it really takes to put together a world-class 

nightclub on the cut-throat streets of Miami, 

Fla. 

What my gumshoes found may not be 

suitable for young viewers, as it is extremely, 

and unavoidably, graphic. 

The Suspect 

Name: Dean Iacuzzo 

Position: Senior designer, Underboss 

Known Alias: Dino 

Known Accomplices: 

Robert ‘Lippy’ Lippolis 

Scott Chmielewski 

Richard Belliveau 

Len Rove 

The Interrogation 

Club Scene Investigation [CSI]: All right 

Dino. Just how long have you been running 

this operation?! 

Suspect [Dino]: Over twenty years. I 

started in the mid-80s at a club called 701 

South, one of the first all-video nightclubs 

in the country. That’s where I first started using 

High End products, including High End 

Systems Intellabeams and Cyberlights. I’ve 

been steadily using their products for the 

last twenty-some-odd years. 

CSI: What do you know about Bricks 

nightclub? 

Dino: It’s in downtown Miami, in an area 

called Brickell. Brickell’s an up-and-coming 

financial district of Miami right now. Most of 

the major banks, trading houses, law firms, 

are located in the Brickell area. 

There was a relationship with the owner 

in several clubs in the Florida area before. 

Going back to 701 South in Daytona Beach, 

as well as several other clubs we had done in 

the area and some of the larger clubs we had 

done in New York. 

CSI: A “relationship,” huh? Tell me about 

another…relationship…with Robert “Lippy” 

Lippolis…How long have you been working 

with him? 

Dino: Over twenty years. Most of my career. 

He is, for lack of a better word, a sound 

guru. He’s done, not only nightclub installations 

since the early ‘70s, but live shows for 

Barry White, Radio City Music Hall and other 

places in the New York area. 

He’s been very close with people like 

Richard Belliveau from High End Systems. He 

always took their flagship stuff and brought 

it to the market. When the Intellabeams 

came out, he said “Great…let me have them.” 

When the Cyberlight came out, he always 

had to be the first. 

When Richard Belliveau dreams up something 

in his head that is just so out there, he 

always has to be the first. 

CSI: Yeah, we know all about this Belliveau 

character. You better give us a straight 

answer on this one. What kind of trouble 

does Mr. Belliveau have you in this time? 

Dino: A year-and-a-half ago, when this 

project was in the design phase, we had 

gotten wind of the DL.2 and its capabilities. 

We flew down to Texas. We saw the product. 

We said “That’s it. We need eight. We have to 

have them.” 

And that was the end of the story. 

CSI: You’re going to have to do better 

than that, Dino. I don’t believe that’s the end 

of the story… 

Dino: In the design phase — in talking with 

some of the people down there — everybody 

had cautioned Mr. Lippolis and myself: “Don’t 

build a dance floor.” That whole Miami feel of 

people just sitting down and doing nothing. 

We bucked convention. We informed the owners 

that they needed a dance floor as well as a 

light show. 

Bricks is an innovative situation because 

it’s the only permanent installation of eight 

DL.2s in the country right now. The project 

started in November of 2005, and completed 

in June of 2006. So it was a seven-and-a-halfmonth 

project. 

We’ve completely gutted the space and 

made it into something that is immaculate. 

I believe downstairs is 6000 square feet. 

There’s also a rooftop that we completely redid 

that’s maybe 4500 square feet. There had 

been several failed attempts in this space to 

make it a nightclub. It was in complete and 

utter disarray. A filthy warehouse would be a 

good way to describe it. 

It had that bad nightclub feel to it. That 

dark, dank, bad smelling — some place that 

you’d only want to be if you were inebriated, 

or otherwise affected, and wouldn’t notice 

your surroundings. 

CSI: That’s the kind of stuff I’m looking 

for. But we need more technical details. We 

need to know how this operation works. So 

keep talking. 

Dino: The dance floor is the centerpiece. 

The eight DL.2s are on the dance floor in an 

octagon configuration. In the center of the 

dance floor are these pieces of privacy glass. 

Privacy glass has the ability that, when you 

apply voltage to it, it goes clear; when you 

take away the voltage, it goes frosted. So this 

octagon in the center of the dance floor is 

one of the surfaces the DL.2s can project on. 

The use of the privacy glass as a projection 

medium seems to wow a lot of people on 

the industry side. No one ever thought of using 

a piece of glass. 

People had mentioned to us that DL.2s 

really need a central focal point. People 

were using the idea of screens or some type 

of retractable medium. But using electric 

glass was something that no one had re- 



ally thought of — probably because it 

was cost prohibitive. It’s a very expensive 

medium to project onto. And no one had 

really made the connection of “Oh, well, 

make the glass frosted.” It was kind of a 

“Duh” situation. 

In the center of the electric glass is a 

cryogenic fog effect using carbon dioxide. 

Not only do we have the ability to project 

on the eight frosted screens, but we 

can make that clear while we’re firing the 

cryogenic effect and have another level of 

projection medium. 

CSI: Well, I think Cold Case 

is looking for Ted Williams, but 

that’s another continued on page 55 




PRODUCTSPOTLIGHT 

By NookSchoenfeld 

Last week my editor called to ask if I 

would take this new dimmer and give 

it a test drive. I thought to myself, “Why? 

A dimmer’s a dimmer, isn’t it?” But I said, sure, 

send it on over, and I’ll take a look at it. It took 

me less than a minute after plugging it in to 

realize that Swisson, the international manufacturer 

of DMX devices, has indeed come up 

with some serious modifications to the dimmer 

pack as we know it. I have never seen 

such a well thought-out way to dim fixtures. 

First of all, these dimmers are contained 

in 19-inch rack-mounted modules. This is not 

a new concept, but one that I wish all manufacturers 

would follow. Each of the 120-volt 

“U.S. version” dimmers contains a configuration 

of either 12 x 1.2kW or 6 x 2.4kW dimmers. 

The dimmers take 3-phase power input 

and can operate on anywhere from 85 to 

130 volts AC. The dimmer will actually stand 

up to 240 volts AC without harming it. Each 

module can handle up to 50 amps per phase. 

There are three separate 55-amp breakers on 

the front of the rack as well. 

On the back of the 1.2kW and 2.4kW rack, 

there are two Socopex connectors. There is a 

This dimmer can run a small show 

or display without any console. 

three-foot tail to plug into any AC distro you 

own. It can run efficiently in temperatures up 

to 35 degrees C (86° Farenheit) while three 

internal fans run continuously. The dimmers 

are controlled by DMX512, and the unit is 

RDM-ready. 

What distinguishes this dimmer from 

most of the rest? The XSD Sine Wave keeps 

the waveform in a perfect sine wave while it 

controls the amplitude of AC. Most dimmers 

utilize thyristors, triacs or SCRs to control 

the voltage applied to the filament of a conventional 

fixture. It controls the voltage by 

regulating the duty cycle, switching it on at 

a certain time during the cycle, resulting in a 

chopped wave. This uneven wave can cause 

harmonics that can overload the neutral in 

a four-wire, three-phase system, and really 

disturb the audio and video vendors you are 

sharing power with at a gig. The sine wave 

technology guarantees that there are no 

harmonics caused by the dimmer ramping 

up and down. You will never again hear the 

ping sound of a PAR filament being slammed 

to full either. It’s great for TV and symphony 

lighting. The sine wave technology will increase 

lamp life as well. 

Now comes the really cool stuff for the 

techs. This dimmer can run a small show or 

display without any console. There are potentiometers 

on the front of each dimmer, 

as well as five different user levels that can 

be set with a pass code. Rather than have a 

single hot-patch switch on a dimmer, each 

one can be set to any desirable level. Imagine 

lighting a trade show display with 16 Lekos 

and a dozen PARs. Just leave the dimmer 

backstage and adjust the level on each dimmer 

by trimming the pot. No need for a console 

or a control snake for the simple show. 

You can also use these potentiometers to set 

a low level on the dimmer, but use a console 

to bring them up to full if necessary. In other 

words, if you black out your master fader, 

these dimmers can still glow the bulbs. It’s 

great for store fronts who wish to leave their 

window displays glowing all night, but not at 

full. Simply put the console on a timer so it 

shuts off at 9 p.m., and the window display 

will still glow as people walk by. These potentiometers 

can run in HTP or LTP mode. 

Each rack module has an LCD display 

where the techs can assign different functions 

to each dimmer in the module. Besides 

setting the DMX address for the module, you 

can soft-patch each dimmer accordingly. In 

the rack, you could tell each dimmer to be 

controlled by a single DMX channel. There is 

a fast flash function that is good for banging 

on moles and PARs. The LCD will also display 

the voltage coming into the rack. This brain 

will automatically shut down the dimmer if 

it is getting over-voltage, but it will not kill all 

the dimmers if one leg suddenly receives too 

much. All other failures, such as over-temperature 

or under-voltage, will only affect 

that particular phase, allowing the dimmer to 

continue functioning normally. The LCD will 

also display 

how many 

amps are being 

used by 

each particular 

dimmer. 

Each individual 

dimmer 

channel on a module comes with three LEDs 

and an on/off button on the front. The green 

LED will show the output level of the dimmer 

when it is emitting AC. The yellow LED 

shows if there is current, meaning there is a 

load on the circuit being fed by the dimmer. 

No yellow LED means something is still unplugged 

or the lamp has failed. There is a red 

LED as well. When this LED is on, the dimmer 

is off. If it is blinking, it has turned off due to 

an overload (too much wattage assigned to 

one dimmer) or a short circuit in the cabling. 

The on/off switch can be used to kill a dimmer 

at any time (e.g. the gel is burning up) or 

to re-arm the dimmer once the correct load 

is placed on it. 

The brain in the rack can limit the output 

of the dimmer. This can be a tech’s savior 

if he is short on dimmers. For instance, a 

4-light Mole Fay may draw 2600 watts — a 

tad too much for a 2.5K dimmer. By limiting 

the output of the dimmer to 105 volts, you 

can insure that the bulbs will never go to 

full and blow the breaker by drawing too 

many amps. On top of this, any load can be 

dimmed. No dummy loads are necessary 

just so you can dim down the rope lights 

on the stage steps. The minimum load on 

this dimmer is actually zero watts, if you 

can believe that. 

The list price for both 120V U.S. versions 

of these dimmers is $5,300.00 

The upside to this dimmer is that it is 

modular (fast and easy for repairs); it can run 

in stand-alone mode without a console, and 

it has all the bells and whistles a tech would 

want. The only downside is that the modules 

are heavy. But this is certainly a small disadvantage 

compared to the fact that they are 

built sturdily; they have 100% protection 

against short-circuiting, and they have 100% 

over-voltage protection. 



INSTALLS • INDUSTRIALS • FILM/TV • THEATRE • CONCERTS 

P R O J E C T I O N CO N N E C T I O N 

Blind Guardian Goes Digital 

CZECH REPUBLIC—German heavymetal 

band Blind Guardian road tested 

Robe’s new DigitalSpot 5000 DT fixtures, 

which were specified by LD and video operator 

Andreas Fiekers. 

While preparing for the “A Twist In The 

Myth” tour, Fiekers became aware of the imminent 

release of the DigitalSpot 5000DT. 

German rental company Satis&Fy (suppliers 

of the European tour) has used Robe 

moving lights for some time, and Andreas 

Drees, CEO of Satis&Fy’s touring division, 

decided that the time was right to purchase 

some of the brand new fixtures. It 

was also a logical step for Andreas Fiekers 

to integrate the DigitalSpot 5000 DT into 

his design. 

This first full tour for the DigitalSpot 

5000 DT actually featured pre-production 

units. The DigitalSpots were used for projecting 

onto the backdrop and set using 

a diverse selection of content for the different 

songs, including 

surreal black and 

white footage of a 

man getting crazy, 

strange landscapes, 

animated artwork 

of the band’s album 

covers, snippets 

of their videos 

and graphics, all of 

which was switched 

and synchronized to 

the music. 

Most of the content was produced by 

Fiekers, with some animation parts made 

by Stanimir Lukic and his team at Rock The 

Nation in Belgrade. 

Robe’s Ales Grivac was also suitably impressed 

with the DigitalSpot’s first touring 

performance. “It was vitally important to 

us to ensure that these products are completely 

roadworthy. Having them on a hard 

rocking heavy metal act where they get 

plenty of serious use was the ideal scenario 

and environment for this to happen.” 

Fiekers was also able to offer invaluable 

feedback to the Robe R & D team for 

enhancing and streamlining the DS 5000’s 

future performance. With the digital world 

in constant development, the latest software 

updates for DigitalSpot users will be 

available on Robe’s Web site. 

The next software feature will be the 

“collage” effect — the merging of images 

from two projectors to create one bigger 

picture (independently of a media server), 

which will make the unit more versatile. 

Mariah Tour Gets XL-ent 

N. HOLLYWOOD, CA — XL Touring Video 

recently completed their project as video 

contractor for Mariah Carey’s “The Adventures 

of Mimi Tour 2006,“ which kicked off 

this summer in Miami following two miniconcerts 

in Tunisia and finished up in Japan 

at the end of October. 

XL worked with production manager 

Harold Jones, production designer Justin 

Collie of Art Fag LLC, Stewart White of Control 

Freak and video director Chris Keating 

to provide four Barco I-10 LED walls, which 

consisted of two 7x7-foot LED walls stage 

left and right, a 13x7-foot LED wall upstage 

center and a 6x6-foot LED wall downstage. 

A large “M” made of MiPix framed the stage 

with a MiPix circular surround 

in the center. VersaTubes were 

installed in the stairs, band risers 

and DJ booth. The camera 

system consisted of four Sony 

D35 cameras, and projection 

was two SLM R12s, shooting rear 

projection onto two 15x20-foot 

screens. 

Touring on behalf of XL Touring 

Video was projectionist/crew 

chief Jason Lowe; engineer Josh 

Alberts; LED techs Jason Baker, 

Matt Ellar and Johnny Jordon; 

and camera ops Mart Stutsman, 

Lonnie Stoner and Randy Mizell. 

Steve Jennings 

U.S. Air Force Dedicates 

Memorial At Pentagon 

GAITHERSBURG, MD — Video RoadshowSM 

debuted at the U.S. Air Force Memorial 

Dedication October 14-15, 2006, at 

the Pentagon in Arlington, Va. 

Each Video RoadshowSM houses a hydraulically 

raised 9 x 12-foot Barco D7 LED 

screen plus a control room with switching 

and playback equipment. The screens rise to 

a top height of 18 feet and can be rotated 

360 degrees for optimal viewing. 

One technician handles delivery and opcontinued 

on page 38 

39 

41 

42 

Inside... 

Glam LEDs 

Low-res LED walls pack punch on 

Scissor Sisters tour. 

Video Digerati 

How to keep it smooth with 

frame-blending. 

Art in design 

Inspiration can come from Monet 

or graffiti. 




NEWS 

Infor Conference Held in Orlando 

NEW YORK — Scharff Weisberg provided 

two Main Light Industries Soft-LED/Scrim 

panels as a backdrop for video imagery at 

the Infor conference, a conclave held in Orlando 

by the world’s third-largest provider 

of enterprise software. 

The drapery product is made of heavyduty 

woven fabric backed by a removable 

Velcro liner, which permits projection, lighting 

and scenery elements behind it. The 

scrim allows a three-dimensional look on 

a stage or on a set and can accept video 

signal, ideally from a media server. It comes 

in an 8x33-foot configuration and is lightweight, 

easy to pack and easy to set up. The 

tri-color surface mount LEDs are 4x4-inch 

resolution. 

“We built a proscenium-type opening 

with a live band upstage, which we wanted 

to fade in and out,” explains production designer 

Andy Warfel of Andy Warfel Environment 

Design. “We were looking at newer 

technology and discovered that Scharff 

Weisberg had Soft-LED/Scrim. It’s ideal for 

large venues with great viewing distances, 

and we had a large thrust stage in a ballroom 

with an audience of 2,000 wrapped 

around three sides. We installed the LED/ 

Scrim between the band in the back and 

the talking heads in front with a trip rig to 

pull it up when needed. 

“The cool thing about the product is 

that it’s very flexible; it combines a techno 

NEW YORK, NY—MB Productions 

(MBP), in association with Kingdom Entertainment 

and Empire Entertainment, 

was selected as the video staging partner 

for the “Black Ball“ event, a benefit 

for the Keep a Child Alive (KCA) organization, 

held at the Hammerstein Ballroom, 

New York City, on Thursday, October 

9, 2006. 

background with scrim-like properties, so it 

can do bleed-through effects,” Warfel continues. 

“The Soft-LED/Scrim was easy to set 

up and turned out to be the best solution 

for what we wanted to accomplish visually. 

At the annual fundraiser for AIDS- and 

poverty-stricken children in Africa, MBP 

produced a 15-foot high by 20-foot wide 

video image utilizing a double-stacked 

Digital Projection HIGHlite 12000Dsx+ 

DLP Projector, a Sony D50 SDI Camera 

Package and Beta sp playback facilities. 

The whole show was recorded on five 

Sony DSR-1800 DV cam recorders. The 

Very low res, moving imagery — graphic 

eye candy, stock shots of water, flags, fire, 

organic textures — looked great on it. I’d 

use it again in a heartbeat.” 

The production company was TKG in 

screen displayed 

a seamless mix of 

live camera images, 

PowerPoint 

logos and a series 

of short films that 

showcased the 

important work 

of KCA. 

In addition, 

MBP’s screen displayed 

videos that 

highlighted the 

major contributions 

of special 

honorees, including 

Richard D. Beckman, president of 

Condé Nast Media Group; Paul Farmer of 

Partners in Health; Carol Dyantyl of Ika- 

FOH view of the Infor stage 

Chicago. The executive producer was Shalyn 

Walsh. Tony Seikman of Durango, Coloradobased 

The Wit Company was the technical 

director. John Featherstone of Lightswitch 

was the lighting designer. 

Charity Event Awakens New York 

Graphics From The “Black Ball” event video 

geng Ministries in Soweto, South Africa; 

and Glamour Magazine’s Woman of the 

Year, Iman. 


U.S. Air Force Dedicates 

Memorial At Pentagon 

continued from page 37 

-eration. Set-up and tear-down are estimated 

to complete within 30 minutes, 

eliminating expensive labor costs associated 

with traditional LED walls. Each 

Video RoadshowSM has an on-board 

generator, can run on shore power, requires 

no additional structures and is 

virtually weatherproof. 

“Video RoadshowSM will change 

the economics of special events, targeted 

advertising and experiential marketing,” 

said Jeff Studley, president of CPR 

MultiMedia Solutions. “Now businesses 

and organizations of all types and sizes 

can take full advantage of a technology 

proven to attract attention, boost 

attendance, increase sponsorship and 

enhance audience response — without 

the crushing expense.” 

Video RoadshowSM can be used 

for indoor and outdoor events held 

at fair grounds and convention centers, 

in parking lots or on city streets, 

including sporting events, concerts, 

festivals, public information display, 

political campaigns, grand openings, 

product launches, trade shows, 

religious celebrations and public 

safety needs. 



UK Music Hall of 

Fame Contracts 

Video Screens 

LONDON — XL Video Ltd. supplied LED 

screens, VersaTUBES, projection and Catalyst 

Playback for the 2006 UK Music Hall of 

Fame event, staged at London‘s Alexandra 

Palace on Tuesday, November 14. It is the 

second year running that XL has supplied 

the prestigious Endemol-produced show. 

XL’s team was project managed by Paul 

Wood, working with production manager 

Paul-Ant Violet and set designer Bill Laslett. 

The main “Awards Package” screen was 

a traditional 6 x 4 meter BP screen, positioned 

stage right and fed by one of XL’s 

new Christie Roadster S+20 HD projectors. 

The up-stage LED screen was composed 

of 80 panels of Lighthouse R16, flown in 

three columns. 

Scenic projection was used on a silvergrey 

gauze in the mid-center stage area, 

with XL supplying four further Christie 

Roadster S+20s that were double stacked 

and soft-edged together to form one 9-meter 

wide by 5-meter high image. 

XL also supplied 112 Element Labs 1- 

meter long VersaTUBE LED fixtures, which 

were used to create a hall through the 

set, consisting of 10 seven-meter VersaT- 

UBE ribs upstage and six 

ribs downstage. The raised performance 

platform stage left was also dressed with 

15 VersaTUBES around its base. 

For video playback, XL supplied three 

dual-channel Catalyst v4 digital media 

servers, with sources either fed through to 

the CTV OB truck and mixed with EVS, or 

straight to the screens. 

XL’s crew were Graham Vinal and Gareth 

Manicom (on LEDs), Gerry Corry (projectionist) 

and Simon Pugsley (who took care 

of all-things Catalyst and VersaTUBE), working 

in collaboration with Catalyst director/ 

operator Ian Reith. 

The Scissor 

Sisters Glitz It Up 

PHOENIX, AZ—The 2006-2007 NFL season 

kicked off with Spyders in the studio, 

Vista Systems Spyders. A pair of networked 

Spyder 380 and 204 models support a large 

LED wall in the background of the new set 

for NFL On CBS, the CBS Sports studio show 

that airs Sunday in High Definition during 

telecasts of NFL games. 

Using Vista Systems software, the 

Spyders control the display of game clips 

and other video feeds, as well as animations, 

stats and other graphics. The Spyder 

supports an upstream Leitch HDSDI 

NEWS 

NFL On CBS Updates Stage 

NFL on CBS set 

router for access of any source required 

for display. 

CBS Sports was exploring a number of 

image-processing options when it visited 

the Vista Systems booth at NAB earlier this 

year. “Ease of use and superior image quality 

were prime factors in CBS Sports’ decision to 

purchase Spyder for its NFL On CBS telecast,” 

notes Victor Vettorello, director of applications 

engineering at Vista Systems. “Having a 

control environment that a broadcast technical 

director can comfortably be at ease with 

was vital to the decision.” 

The Scissor Sisters show 

LONDON — New York rockers the Scissor 

Sisters are currently on tour promoting 

their new album Ta-dah. Flamboyant by 

name and by nature, this band doesn’t do 

low-key. 

Lighting designer Dave Ross first met 

the band over two years ago when they 

headlined their first ever show in the UK at 

The Scala London. Dave specified numerous 

PixelLines 1044s for the gig, which started 

an 18-month stint of touring. The 1044s soon 

became a big feature of the show, especially 

in the US, where 1044s were relatively new 

to the market. 

For this tour, Dave works alongside show 

and set designer Roy Bennett. An integral 

part of the design is a flat wall of 144 PixelPar 

90s 16 fixtures wide by nine fixtures high 

upstage behind two Kabukis. 

Dave explains, “The band has very set 

ideas concerning the use of lighting and 

video, and they are always keen to build 

their show gradually. An although the PixelPars 

are only really used for the last two 

songs, it’s well worth the wait.” 

The concept behind the wall of PixelPars 

is to produce a ‘70s light box. Programmed 

by Dan Hardiman using an M-Box extreme 

to play video across the matrix, it was not 

the intention to make the video obvious, 

and the whole wall is intended to look like a 

lighting fixture, rather than a low definition 

screen. 

Dave continues: “The songs where the 

PixelPars are introduced have very different 

inspirations, and the wall is used to try 

and reflect those influences. Be it a giant underlit 

dancefloor for ‘Dancin’ or sleazy strip 

club signs for ‘Filthy Gorgeous.’ The ‘70s look 

keeps the back white backdrop to diffuse 

the light and give a more colourful backdrop. 

For ‘Filthy’ we drop the Kabuki to give 

more beams and a heavier backlit look.” 

The show is controlled by a Wholehog 

IPC, and all lighting is supplied by 

PRG Europe. 




VIDEO NEW PRODUCTS 

» Da-Lite Series 300 Lace and Grommet 

Frame System 

The Da-Lite Series 300 Lace and Grommet Frame System is a large venue projection 

screen constructed of three inch diameter 

aluminum tubing. It includes lacing 

cord and positioned “S” hooks for attaching 

a Da-Lite Lace and Grommet projection 

screen surface. It has a black powder 

coated finish, or can be ordered with the 

optional seven-inch-wide Pro-Trim masking 

cover that conceals the screen binding 

and lacing cord. The Series 300 is also available 

as a curved model with any degree of 

single axis curve and is recommended for 

use with any of Da-Lite’s vinyl front projection 

surfaces in sizes up to 90 feet wide, and rear projection surfaces up to 40 feet wide. 

Da-Lite Screen Company • 574.267.8107 • www.da-lite.com 

» Fujinon XA88x8.8BESM HD Telephoto Lens 

Fujinon’s new XA88x8.8BESM HD telephoto lens features 88x magnification with the widest 

focal length of 8.8mm to 777mm. It is also available with Fujinon’s patented Precision Focus 

Assist (PFA). Its dimensions are 258mm 

(H) x 270mm (W) x 625mm (L). It has 

an F number of 1.7 from 8.8mm to 

348mm, and drops to F3.8 at 777mm. 

It is equipped with Fujinon’s exclusive 

GO- Technology, designed to improve 

image resolution and chromatic aberrations 

at all focal lengths. A new 

shroud design incorporates a tightly 

sealed, dust-proof housing that provides 

protection against dust contamination, 

and there is a built-in moisture 

protection system. 

Fujinon • 973.633.5600 • www.fujinonbroadcast.com. 

» Altinex AVSnap® v3.0.0 

AVSnap v3.0.0, is an AV system design and integration program and features a fully Webenabled 

interface that allows sharing of documents and presentations across the globe, and 

downloading manufacturer libraries all within in the same AVSnap environment. Additional 

changes with this updated version include: redesigned print preview for accurate document 

printing; support for 14 languages; wholly editable menus in 8 different languages; direct access 

to manufacturer libraries and sample projects; Enhanced DXF import functions for compatibility. 

AVSnap offers weekly online training. 

Altinex, Inc. • 714.990.6088 • www.avsnap.com 

» Digital Projection International Highlite 

10000Dsx+ and Highlite 16000Dsx+ 

Digital Projection International’s latest 3-chip DLP Professional Series projectors, the 

Highlite 10000Dsx+ and Highlite 16000Dsx+, offer 1400x1050 resolution and increased 

brightness. The Highlite 10000Dsx+ delivers 9,500 ANSI lumens at 2000:1 contrast, while the 

16000Dsx+ produces 13,000 ANSI lumens at 1800:1 contrast. The new lamp and lamp module 

are backwards compatible 

with DP’s previous Highlite 

Professional series models. 

Four-side soft-edge blend is 

standard, and the units can 

be customized to include 

advanced options such as 

seamless cross-fade and userdefinable 

geometric warp. 

Active stereo display (3D) at 

resolutions up to 1400 x 1050 

at 96 Hz is also supported. 

The Highlite 10000Dsx+ is 

offered at $59,995 MSRP, and 

the Highlite 16000Dsx+ for 

$69,995 MSRP. 

Digital Projection International • 770.420.1350 • www.digitalprojection.com 

» Panasonic Broadcast Pro:Idiom-Equipped 

Plasma Displays 

Panasonic’s Pro:Idiom plug-in card can support Panasonic’s full range of professional displays, 

including Panasonic’s new 50-inch and 65-inch native 1920 x 1080p full HD resolution 

professional displays, while protecting satellite-delivered HD programming and video-on-demand 

content against piracy at every point in the distribution chain, including the television. 

Panasonic 9-Series professional plasma displays offer: high contrast ratio even in bright rooms; 

60,000 hours of continuous performance; ultra-compact design with the speakers positioned 

under the screen; an ultra-wide viewing angle; a durable, “child-friendly” scratch-resistant glass 

surface; and the flexibility of a multi-function slot architecture for adding and upgrading connectivity 

options and features. 

Panasonic Broadcast • www.panasonic.com/hospitality. 

» PixelRange PixelLine Micro E 

The PixelRange PixelLine Micro E features 

174 red, green and blue LEDs with an 

estimated 16.7 million color combinations 

and a beam angle of 20° conical as standard. 

It also features a new built-in effects generator, 

capable of more than 1000 effects and 

up to 29 channels of effects control with independent 

DMX start addresses. Programmable 

offset allows for synchronizing effects 

over multiple fixtures. The Micro E can 

be controlled via an external source or in a 

stand-alone master/slave set-up. It comes 

with PowerCon 20A chassis-mounted input 

and output sockets fitted. A yoke is supplied 

standard for hanging or floor standing. It uses 

a silent convection cooling system. Black powder 

coating is standard, but other colors are available to order. Dimensions are 

205mm (L) x 84mm (H) x 167mm (D), 155mm (H) with yoke. The Micro E is IP 20 rated. 

PixelRange • 865.588.7660 • www.pixelrange.co.uk 




Taking the 

VIDEO DIGERATI 

Frame Blender 

Off “Choppy” 

By VickieClaiborne 

Many media servers feature a control 

channel for Media Play Speed. How 

does this feature affect your content? 

Have you ever used it? Well, if you have, you 

will very quickly know whether or not that media 

server uses frame interpolation, also called 

frame blending or video smoothing. 

When a piece of content is created, it will 

be rendered at a specific speed in frames per 

second, or FPS. Typically, that value will be15, 

25, 29 or 30 FPS, depending on the format of 

the media, the codec and even the hardware 

being used for playback. If a piece of video 

The result made lighting 

designers cringe. 

content is rendered at 30 FPS, what happens 

when you use the Play Speed control channel 

and slow the movie down? That actually 

depends on the software and media server. 

When a piece of 30 FPS content is being 

played back at its rendered speed, all will appear 

normal, and each frame will blend cohesively 

into the next. But when that same piece 

of content is played back at 15 FPS (overriding 

the content’s rendered frame rate via 

the Play Speed control channel), the content 

will be playing back at half of its rendered 

speed, and it can appear “jerky” or “choppy” 

because you have time-stretched the 

footage — that is, unless the software can “ fill in 

the missing frames,” which is the effect of frame 

interpolation. 

How Does Frame Interpolation Work? PC 

Frame interpolation is the process of creating 

intermediate video frames based on the 

data in two consecutive frames of encoded 

video. Technically, pixels are displaced by 

mixing pixels from the source in the current 

frame with source pixels from previous or future 

frames. Basic frame blending is used to 

compute intermediate pixels and to produce 

anti-aliased results in the render. In effect, 

frame interpolation 

increases the frame 

rate of encoded video 

at the time of decoding. 

Essentially, the 

content is rendered 

with a codec, or compression/decompression 

information. The decoders in the media server’s 

software can compare the information in 

the frames of the movie and interpolate the 

differences between them, thereby filling in 

what is missing. The algorithms being applied 

by the decoders compensate and estimate 

the motion and smoothing, which creates 

smoother motion at slower FPS values. These 

algorithms also do not involve any special encoding 

options; this means that they do not 

add any overhead to the content, and won’t 

make your content larger. 

In the lighting world, we are very accustomed 

to being able to increase or decrease 

the speeds of our effects with a control channel 

without compromising the smoothness 

of the effect. Rotating a gobo is just one example, 

as are pan & tilt. Remember when you 

would program an 8-bit pan/tilt fixture on 

a DMX console and try using a really slow 

fade time? The result made lighting designers 

cringe. As a result of that feedback from 

designers, the manufacturers of intelligent 

lighting fixtures soon doubled the number of 

pan & tilt channels and increased the resolution 

of a pan/tilt crossfade to 16-bit, and we 

suddenly went from a mere 256 bits of data 

in a crossfade to 65,536 bits of data in a crossfade. 

Once that change occurred, pan and tilt 

smoothness during a slow crossfade quickly 

became the signature of a quality automated 

lighting fixture, and all manufacturers followed 

suit by offering full and reduced resolution 

modes for their fixtures. 

Now, here we are in a lighting world that 

is quickly converging with the video world, 

but we lighting designers and programmers 

expect the same results from our digital lighting 

fixtures that we already get from our automated 

lighting fixtures. Thus, manufacturers 

of media servers are being pressed to make 

improvements in order to match our expectations. 

A media server that offers frame blending 

has the benefit of being able to generate 

higher quality slow-motion video since it 

“inserts” newly interpolated frames into any 

gaps between frames, which we perceive as 

spatial motion smoothing. This is where companies 

like Green Hippo are leading the way, 

with their latest version of the Hippotizer. 

I had the opportunity to sit with the developers 

of The Hippotizer while at LDI in 

October to check out their latest version 

of software, v3. This version of their media 

server has an extremely well designed frame 

blending feature that makes content appear 

remarkably smooth at really low frame 

rates, and this makes it an incredibly powerful 

digital lighting tool. It is also one of the first 

digital lighting media servers to make use of 

a frame interpolation technique to produce 

these impressive results. In fact, it does interpolation 

so well that it is next to impossible 

to tell that the content was not created at the 

lower frame rate. I believe that all media servers 

will need to perform at this level if they 

want to be competitive at the pro level, because 

products like the Hippotizer, with it’s 

ease of use and powerful playback capabilities, 

will keep raising the bar. Advancements 

in new technology and hardware, along with 

the development of new software that makes 

use of those technological improvements, 

contribute to increased performance capabilities 

of our media servers, and they will only 

continue to shape the future of our digital 

lighting world. 

Vickie Claiborne (www.vickieclaiborne.com) 

is an independent programmer and training 

consultant, and can be reached at vclaiborne@plsn.com. 

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feat ure 

Visuals for the Live Event 

By BobBoniol 

T 

Some of the graffiti art on Exchange 

Random influences can have extraordinary surprises. 

The Seattle Public Library 

he other day I was reading about 

a program called “Exchange.” Created 

by noted graffiti artist Jersey 

Joe, Exchange is a forum for some 

of the world’s foremost graffiti artists to exchange 

seed art (in this case, each others’ 

names, in their own definitive script style) 

and develop each other’s art to a finished 

piece with the influence of their own style. 

Some of the world’s most famous and prolific 

graffiti artists (Rime, Revok, YES2, Ewok, 

Snow and more) have become involved. 

Later, I was reading a fascinating interview 

with Rem Koolhaas, one of the most 

amazing architects alive. He discussed how 

every building manifests by deploying a 

certain sequence of circulation, and how 

this creates narrative. He elaborated about 

Seattle’s public library, and how moving 

through the building brings a perception 

of instability to what is a very stable (and 

completely remarkable) structure. This becomes 

part of the patron’s narrative relationship 

with the building. 

Finally, I found myself viewing a segment 

of MaThew Barney’s Cremaster Cycle. 

The Cremaster Cycle is an astonishing expression 

of myth, narcissistic cultural sparkle, 

fetish, sport and symbolism. It took the 

shape of five (nonlinear) films, as well as 

extensive installation art, sculpture, photography 

and drawing. Barney samples our 

hyperactive culture and has constructed a 

piece that exposes it at the same time it 

flaunts it. 

Okay, so now you are probably asking 

yourself, what does this have to do with 

designing projections or visuals for a live 

show? Why have I hijacked the normally 

super-rational and useful columns to be 

found here in PLSN? 

Because design must be informed by 

context. As visualists, projection designers 

or VJs, we have to acknowledge that 

our schemes work best when we engage 

the audience in narrative. When we give it 

meaning, it transcends “texture” or “wallpaper” 

and becomes a more powerful part 

of the whole. 

So I actively search out the influences in 

the world around me that can help me to 

craft this context. This kind of influence (for 

me) is best when I am sampling a very wide 

range. The examples I give above are typical 

of the sort of contextual rooting around I do 

on a daily basis. The idea of exchanging art 

between practitioners (like the graffiti artists) 

is fascinating, and the work they have 

produced has influenced how I graphically 

approached gigs like Nickelback’s recent 

concert tour. The interview with Koolhaas 

reveals that narrative is even communicated 

in structure; thus, media as scenery 

can achieve the same effect. And finally, 

Mathew Barney’s whacked interpretations 

and reflections of popular culture reveal 

that soul searching can result from looking 

in the funhouse mirror. Any and all of this 

might become a relevant starting point, or 

reference, for a design I work on. And thus, 

the tapestry becomes more complex, interesting, 

engaging… 

If any of you have attended art school, 

you know of that dreary exercise in the first 

year known as art history. Probably a lot of 

folks with a general liberal arts education 

know it, too. It’s that fundamental course 

that they make you take to fulfill the arts 

“req.” For the art school crowd, it can be an 

occasion to sleep off the previous night’s 

adventures with LSD. It shouldn’t be. Art 

history has a bad rap. 

One of the influences, the contexts I’m 

talking about here, is art history. I was one 

of those sleepers back when I took it, and 

now I can’t get enough of it. Ah, the irony. 

Education is wasted on the young… Or 

maybe the young are wasted during education. 

Some of both, probably. Now, I find 

myself going back to those books, cracking 

them open again, and it’s fascinating. 

Discovering the details of the widespread 

“scene” of which Van Gogh was a part, the 

way his studio brimmed with the activity 

of assistants, how they were all participating 

in a massive movement in Dutch arts 

is cool. There are lessons of collaboration 

and style to be found there. The act of 

learning to understand how Monet’s lifelong 

fascination with the interplay of light 

on scenery was of paramount concern to 

him — how it drove him to sit in the same 

location for complete days, for months, in 

order to reflect it in pigment — can inform 

all of us about what he spent so long figuring 

out. When’s the last time that you did 

that? The last time you sat for a whole day 

to witness the movement of natural light 

across a landscape or piece of architecture? 

If you’re a busy professional out on 

tour, or banging out corporate work all the 

live-long day, maybe it’s not recently. But 

by finding the time to see some of Monet’s 

work and seeing those lessons manifested, 

you can still find some of that value. 

It’s not just art history, though. It can 

be as simple as looking, really looking, 

around you as you drive to work for instance, 

or roll into a new town on the bus. 

The other day I noticed how the curved 

truss supporting the roof of the Seattle 

Seahawks’ Qwest field perfectly contains 

the shape of Mt. Rainier looming in the 

background at a particular place on the 

highway. In the same place it also links 

itself to the repeating curved shapes of 

the Mariners’ Safeco Field, and also connects 

itself to the end of the lineup of 

skyscrapers that spill from downtown. Is 

all of that a design accident? I don’t think 

so, and beyond being an architectural 

whimsy that’s fun to see and think about, 

it reminds me just how rigorous I should 

be in finding those same opportunities in 

my own designs. Modern art, like MaThew 



Barney’s stuff or the street art of those 

graffiti practitioners, is just as expressive, 

just as detailed, just as instructive. 

Early in my career I read a great book 

by an author named Julia Cameron. It was 

called The Artist’s Way. It’s full of useful 

suggestions and practices that a working 

artist can engage in to keep the font 

flowing, keep the work productive and invigorating. 

One of the best practices was 

to give yourself “artist’s dates.” Find the 

time, and schedule it if necessary, to go do 

some extracurricular thing that is going 

to feed your inner artist. This can be many 

different things. Maybe it’s rolling down 

to the local bookstore, grabbing a latte 

It became instantly sensible for us to find 

a place in the show where the twin contexts 

of Frank’s own paintings and his 

influence by Rothko could be expressed. 

Another sampling of the graffiti art on Exchange 

and a good book on art, architecture, design 

or music, and doing some reading. It 

might be finding a local museum, or, even 

better, some local gallery shows featuring 

the work of people you haven’t heard of, 

and stopping by to see it. Or it could be as 

simple as finding a unique vantage point 

in the local landscape where you can see 

the light of the sun moving across some 

distant hills or buildings, and then watching 

carefully… Channeling Monet yet? You 

should be. 

The artist’s date is one great way, but 

some of us can’t interrupt our working day 

that way. If so, good for you, and boy am I 

sorry. I do know what that’s like. But find a 

way to seek the influences at work. Instead 

of spending lunch browsing MySpace on 

the Web, go check out the sites of some 

working artists, or google 10 different 

words that occur to you, and then hit the 

“images” button to see what happens. Random 

influences can have extraordinary 

surprises, and most of us find ourselves 

online some part of the day. 

Conversely, specific research on context 

is also good, and even enjoyable. This 

year we designed the multimedia and 

projection elements for Sinatra Live at the 

London Palladium. It turns out that Frank 

was a painter as well as being a world-class 

crooner. We had been granted access to 

all of Sinatra’s materials by his family, and 

the estate, in order to do the show. When I 

looked at Frank’s paintings, I saw a fascination 

with geometry and color graduations 

that seemed familiar to me. It turned out 

that Frank was a huge fan of Mark Rothko, 

and that influence had shown up in some 

of Sinatra’s art. I loved this, and it became 

instantly sensible for us to find a place 

in the show where the twin contexts of 

Frank’s own paintings and his influence by 

Rothko could be expressed. That opportunity 

ended up being in the seminal tune, 

“Learning the Blues.” The song was staged 

to take place in a seedy blues bar. Frank 

would be singing on one screen stage left, 

while we would have to come up with “atmosphere” 

on a full stage RP screen that 

would back the bar. We ended up creating 

a small library of Rothko-esque (is that a 

word?) shapes and color gradients, all in 

the blue palette, which would come and 

go, morphing subtly. We added in some 

blues bar texture as well: cigarette smoke, 

a stiletto shoe, feminine lips parting… 

All blended to create a scenic backing. It 

worked beautifully at a purely scenic level, 

but also as a real expression of Frank’s 

explorations of blues music, blues culture 

and the color blue through paintings. It 

was way more than just great background; 

it was linked and grounded by real influences 

and priorities in Sinatra’s life. 

So go forth, I say, and find narrative 

and context. Look for it in the heart of 

your design, whether that’s a script, a lyric 

or a bar of music. But also, take the time to 

look for it in other directions. Break down 

the limits of your view, and find something 

new. 

Claude Monet’s Haystack 


PLSN DECEMBER 2006 43 

Ad info:http:// www.plsn.com/instant-info Ad info:http:// www.plsn.com/instant-info

VIDEO WORLD 

ByThomas.S Freeman 

It’s a fair question: Do two doublestacked 

5K projectors equal the brightness 

of one 10K projector? 

The issue, it seems, has been a hot topic 

among projection designers, but lately 

it has become more prominent since the 

proliferation of projection, double stacking 

and edge blending software. Last June, 

when High End Systems debuted their 

Collage Generator, which combines up to 

eight DL.2 digital projectors and creates 

one large edge-blended image, the question 

became even more complicated. What 

is the equivalent brightness of four edgeblended 

5K projectors? 


The confusion about equivalent projections 

stems from two sources: first-hand 

experience with double-stacked projectors 

and the seeming complexity of the inverse 

square law. I mean, even the nomenclature 

sounds involved. 

Some projection designers who have 

experience with large venue projectors 

are very used to using and seeing doublestacked 

projectors. Many are convinced 

that one 10K projector is brighter than two 

double-stacked 5K projectors. One of them 

If what he says is true, and I have no reason 

to doubt him, then how does that differ from 

double-stacking two 5K projectors? 

is a good friend of mine, with whom I had 

this conversation very recently. But when 

I asked if he had ever compared the two 

side-by-side, he admitted that he had not. 

Without doing so, I believe it’s very difficult 

to assess them. Still, he believes what he 

believes. Fair enough. 

I recently had the 

good fortune to witness 

a projector shootout 

between three competing 

manufacturers, 

all vying for the sale 

of multiple projectors 

in a large venue. One 

of the projectors was a 

Sony SRX-R110 projector, 

a 10K ANSI lumens 

projector, which uses 

two 2kW xenon lamps. 

The idea is that if one 

lamp goes down, you’ll 

still be able to project a 

usable image. The Sony 

factory rep told me that 

with only one lamp on, 

the brightness is the 

same as their 5K ANSI 

lumens projector. He 

illustrated this by first 

turning on both lamps, and then dousing 

one of them. It seemed very plausible to 

me. 

If what he says is true, and I have no 

reason to doubt him, then how does that 

differ from double-stacking two 5K projectors? 

I don’t believe it does. I think it’s 

exactly the same scenario. I saw the difference 

between the two, and I would have to 

say that it would be very difficult to gauge 

the amount of difference between the two 

images. Is it twice as bright? Or some other 

multiple/fraction brighter? The only sure 

way to tell is with a meter because your 

eyes compensate by opening or closing 

your irises. In a controlled environment 

without a meter, it’s anybody’s guess. 

What is for certain is the math behind it. 

Now just hold on — before your eyes glaze 

over and you lose interest, I promise not to 

bore you with any formulas. We’ll just intuit 

our way through this. 

Suppose you have a projector that produces 

100 nits at a throw of 25 feet. (A nit 

is a measure of brightness equal to one 

candela spread over one square meter. But 

Let’s not concern ourselves with the details 

of nits for the moment; let’s just accept 

that it’s some measure of brightness.) If we 

now measure the brightness at a throw of 

50 feet — twice the original throw distance 

— then how many nits would be expect to 

see? That’s where the inverse square law 

comes in. Since the throw distance has 

doubled, we can figure that the projection 

area is now four times bigger and brightness 

is one-fourth intense; therefore we 

might expect to measure 25 nits. 

We can now figure out what it would 

take to piece together four images to recreate 

the same brightness as a single image 

four times the original size. Think of the second 

projection — the one that’s four times 

as big as the original — as four individual 

images, each of which are 25 nits. Stitch 

them together and the four would equal 

the size and brightness of the single projector. 

Therefore, from a theoretical standpoint, 

all things being equal, four projectors 

with X ANSI lumens is equal in brightness 

to one projector with 4X ANSI lumens. Or, 

in English, four 5K projectors have the same 

punch as a single 20 ANSI lumen projector. 

That’s true whether you quadruple-stack 

them or edge blend them. 

The same is true whether you’re talking 

about projectors or luminaires. After 

all, a projector is a luminaire — a very specialized 

one, but a luminaire nonetheless. 

In this era of convergence where lighting 

people are learning video, and video people 

are learning to live with lighting people, a 

little confusion is understandable. Video 

techs are used to dealing with ANSI lumens, 

nits and aspect ratios, while lighting techs 

are used to dealing with footcandles or lux, 

candelas and beam or field angles. But the 

principles are the same when you’re dealing 

with light. With any given quantity, you can 

spread it, stack it, spend it any way you want, 

but you have to account for every bit, and 

you can’t get something for nothing. 



PRODUCTGALLERY 

- 


This month’s Product Gallery could be 

a metaphor for change in our industry. 

Less than 10 years ago, a small 

display appeared at LDI in which only a few 

luminaires were displayed on a countertop. 

Those luminaires drew little interest, a few 

snickers and lots of doubt. The company 

was Color Kinetics and their product was an 

RGB color mixing can with LEDs. 

In just a few short years, the doubt 

turned to debate about the viability of LEDs 

in the entertainment industry while manufacturers 

increasingly turned out more and 

more products using the now ubiquitous 

solid-state devices. But despite their best 

efforts, few manufacturers have succeeded 

in producing LED fixtures for general illumination. 

They have, however, been very successful 

in turning out LED displays for direct 

viewing — aided, in part, by the new generation 

of DMX-controllable media servers 

that make it so fast and easy to create intricate 

graphics. So successful, in fact, that 

most every entertainment lighting manufacturer 

now has some form of LED product 

in their stable. 

Keep in mind, this is in a category that 

didn’t even exist a few years ago. Interestingly 

enough, the product that everyone 

was talking about at LDI 2005 fit into this 

category very nicely. Unfortunately, the 

manufacturer, Komaden, was unable to deliver 

on its promise of a semi-transparent 

LED display called I-Mesh. Fortunately, Element 

Labs was — or at least a reasonable 

facsimile they call Stealth. But that’s just 

one of the many lo-res displays on the market 

today. 

What exactly is a lo-res LED display? 

Excellent question. Hi-res displays have a 

huge number of pixels and lo-res displays 

have less. Also, lo-res displays tend to have 

a larger pixel pitch, meaning the LEDs are 

spaced farther apart. But what’s to keep 

someone from putting together lots and 

lots of “lo-res” displays with a very large 

pixel pitch to form one huge display with 

lots and lots of pixels and feeding it with 

hi-definition content? Or, what’s to keep 

someone from using an LED display with a 

very small pixel pitch and feeding it lo-res 

content? Absolutely nothing. 

In a sense, “lo-res” is all in how you use it 

— whether you feed it hi-definition images 

(assuming it’s able to display it) or lo-res 

graphic images to complement the other 

staging elements. Either way, LED displays 

are flexible, fun, and it looks like they’re 

here to stay. 

But just as the industry is constantly 

changing, so are LEDs. What’s rare today 

is plentiful tomorrow. What’s costly now is 

reasonable tomorrow. What’s highly competitive 

today is... Okay, some things will 

never change. 

Here are some of today’s LED displays 

that you might use for lo-res. 

Martin LC2140 

MainLight SoftLED 

Artistic Licence Color Web 

Chauvet DV Wall 

Robe StageQube 324 

Daktronics Pro Pixel 

Acclaim X Panel 

Barco MiPix 

Pixel Range Pixel Line 1044 

A.C. Lighting Chroma Q 



PRODUCTGALLERY 

Manufacturer 

Web Address 

Acclaim Lighting 

www.acclaimlighting.com 

Product Name Type of Source Pixel Pitch Substrate Material Weight Standard Size 

X-Ball 

RGB 42 LED Model- 18 red, 12 

blue, 12 green. True RGB 21 LED 

Model- 9 red, 6 blue, 6 green 

Up to 40mm pitch 

Die-cast construction glass diffuser 

300g (42 LED) 295g 

(21LED) 

3.66" x 2.87" x 2" 

X-Curtain 72 tri-color LEDs 2.4" (60mm) PC + UV-resistant tubes 1.2 Kg 59.10" x 2.36" x 2.16" 

X-Panel 25 tri-color LEDs 40mm Polycarbonate .08 Kg 7.87" x 7.87" x 1.46" 

A.C. Lighting 

www.aclighting.com/northamerica 

Chroma-Q Color Block 

DB4 

4 sets of tri-color LED 2.5" Anodized aluminum 3.1lbs 10" x 2.5" x 4.75" 

Artistic Licence (distributed by 

A.C. Lighting) 

www.aclighting.com/ 

northamerica 

Barco 

www.barco.com 

Chroma-Q Color Web 

250 

Chroma-Q Color Web 

125 

MiStrip 

MiPix 

MiSphere 

Tri-color surface mount LED 10" Pliable webbing 1.76lbs 3.3' x 3.3' 

Tri-color surface mount LED 5" Pliable webbing 4.06lbs 3.3' x 3.3' 

Data DVI up to UXGA, SDI, HD- 

SDI, YUV, composite, S-video 

MiPIX Control Unit. Up to 128 

blocks per Control Unit (four 

lines of 32 blocks). Connection 

between Control Unit and blocks 

by means of flat ribbon cable. 

S-Video, composite, YUV, RGB, 

SDI, HDSDI, data DVI up to 

SXGA 

13mm 

LED 

Height - 26mm; Depth (w/o connector) - 

55mm; Length - 1500mm, 750mm, 380mm 

20mm LED 34g 40.3mm x 40.3mm x 22mm (1.6" x 1.6" x .87") 

160mm 

4 SMD LEDs (2x2 configuration) 

MiSpheres are daisy chanined in a 

string that is self supporting 

142g 60mm x 103.5mm x 60mm (W x H x D) 

Chauvet 

www.chauvetlighting.com 

Daktronics.com 

www.daktronics.com 

Element Labs 

www.elementlabs.com 

DVmodule HR 

Red, green, blue LEDs grouped 

in clusters of nine. 

256 LED clusters per module 

31mm 

28lbs/module (with 

mounting hardware) 

Dimensions/module: 19.75" x 19.75" x 4" ( 

501mm x 501mm x 101mm). Weight: 28lbs 

(12.7kgs) 

ProPixel PXC-89 5mm RGB LEDs 89mm Face: plastic in custom colors 0.5 lbs 73mm x 73mm 

Stealth Tri-color LED 25mm pixel pitch Plastic 1.0 kg (2.2 lbs) 40cm panels 

Cirrus Tri-color LED 75mm pixel pitch Vinyl Approx. 50 lbs 2.44 m x 4.88 m (8' x 16') 

Phantom Frame 

2.4" x 2.4" 1.5 lbs per square foot 

Modular frames that clip together to any size. 

Each frame is 37"x37" (0.9m x 0.9m) 

G-LEC (distributed by Scharff 

Weisberg) 

www.scharffweisberg.com 

Tube Individual LEDs 

2" linear N/A 

Each tube can be any length up to 15'6" (6m). 

Any number of tubes may be arranged vertically 

or horizontally to create any size display. 

Light Frame 2.4"x2.4" 2.2 lbs/sf 

Modular frames that clip together to any size. 

Each frame is 37"x37" (0.9m x 0.9m) 

Main Light Industries 

www.mainlight.com 

SoftLED 

Tri-color surface mount LED 

High X: 2"x4"; High - 4"x4"; 

Medium X - 4"x8"; Medium 

- 8"x8" 

Face: 22oz Encore IFR Liner: 

Black IFR 

Hi-Res: .5lbs/sf Medium 

X: .35lbs/sf Medium: 

.21lbs/sf 

Hi-Res (Square) - dim: 16'1" x 16'9" (5 m x 5.1 

m); wt: 128 lbs. (58 kg); 2400 nodes 

High Resolution - dims: 8'1" x 33'5" 

(2.5 m x 10 m); wt: 128 lbs. (58 kg); 2400 nodes 

Med X Res - dim: 16'1" x 33'5" (5 m 10 m); wt: 

184 lbs. (84 kg); 2327 nodes 

Med Res - dim: 16'1" x 33'5" (5 m x 10 m); wt: 

111 lbs. (50 kg); 1200 nodes 

HardLED 

Series 6000: 2"x2" Series 

6100/6200: 1"x1" 

Frame material: aluminum extrusion; 

Face: hard phenolic covered 

with black/synthetic fabric 

Series 6000: 56lbs Series 

6100: 32lbs Series 6200: 

28lbs 

Martin Professional 

www.martin.com 

LC 2140 5mm oval LEDs, 1800cd/m2 40mm 44lbs 

2m x 1m (39.4"x78.7") 25 x 50 resolution, 1250 

pixels 

Pixel Art 

Osram tri-color thin-film SMT 

LEDs 

15mm (30mm to follow) 

Batten: 4.5lbs Block: 

0.75lbs 

Batten: 42.5" x 3.6" x 2.76" (1080mm x 91mm 

x 70mm) - 72 x 6 pixels. Block: 7.09" x 3.6" x 

2.76" (180mm x 91mm x 70mm) - 12 x 6 pixels 

Pixel Range 

www.pixelrange.com 

Robe 

www.robeamerica.com 

Pixel Line 1044 

Pixel Line 110 

StageQube 324 

1044 high intensity red, green 

and blue LEDs 

110 high intensity Luxeon 

emitters: 1W Reds & Ambers, 

3W Blues and Greens 

Red, green and blue LEDs 

6-12mm 

21.5mm 

18x18 pixels w/ 4.44cm 

pixel pitch 

PC board 

Metal framing 

12.2kg (27lbs) w/ combi 

yoke; 11kg (24lbs) w/o 

55.1lbs (25kg) 

1179mm(L) x 84mm(H) x 165mm(D) 

1179mm(L) x 84mm(H) x 165mm(D) 

No 

800mm x 800mm x 120mm (31.5"x31.5"x4.7"); 

800mm x 800mm x 180mm with diffusor 

(31.5"x31.5"x7") 

Staging Dimensions 

www.stagingdimensionsinc. 

com 

High Resolution Pixel 

Panel 

Tri-color surface mount LED 

nodes 

4" x 4" 

4' x 4' x 3/4" clear or milk plexiglas, 

extruded aluminum frame, nylock 

nuts, dual locks 

4' x 4' panel / 105 lbs 4' x 4' x 3 3/4 "h stage panel 

Studio Due (distributed by 

Techni-Lux) 

www.studiodue.it 

www.techni-lux.com 

RGB CityLED/C Modular 

LED Spot 

42 single color LEDs; 18 red, 12 

blue, 12 green 

13.78" x 9.85" Aluminum case 0.525 kg (1.16 lbs) 10cm x 9cm x 5cm (3.9" x 3.5" x 2") 

TMB 

www.tmb.com 

ColourPix - Low-Res 

Modular 

Red, green, blue 5mm LED's 

1", 2",4"and 6"as standard 

with other pitch options 

available 

Carbon steel with powder coating, 

and optional digital printing on 

vinyl film for the background 

Varies depending on type 

of housing required. 

Custom configuration for various sizes - call 

TMB 



Power Supply Size/Weight Control Options Accessories Retail Price Comments 

4" x 6" x 8" / 3 lbs DMX or X-Soft 

XB-R1 Remote Controller 

$120 (42 LED)$85 (21 

LED) 

IP 67 for exterior use or submerge to 1 meter. Produces up to 16 million colors. 

4" x 6" x 8" / 3 lbs DMX or X-Image $200 IP 65. Up to 16 million colors- 24-bit color. 

4" x 6" x 8" / 3 lbs X-Soft $250 25 RGB LEDs. 

5-way: 14.1" x 7.3" x 2.6" / 5lbs 30-way: 19" x 14.5" x 3.5" / 

24.5lbs 

10-way: 4" x 8.6" x 4.3" / 3lbs 

10-way: 4" x 8.6" x 4.3" / 3lbs 

DMX512 

DMX512A, (480 channels), XLR 5-pin in 

and through 

DMX512A, (480 channels), XLR 5-pin in 

and through 

D-sub 25 D-320 

Yoke attachment, 

batten bracket, blinder 

frame, 1-way & 5-way 

LED pipes, set of 4 

pixel caps, hinge kit, 

wall bracket, single link 

cable, various beam kits 

Control software, circuit 

extensions, multicore 

extensions, spider, fly 

adapters, IP65 end cap 

$845 

$654 

$2,600 

$3680 - $6720 

(8 Pieces) 

Modular "building block" design enables individual or connected use for a variety 

of configurations (battens, blinders, footlights, side fills, cyc, floods, truss toners, 

discreet set piece lighting and interior architectural applications). Available in a 

range of color, mounting, optical and power supply options. 

Panels clip together or joined over distances, enabling them to be re-configured 

to fit almost any height, length or shape. Each 3'-3" square panel provides 16 

individually addressable color mixing LED cells with a pitch of 10". 

64 individually addressable color mixing LED cells with a pitch of 5" with double 

the resolution per square foot compared to Color Web 250. 

1.2 w/block (max) 

206 w/system (1CU + 128 blocks) 

D-320 

Rental Structure 

$8840 

(200 pieces) 

3 w/block (max) D-320 

$7748 

(64 pieces) 

DVwall Studio or ShowXpress Timeline 

Additional DVwall 

drivers to expand 

the overall size; flying 

hardware 

4 modules min + case/ 

$7999.99 

IP65 ingress protection rating, video, Flash, Powerpoint, graphics displays, 50,000- 

100,000 hrs average LED life, sold in minimum of four modules. 

Varies Daktronics Venus 7000 controller POA 

Varies based upon configuration 

Video (DVI & SDI) 

Optional Rigging Accessories 

$1,700/panel 

Varies based upon configuration 

Video (DVI) 

Optional Rigging Accessories 

$30,000/panel 

Power supply is remote from frames to keep weight low. 

Phantom I: own graphics computer with 

graphics storage and NTSC video input 

Phantom II: DVI input 

Own graphics computer with graphics 

storage and video input. 3D multilayered 

graphics control. 

For rental only 

Snap-fit frame system and very light weight designed for touring. Very large systems, 

indoor or outdoor. Transparent to light and air (e.g. wind, smoke, etc.). 

Can be fitted on any surface or hung at any length up to 15'5". Can be bent to 4' 

radius. 

Power supply integral in frame 

DMX512 input, RDM, LED control modes: 

1-, 4-, 16-squares of pixels and each 

individual of 16 tubes 

$4,940 per frame with 

volume discounts 

Quick-fit frame system and very light weight designed for touring. Indoor or 

outdoor. Transparent to light, and air (e.g. wind, smoke, etc.) 

Tubes and control box can be de-mounted from frame and used in scenery or 

separately on custom surface. 

Included in frame, no additonal equipment necessary 

Included in Batten; not yet available for Block 

Internal 

DVI, genlock 

Master Controller: takes either DVI or 

RGB analog video or Artnet, maps to Ethernet-based 

protocol. Master supplied 

with multiple port options. Entry level is 

one protected port capable of driving up 

to 120000 pixels. (703 equivalent DMX 

universes) 

External source (DMX) and Stand alone 

External source (DMX) and Stand alone 

Mounting hardware, 

calibration system 

Mounting kits, PSU/ 

Ethernet repeater with 

mapped DMX outputs, 

range of filters 

Yoke, Holographic 

filters,Power Jumper 

Cables 

Yoke, Holographic 

filters,Power Jumper 

Cables 

$20,795 

POA 

$6,250 

$6,525 

2 x 1 meter semi-transparent LED wall of light with RGB color illumination with 

color calibration capability. Suitable for TV studios (genlock). Runs via standard 

DVI in/output with daisy chain capability. 

Built-in 

VGA and Ethernet connectors 

Adaptors for rigging 

systems 

POA 

Integral rigging system allows construction of large systems. With optional foot 

plate, the system is self-sustaining and it can also be flown. 

8.8" x 5.5" x 3.6" / 6 lbs 

Pre-programmed, DMX or Ethernet; VLSE, 

Catalyst or DMX lighting console 

Diamond plate ramps, 

guardrails, stair units, 

stage legs from 4" - 100" 

high, stage skirting 

$3,308.50 clear 

$3,055.00 milk 

Complete staging panels which will support 150 lbs per square foot and require 

no sub-floor. Structural, portable light surfaces can be custom built. 

24 VDC: 1 unit can supply 32 CityLed/19cm x 11cm x 5cm 

(7.5" x 4.3" x 2") 

0.725 Kg. 

DMX or Studio Due software + X Board/C 

Modular horizontal 

and vertical bars with 

fast lock 

POA 

IP 67 rated. It can be used in matrixes or individual confirgurations. 

CF controller (pre-programmed color 

patterns) and DVI controller (live DVI 

signal input) 

or integration w/ media server 

POA 

Modules are weather proof for permanent outdoor installation, allows for multiple 

design layouts to accommodate unique structures such as curved, triangular etc. 

Module housings can also be specified as interlocking sections for touring applications 

to provide quick and easy setup. 



A Christmas Production Poem 

‘Twas the night before Christmas; the deadline was tight. 

The tempers were flaring; there was no end in sight. 

The ground plans were hung on the walls without care, 

While hundreds of box truss were flown in the air. 

The Clients were nestled all snug in their beds 

While us in production were banging our heads. 

The script had revisions; the computer had crashed. 

The messenger was late; the PA needed cash. 

The producer was phoning to bring in more troops. 

We were pushed to the limit and jumping through hoops. 

The crew was on OT, the budget was trash; 

That good ole’ contingency had gone in a flash! 

When out on the stage there arose such a clatter, 

We all ran to see what the heck was the matter! 

The stage manager screamed that the cues were all wrong, 

And rehearsals were running 30 minutes too long! 

The actors were brainless, with no talent at all. 

The set needed adjusting; it was one foot too tall! 

The moon on the breast of the new fallen snow 

Was a painful reminder that we could not go. 

The lights in the city were twinkling and vivid 

While sitting at home, our spouses were livid. 

Then what to our wondering eyes should appear 

But a dozen large pizzas and four six-packs of beer? 

With some carbs and some spirits we merrily pushed on. 

The job fell in place and we wrapped around dawn. 

As we handed out praises and wished all a good night, 

Alas…a sleigh and reindeer about to take flight. 

Then a jolly old man gave a laugh and advice: 

“Happy Holidays to all, will you please get a life?!” 

Illustrations by Tony Gleeson

PRODUCTSPOTLIGHT 

Flying Cars 


and Wybron’s InfoTrace 

When I was a young kid, I told my 

older brother that I wanted a 

’69 Mustang fastback when I 

was old enough to drive. “When you’re 

old enough to drive,” he said, “we’ll 

have flying cars!” 

My sixteenth birthday came and 

went, but not a single flying car did I 

ever see. Still, that became 

my benchmark for the future: 

When cars could fly, 

the future was here. 

Now Wybron has introduced 

a new product 

called InfoTrace that promises 

to usher in the future 

of control systems for the 

entertainment industry. It 

is not so much of a “flying 

car” as it is a mechanism to 

allow the flight of cars, except 

in this case, the “cars” 

are packets of information 

passed between controllers 

and devices in a networked 

system. 

Before the approval of 

Remote Device 

Management, or 

RDM, there was 

no bi-directional 

c o m m u n i c a - 

tion standard for 

control systems. Last 

summer, the Controls 

Protocol Working Group of ESTA finished 

pushing RDM through the approval process, 

paving the way for manufacturers 

like Wybron to develop products that 

take advantage of the bi-directional protocol 

for the control and management 

of DMX-controlled devices. But instead 

of building the firmware into their own 

products and stopping there, Wybron 

smartly chose to offer it as an after-market 

and/or OEM product that anyone 

could adapt to their own equipment. 

InfoTrace is a complete system that 

includes InfoChip, InfoGate and InfoStore. 

InfoChip is a small package with 

two tiny printed circuit boards about the 

size of your thumbnail. It has an eightpin 

configuration, and it’s designed to 

plug into a standard DMX transceiver 

socket, so it’s easy for just about anyone 

to install in any DMX device. It communicates 

back to InfoGate, a package 

of software running on a computer, to 

facilitate several “flying car-type” functions. 

It automatically participates in a 

discovery process whereby the device 

reports to InfoGate what device it is and 

where it resides on the network. It also 

collects and reports information about 

the duty cycle of the device, and it allows 

the operator to remotely change 

the DMX address from the controller, 

which is even a lot faster than a flying 

car. But wait, there’s more. 

InfoGate is the software running on 

a computer, which is networked to a 

Gateway IT box through an off-the-shelf 

network router. It provides a graphical 

user interface in the form of a spreadsheet 

whereby you can view and change 

a variety of information about the devices 

and system, including variable parameters 

such 

as intensity, focus, 

color, sensors, 

labels and functions. 

One of the views shows 

a DMX map with a graphical 

representation of each DMX device and 

its footprint (how many channels it uses). 

Dragging and dropping the device to a 

new location on the screen can change 

the DMX starting address, and if there are 

overlapping DMX addresses, they show 

up on the screen in red. Many more functions 

are available in the application. 

InfoStore is an Internet application 

that allows you to check in with, 

monitor and manage any number of 

InfoTrace systems. As InfoGate gathers 

information about the operation of the 

system, including such data as voltage, 

temperature (provided the device has 

the appropriate sensors), fan speed, etc., 

it can send reports back to the webbased 

InfoStore site. You can set alarms 

to monitor certain parts of the system 

that might be of concern, such as lamp 

hours and gel string hours. Wybron’s 

own Coloram, CXI, Eclipse and Eclipse 

II have built-in sensors to monitor the 

presence of light, the temperature, voltage, 

fan speed and gel string frame color 

information. They can send information 

about the current status of these items 

and warn of potential problems. 

All of these components work together 

to gather, transmit and store information 

about each device on a system. It provides 

an end-to-end solution 

for legacy DMX devices 

as well as for systems 

that are yet to be built. 

The number of useable 

functions will continue 

to grow as manufacturers 

find new ways to use 

the technology. 

In the future, robots 

will perform system 

checks and maintenance. 

Right now, we 

humans have to do it. 

What makes the Info- 

Trace system appealing 

is that it can help 

make your life easier by 

speeding the process of 

setting up a lighting rig, 

configuring or re-configuring 

it, and maintaining 

it. How many 

t i m e s 

have you 

flown a 

rig only 

to disc 

o v e r 

that you 

forgot to 

set the 

DMX address 

on 

one of the devices? 

Be honest. 

Or how many times 

have you noticed a dim 

lamp in an automated luminaire and wondered 

if it’s aligned correctly or if it’s just an 

old lamp? Wouldn’t it be great to be able to 

consult your laptop and find out before you 

decide your next course of action? Sure it 

would. And it would also be great to take a 

flying car to your next gig. 

Ironically enough, just a couple of months 

ago there was an article in Popular Science 

magazine about an MIT aeronautical graduate 

student who designed a flying car called 

the Transition. He and a team of engineers 

are building a prototype, and they hope to 

be flying by 2010. 

When asked about how his invention 

compares to the flying cars in the Jetsons cartoon, 

Carl Dietrich, the inventor, said, “We try 

to steer away from The Jetsons. It’s a step in 

that direction, but a baby step.” 

InfoTrace is more than just a baby step. 

It’s a full-sized step towards the future of automated 

control. In just a few short years it 

will be soaring. 




FEEDINGTHEMACHINES 

Test Time 

at the 

Trade Shows 

By BradSchiller 

Ad info: http:www.plsn.com/instant-info 

Our industry has recently had two of 

its biggest tradeshows: PLASA and 

LDI. Lighting tradeshows are like a 

giant candy store for automated lighting 

programming kids as well as conventional 

lighting geeks. Not only can you see what 

new goodies all the manufacturers have developed, 

but you can also learn about existing 

products and make incredible contacts. 

While I was at these shows, I realized there 

is a great learning opportunity available 

to attendees with no additional monetary 

cost on their part. While paid programming 

seminars are often available at these shows, 

there is plenty to learn at each of the console 

manufacturers’ booths. 

Seeing What’s New 

Of course, every tradeshow provides a 

great venue to see what each manufacturer 

has to offer. You can simply walk around and 

)) 

look at consoles and fixtures to see what 

looks nice or appears bright. Often, many 

people will be talking about the new console 

from Company A, or the new moving head 

from Company B. It is very easy to walk into 

most booths, take a look, put a brochure in 

your bag, and move on yet by doing so, you 

are not really learning anything about the 

products. What is even better is to sit down 

for a demo or ask for a walk-through of the 

product. I have been attending these shows 

for many, many years, and there have been 

periods where huge demonstrations were in 

vogue. However, the current trend seems to 

be small, intimate, hands-on demos. 

When you want to learn about a new 

console, you will find that most manufacturers 

set up kiosks with consoles and visualizers. 

At these kiosks you can either work on 

your own with the console, or, hopefully, a 

representative will assist you. In some cases 

1/2 JR. VERTICAL AD 

a manufacturer representative may give a 

standard demo or sales talk; you just stand 

and listen. 

The most 

important 

thing is 

to ask for 

a demo 

specific to 

your questions. 

Every 

user is different, and if you ask the demonstrator 

to explain patching, unique functions, 

or effects, then they will be happy to 

tailor the demo to your needs. However, if 

you just ask to see what the desk can do, do 

not be surprised when they simply provide 

a cursory overview. 

One of the greatest little-known facts 

about console demonstrations at a tradeshow 

is that the people working the kiosks 

are often the software developers. Most 

manufacturers unchain the developers from 

their cubes and allow them to meet the users 

at tradeshows. This provides valuable feedback 

for the developers, and also offers you 

the opportunity to meet the brains behind 

the consoles. Once you understand who is 

demonstrating the console, then you can begin 

to ask important questions and request 

additional information. Very rarely do I see 

sales people working the demonstrations at 

tradeshows, and that is a very good thing. 

Most manufacturers unchain 

the developers from their 

cubes and allow them to meet 

the users at tradeshows. 

An Attendee’s Point of View 

After LDI, I spoke with Michael Graham of 

Austin, Texas. Michael is a freelance programmer, 

and he attended the show to learn about 

the various consoles on the market. He wanted 

to be better prepared for any future gigs 

that may have consoles other than those he 

already understands. 

Q Did you find attending the tradeshow 

useful for improving your programming 

knowledge? 

A Michael Graham: Yes. As a programmer, I 

tend to stay on the consoles I know, and the 

last place I want to learn a new desk from 

scratch is on a gig. With so many different 

choices today, a tradeshow is the best place 

to see everything. You get to spend some 

time on each desk and talk to people who 

know the product and can truly answer your 

questions. And in most cases, everyone has a 

PC version — so after spending some time 

in a demo, you can pick up a copy of the PC 

version for free. Then you can take that home 

to spend some time learning more about the 

desk before you use it. 

Q Did you have to ask for a demo? Or 

did you walk up on an active one? Or 

were you approached by someone working 

the booth? 

A I walked around in the morning and 

found which consoles I wanted to learn 

more about. Then I walked up and asked 

for a demo on one desk, and my friend 

asked for a demo on another desk. I did 

not attend any group demos, but when I 

)) 

was looking at one desk, no other attendees 

were around the booth, so I was able 

to spend a 

good 30 to 

45 minutes 

on the console 

with 

the developer. 

This 

was very 

useful — 

enough that I think I could do a gig with 

it if I truly had to. 

Q Did you find enough time to really 

learn a console? Or were you just able to 

get an overview? 

A I don’t think a trade show is a place to 

really learn a console, unless you take a formal 

class. I was able to get a very good overview 

of the desks. At both stands, everything 

from patching to changing fixture types was 

shown: building cues, editing cues and timing. 

If more time was allowed, we could have gone 

more in depth. I do know that I now want to 

learn more about both consoles, and have 

already started playing with one of the PC 

versions I picked up at LDI. So it can be very 

useful to gain understanding, but it is not a 

substitute for proper training. 

If you ever get the chance to go attend a 

trade show, I would highly recommend it. Not 

only is it a great place to meet and catch up with 

people, but it also allows you to see the tools 

that are available in our industry. Where else 

could you spend 30 minutes on six different 

consoles in one day and still make happy hour? 

Meeting Other People 

As Michael pointed out, one of the other 

huge benefits to attending a tradeshow is 

meeting others in our industry. At LDI I saw 

the majority of the major programmers and 

designers in our field. I made it a point to 

speak with each of them and find out what 

they have been up to, what they are using, 

etc. One friend of mine spotted a famous LD 

(identified by his badge) and shouted out his 

name. He introduced himself as an admirer, 

and it led to a 29-minute conversation. You, 

too, should make it a point to look for industry 

names and talk to all that you find. You 

never know what you will learn or what gigs 

may come from the conversation. 

Tackling the Tradeshow 

Our major tradeshows only happen once 

a year. If you can attend at least one every few 

years and learn about new products, then you 

will be ahead of many others. These shows provide 

a great resource of equipment and people 

in a single building. When at the show, make it 

a point to learn as much as possible and try not 

to just walk around in a daze. If you ask, most 

manufacturers offer free exhibit-only passes, 

so the learning experience is nearly free. (You 

just have to pay travel and meal expenses.) 

Prepare now for next year’s shows, and plan to 

learn all you can while at the show. 

)) 

)) 

Contact Brad at brads@plsn.com. 



THEBIZ 

istribution 

ynamics 

Money changes everything. Declining 

pricing for mainstream professional 

lighting products is accelerating a 

condition that has been part of the distribution 

channel for decades, one in which the 

once-distinct lines between manufacturer, 

distributor, retailer and end user become less 

clear as each one jockeys for best position. 

Most lighting manufacturers use the traditional 

distribution model whereby they 

make the equipment and sell it to a dealer 

network, which then resells the products to 

end users. The typical dealer is an installer 

or theatrical supply house that either stocks 

inventory for resale or provides value-added 

services and sells the gear as part of their 

service. 

Production companies that also resell 

equipment, however, can blur the lines between 

the dealer and end user, because they 

use the equipment in their own productions, 

and the vast majority of gear they buy is for 

their own use. They sometimes have counter 

sales, but that’s not where they derive most 

of their income. Products that would have 

been purchased with some kind of retail 

markup instead are acquired at direct prices, 

bypassing the retail channel. Some would 

say that that ultimately undermines the entire 

industry pricing infrastructure. 

Eric Bernstein, owner of Intelligent Lighting 

Services, a dealer and service provider in 

Austin, says he is seeing more manufacturers’ 

reps at trade shows and events that have traditionally 

been the purview of end users. 

Bernstein uses the burgeoning church 

market as a model for what’s happened. “The 

church market for lighting now is like the 

way things were in the early days of computers: 

intelligent lighting is more than a 

plug-and-play device, and it needs expertise 

to operate properly,” he explains. “Going to 

Guitar Center to buy advanced lighting isn’t 

in the best interests of the customer, really. 

The qualified dealer is going to provide the 

value-added services, and the qualified installer 

is going to provide the quality installation 

and support. You lose that when the 

traditional distribution channels break down 

over pricing. All that does is further depress 

pricing, and you’re in a vicious cycle.” 

Bernstein says he feels squeezed the 

same way the independent hardware stores 

were when big-box chains like Home Depot 

and Lowe’s expanded. “Best Buy wants the 

sports bar business, and they can offer in 

terms of price what the smaller dealers can’t. 

I have a local bar that wanted 40 42-inch 

plasmas. Best Buy could offer a better price 

as well as financing. I can’t compete with 

“Intelligent lighting is more than a 

plug-and-play device, and it needs 

expertise to operate properly,” 

By DanDaley 

A Price-Driven Landscape Shapes the Relationships 

Between Manufacturer, Distributor, Dealer and User 

– Eric Bernstein 

Some dealers think they should be able 

to solicit production companies’ business, 

and they consider direct sales by the manufacturer 

to be in violation of the spirit of 

their dealer network. Some manufacturers, 

though, will counter that production companies 

are not end users, per se, and that they 

should be able to sell to them because they 

promote their products by using them in 

high-profile shows and events. 

The issue isn’t so much that this is taking 

place and that it is a bone of contention 

— it’s always gone on, and it’s always caused 

some friction. What has changed is how increasingly 

pervasive it’s become. “Everyone 

is more aware of it now because the competition 

is as fierce as it is,” says Jack Kelly, 

president of distributor/manufacturer Group 

One, which owns the Elektralite brand of intelligent 

lights and controllers. Referring to 

the widely read business book Competitive 

Advantage, by Michael Porter, Kelly quotes, “ 

‘Any industry is only as strong as its weakest 

competitor.’ If there are 25 makers of moving 

lights and a huge project comes up, the 

project in an environment like this is going 

to follow pricing. Like the airline industry, 

lighting has become commoditized, and any 

time you make a technology product a commodity, 

you are rewarded according to how 

inexpensive, not necessarily how good, you 

can make it.” 

that. It’s no different than when a manufacturer 

goes directly to a club. More than the 

price is undermined — the manufacturer 

is used to dealing with maybe 100 dealers 

in the U.S., and now, suddenly, they have 

a thousand in the form of clubs and other 

customers they have to support.” 

Companies like Guitar Center, which 

through its subsidiary Guitar Center Pro has 

extended the value proposition into the territory 

of pro audio, video and lighting dealers, 

are large continents in the changing 

tectonics of retail in general. They’ve aimed 

themselves at the entry levels of markets 

like performing musicians, but the power of 

a vertical sales organization will be pretty 

graphically illustrated when they start approaching 

more traditional pro lighting markets 

like theatres. 

Expect the manufacturer-dealer-user 

channel to continue to evolve, with more 

than a little pressure coming from the kind 

of pricing pressure paradigm brought on 

by the big-box retail trend, propelled further 

by the increasing amount of lighting 

being made in China. The equation in this 

kind of situation has always been the tradeoff 

between price and customer service. 

Time will tell which way the pole is going 

to lean. 

E-mail Dan at ddaley@plsn.com 




TECHNOPOLIS 

Controlknobs 


Every once in a while, I’m asked to 

visit another school or community 

theatre, usually to try to figure out 

what’s wrong with their lighting system. 

So I’ve seen a lot of archaic systems, 

including the classic dimmer rack controlled 

with a broomstick (the originator 

of, “Take it down by half,” usually 

done with a broomstick across the dimmer 

handles). It seems that when any 

improvement comes along, some poor 

soul is stuck, whining, with a legacy 

system. Sometimes I wonder how they 

cope. 

Soon, we may be whining about our 

DMX-512-based systems and controllers. 

After all, it didn’t take long to max 

out our first 512 channels, did it? Multiuniverse 

DMX control is now normal, the 

trick of using one controller for moving 

lights and another for the static units 

is old hat. Add multi-media, effects and 

LED displays, and the DMX-512 limitations 

can become true sticking points in 

lighting design. 

It seems like we need a controller to 

control all of our controllers. Enter ACN, 

the industry’s newest control protocol. 

It’s just been approved by the ANSI 

Board of Standards Review and is now 

the next level of control protocol. It will 

Broomsticks 

I suppose when DMXwas dreamed up, 512 

possible channels seemed like plenty… 

likely be implemented first, perhaps, in 

your larger installations, then… who 

knows? 

ACN is the new Architecture for Control 

Networks protocol developed over 

the last few years by ESTA. (Everyone I’ve 

spoken to calls it the “Advanced Control 

Network,” but that moniker was superseded 

somewhere along the way.) Entertainment 

equipment manufacturers 

realize that an advanced system must 

be made compatible across the industry 

to survive in the marketplace. (It’s the 

old Beta/VHS thing all over again.) So 

they’ve banded together as an industry 

to forge the ACN protocol, also called 

the Multipurpose Network Control Protocol 

Suite. 

ACN is an Ethernet-based ANSI standard 

that attempts to address (address, 

get it?) some of the difficulties involved 

with a complex installation. For instance, 

controlling a large LED curtain, 

a complex media presentation, a gaggle 

of moving lights, room lights and effects 

is just about impossible for a single controller 

these days. OK, not impossible, 

but, let’s say, awkward. What’s going to 

happen when the installation or event 

gets even larger? 

ACN promises to connect ACN-ready 

controllers with ACN-ready fixtures so 

that a designer can be “put back into 

the world they are comfortable in,” according 

to western regional sales manager 

of EDI Tracy Underhill, who is also 

the co-chair of ESTA’s Control Protocol 

Working Group. 

How? Well, it’s magic. Actually, it’s 

a robust, expandable 

system that allows 

communication in both 

directions between the 

controller(s) and the 

ACN-compliant components. 

Imagine a unit that tells the 

control board exactly what it is and also 

gives information on how to use it, and 

you are on the right track. ACN uses 

downstream and upstream messaging 

(over the aforementioned Ethernet 

link) to sort of patch itself. The promise 

of not assigning individual channels, 

and not worrying about individual DMX 

addresses is right there, too; high-end 

boards can sort of do this already, but 

ACN should make this feature universal, 

and any company that cares to can jump 

on the bandwagon by building ACNcompliant 

equipment. 

Other features and components of 

ACN include a very clever talkback system 

(the “leader” knows when to send 

a signal that needn’t be acknowledged, 

and when to send a signal that must be 

acknowledged), a better error-detection 

system and improved interoperability 

between pieces of equipment 

By JohnKaluta 

from different manufacturers. Another 

part of the protocol addresses the issue 

of local control of any part of the system, 

allowing a sort of overarching control 

to mix with (or be superseded by) a 

smaller control system placed wherever 

it’s needed. 

Just as drafting has moved to AutoCAD 

and beyond, and just as graphic arts has 

moved to PageMaker (and beyond), entertainment 

system control will very likely 

move to ACN. 

The idea, of course, is to use the existing 

Ethernet base and parts of TCP/IP to allow 

the analog world of designers to become 

the digital world of controlled lights (and 

sound, and fog, and haze, and anything else 

we care to imagine). Using some of the existing 

TCP/IP protocols to carry the ACN data 

builds in a compatibility that DMX doesn’t 

have. DMX works by putting out 512 (8-bit) 

codes every 1 / 44 

of a second — essentially a 

long, fast serial port. I suppose when it was 

dreamed up, 512 possible channels seemed 

like plenty, and 256 (theoretical, anyway) 

levels of control was heaven for those of us 

used to 0 to 99. But we all know that moving 

lights sucked up all the channels, and 

the 0-255 thing didn’t always work as well 

as could be hoped anyway. 

ACN is different. Built “from the ground 

up,” according to Underhill, ACN is open 

ended and can control an unlimited number 

of channels. ETC’s new Eos console (one 

of the first to offer ACN control) offers 8000 

outputs. And, since the manufacturers aren’t 

willing to cut off their nose to spite their 

face, ACN-to-DMX converters are available. 

You’ll lose a few features, but gain the use of 

your existing DMX-controlled inventory. 

One little sticking point is that ACN uses 

regular old Ethernet wiring, which is great, 

except Ethernet wiring has certain unbreakable 

limits. Take, for example, the limit of the 

length of a cable run — 300 feet — which 

could prove a little frustrating in implementation. 

The plan is to go to switches and fiber 

optics to beat that issue. The standard 

of Internet compatibility is built into ACN, 

which raises the concept of remote control 

lighting design, which sounds like fun. 

So, do you need to run out and buy 

ACN-ready equipment for your next gig? 

Probably not. For one thing, precious little 

ACN-ready equipment is available today. 

But the day may come when a visitor drops 

by your place and says, “Oh, you have one 

of these old-fashioned DMX rigs? How in 

the world do you cope?” 

Watch this space. 

John Kaluta teaches Research & Experimentation 

and Robotics at Montgomery 

Blair High School in Silver Spring, MD, 

and sponsors the Stage Crew there. He is 

also the author of The Perfect Stage Crew 

and The Compleat Technical Guide for 

High School, College, and Community 

Theatre, available at the PLSN Bookshelf. Email 

him at jkaluta@plsn.com. 



FOCUSONDESIGN 

The Illusion 

of Diffusion 

“The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, 

but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.” - Alvin Toffler 


A 

couple of months ago, I came face to 

face with the realization that all I had 

known to be true about diffusion was 

little more than illusion. For several years I put 

those little square pieces of plastic in front of 

my luminaires to magically transform the subject 

by changing the quality of the light. But by 

sheer accident I found it wasn’t changing it as 

much as I thought. 

I was recently commissioned to write an 

instruction booklet about lighting design. 

When the text was finished, I went about illustrating 

it, creating graphics and taking 

pictures to illustrate certain points. When I 

downloaded the pictures and saw them on 

the computer, I realized the shots of diffusion 

didn’t look like I expected. 

I use diffusion for one primary reason: to 

soften the light. Soft light makes soft shadows 

and great pictures. It smoothes wrinkles and 

renders age lines virtually invisible. Think of a 

textured wall, like the ones in your house. When 

it’s illuminated by focused, directional light, the 

texture stands out and you can see every detail 

in the wall. But with softer, more diffuse light, 

the texture all but disappears. Diffusion scatters 

and softens light. At least, that’s what I thought. 

But the pictures I saw didn’t bear that out. 

For my illustrations I used a basketball because 

it has a nice bumpy texture and an orange 

color. I carefully set up my camera on a 

tripod and an ETC Source Four where I would 

normally put my key light. I then took a series of 

pictures starting with no diffusion and working 

my way through every piece of diffusion material, 

from light to heavy, that I could put my 

hands on. As I was placing the diffusion in the 

fixture I could see the field widen — a telltale 

sign that the diffusion is scattering the light. 

When I finally looked at the pictures, much 

to my surprise, I couldn’t tell the difference 

between those with light diffusion and those 

with medium to heavy diffusion. The shadow 

of the basketball was clearly very sharply defined, 

unlike the soft shadows I was expecting. 

And the dimples of the basketball were totally 

visible in all the pictures. At best, I could only 

see a slight difference between the pictures 

with no diffusion and those with heavy diffusion. 

What went awry? 

I scratched my head and then called somebody 

a lot smarter than me — Josh Allemany 

of Rosco, whose last name, I think, translates 

roughly to “Einstein” in Yiddish. I quizzed Josh 

about their diffusion, and he was gracious 

enough to send me a sample of every type 

of diffusion material that Rosco makes. I then 

took the sample pack to Westlake High School 

in Austin where my friend David Poole is the 

theatre tech director, and I borrowed their theatre 

to unlearn and relearn everything I could 

about diffusion. 

I essentially repeated my photography session 

with the basketball, one Source Four, and 

a variety of diffusion. My sense was that the effectiveness 

of the diffusion was somehow related 

to where it was placed in the path of the 

beam. I thought that by placing it further away 

from the fixture it would be more effective. 

Also, since my original pictures were shot in my 

Diffusion scatters and softens light. 

But the pictures didn’t bear that out. 

small studio, 

I was forced 

to use a very 

short throw. 

This time I 

would have 

a much longer 

throw. 

Instead of 

simply placing 

the diffusion in front of the Source Four, I 

varied the distance between the luminaire and 

the diffusion by holding it in place. 

I took over a hundred pictures, and this 


time they came out differently. The shadows 

were much softer in all the pictures, leading 

me to believe that effectiveness of the diffusion 

is related to the throw distance; the 

longer the throw, the more effective the diffusion. 

But the texture of the ball was still plainly 

visible. Based on the outcome of the pictures, 

I now believe that there are certain things 

diffusion can do and certain things that it 

cannot do. 

Diffusion does: 

•Spread the field; the heavier the diffusion 

the more it spreads the field. 

•Soften shadows; the longer the throw, 

the more scattered the light and the softer the 

shadows become. 

•Decrease the intensity 

of the illumination; the 

heavier the diffusion, the 

greater the light loss. 

On the other hand, 

diffusion does not convert 

a point source, like 

a Leko, to a linear source 

like a Kinoflo. 

It seems to me that 

no matter how much diffusion 

you use in a point 

source, it’s very difficult to 

obscure textures and age lines. Linear sources 

and very large sources, like a large diameter 

Fresnel, do that best. Perhaps that’s why the 

“jewel” method of lighting, where you surround 

the subject with many sources, is so popular 

in Hollywood — it approximates a linear 

source. If the McCandless method with three 

points of light is good, then the jewel method 

with six or so points of light is excellent. Add 

diffusion and it becomes pure magic. 

What still confounds me is the tradeoff 

between soft light and spill control. The 

more scattered the light, the more difficult 

it is to place it where it belongs and keep it 

away from where it does not belong. And 

the longer the throw, the more difficult a 

problem it becomes. Someone cleverer 

than I should invent a soft light with a very 

long throw to use in applications where I- 

Mag is being used in conjunction with a 

live audience. The presence of a live audience 

precludes the use of large soft boxes, 

which can interfere with lines of sight, and 

large Fresnels lack the control of a long 

throw Leko. 

Diffusion is a wonderful and necessary 

tool for the lighting designer, but it has to be 

used properly to get the right results. This little 

foray into the application of diffusion was a 

great eye opener. When you’ve been working 

on assumed knowledge for many years and 

then you find out you weren’t quite on the 

mark, it can shake the core of your existence. 

And that can be a very good thing. 

Don’t hide in the shadows. E-mail the author 

at rcadena@plsn.com. 



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ADVERTISER’SINDEX 

COMPANY PG#RS# PH# URL COMPANY PG#RS# PH# URL 

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AC Lighting 31 416.255.9494 www.aclighting.com/northamerica 

All Access Staging & Prod. 16 310.784.2464 www.allaccessinc.com 

American DJ 9 800.322.6337 www.americandj.com 

Angstrom Lighting 53 www.angstromlighting.com 

Applied Electronics 37 800.883.0008 www.appliednn.com 

ARRI, Inc. 17 845.353.1400 www.arri.com 

Atlanta Rigging 39 404.355.4370 www.atlantarigging.com 

Branam 3, 26 661.295.3300 www.branament.com 

Bulbtronics 50 800.227.2852 www.bulbtronics.com 

Chauvet Lighting 15 800.762.1084 www.chauvetlighting.com 

Checkers Industrial Prod. 19 800.438.9336 www.checkersindustrial.com 

City Theatrical Inc. 32 800.230.9497 www.citytheatrical.com 

Coast Wire & Plastic 

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Cooling & Power Rentals 8 888.871.5503 

49 800.514.9473 www.coastwire.com 

Creative Stage Lighting 12, 18 518.251.3302 www.creativestagelighting.com 

Delicate 27 www.delicate.com 

Doug Fleenor Design 18 888.436.9512 www.dfd.com 

Elation C4 866.245.6726 www.elationlighting.com 

ESP Vision 19 702.492.6923 www.esp-vision.com 

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High End Systems 43 512.836.2242 www.highend.com 

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Johnson Systems 14 403.287.8003 www.johnsonsystems.com 

Le Maitre 13 519.659.7972 www.lemaitrefx.com 

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MDG Fog Generators Limited 23 800.663.3020 www.mdgfog.com 

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Paradigm Production Services 52 954.933.9210 www.paradigmlighting.com 

PR Lighting LTD 29 253.395.9494 www.omnisistem.com 

R&M Materials Handling 40 800.955.9967 www.rmhoist.cm 

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Screenworks 28 800.868.2898 

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Staging Dimensions 21 866.591.3471 www.stagingdimensionsinc.com 

Strong Entertainment Lighting 38 800.262.5016 www.strong-lighting.com 

Techni-Lux C2 - 1 407.857.8770 www.techni-lux.com 

TMB 19 818.899.8818 www.tmb.com 

Tribe Inc 10 310.452.8683 www.tribedesign.net 

Tyler Truss Systems 51 903.877.0300 www.tylertruss.com 

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DK Capital 54 517.347.7844 www.dkcapitalinc.com 

ELS 54 800.357.5444 www.elslights.com 

Hybrid Case 54 800.346.4638 www.discount-distributors.com 

Light Source Inc. 54 248.685.0102 

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RC4 54 866.258.4577 www.theatrewireless.com 

Roadshow 54 800.861.311 www.roadshowservices.com 

TLS 54 866.254.7803 www.tlsinc.com 

Upstaging 54 815.899.9888 www.upstaging.com 


CSI: Miami 

continued from page 25 

show. Still, I’d watch it with that cryogenic 

stuff. Anything else I should know 

about that you’re keeping behind your 

“privacy” glass? 

Dino: There’s nothing in the direct line 

of sight. Everything’s been mounted above. 

We did that because we also have a threewatt 

multi-colored laser that has the ability 

to project on the screens in the frosted 

state. We also use it in the clear state where 

we get a refraction off the glass itself 

while it also projects through that to the 

outer walls. 

CSI: Well, you couldn’t have pulled this 

off by yourself, so you’d better start giving 

us some names. 

Dino: We brought in an external programmer, 

not only to program the DL.2s 

and to use them to their full ability, but 

also to train the lighting personnel on 

how to get the most out of 

these fixtures. His name 

is Scott Chmielewski of Digital 

Media Designs. 

There’s one primary technician 

and two alternates. 

The primary technician is 

Len Rove. He’s in charge. 

He’s the man who maintains 

the fixtures, makes 

sure they’re used to their 

full ability, and makes 

sure all the nights are 

staffed with the proper 

personnel to run the 

lights. Right now, he 

oversees two to three junior 

lighting technicians. 

Len works several of the larger clubs 

in Miami, so he brought to the table the 

ability to work with the other DJs because 

he knows the music, which is a very important 

component of any lighting or visual 

media technician. 

CSI: You’re lying to me, Dino, 

and I don’t like being lied to. How 

could any one technician handle this 

system himself? 

Dino: It’s always been my philosophy 

that total integration makes for a more provocative 

show. So if my light man — or my 

light artist, or visual artist, now that they’ve 

been promoted to higher and better things 

— if he has the ability to stay in one place 

and focus on what he’s doing, and sort of 

control subsystems without taking his hands 

off the board, I just think it makes for a better 

light show, or video show now. 

CSI: You’d better give me an example. 

Dino: The DL.2s have the ability to use 

their onboard cameras to output to other 

projectors or other DL.2s. 

Current DMX controllable video 

switchers only go up to four-by-four matrices. 

We have eight fixtures, and we wanted 

the ability to switch any image to any one 

— in other words, a full eight-by-eight matrix 

switcher. 

Crestron is very big in the automation 

industry: home automation, commercial 

automation, building management. We 

had the ability to use one of their stock 

pieces along with a processor that was going 

to be doing facility control like lighting, 

HVAC and stuff like that. 

We got the Hog iPC lighting console 

to talk to this processor and do the video 

switching for the DL.2s, as well as control 

the privacy glass in the center of the 

dance floor. 

CSI: So after…where’s that name… 

[mumble]…after Mr. Chmielewski pre-programmed 

the console, he apparently fled 

the county. Do your “technicians” throw up 

the same looks every night? 

Dino: The glory of the DL.2 and the rig 

we have is that new looks and new creations 

can be done on the fly, in real-time. 

Len, of course, is the senior. The others 

have the abilities to access the media files 

and bring up certain looks. 

They all become very creative in their 

own way. Each of them has their own abilities 

and, of course, their own restrictions. 

But the DL.2 is such an open palette that 

no matter who is running the lights at any 

given time, they just have this amazing and 

incredible feel to them. Even though someone 

may do something differently to a certain 

DJ’s set, it’s something new and fresh 

every time. You think, “Wow, I never really 

thought of that.” 

It’s always a joy to me, as a designer, 

to look at a lighting system or video 

system, and think to myself, “How did 

he possibly do that? I never thought 

of using the lights and the video in 

that particular capacity.” But, somehow 

they do it. 

CSI: You think you’re pretty special, 

huh? Just what do you think the people 

outside this cell are saying? 

Dino: We put a lot of detail into this nightclub. 

It wasn’t going to be “gut the room, 

clean it up, throw up some lights and then 

just run with it.” Besides the high tech 

wow effect that they get, these are some 

of the words that people have described 

in seeing the club: clean, friendly, bright 

atmosphere and “Some place that you’d 

want to be.” 

Several well-known club owners 

and DJs down there have expressed 

this to us. 

With the DL.2s and the level of integration 

that we have, they’ve really never 

seen anything like this anywhere else 

in the world. And these are people who 

have been to clubs, not only in the United 

States, but overseas in the UK and Ibiza. 

Well-known DJs have said there’s 

nothing like this anywhere else in 

the world. 

CSI: Well, we can’t hold you on any of 

this, but we’ll be watching you and your 

nightclub. Do you have anything else to 

say for yourself? 

Dino: People told us “Nobody dances 

anymore, just set up couches.” 

Every night that they’re open, the dance 

floor is the most crowded place in the 

entire nightclub. 

Phil Gilbert is a freelance lighting designer/programmer. 

He can be reached at 

pgilbert@ plsn.com. 



LDATLARGE 

By NookSchoenfeld 

Anyone? 

[In the last t wo columns, 

lighting designer 

Nook Schoenfeld 

and a posse of LDs including 

Bob Peterson, 

John Featherstone 

and Olivier Ilisca sat 

down for lunch to discuss 

how they got into 

the industr y and what 

makes them successful. 

What we’ve learned 

so far is that, of the 

four designers, none 

of them were formally 

educated, but they all 

recognize the value of 

a good education. But 

when it comes to work, 

nothing can replace 

experience and handson 

training. And, if you 

really want to excel, 

there’s one more ver y 

impor tant ingredient. 

To find out what 

that is, read this, the 

last installment of the 

three-par t series, “Sushi 

in Chicago.”-ed.] 

John: How about a 

little passion? Show me 

you’re into the gig. At 

the auto show last year 

I noticed one of my interns 

walking around 

with a grin from earto-ear. 

He walked up to 

me and just said “This 

is so-o-o cool.” I love 

that. That’s what I’m 

looking for; someone 

who really wants to be 

there. 

Nook: That’s so true. 

You look for somebody 

who just wants to do what we do. The 

money’s not the reason; the art is. 

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“I assumed everyone was in the 

theatre for the same reason as me; 

for the love of it.” 

Olivier: In my early theatre days there 

was no money. I assumed everyone was in 

the theatre for the same reason as me: for 

the love of it. 

Nook: Perhaps that’s why we’re able 

to make some good money these days. 

John: Speaking of which, I’m still surprised 

that people are willing to pay me 

for my services. 

Nook: I know — that old adage about 

protecting our phony-baloney jobs. 

John: Exactly. Sooner or later somebody’s 

going to find us out and ask for their 

money back! 

Bob: And then the more you charge, 

- Olivier Ilisca 

the better they think you are. 

Olivier: So true. But we will always 

remember when we did the same job for 

peanuts and the love of it all. 

Bob: But to me...I love what I do. I 

think I’m an incredibly lucky guy who’s 

had some amazing breaks and worked 

with fantastic people. I was fortunate 

to get some breaks in the T V business 

and learn enough to make a living out 

of it. 

John: The young people that resonate 

with me are the people who demonstrate 

excitement. Nowadays it seems to be so 

cool to not be impressed with anything. It 

makes me want to slap 

the shit out of my 13- 

year-old. [Rhetorically 

speaking, of course! Do 

not try this at home. 

– ed.] I’m sorry, but 

passion is a wonderful 

energy source. 

Nook: Absolutely. 

I remember programming 

lights on a rock 

show for the first time. 

I couldn’t believe that 

I was actually making 

money for something 

I loved so much. 

I would’ve done it for 

free if I knew I could 

have gotten that high 

of a feeling. 

John: Don’t show 

me a degree, show me 

some excitement. 

Nook: What other 

advice do we have to 

offer to youngsters 

who want to pursue 

this silly business 

of ours? 

Olivier: The only 

way to move ahead, and 

unfortunately we must 

always move forward, is 

that you cannot become 

stale. You must grow 

with the business. 

Bob: Adapt. Each designer 

has his own style, 

and you will find your 

own in time. But one 

must be able to adapt to 

every different type of 

gig. Theatre is different 

from rock, which is different 

from TV. You can’t 

use the same lighting 

applications for these very different entities. 

John: Be excited about your projects, 

and your imagination will follow. 

Bob: And what do you guys want to be 

remembered for after you’re gone? Myself, I 

get satisfaction when I see portraits of old 

performers that are well lit, and know that I 

lit them beautifully for that shot. 

John: Inspiring someone young, much 

as my mentors inspired me. If I can inspire 

someone half as much as guys like Roy Bennett, 

John Huddleston and Norm Schwab 

inspired me, that would be more than 

enough. 

Olivier: I want it to be known that I 

loved light and life. 

Nook: I’d like to be remembered as the 

guy who gave a few young designers their 

breaks in their careers, the guy who taught 

and opened those doors for some talented 

individuals to kick in. 

E-mail Nook at nschoenfeld@plsn.com.

Spectacle of Lights - PLSN.com

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