September Issue - PLSN.com

INTERNATIONALNEWS
Jurassic Lighting
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LONDON—White Light, the exclusive UK
distributor for the range of DMX networking
and control equipment from ELC, has supplied
eight ELC miniSTOREs to the new Dino
Jaws traveling exhibition from the Natural
History Museum.
Designed by exhibition designers Ralph
Appelbaum Associates (RAA), the lighting for
Dino Jaws has been designed by leading architectural
and exhibition lighting consultants
dha design. “Dino Jaws features eight automated
dinosaurs and an interactive display area
called the LAB. The aesthetic requirement was
to light each dinosaur, but not to make a light
show so dazzling it distracted from them,” explains
Flick Ansell of dha design. “The brief was
subtle changing landscapes and, importantly,
to make shadow play on the different colored
backdrop between each dinosaur. “
“There was also a practical brief that each
display area could, in future, be toured as a
stand alone exhibit. This meant that the lighting
for each area had to be integral to that
area.” To help facilitate this, dha and RAA developed
high-level and low-level three-circuit
track lighting positions that were then routed
back to one six-way dimmer rack per dinosaur.
“The control and dimmer systems were
developed with Roger Hennigan and Julie
Harper of White Light at a mock up with
the Natural History Museum, RAA and the
electrical contractor Reed Electrical all present,
so that everyone understood what was
possible—the difference between ‘moving
lights’ and ‘the movement of light’ is best
explained to non-lighting specialists by a
mock-up,” Flick explains.
For programming the lighting, a series
of linked cues creating dynamic lighting
sequences, White Light supplied an ETC Express
console. Once the lighting for each
dinosaur was completed, that entire lighting
sequence was recorded into one ELC
miniSTORE per dinosaur. The miniSTORE is
a reduced version of ELC’s showSTORE show
backup system; it captures up to 512 channels
of DMX data from another lighting console
in real time, and can then play it back to
provide show backup or, in the case of Dino
Jaws, complete show playback.
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Art Imitates Light
LANCASHIRE, UK—HSL supplied all lighting,
rigging and staging for the Whiteplane
2 project, a live interactive performance/
art installation tour using an atmospheric
mix of ambisonic sound and architectural
lighting, created by experimental artists
Alex Bradley and Charles Poulet. The audience
enters the space and sit, stand or lie
between the two planes of light, which
change color and intensity as the piece unfolds.
The multilayered physical experience
is completed by the “walls” of sound coming
in from the sides, immersing everyone
in tonal sweeps of color and sonic waves.
Bradley and Poulet have used conventional
lighting in many of
their previous works, but
this was their first time with
LED and they were originally
put into contact with HSL by
Chris Ewington, inventor of
the Pixel range of products.
HSL’s Ian Stevens managed
the project.
The floor is made up
from 8x4 Steeldeck frames
covered with a special Perspex
mesh. The PixelLines
sit below this, on a floor area
covered with Lee silvered
gel. The top plane is made
from standard rear projection
screen, stretched taught with bungies
on a frame constructed from A-type trussing,
suspended by four one-ton Lodestar
motors. A Tomcat 1 truss bridging system
over the top of the A-type is used to support
the PixelLines that shine down through
the screen material from the top plane. This
was a collaborative design by HSL’s head of
rigging Rupert Reynolds Charles Poulet and
Alex Bradley.
The PixelLines are run DMX through an
Expression lighting console. The HSL team
also supplied motors and flew the d&b line
array PA from Orbital with another four
one-ton Lodestars.
Visitors at the Whiteplane 2 installation