Set & Light: Winter 2014 (Issue 113)

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 1

Issue 113: Winter 2014

www.stld.org.uk

Set & Light from the Society of Television Lighting and Design

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 2

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 3

Editorial

Recollections of the past, reports of the present and emails in future!

I

’m really excited about this issue of Set & Light. We have fabulous stories from 1974, as well as reports of our latest visits, including our 40th anniversary get-together at The Shard, which incorporated a visit to the Greenwood Theatre.

We have lined up some great visits for 2015, too. These include Philips at Chelsea FC; the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse; and the Celebration of Light at the Royal Institute, celebrating 200 years of the Fresnel and part of the International Year of Light 2015. So keep your eye out for the invitations in your inbox.

We send out all invitations to our events by email now and we are still missing a few people, so if you haven’t received any in the last couple of months, please contact us. For now, though, here is your official invitation to our next AGM. The 41st AGM of the STLD will be held on 13 January 2015 at St Martin’s Hall, St Martin-in-the-Fields, Trafalgar Square, London WC2N 4JJ Further details TBC – all to follow by email.

All there is to say now is enjoy this issue and have a wonderful Christmas and a prosperous and healthy new year!

Emma Thorpe Editor

Contents 4

Letter from the Chairman

34

Information: BTS/RTS awards/KOI awards

6

STLD visit: AGM/The Shard

38

Recollection: Michael Hall

11

Recollection: Tabs magazine

42

Recollection: Rod Litherland

18

Lighting: Mike Baker in Taiwan

45

In memoriam

22

Lighting: Backstage Heritage Collection

47

A view from across the pond

26

Lighting: The BBC Proms

50

Sponsor news

32

Recollection: Jeremy Hoare

76

Society sponsors

Set & Light is the journal of the Society of Television Lighting and Design and is published three times a year. ISSN 2055-1185 Editor: Emma Thorpe and Bernie Davis E-mail: editor@stld.org.uk Web: www.stld.org.uk Production Editor: Joanne Horne Sponsor News: Emma Thorpe E-mail: sponsornews@stld.org.uk Advertising: Paul Middleton E-mail: adverts@stld.org.uk Cover photo by: John O’Brien

Printed by: Gemini Brighton

Deadlines for the next issue: Editorial: 27 February 2015 Advertising: 20 February 2015 Advertising is accepted only from sponsor members of the Society © Society of Television Lighting and Design 2014

Set & Light | Winter 2014

3

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 4

Welcome

A letter from Chairman Stuart Gain Dear members, May I welcome you to this our 40th anniversary magazine!

Our inaugural meeting took place on 30 October 1974. I hope there may be some of you out there who were actually present on that occasion and can remember it! Things were very different then as the original members were mainly lighting people from the BBC and ITV. The early days were mainly about BBC and ITV staff being able to meet up, discuss ideas on lighting and have a few drinks at the same time. I was both fascinated and horrified to learn that even strippers were included in the entertainment at times! You will be glad to know that at the next AGM (13 January hint, hint!) all the committee will be required to attend fully clothed so there’s no excuse to not turn up!

I could go on at length about how successful the STLD has been over the last 40 years. Indeed, I joined in 1984 (10th anniversary) and I have enjoyed every moment, from visiting many fascinating places to meeting interesting and lovely people. This is testament in itself to the society’s success and longevity.

As well as celebrating our 40th anniversary, which we did in style, earlier in the year, with a trip up The Shard, my duties as Chairman would not be complete if I didn’t cast a note of caution for the future. If we want to see the STLD succeed for the next 40 years, we do need to recruit more members.

During my time in the chair, I have tried to make joining the society less of a ‘closed shop’ and more open to a greater variety of people in the industry.

Our recruitment should be twofold. As members, we should all be actively looking out for potential members and signing them up for membership. The other potential area for recruitment is in the student sector. Recruiting the youngsters works well for other societies, such as the ALD, and I would like to see us becoming a lot more proactive in this area. If we can build upon our membership then this society has a very strong future.

I hope you all enjoy reading this special edition of the magazine and find some interesting facts in the 1974 articles. All that remains for me to do is to wish you all a very merry Christmas and a peaceful and prosperous new year!

Thank you for your continued support and I look forward to meeting as many of you as possible at the meeting and AGM on 13 January 2015.

With best wishes to you all, Stuart Gain 4

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 5

Set & Light | Winter 2014

5

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 6

STLD visit

A high point in our history Words: Ian Dow Photos: John O’Brien In the beginning there was light, then there was Strand Electric, and then, on 30 October 1974, the Society of Television Lighting Directors was formed. Which is why, some 40 years later, 70 members and friends of the STLD came together to celebrate.

In those early days of television lighting, the only opportunity for the two camps of the BBC and ITV to meet each other was the occasional meetings set up by Fred Bentham of Strand Electric at its showrooms in King Street, Hammersmith, to view and discuss their latest products. This led to a small group of LDs coming together to discuss the possibility of forming a TV lighting society. John Treays of the BBC wrote inviting all his BBC lighting colleagues, while Chris Bartlett Judd of London Weekend Television covered all the ITV companies. Some 200 people turned up at Strand’s premises on the appointed date, each clutching a fee of £2, and the STLD became a reality!

King Street, Hammersmith, was probably much easier to find than Weston Street, SE1, the location of the first of the three venues for our 2014 celebration. Members relying on satnav apps on their smartphones to navigate through the enormous building site that used to be London Bridge Station found themselves clambering over hoardings, getting lost in dead ends and searching in vain for roads under railway arches that no longer existed. Meanwhile, those studying Andrew Dixon’s handdrawn map (pictured above), loosely based on the Reverend Christopher Awdry’s map of the Isle of Sodor, home of Thomas the Tank Engine, went straight to the Greenwood Theatre.

Andrew had conveniently included the entrance to A&E at Guy’s Hospital for those who might have imbibed too much by the end of the evening!

The Greenwood Theatre

We were welcomed with a refreshing cup of coffee or tea and a mini buffet 6

Set & Light | Winter 2014

before taking our place in the auditorium. This University of London theatre was built within the Guy’s Hospital complex, and one does wonder whether the architects misunderstood their brief, causing considerable surprise to the surgeons when they first stepped inside clutching their scalpels.

Andrew welcomed us to our 40th anniversary celebration, quoting from Founder Chairman John Treays’ speech at the STLD 21st celebration at the Royal Bath Hotel in Bournemouth in 1995. In comparison to today’s attendance at STLD meetings, one of the society’s meetings in their first year was a visit to Rome hosted by Rank Film Equipment and Quartzcolour Ianaro, with 66 lighting directors flying out in a Boeing 707. The aircraft aborted its take-off, was hit by lightning and a member of the STLD contingent locked a lady in the toilet after she had stabbed a stewardess – you’ll have to read back issue 58 of Television Lighting, as our magazine was then known, for the full story!

Andrew then introduced our

speaker, John Beveridge. John was a member of Crew 1 at Television Centre back in 1959. He then rose through vision mixing and floor managing to become a Producer and Director in BBC Current Affairs. He and Andrew then left the BBC in the early days of freelancing and set up an independent TV studio in Gillingham, before moving their operation to the Greenwood.

John told us that one of their major shows was Question Time, with the technical facilities supplied by a BBC Outside Broadcast scanner parked in the narrow street. This was unusually equipped with an axe to cut through the camera cables in case a fire engine needed access and the scanner had to be quickly driven away! After five years the BBC moved the show on the road, and the theatre lease came up for grabs. There were some rather murky negotiations with the leaseholder, a cohort of the underworld’s George Biggs, and the Greenwood lease was taken over by Network 1. John’s wife Angela came on board to deal with outside contacts, and they were able to re-equip the studio internally with

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 7

AGM/The Shard

The view from The Shard

Members enjoyed a mini buffet at the Greenwood Theatre

In years to come, people will ask, ‘Who is this John O’Brien, of whom we hear so much, but who never appears in any photos?’

John Beveridge and Andrew Dixon

The auditorium at the Greenwood Theatre Tower Bridge and the Tower of London, viewed from The Shard

Set & Light | Winter 2014

7

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 8

STLD visit

cameras, sound and galleries.

There was a chance to bid for the Jonathan Ross show in 1989, three days a week for Channel 4. The studio was empty, and so to make it look like a going concern, they hired freelancers for the day. As Jonathan arrived outside, John rang Andrew on his mobile. “Go, go, go!” he shouted, and suddenly lighting bars were dropped in, tabs swung into place and Jonathan was most impressed by the feverish activity and the ambience, and that clinched the deal.

Russell Harty and Parkinson were other chat shows hosted at the Greenwood. Parkinson’s set used the full depth of the stage, with so much scenery that it wasn’t practical to derig it each week, so that any other shows could only use the extension in front of the stage. On arriving through the stage door, the first sign that production staff saw was: ‘The stage must only be used as a storage area’!

They had a good team running the Greenwood, more as a TV theatre than a studio. John with his experience in TV current affairs and also theatre; Andrew with his knowledge of the technicalities of television and lighting, and his theatre knowledge from his voluntary work at The Questors in Ealing; and Roy Devlin, the third member of the team, who had worked as Technical Manager and Company Manager for Danny Le Rue, as well as in TV. John said ‘with that experience you couldn’t pull the wool over our eyes’!

Other studios became available and lightweight cameras made it easier to use any free space. This, coupled with the 1990 recession, meant the work dried up eventually. All the technical gear was stripped from the building, with even the light switches torn from the wall. The building was owned by the Special Trustees of Guy’s Hospital, and after several meetings, John and his team went into a profit sharing partnership and, with help from Teddington Studios, formed London Bridge Studios. They used drive-in scanners from Thames TV and Roll to Record, lighting from Samuelson and all the furniture remaining at Thames in Euston. This gave them another five years of life, but the Greenwood closed as a TV studio in 1998.

In that time, the Greenwood hosted 8

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Dinner at Strada

The Chairman’s speech

a myriad of TV shows, including situation comedies with Jo Brand, Armstrong and Millar, Tim Vine and Al Murray, together with General Election debates, Play School, BSkyB talent shows and the chat shows already mentioned.

Andrew then told us about the technical facilities. Initially, there were 11 lighting bars front of house, seven have since been replaced by truss. There were 50 scenic flying bars operated manually by rope and counterweight, which were very flexible as they could operate at any speed – unlike motorised studio hoists. The theatre dimmers were at the back of the audience, but Brian Fitt installed LD 90 dimmers for TV on the stage fly floor, which are still there, and there were also some touring type rock ‘n’ roll dimmers brought in for the Jonathan Ross series. Interestingly, for the snap lighting effects as used on that show, they found that the TV dimmers were slow, the rock ‘n’ roll better, but the quickest of all were the old theatre dimmers!

The current management were very kind in allowing us to roam freely through the theatre. Simon Taylor, the

resident technician, hosted visits to the control rooms, stage, dressing room and scene store. Incidentally, Simon’s father works for the BBC Research & Development Department. Even though the lighting gallery had been refurbished, the old analogue clock with blue and red rehearsal and transmission lights was still ticking away. In the old sound control room, Simon’s boss Catherine Sharman’s office, we could see from their wall calendar that the theatre is very busy, hosting visiting companies, student shows and conferences.

The Shard

Those clutching the prized copies of Andrew’s map led the assembled company towards The Shard, squeezing through narrow alleyways between builder’s hoardings, down a dead-end street with a bus stop which had not seen a 381, or indeed any bus, for years, and then past a liveried doorman into the base of the Shard. Making sure we had no liquid greater than 100mls, we took off jackets, dumped heavy metal into trays and passed through

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 9

AGM/The Shard

Tower Bridge at night

the airline-type security into the heart of the building. Shepherded into the first lift we ascended to the 33rd floor, then transferred to a second lift for the 10-second ascent from the 33rd to the 68th floor. To distract those with weak stomachs, a video screen in the roof of the lift showed us flying upward through leaves, then rain, then into sunshine and blue sky as we shuddered to a halt.

We still weren’t there and had to climb stairs to the 69th floor for a panoramic view of London. No doubt to justify the expense to those who had paid for the trip (all part of the deal to STLD members) there was even a champagne bar. Adventurous members of the party could then climb another three flights of stairs to the 72nd floor into the iconic shards of glass, which we had only seen from afar. There was no way of climbing over the glass walls and plummeting to earth, but you could certainly feel the wind and get rained on!

The views were quite spectacular, particularly for railway enthusiasts, who could watch the model-like rush-hour trains from Charing Cross, Blackfriars

and Cannon Street squeezing through the two-line bottleneck above Borough Market. The Thames wound its way into the distance, with HMS Belfast looking quite slim in the foreground. We could recognise Wembley Stadium, and the Post Office Tower actually looked quite small. However, the new buildings across the river in the City looked a very untidy bunch to my untrained eye.

The weather was reasonably clear to the south and east, and Kent and the South Downs were visible, but cloud towards the west cut any chance of seeing Windsor or the Chilterns.

Gazing into space I overheard a conversation between two of our members lamenting the lack of knowledge of present-day production teams. Apparently, one had received an email from a production manager on quite a prestigious OB, complaining about one of the crew in the cost estimate she had received. “Why is Simon Hoist so expensive? What does he do, and can we find someone cheaper?” The mind boggles...

Several of us then made the mistake of leaving The Shard by the door

labelled EXIT. Soon we were transported up an escalator into rooftop territory uncharted by Andrew’s hand-drawn map. The challenge was to get across the 15 platforms of London Bridge Station without having to tap in with an Oyster Card, so being charged by the computer for the longest journey possible from there. (Andrew insists that his map clearly shows the two ground-floor levels and the route to Tooley Street, but it seems a shame to let the facts get in the way of a good story!)

The next challenge was to find our restaurant, Strada. Rather than follow Andrew’s recommended route down the diesel fumed atmosphere of Tooley Street, we were tempted to take a shortcut through a building to the Thames Path, which we could clearly see on the other side through the glass façade. As an office worker left we nipped inside before the door closed – only to find ourselves trapped in an abandoned office block. Eventually a kindly security officer took pity on us, and after a stern warning, let us out the far side onto the embankment to rejoin our colleagues.

Dinner at Strada

Before going in for our meal we had a group photograph taken on the Thames embankment with Tower Bridge as a backdrop. In years to come, people will ask: “Who is this John O’Brien of whom we hear so much, but who never appears in any group photos?”

Others who missed the photo were the entire team from Rosco, who had been so bamboozled by Andrew’s map that they had felt the need to take time out to rest in a hostelry to study it in greater detail.

Andrew had arranged a group of tables on the first floor of the restaurant overlooking the Tower of London and Tower Bridge. We were welcomed with a glass of prosecco, sitting proudly on a beer mat featuring the original STRAND ELECTRIC logo, which we all know so well – some of us from the past, and some of us whose budgets are such that we are still working with 50-year-old lamps! Strand is now part of Philips Entertainment but it has been a proud sponsor of the society from that first meeting in 1974 Set & Light | Winter 2014

9

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 10

STLD visit

when it was part of The Rank Organisation. Our thanks to Strand for its generous support of this meeting, and to Alan Luxford and Bill Richards for dishing out the nostalgic logos.

As usual, it was a splendid meal, with the starter of antipasto being as filling as an average main course. Pollo funghi and panacotta followed, to be rounded off with a coffee. As darkness fell, the scene outside the picture windows became even more dramatic as Tower Bridge was outlined, no doubt in LEDs, although they looked like the old-fashioned golf ball bulbs we all know so well. There was a gap of about a metre between the rail at the edge of the balcony area, where we were dining, and the plate-glass picture windows that rose up past all the floors of the restaurant. Members congregated as close to the windows as they could to capture this magnificent sight, each taking a splendid picture of the reflection of the restaurant. Where were the sparks, one might ask, holding up sheets of black poly?

Our section of the restaurant was shared by around 20 other diners, several of them couples out for a romantic dinner staring lovingly into each other’s eyes over a glass of wine. As Andrew introduced our Chairman, they realised with horror that they were about to be regaled with the history of television lighting from 1974 to the present day.

They took it rather well and our members thanked them with applause.

The Chairman arose and, in true STLD tradition, stood in an unlit area and delivered his speech entirely without the aid of a microphone. Although the other diners on our level maintained a reverential hush, the noise coming up from the floor below was quite considerable. So for those STLD members unable to join us for the evening, and indeed for those who were there but haven’t yet mastered the art of lip reading, I will replicate the Chairman’s hand-scribbled notes as best I can: “Ladies and gentlemen, members and guests, I’d like to welcome you to this 40th anniversary celebration of the STLD, and a particular welcome to Alan Luxford of Strand, who was at the very first meeting, and also to one of our longest-serving members, Duncan 10

Set & Light | Winter 2014

AGM/The Shard

The City at night

Brown. I could start by giving you a blow-by-blow account of what has happened during our 40 years, but don’t worry, I’m not going to!

Fortunately, we have a vehicle for that called a magazine where we intend to run a special 40th edition, which will have lots of articles marking the history of the society. Tonight is all about enjoying ourselves and marking our 40th year not in lights, but in heights – namely, The Shard. We have our very own MC and Red Coat Peggy Dixon (sorry, Andrew Dixon), so I’ll just get you in the mood here, ‘Hi Di Hi!’ (The only response came from a party of Japanese on table 12).

“Now I’ve mentioned sitcoms because many of us work on them and it came to my notice that Porridge is also 40 years old this year. As a society we don’t have a lot in common with the show, except we do have our own versions of Fletcher, Mr McKay, Grouty and Luke Warm – mostly on the committee, although I’ll leave you decide who’s who.

“We also share our birthday with Leonardo DiCaprio and Victoria Beckham. One connected with a sinking ship, and one with golden balls, so I’m hoping the similarity stops here!

It’s also 40 years ago that Jon Pertwee finished his role as Dr Who. Andrew and I have been trying to emulate his bouffant hairstyle ever since but not quite managed it.

“So, it was 40 years ago that a group of lighting directors from the BBC and

ITV decided to form an organisation to exchange ideas on what was then a fantastic industry. Sadly, we are in a very different world these days and the majority of people working in television are now freelance rather than staff. This gives the STLD many challenges and has meant that as an organisation we have had to move with the times. I hope we are rising to the challenge to remain a relevant organisation, although we still need to make changes, but hopefully we will always maintain the foundations on which the society was built thanks to the vision of those first committee members such as John Treays and Bill Lee. “Ladies and gentlemen, I do hope you enjoy this evening, and like any good evening out we have all the ingredients: travel, a show, followed by a drink and a ruby. Thank you very much.”

As ever, our grateful thanks to Andrew Dixon for once again coming up with such super locations in which to celebrate our 40th year. He did try to see if we could eat in a restaurant in The Shard, but the quote of £35,000 caused apoplexy to overcome the Treasurer, and his plan to float a video wall down the Thames congratulating us on our 40th was scuppered by the quote of £4,000 for a boat!

Thanks also to all our sponsors whose support for the society we gratefully appreciate, but in particular, a big thank you to the following sponsors who have stayed with us since that first meeting 40 years ago: Lee Filters, Osram, Philips Lighting, Rosco, Sony Broadcast and White Light.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 11

Recollection

Tabs magazine

In 1974, Tabs, the Strand house magazine, got a new editor. Fred Bentham had retired and Francis Reid , a well-known theatre lighting designer, took the helm. Francis wanted a new look and asked me to write about how a television studio play was lit.

Why me? Because I had contributed technical articles in the past to Tabs (I worked in the BBC engineering division), and in the early days of the STLD, there was nobody else Francis knew who might oblige. Fees were very small.

But Francis wanted the ‘how it was lit’ type of report, the artistic point of view. I talked to a few BBC lighting directors at Television Centre who I knew, and Dennis Channon (alias Peter Harris) agreed to talk to me and allowed me to follow him around and take a few pictures. What follows over the next few pages was the result.

Bob Anderson

Set & Light | Winter 2014

11

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 12

12

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 13

Set & Light | Winter 2014

13

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 14

14

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 15

Set & Light | Winter 2014

15

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 16

16

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 17

Set & Light | Winter 2014

17

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:20 Page 18

Lighting

Bangkok transit lounge

The training room with Mr Wang, right

Left, the typhoon forecast for Taiwan; this picture, warm tropical rain awaits Mike

Typhoons and training in Taiwan Words & photos: Mike Baker Taiwan, Taipei, typhoon

Three years ago, I received a request from Vic Gibbs, sadly no longer with us, to take part in some training for Taiwan’s PTS (Public Television Service) whose television studios had been refurbished by Vic’s company, Broadcast Lighting Systems, in the 1990s. I was there for a week, delivering lighting training for the guys at the ‘sharp end’ of the studios in Taipei, the capital of the island.

I didn’t expect to be part of the ongoing staff training at PTS after Vic’s demise and was genuinely surprised to get an email from Paul Chang, of IX Technology in Taipei, in June this year asking if I was available to deliver a repeat of my week of September 2011. With the date fixed for September, I was once again in touch with my mentor and friend of many years, Alan Bermingham. He had, as he put it, drawn a ‘line in the concrete’ a couple of years ago but he was still keen to help the likes of myself by loaning me some of the lighting training ‘goodies’ he had acquired over his many years in the business. A couple of days later, Postman 18

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Pat delivered a spot meter, Minolta lux and colour temperature meter, a spectroscope and a two small calibrated greyscales, along with attendant literature.

A little about Taiwan: historically called Formosa, from the Portuguese meaning ‘beautiful island’, it straddles the Tropic of Cancer just 100 miles off the coast of China. Until 1895 it was ruled by the Qing Dynasty, but Japan defeated China in the first Sino-Japanese War of that year.

It remained a Japanese colony until 1945, when it once again reverted to Chinese ‘ownership’. This has been a source of friction ever since, as Taiwan dragged itself out of post-war depression and poverty into a technologically successful country, exporting its produce to the USA and beyond.

On 20 September I found myself in the newly refurbished Terminal 2 at Heathrow. I checked out the weather forecast for Taiwan and immediately wished I hadn’t: Typhoon Fung Yong was destined to arrive in Taiwan that very day. Taiwan is hit by four typhoons a year on average. Wow, what luck, to arrive in a flimsy aeroplane in battering wind and rain. Not.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 19

Mike Baker in Taiwan

A fascinating and dynamic set for a chat show

Diva lighting for the female presenter.

The line-up level was 450 lux

A set with lots of depth when lit Non-dimmable, internallylit wedge-shaped setpieces on the floor

The rear of the set showing support struts preventing back lighting

After 13 hours we landed in Bangkok. While the Boeing 777 took on liquid sustenance, its bleary-eyed occupants trooped into the transit lounge (along with all their carry-on luggage) for another security check before re-boarding for the three hours-plus flight to Taipei, the capital city.

I took another look at the weather app, expecting a delay to be announced due to ‘inclement flying conditions’. That did not happen, so it was time to resign myself to reading the safety card while checking the under-seat position of my ‘life vest’. At least, I thought, the sea would be nice and warm in the Tropics. Are there sharks?

I later found out that Fung Yong had caused several deaths and deposited one metre of rain in 24 hours. Yes, one whole wet metre. Having just come from one of the driest summers in the UK for many years, that had particular significance. However, in spite of many international flights to and from Taiwan being cancelled, BR 068 landed smoothly and on time. I have had worse landings in the UK. The next morning, after a somewhat fragmented sleep, a car arrived with Alice, a 20-year-old business student, who was to be my translator for the first part of my week. I was whisked through rush-hour traffic to the studios of PTS. Delete ‘whisked’, insert ‘crawled’.

I was met at the studio door by the incredibly fit, marathon-running Mr Wang, who, along with several other faces from 2011, welcomed me and showed me to the

seminar room in one of PTS’s large studio centres. I started the ball rolling by showing some video extracts of UK-based news programmes from Channel Four, ITV and the Beeb just to give a flavour of ‘where we were at’ in TV news lighting and sets. Alice worked hard at translating all the tech speak stuff into Chinese and I worked hard at hoping that she got it right!

It was then time for a tour around the studios to see actual lit sets, with an opportunity to provide my thoughts on possible improvements. The first set I saw was an impressive peaked set with great depth providing a background to essentially a one plus two in the foreground.

It was the foreground area where I felt I could provide the most constructive criticism. The keylights were downstage rather than upstage, causing unsightly shadows on the set as well as being part of what I described as ‘flat’ lighting with lack of depth in the pictures. This was an ongoing comment by me in virtually all the studios I visited during my stay in Taipei. The locals mostly had black hair, which could take much stronger backlight than was used.

Onwards to Studio 3, where a newish, semi-circular set was the background for a weekly one-hour current affairs programme with a glamorous lady presenter who introduced the show after a lighting change during her walk on. I was introduced to her as the man from the UK who was ‘going to make her look younger’. That seemed a little Set & Light | Winter 2014

19

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 20

Lighting

One of my suggestions was to introduce 1/2 CTB on the soft back lights

Too many soft lights, too high and too far away

Hanging polyboard makes an appearance An ‘interesting’ background on the set for

unlikely in view of the array of Chimeras and diffused sources that met her at her opening position.

The main problem, as I saw it, was the inability to back light the set, even though the panels were translucent, as the structure of the set prevented this. I am sure that at the setbuild stage it would have been easy enough to either incorporate lighting within the set or to have spaced the supports further apart. Also, the wedge-shaped floor pieces were lit internally at one end with non-dimmable fluorescent fittings. I kept being told, with a smile, that this was because of a ‘no money’ situation.

Once again, as in my previous visit, it seemed there was little liaison between design and lighting at the planning stage.

‘What planning stage?’ I hear myself say.

Lunch that day was taken in a Taiwanese ‘caff’ across the road and included such popular delicacies as dumplings and pigs’ ears. Pork is my least favourite meat at the best of times so I was able to politely desist.

After a pig’s ear kind of lunch, we were in to Studio 6, where the most viewed children’s TV programme in Taiwan was made. It has been going for some 18 years and it features a ‘grandma’ figure (played by a man) dealing with puppets in a splendid, cartoonish kind of set. There’s an outdoor set with trees and fluffy clouds, a lounge and a kitchen, in what I think must be PTS’s largest studio. A great set, but what about the lighting?

Well, I felt that in the ‘outside’ part of the show, there was no excuse for multiple shadows of the puppets on the nearby background. It didn’t take long to see the culprits: many soft lights too high and too far away. I also suggested that the poly board, lit behind the cameras, would be more effective if it were bigger and closer to the action by being suspended over the cameras. Oh, and turn off all those soft lights; we could easily save a rainforest tree or two here.

Once again, I was seeing ‘flat’ pictures, which could easily be improved by introducing a difference in colour temperature between frontal and backlights. Maybe space lights could be considered as a better and more inexpensive option to a myriad of soft sources. Much nodding and discussion ensued.

On another day, we were back in Studio 6 and I was pleased to see that, already, some of my suggestions had been taken up. A large reflector board was hanging in the kitchen set and the soft backlights were wearing ½ CTB. One small step…

I was also pleased to see ‘sunlight’ pouring through the set windows and arches, which had not been the case previously.

In the evenings, I was largely left to my own devices, which was a mixed blessing. I had the freedom to go where I wanted, but that was within the confines of a short evening and my ability to get quite lost within a block or two of the hotel. The Chinese signage was confusing to a simple Westerner such as myself, even with a map of the locality provided by the hotel. However, I coped, and even ventured to see the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall by night.

Another day and I was running consecutive seminars for lighting, design and directors: the dreaded (but useful)

20

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 21

Mike Baker in Taiwan

There was always a supply of tea available

Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall Signage was not easy for this Westerner

‘Mr Cool’ and the gang post pig’s ear lunch

PowerPoint, illustrated with pictures taken during the first part of the week of what worked and what didn’t. I must have succeeded because nobody actually fell asleep but at times I felt as if I was going over stuff I had said in 2011 and I secretly wondered if my mission statement of ‘planning and preparation’ and ‘working together as a team’ would survive here in Taiwan. Actually, ‘mission statement’ is too grand (and pretentious) a way of describing how the sessions went; I prefer pro-active involvement and we certainly got that when we had a mixed audience.

I couldn’t resist talking about the set for a show about Making a Fortune, which has been going for years and looked exactly the same as it did three years ago. It suffered from the problem of getting keylights for what is essentially a ‘1 plus 1 or 2’ in an optimum place. Overhanging chunks of set made that difficult. The backgrounds between the presenter and guests was totally different and did not help intercutting one little bit. One director confided in me that she had been saying that for years. The designer of the set was actually present in the room, so I was diplomatic in my criticism, trying to be constructive rather than destructive. Not easy!

The group of trainees were all long-term employees of PTS, a government-funded organisation. Some had been there for as much as 18 years, so I felt a touch of kindred spirit when thinking of my own career at the Beeb, ever since I left school at 18 for some 30-odd years.

It only remained to write a short report on my return, sent by email, and to take an occasional look at PTS output

on its live streaming TV service. How life has changed since my first foreign assignment to Cyprus almost 30 years ago!

So, why did I think I was the right person to be there on the other side of the world advising much younger local people as to how to light their TV studio?

I have always been interested in passing on whatever knowledge I thought would help others. I was made redundant in 1996 and, with a little help from a course for trainers at BBC Wood Norton, my years at the BBC became my ‘ticket to train’. The BBC was, and is still, highly respected around the world, and the years since I left Auntie have been full of interesting experiences, Taiwan being the latest of many.

I have found it intensely rewarding and, I hope, a useful contribution to maintain the quality of our craft: that of improving standards despite all the ongoing pressures of time and money. Having said all that, it will soon be time to pass on the baton to a younger person. That person will do it differently and almost certainly better than me. With training, as in TV generally, you have to be up to date with technique and trends, facilities and fashion, lux and LEDs, robotic lamps and virtual reality. Any takers?

I would like to thank Paul Chang of IX Technologies Taipei; the staff of PST for their welcome and hospitality while in Taipei; and my long-suffering translators, Alice, Daniel and Hans, for converting Western tech speak into Taiwanese.

Set & Light | Winter 2014

21

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 22

Lighting

Keeping old lights in the spotlight Words & photos: Rob Halliday My, what a long way our technology has come in 40 years: a veritable revolution of lights and light sources and machines to control them. Life is better, easier, simpler, faster... and yet, and yet, why does it sometimes feel that we haven’t made so much progress after all? Why, occasionally, does it even feel like we’ve taken a step or two backwards?

It’s hard to know for sure, of course; memory is hazy and once a clear-out of ‘outdated’ equipment starts, it often continues ruthlessly and rapidly, all the better to fill the skip while it’s outside. So, while you think some older products were better – that faithful Fresnel, those group masters on that Galaxy – without one to actually try, can you ever be quite sure?

Except it turns out that not everything destined for a skip actually ends up in one. Sometimes, saviours come along, determined to preserve a little of the past. The only problem being, they often keep it to themselves.

Someone else looking for an example of that item might never find it, giving up once Google reveals that no, there is no national museum of lighting technology.

Hopefully, though, by the time you read this, a search on that subject will lead you to the Backstage Heritage Collection, which, while sadly not a national museum, is aiming to become a virtual museum and a distributed collection of entertainment technology, lighting and more.

The what? A what? Let’s backtrack for a quick catch-up. As you may know, I write a monthly column called Classic Gear for Lighting & Sound International magazine, intended as a light-hearted look at products that have shaped our industry. Unsurprisingly, this leads to conversations with a variety of people as I try to unearth the history of these products, with varying degrees of success (the biggest historical blank spot so far has been the first to invert a chain hoist, as the riggers of the 1960s and 1970s are somewhat vague 22

Set & Light | Winter 2014

in their recollection of that time period...) Most recently, this has led to me being part of a fascinating multi-way email exchange between members of Strand’s engineering department during its heyday from the mid-1960s to the late 1970s, sparked by ex-employee John Wright’s research for a book intended to give a true re-telling of the company’s history, and ex-chief engineer Martin Moore, who, I think, just enjoys a bit of rabble-rousing. The stories, memories and photographs being unearthed are remarkable. John’s book seems set to be a fascinating read and some of the images are already available to view on the newly expanded Strand Archive website (www.strandarchive.co.uk).

Triggered by all of this, I started trying to track down the control system that, with my ‘programmer’ hat on, I have long been fascinated by: the Lightboard, designed by Richard Pilbrow and built by Strand for the opening of the National Theatre in 1976 and, in many ways, the predecessor to Galaxy. The National had two, and others were sold to Germany. All who used it recall it being a remarkable tool for creating lighting, the designer able to mix states on their own ‘palette’ of wheels in collaboration with an operator. Yet no one seems to knew where any of them are now.

My search started with Jim Laws.

His Suffolk barns full of lighting from the age of gas onwards are the closest

thing we have to a national museum of lighting. He had bits of it, but pointed me in the direction of a fellow called Jason Williams. It was on my to-do list to call Jason when he emailed me.

Jason is one of those people who can’t bear to see things go into skips.

He was working in and around theatre during the 1990s as earlier generations of computer control systems started being replaced and he was in the right place at the right time to start rescuing them, which he did, with the intention of creating a National Exhibition of Entertainment Technology (NEET).

You might have seen bits of this collection at a few PLASA shows in about 2006. But the NEET plan never found the support it deserved. Jason had since found other interests and was hoping to find others to become the custodians of this equipment.

This sparked more conversations and, ultimately, a wonderful afternoon hosted by Jim and Pat Laws and attended by a group of people with an interest in this stuff, including Richard and Molly Pilbrow; Jon Primrose, who runs the Strand Archive; Jane Thornton and Robin Townley from the ABTT; Shane Guy from Nottingham Trent University; Lucien Nunes, who runs a wonderfully diverse collection called Electrokinetica; David Fitch; Peter Willis; Andrew Candler; and me (Martin Moore had visited a few weeks earlier, Alan Luxford led another trip a few weeks later). If nothing else, this proved, if proof were needed, that many find this equipment fascinating, whether you’ve used a particular product or not.

Richard found a Patt 27 float spot he first used at school; Jane, the 72-way System PR she worked at Windsor some decades years ago, while all assembled couldn’t resist reaching out and touching the keys and stops on the ex-Drury Lane Light Console.

After playing and lunch, we thought of a name – the Backstage Heritage Collection – and all dreamt of a centrally-located, easily accessible ‘real’

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 23

Backstage Heritage Collection

Organ keys and stops adapted for lighting – Strand Light Console

Lighting historian and collector Jim Laws with a gas lighting control

Prototype and production Strand Patt 263/264 and friends Valves from a thyratron dimming system

Twister as a Fresnel, viewed from soft end Photo courtesy of Jim Laws

Set & Light | Winter 2014

23

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 24

Lighting

Cutaway Strand Patt 243 Fresnel on the Strand stand at PLASA 2014

They made them bigger in the old days: a traditional Avo console

A Strand Chromalux lighting control – colour made easy!

The fire of light: looking straight into a Patt 137 flood Classic lights on show at PLASA 2014

Richard Pilbrow finds part of the Lightboard console he designed for the opening of London’s National Theatre in 1976

museum. But we accepted this was unlikely to be viable. Instead, we started hatching a two-pronged plan. As items were found, they would be documented thoroughly. The item would be photographed and otherwise recorded and that information would then be gathered together with any related material. These could include designs, brochures, photographs and other marketing materials, and related things such as cue sheets for manual lighting consoles. Crucially, it would also include any memories from those who had designed the product, as well as the men and women who then used it. All of that information would be available via the web – in some ways an extension of the work the Strand Archive already does, crossed with the kind of oral history brilliantly demonstrated at 24

Set & Light | Winter 2014

www.folklore.org, which charts the development of another marvel of technology, the Apple Mac. But items also deserve a home, partly to save them from a skip, partly because while virtual is good, items like these are better if they can be handled ‘live’. I’ve started summarising Backstage Heritage’s intent as being a ‘dating agency for lonely lights’. If you, your theatre, your company, your college have some room and want one or more items, whether as an

attention-grabbing foyer exhibit or to explore how things used to be done, you can have them – as long as you give them a good home, look after them and let others come and visit should they wish. The first taker was lighting supplier White Light in south London.

It now has some of the lighting consoles from the NEET collection, including a Galaxy, a big Avo desk, a Thorn console from Sheffield, and the original 1971 IDM memory system from the New London Theatre. Every single person who’s passed them has stopped to touch, to play, to reminisce.

Second taker, at our suggestion: Strand Lighting, with a milestone anniversary to mark at an important tradeshow. I might be biased, but I think the historic Strand ‘half lights’ from the company’s King Street

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 25

Backstage Heritage Collection

The inside of a Strand Patt 23N profile spot

Mark 1, 2K Twister, soft end

Strand Light Console from the Theatre Royal Drury Lane Glowing filament and reflector in a Strand Patt 263 flood

Cutaway Strand Patt 263 profile at PLASA 2014

Side view of the cutaway Strand Patt 243 at PLASA 2014

showroom, lovingly preserved since by Jim, were the most beautiful objects at the PLASA show this year, one each of Patts 23, 23N, 263 and 243, plus whole Patts 123 and 137 from Alan Luxford, giving a gentle, warm tungsten glow to the back of the stand. Strand also found itself a Galaxy, courtesy of Roger Williams, which formed a centrepiece beneath the bar and also attracted much attention. Interestingly, a gentleman from China was taking a lot of close-up photos of all of these products; expect to see the ‘leaky lights’ announced as cutting-edge new technology sometime next year.

There are other examples of newly blossoming romances. Arri has been running a trade-in deal on old ballasts and didn’t know what to do with them.

Through Jim Laws, it’s found a new

keeper – and through Arri’s Andy Barnett I’ve learnt a little more about how technology has supported the development of new cinematic techniques, and why we suddenly had a glut of films where everyone’s movements dropped into super-slow mo. I love the gear, but I love these kinds of historic factoids more!

So, that’s the plan, one that’s continuing to evolve as we figure out how we do what we’ve set out to do, how we pay for it (some crowd-funding is on the horizon, but companies wanting to support the cause should get in touch please) and a myriad of other details. Having stuck our heads above the parapet, we are starting to discover many other collectors: from Belgium, one remarkable collection; at Gerriets in France, another. Even on

the STLD stand at PLASA, where a pile of Strand literature was sitting just begging to be browsed.

The aim isn’t for Backstage Heritage to be a collection in and of itself; it’s to be a collection of collections, a gathering place for all this information.

The name deliberately doesn’t limit that to lighting, and though there is a theatrical implication, there’s no intent to exclude television, film or other areas of entertainment technology.

We’ve all borrowed current equipment from each other – why should it be any different with ‘retired’ equipment?

So, if you have anything – lights, controls, brochures – which you think should be part of this, get in touch via www.backstageheritage.org and let’s figure out how to make your little collection part of this much bigger one.

Set & Light | Winter 2014

25

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 26

Lighting

The prom king Words: Bernie Davis Photos: John O’Brien 2014 marks my 22nd year lighting the BBC Proms, and before that, I worked on this remarkable festival many times as a BBC vision engineer. With this familiarity, it is all too easy to assume no one will be interested in looking around my place of work, but when the STLD announced this year’s visit to the Proms, all the places were quickly taken up, and we had to split the tour into two parties just to accommodate the numbers.

In this, the STLD’s 40th anniversary year, it seems appropriate to look back at how the lighting got to where it is today on a show that so many people think is the same each year. When I lit my first season, I inherited a design from BBC EM John Livingstone, who had just taken early retirement, and his design largely relied on eight 5K fresnels to back light most of the orchestra and two 10K fresnels to front light them. A few more 2Ks and a handful of par cans completed the orchestra, and Cadenza profiles were used for specials such as the conductor and soloists. Further 2K fresnels lit the organ and stage side panels and a few 6-lamp bars lit some of the orchestra.

The lighting was rigged on a box truss flown 32ft over 26

Set & Light | Winter 2014

the stage, surrounding the Royal Albert Hall canopies that sit over the orchestra to improve the acoustics. These canopies have to hang at the right height to get the best acoustics and the stage lighting rig height is governed by this requirement.

The canopies have attached trusses and these were filled with 2K fresnels, which lit the orchestra on days when the television cameras were not present (we only televised 10/11 concerts out of a season of up to 70 concerts.

The lighting director before John Livingstone was Dan Cranefield, who, I am pleased to say, was at this summer’s meeting. I learnt it was his initiative that had introduced the Celco 90 desks and Q-Patch, which were in use when I started. Dan wanted to use trussing but the old compulsory BBC electricians were not happy with this. John won that battle, and Meteorlites (now ELP) was able to deal with the trussing and lighting – a situation I took over, with the legendary Paul Devine as crew chief. You might wonder if Iron Maiden’s lighting designer was the right person to head up the lighting for the world’s largest classical music festival – as indeed I did – but Paul proved to be an ideal and very professional gaffer, and it is fair to say I learnt a lot from

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:21 Page 27

The BBC Proms

Proms rig from 1995 showing pars that had replaced the 5Ks at the back Photo by Chris Davis

him and will always be grateful for his help and support.

In the first couple of years, I quickly changed the big fresnels for groups of pars, offering an easier focus and less susceptibility to lamp failure! But the one thing I wanted to change was having to focus the conductor and soloists lights by climbing the truss. Inevitably, our best guess as to where they would stand would be wrong; then they would complain that they were not lit. I did a test with VL6s to see if the sound levels would be acceptable to Radio 3. Despite being really quiet, they were rejected by the sound team.

They said they might be quiet enough for some concerts but that was not enough for me, so we dropped that idea. We eventually bought some Compulite moving yokes in which we placed the new Source 4 profiles. The lights were excellent but the yokes were too low resolution in their movement and you often found yourself having to leave the shuttered shape rather big to be sure the yoke could stop on the conductor. However, they served us well for a few years, and what we did find was that not having to climb the truss several times a day left the rig focus more stable and there was a lot less work to do!

Solo keys used to be from an advance truss – Cantatas off-set from centre in an attempt to get the angle as low as possible for what was, by necessity, a very steep key. Then, in the mid-1990s, the new Source 4 5° profiles came out.

According to the figures, a 575W profile could light the stage from the gallery at the back of the Royal Albert Hall, and two of them doubled up could produce enough light to key a soloist against the large amount of light the orchestra

needed to read the music (lit stands are not usually an option as TV doesn’t want them and the orchestra doesn’t like them). I found those figures difficult to believe, but I got some in and they were a spectacular success. We could now focus soloists without having to climb over the stage.

It will sound odd today, but in the 1990s I was not allowed to use coloured light on the Proms. This was serious music and should not be trivialised by entertainment values! But then came the Blue Peter Prom, and its event manager wanted colour and gobos! We couldn’t risk MAC 500s as they were too noisy for the sensitive mics of the Radio 3 team, but a small rig of Studio Spots and Studio Colors were silent and able to improve the look at last. The orchestra was up for a few lighting changes, and the event proved a success. I should point out that the Blue Peter Prom was not for TV that year, just Radio 3 and the Albert Hall audience.

The Blue Peter Prom returned the next year and we did the same, and TV production happened to see what we were up to. I was asked why they couldn’t have colour on their show and I told them it was because they had always wanted only white light. This happened to coincide with the start of the new BBC digital channels, when it was decided to transmit more proms, adding five more in the first year and increasing to 15 more over subsequent years, in addition to the original 10 on BBC Two. It was agreed that we could use colour for the digital channels but not for BBC Two. The additional budget that came in with the extra programmes paid for a bigger rig that stayed in for the whole season, too.

Set & Light | Winter 2014

27

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 28

Lighting

With less climbing to do we were able to reduce the crew to just two per TV prom, and by now we had incorporated the whole lighting system into our design, with our crew looking after every prom in the season. To be fair, the Royal Albert Hall lighting crew today are excellent, but 20 years ago the lighting was left to the venue electricians, who did it in between changing lightbulbs in corridors. They were not really interested in stage lighting, and with ELP taking over the whole season, the orchestras and the audience were much better served.

TV production saw that the BBC Four proms looked better than the BBC Two proms, despite the latter being seen to be more prestigious. I pointed out that it was their request to have white light only for BBC Two, so that decision was reversed!

I wanted to move on from the moving yokes, and as it happened that year, two new instruments were launched – the ETC Revolution and the Vari*lite VL 1000. Both were silent and both offered shutters so ideal for my needs. We did tests; both offered different features and both could fulfil the main need of focused light for the conductor, controlled from the lighting desk. As it happened, the VL 1000 won, mainly as the Revolution could not be delivered in time for that season. We now had a rig of about 20 VL 1000s carefully spread around the stage, and the next big improvement was to replace the Studio Colors with MAC TW1 washes.

That takes the potted history up to about six years ago, when the programme commissioner started asking for a modernisation of the Proms. The easy answer to any question about ‘Why don’t you?’ is to say ‘Ah, but this is the proms and that won’t be accepted’. She wouldn’t take this as an answer and we set up a big meeting to go through the options. I was fed up with trying to get a bit of design low enough into the orchestra to actually see it on shot – wide shots showed the organ and the hall, but tight shots just showed musicians, and the majority of orchestral coverage tends to be musician shots – and I suggested having a lowresolution LED display around the stage back. Somehow the budget was found and a new designer was commissioned to advance the look further. Chris Webster, ably assisted by Andrea Simpson, came up with a structure to support the LED display, while keeping the precious stage area all in use.

He also replaced the old gauzes either side of the organ with painted ones, which reflected the Albert Hall architecture – indeed, many viewers think the three arches either side of the organ on the Proms are real and not scenic. The Proms also wanted to get rid of the famous fountain in the arena and Chris was asked to supply a graphic to replace it. The large PVC sticker he came up with shocked the rather conservative proms audience and ushers had to prevent them from trying to remove it from the arena floor on first night. I have no doubt that the same promenaders will object when the sticker eventually doesn’t appear. The promenaders know what they don’t like, and it is change.

To drive the LED display I bought a Hippo Critter, which is also controlled from my Compulite Ultra Violet desk.

Moving lights, generic lights and graphics all driven by one portable desk – how things have moved on from the two Celco 90s! The screen is the full width of the stage but only 28

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Stage showing LED panels and gauzes with arch design either side of the organ

The changing face of backstage: We now have two Art 2000 Avo racks per side, as well as hard power distribution for all the moving lights. These are in addition to the RAH dimmers and switched power. On the left, you can see a bespoke data rack dealing with all the networks and graphic servers.

Two Compulite Vectors run Master/Slave, networked for back-up

a total of 1,024 by 32 pixels, and it has a diffuser filter fitted to soften the point sources in close-up. Considering the lack of resolution, it is surprising how good the images look. And I have loved the challenge of coming up with new content all the time – so much more satisfying than trying to make the same gobos on the organ look different yet again.

The most recent changes to the Proms’ design started in 2013, when I dabbled in LED moving lights by adding a small rig of MAC 301s. Just 12 of these could offer a colour wash over the whole stage, and they proved a great success. Well, a partial success in that I had hoped to dot in any gaps in the generic rig when necessary and I was surprised to see that, on camera, the 301 looked a little green, and careful adjustment of the colour seemed to take me to magenta without ever going through white. But their value for colourful events was without question. Then a chance visit to the BT Sport Studio in Stratford led me to see just how good the MAC Auras were And in 2014, I changed to Auras and added a few more, replacing some of the TW1s. Their colour range and zoom range added a new dynamic I had not had before, and their white was very acceptable for TV cameras.

So, from 1993, when an LED told you if a power supply was working, to 2014, with a significant part of the lighting now with LED sources. The Royal Albert Hall has up-lit all the columns in the gallery with Coemar LED fixtures, the mushrooms have Chroma Floods and this year, for the first time, the organ is lit with a new rig of Robe Parfect LED par

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 29

The BBC Proms

Dr Who prom from 2013 season Photo by Chris Christodoulou

replacements. Together with the MAC Auras, I found myself lighting Rufus Wainwright at one point near the end of the 2014 season with almost all the lighting from LED sources.

This has not happened through a green agenda but just through using the right light for the job.

To give you an idea of what went into the 2014 proms season, here is a summary: we had 76 concerts in the Royal Albert Hall in the space of just eight weeks. Twenty-nine of these were televised; some live, some recorded and two yet to be transmitted: a very theatrical War Horse prom and a big production of Kiss Me Kate with the John Wilson Orchestra. Some of these are more than just an orchestra on stage, including a CBeebies Prom, which had presenters all over the hall, and Paloma Faith doing a late-night prom.

We even had a swing night in the form of a Battle of the Bands. One prom was recorded for The Space, the digital online arts project, and was a new work that had the musicians almost everywhere but on the stage, all playing to in-ear click track. We had the Pet Shop Boys and Rufus Wainwright, and a number of semi-staged operas: Salome, Elektra, and Glyndebourne Opera’s Der Rosenkavalier. We had orchestras from all over the world: from Australia, China, Greece, Iceland, Lapland, Qatar, South Korea, Singapore, Turkey and, of course, the United States. With sometimes two concerts in a day, all needing rehearsal time on stage, just spare a thought for the organisation that goes into the Proms season.

Photo by Chris Christodoulou

And where to for the future? Well, every year I leave the hall with notes for improvements for next year in the event that I am asked back, and I have a little list!

I must make a few thank yous: first of all to the excellent team at the Royal Albert Hall, led by Ollie Jeffery who made this meeting possible and has been a great support since he joined the hall. Also, thanks to ELP, which has been the contractor for the Proms and which contributed to the drinks for this meeting; and to my Proms team: Paul Tibbles, Mark Gardiner, Lawrence Robinson and Matt Chalk, and also David Bishop, who has been principal operator and guest LD this season. You are only as good as the team behind you.

Set & Light | Winter 2014

29

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 30

STLD visit

A ‘sellout’ tour Words: Chris Harris Photos: John O’Brien

Forty-five metres above the arena

Chance encounter at the Proms By chance, while we were at the Royal Albert Hall, a new light was being shown to the RAH lighting team, writes Bernie Davis.

From Rosco, the Miro Cube is a very compact LED fixture with a big punch. Measuring only 4.5in by 4in by 4in, it takes just 50W and claims to produce 3,400 lumens with flicker-free dimming adjustable from 2,800K to 6,500K. Another version offered RGBA mixing, too.

It struck me as a product aimed at a broad market, looking equally at home lighting a shop window, a building’s architectural features, or else built into a set for stage or TV. The Miro’s compact design looks ideal to hide into corners where regular lighting fixtures won’t fit.

30

Set & Light | Winter 2014

On Friday 22 August, 50 STLD members, sponsors and their guests gathered at the Royal Albert Hall for lunch and a tour of this iconic historical building, home of The BBC Proms.

To kick off our experience of this wonderful venue, we ate at Verdi – Italian Kitchen, one of six restaurants that the Royal Albert Hall as to offer within the building itself. We enjoyed a most pleasant meal in very relaxed surroundings, with drinks provided by STLD sponsor ELP. We all eagerly awaited an interesting time ahead going behind the scenes.

We certainly were not disappointed!

Once inside, we assembled on the gallery, where Bernie Davis gave us an introduction to the building and the technical and lighting aspects that makes The BBC Proms what it is and why it is such an integral part of the Royal Albert Hall. The venue has not always played host to the Proms, which originally began in The Queen’s Hall in 1895.

In 1942, it was chosen as the new venue after Queen’s Hall was destroyed in an air raid.

After the introduction we split into two groups: one group stayed with Bernie and the other set out on a tour of the building. As we made our way down the main staircase we looked out onto the Albert Memorial, which stands on the original site of The Crystal Palace. Profits from the Great Exhibition were used to build the Royal Albert Hall between 1867 and 1871. When we arrived at the ground-floor foyer we were shown a time-lapse video of the auditorium over 12 months, showing some 390 events and 1.7 million visitors. The YouTube address for this video is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-MhcufpEPI or search ‘An incredible year in the life of the Royal Albert Hall’.

From here we made our way backstage to view the dressing room and green-room facilities, finally arriving at the underground loading bay. This new loading bay was built in the year 2000 and can take three 40ft trailers, unloading to a scissor lift direct to the auditorium floor or stage level.

From here we made our way back to the gallery, looking at some of the bars and restaurants in the building. At this point, the two groups changed over.

When we all arrived back at the gallery we were given the opportunity to go into the roof space, so after the mandatary health and safety briefing and form signing, we made our way to the roof. I had not realised that the roof of the Royal Albert Hall was glass and it was like entering a new world as we entered the dome. The final test of nerve was to walk into the centre of the Corona on top of the dome and look down through the tension wire grid to the auditorium below – and I do have the picture to prove I did it, courtesy of Les McCallum!

Our grateful thanks to Bernie and the Royal Albert Hall team for making a very enjoyable day.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 31

The BBC Proms

Verdi – Italian Kitchen, one of six restaurants at the Royal Albert Hall It was like entering a new world when STLD members went into the dome of the Royal Albert Hall

Bernie Davis gives an introduction to the building

Compulite Vector and Critter

Set & Light | Winter 2014

31

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 32

Recollection

A year in the life of an aspiring LD Words & photos: Jeremy Hoare 1974

Since I first used a Kodak Brownie box camera at the Coronation, I had always wanted to be a lighting director and by 1974, I was a cameraman at Lew Grade’s ATV Elstree, where I felt privileged to work on great dramas with inspirational actors and light entertainment shows with world-class stars.

Shooting a Julie Andrews special

ATV lighting directors

To become an LD in 1974 at ATV was impossible unless someone died, but my determination led to me spending many days off sitting in with and learning from inspirational LDs like John Rook, Tony Hudspith and Jimmy Boyers. Their skill was extraordinary to me and they had no hesitation in passing on their knowledge, for which I was very grateful.

A Julie Andrews special

We were shooting a Julie Andrews special, which was being directed by her husband, Blake Edwards, whose films included classics such as Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Days of Wine and Roses and The Pink Panther series. He did not have an ACTT ticket (the Association of Cinematograph Television and Allied Technicians trade union) but was given highly unusual dispensation to direct in Studio D. However, although his creativity and skill were beyond doubt, in a multi-camera studio he was a bit lost, and at some point during a song with the full orchestra, it dawned on Julie why it wasn’t working, so the studio was given a tea break and the two of them had a huge row. The crew liked Blake, so we gave him all the help he needed, and one memorable shot I did was craning down on a forklift truck using a fisheye attachment on the EMI 2001. The lens made the set swirl and look like a Vasarely painting, which I suggested over talkback to Blake, who commented that they had an original one somewhat similar in their Geneva house. There was no topping that!

We shot a Chicago prohibition sketch, which had Peter Sellers and Omar Sharif as gangsters playing against Julie, who was all sweet in her Mary Poppins outfit. It took all day and was funny, but subsequently Disney refused to allow the Mary Poppins character to be seen that way. It wasn’t included and, I believe, has never been seen.

As is the way with creative people like Blake, he had a brainwave on the Friday to do a shoot the next day in sculptor Henry Moore’s garden in Perry Green near Much Hadham in Hertfordshire. Blake knew him, of course. After we wrapped, the sound crew stayed on and recorded Julie singing a track with just a piano for her to mime to on location.

Saturday was, thankfully, a dry bright day. We arrived at the location; it was a notional, so we were all on 2T overtime. Senior Cameraman Bill Brown used a Phillips LDK 13 camera fed to a two-inch Ampex VTR in the vehicle that ATV called Monoculus. Blake had persuaded Samuelson Film Service to get a Chapman Titan camera crane to the shoot.

It had arrived by ship from an African desert with sand all 32

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Pictured abo

over it, such was Blake’s clout in the film world. Bill shot the number with Julie around various sculptures, to which the orchestra track was added later.

Amateur drama

A couple of years before, and to appease my frustration of not being able to be an LD at ATV, I had joined an amateur drama group in Bishop’s Stortford, Drama Group 64, on the understanding that I would never appear onstage, even as a spear carrier, but would do the lighting for them. I’d seen one of their productions before joining and it was so badly lit I still cringe at the memory of it. I could not have done worse and it was through having such a free hand that I was able to learn and experiment– lessons which I put to good use later when I did become an LD. In 1974, I lit the group’s Say Who You Are, a comedy by Keith Waterhouse & Willis Hall, at the Rhodes Centre – a flat-floor multi-purpose hall – using the venue’s Pattern 23s and 264s in a very typical sitting-room set. For several other productions there I borrowed a few 1K Pups from Elstree, which made a big difference to what I could achieve on the stage.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 33

Jeremy Hoare

d above, right, below left and below centre: The Ann Margret Show

Jeremy photographed Red Rum on the beach at Southport

Red Rum

In 1974 the greatest racehorse of the 20th century, Red Rum, won the Aintree Grand National for the second time.

In the morning I had been in St John’s Wood for an outside rehearsal for an episode of ATV’s major drama series Edward VII, starring Annette Crosbie, Timothy West and Robert Hardy. There, the actor Peter Howells was convinced Red Rum would win the Grand National.

As my wife at the time was an equestrian artist, I subsequently managed to gain access to Red Rum through Ginger McCain, who trained him on the beach at Southport.

There I took photos, which my wife used as reference, and the book about Red Rum by Ivor Herbert featured her painting as the cover and several of my photos inside.

Ann-Margret

I was still a camera assistant at times and happy to be with Bill Brown again when we did an episode of The Ann-Margret Show.

One day was a location shoot with the same Phillips LDK 13 camera and Monoculus at the University College of London’s swimming pool with Ann-Margret, who had been

married to Elvis Presley, doing an Esther Williams-type dance routine in the water. It was memorable for me as LD John Rook used what looked to me like conventional lights underwater. I never really understood how that worked without electrocuting everyone!

Art exhibition

The year ended with the first (and, to date, only) exhibition of my paintings and collages. I was heavily influenced by the American artist Frank Stella and my own work reflected his hard-edge geometric abstracts highly dependent on colour arranged in straight lines, using light but in a different way.

Lighting director at last

It was to be almost a decade later that after 23 years as an ATV cameraman, I finally realised my dream of becoming a lighting director with the remarkable John Watt as my head of department at Central TV in Nottingham. It was a steep learning curve, but I enjoyed every minute of it.

Now I seem to be always telling young people: live your dreams – I have; it’s certainly worked for me!

Set & Light | Winter 2014

33

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 34

Information

Behind the Scenes

Extending a helping hand to those in need The PLASA Foundation has announced the formation of Behind the Scenes UK to provide financial assistance to entertainment technology professionals, or their immediate family, who are seriously ill or injured.

Since issuing its first grant in the spring of 2006, Behind the Scenes in North America has provided almost half a million dollars to our colleagues in need. These grants have brought help and hope to these individuals during some of their darkest hours.

Grants may be used for basic living costs, some medical related expenses, transportation, retraining or funerals.

Behind the Scenes has a wide remit.

Anyone is eligible for assistance who has earned their living in the industry for at least five years, whether behind the curtain, behind the camera, on the road, or working for companies that manufacture or supply entertainment

34

Set & Light | Winter 2014

technology products and services. The charity exists solely to aid those who work behind the scenes; it does not assist performers.

Behind the Scenes was modeled on the Light Relief charity. While Light Relief has served the UK liveperformance lighting industry successfully, there has long been a desire to be able to extend that assistance to the entire entertainment technology community. To that end, the trustees of Light Relief have voted to bring Light Relief under the umbrella of Behind the Scenes UK. A board of trustees has been formed to oversee the day-to-day operations of the charity in the UK. Serving as trustees are Simon Baker, Alison Brodie, Malcolm Burlow, Bernie Davis (vice chair), Lee Dennison, Jon Driscoll, Rick Fisher, Alan Jacobi (treasurer), Lori Rubinstein and John

Simpson (chair). Ed Pagett and Adam Blaxill, in their roles as chair and vice chair of the PLASA EU Regional Board, also serve on the BTS UK board.

Behind the Scenes officially launched its fundraising activities at the PLASA London show in October with a raffle. First prize was a £2,500 gift voucher for a dream vacation, which was won by Jerome Dunn of StageLight in Texas. Phil Hurley, of Stage Sound Services Ltd in Cardiff, won the second prize of a £1,000 Amazon gift card, while the third prize of a £500 voucher with Mr and Mrs Smith hotels was snagged by Amber Etra of Philips.

A further fundraiser was held at its Behind the Scenes Golf Day a week later, which raised £5,500 for the charity.

For more information, visit www. behindthescenescharity.org or email ukinfo@behindthescenescharity.org.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 35

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 36

Information

Seventh Knight of Illumination Awards winners The seventh Knight of Illumination Awards (KOI) took place in October at Troxy, an Art Deco theatre in London.

Hosted this year by Lighting Designer for the theatre, opera and ballet, Mark Jonathan, the awards offer public recognition for outstanding achievements in touring, television and theatre lighting, and video design, and are organised by the Society of Television Lighting & Design (STLD), the Association of Lighting Designers (ALD), Clay Paky and Ambersphere Solutions.

The 2014 winners for each category were announced as follows:

Theatre

Dance – Paul Keogan, No Man’s Land, English National Ballet, The Barbican Opera – Joachim Klein, Bluebeard’s Castle, Opera Frankfurt, Edinburgh Festival Theatre Play – Andy Purves, The Believers, The Drum, Theatre Royal Plymouth and touring Musicals – Adam Silverman, Urinetown, St James Theatre Projection Design – Ethan Wang, Rice, Cloud Gate Theatre Dance Theatre of Taiwan, Sadler’s Wells.

Television

Drama – David Higgs, The Escape Artist Light Entertainment – Chris Rigby, Alan Carr: Chatty Man Small Studio – Hugh French, Channel 4 News Events – Ben Cracknell, The Olivier Awards Video Graphic Display – Luke Halls, Don Giovanni

Concert Touring & Events

Concert Touring Stage – Will Potts, Disclosure Concert Touring Arena – Andy Hurst, The Prodigy Live Events – Matt Button, Castrol Video Graphic Display – Paul ‘Pablo’ Beckett, Blue Leach and Cate Carter, Elbow In addition, the Enrico Caironi Award for Lifetime Recognition was presented to an individual whom the KOI committee feels has made an outstanding impact on the industry.

This year, the award was presented to Brian Croft. He is perhaps best known for his work in rock ’n’ roll, notably with ESP Lighting, RFA Electrosound, Theatre Projects, Samuelson’s, Eagle Trust and Vari-Lite productions, but he is also a dedicated supporter of the National Youth Theatre since he began his career as a stage manager on its inaugural production in 1956.

Previous winners of this award include Lighting Designer Richard Pilbrow in 2011, Bryan Leitch in 2012 and Ian Dow in 2013. The category is named in recognition of former Clay Paky commercial director Enrico Caironi (1947–2011), whose inspiration and enthusiasm created and subsequently shaped the Knight Of Illumination Awards.

The Knight Of Illumination Awards’ main sponsors, Ayrton, Hawthorn, MA Lighting, Osram, Robert Juliat and XL Video, all share its determination to forge closer ties between the world of lighting design and the lighting industry

as a whole.

In addition, the wider industry’s support for Knight Of Illumination continues to flourish and KOI is delighted to welcome table sponsors from every sector, including AC Entertainment, Avolites, Chauvet Professional, Creative Technology, d3, ETC, Fix8, Gallowglass, Gearsource, Green Hippo, HSL, Martin Professional, Philips Entertainment, Pharos, PLASA, PRG, Rosco, Stage Electrics, TMB, TSL and Wireless Solutions.

Lighting Designer Durham Marenghi, who co-ordinates the Awards along with his wife Jennie, had this to say of the evening: “What a fantastic celebration of lighting design and video and projection design, and this year supported by so many companies in the lighting and projection world. Although saddened by the passing of Clay Paky’s founder Pasquale Quadri, the event that he so passionately supported is now recognised as the most prestigious and wide-ranging lighting design awards in the UK, and the evening was thoroughly enjoyed by all those who attended.”

The STLD wishes to congratulate the nominees as well as the winners in all categories. Please note that nominations for the TV section come from anyone and everyone. If you see anything you think is worthy of recognition, do please go to the KOI website and nominate it – it is that simple. Short-listing for next year will start soon after the deadline at the end of July 2015, so don’t leave it until the last minute. More information can be found at www.knight-of-illumination.com

RTS announces winners of the Craft & Design Awards Chris Rigby has won an RTS award. The LD triumphed in the category of Lighting for Multicamera for Alan Carr: Chatty Man – Series 11/12 (Open Mike Productions for Channel 4).

The RTS Craft & Design Awards recognise the skills and processes involved in programme production. This year’s awards were chaired by Cheryl Taylor, Controller of CBBC, and the ceremony was hosted by Jennifer 36

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Saunders on 1 December at the London Hilton Park Lane.

The jury was impressed by the quality of the music numbers in Chris’s winning show and said the lighting gave the numbers an edgy quality, which made him stand out from the rest.

Dave Davey was nominated in the same category for Dancing On Ice – Series 9 (ITV Studios for ITV) and again for The X Factor (Thames/Syco for ITV).

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 37

Awards

Ben Cracknell, winner of the Television: Events category for The Olivier Awards

Luke Halls, winner of the Television: Video Graphic Display category for Don Giovanni

David Higgs, winner of the Television: Drama category for The Escape Artist

Nick Collier accepts the award on behalf of Hugh French, winner of the Television: Small Studio category for Channel 4 News

Set & Light | Winter 2014

37

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 38

Recollection

1974 and all that

Jack Cardiff’s brilliant portraiture in monochrome of Marlene Dietrich, see the Spring 2007 issue

Words: Michael Hall 1974 was an exciting and memorable time for lighting in television, film and theatre because of developments in lamp and lighting technology. This article sets out my own take and recollections of this time – with some input from friends. It’s very much a personal view, though, and not a formal history.

Looking at the present list of STLD sponsors, I don’t believe that many of the companies were active in 1974, but I note that White Light, AC and Pulsar were formed before 1974 and that John Simpson and David Legget, who founded White Light and AC, respectively, are still running their companies. Pulsar was also around then, with Paul Mardon and Ken Sewell as joint founders, although Ken is now CEO of Entertainment Technology. Strand is still with us, but as a brand of Philips.

Information gathering and meeting manufacturers was more difficult in 1974 – there were no annual trade shows. The International Broadcasting Convention had been held biannually since 1967, but was really aimed at engineers at that time.

The ABTT had been formed in 1969, but their first Theatre Show was in 1977. Interestingly, Roger Fox was the first Show Director. John Simpson exhibited as Whitelight, with myself as Rosco, at that first show. Each company had an 8ft by 4ft exhibiting space. Roger, John and I will be there again this year.

PLASA started life in 1976 as the British Association of Discotheque Equipment Manufacturers, with the mandate to run an annual trade show. It became PLASA in 1983.

The ALD started with an informal series of lunches at Rules restaurant in the West End. Joe Davis and Michael Northen started as the Society of British Theatre Lighting Designers and later separated to become the ALD. By 1973 there were over 30 members, including four honorary US members, and English members included Francis Reid and David Hersey, with Richard Pilbrow as Chairman.

I’ll leave the television climate of 1974 to others, but the theatre world is worth recall.

The National Theatre Company was still in the Old Vic and the new National Theatre on London’s South Bank opened in 1976 with the Lyttleton Theatre. Richard Pilbrow’s company, Theatre Projects, were consultants and Peter Hall was the Director. Its second stage – the Olivier – had a unique thrust stage with a saturation lighting rig for fast changeover in productions.

It was a great period in the West End: The Debbie Reynolds Show at the Palladium, followed by Julie Andrews; Claire Bloom in A Street Car named Desire at the Piccadilly, lit by Richard Pilbrow and Molly Freidel (later to become his wife). Jesus Christ Superstar, No, No Nanette and West Side Story in Dublin.

In 1974, the stage musical A Chorus Line was in planning, lit

by Tharon Musser, first on Broadway and then in London.

It was the first Broadway show to use a mini computer-based 38

Set & Light | Winter 2014

system – the prototype Electronics Diversified LS-8, developed by Gordon Pearlman – to control lighting. Costing around $50,000, it enabled her to produce a complex, precisely controlled, fast multi-cue lighting plot. It was replaced the following year by the Strand Multi-Q system.

Francis Reid took over editorship of TABS magazine from Fred Bentham. Francis reports that the fee for a lighting designer in 1974 for an easy-to-light comedy, The Turning Point at the Duke of York’s, was £250.

With the emergence of lighting designers, talent became appreciative of good lighting: Marlene Deitrich gave performances through the 1970s, but only if Joe Davis could light her. He even lit her for a private function at Buckingham Palace. He used a single high key light. She painted a blue line down the middle of her nose to minimise its tilt, and never wanted to be seen in profile. She then painted a white line on the inside of her eyelids to emphasise the key light reflection.

But all was not glossy. A friend of mine, Graeme Cruickshank, retired now to New Zealand, was touring England in 1974 with a production of Gershwin’s Oh Kay as Company and Stage Manager and had to relight to suit different theatres. He didn’t know much about lighting, but got help from friendly local electricians. He does recall a night-time scene and a crescent moon projected onto the cyc, done by jamming a copper penny in an iris.

Lighting fixtures

Strand Electric, under the technical leadership of Fred Bentham, had long dominated stage lighting, although they had been acquired by Rank in 1968 to avoid bankruptcy caused by unreliable electronic dimming systems and the

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 39

Michael Hall

Pictured, above left: A gas lighting designer in Covent Garden in 1817 – people complained that gas lighting gave ‘a deadly hue to the complexion’. Pictured, above right: A musical show produced and directed by Bill Turner, which was lit by Bill in Studio 5 at Wembley, probably in the late 1960s. With little time or budget, and no gobo maker yet in existence, Bill needed projected images, so he had cutouts made and shadows cast, probably with Strand Patterns 93s

success of Thorn’s Q File. It is said that the Q File inspired Fred Foster to design a compact console: the Mega Cue. Launched in 1976, it was the beginning of ETC. Strand introduced the Patt 23 in 1953 and a short while later, the Patt 123, Fresnel. They had made over 500,000 Patt 23s by 1983.

The growth of the compact, more efficient tungsten halogen lamp drove new generations of fixture design, the Strand 764, 773 and 774, and the T Spot 64.

CCT, formed in 1968, were active in developing variable beam zoom spotlights like the Silhouette, with efficient optics, and halogen lamps. They concentrated on developing product to meet the BBC needs of Profiles, Follow Spots and Optical Projectors.

In mainland Europe, Strand was strong in Germany, as were Niethammer and Reiche & Vogel. There were also ADB in Belgium and LTM in France.

PANI in Vienna were specialists for high-power projectors with the long throw needed in the traditional European opera houses.

Around this time, Rank Audio Visual were marketing the Italian Ianiro Quartzcolor ranges for halogen and the new HMI light sources (which tended to change colour temperature in use). New efficient discharge lamps were invaluable for colour televising football. Light levels needed to be increased approximately fourfold from black and white and the existing corner lattice towers could not cope with the extra windage from four times as many projector floodlights. The answer was CSI (Compact Source Iodide) – a sealed beam reflector lamp – in a projector with a choice of different lenses – spread glass – for different beam angles.

There was little spill light, thanks to elaborate calculations on

a mainframe computer and careful alignments on the towers.

Another form of the lamp was linear, where the fixtures were sited on the edge of stand roofs, with early installations at Wembley and Arsenal. (My thanks to David Brooks for this vignette of lamp developments). It was mostly European lamp companies like Osram making HMI lamps.

It’s curious that an Italian company should lead the way with fixture design when Italy was one of the last countries to go to Colour Television – in 1977. West Germany had introduced two main channels, ARD and ZDF in August 1967, opened formally by Willy Brandt.

In the UK, around 1974, sales of colour sets exceeded sales of black & white sets for the first time.

In film, the BSC had been formed in 1949 by Bert Easey, then head of a studio camera department, with 55 members.

1974 was a healthy year for film. Pinewood and Shepperton Studios were busy; Pinewood completed another Bond film, The Man with the Golden Gun. Top grossing films shown were The Towering Inferno, The Godfather: Part II and Roman Polanski’s Chinatown, well worth watching today and beautifully lit by the DP John Alonzo, the first Mexican-American member of the ASC. In 1974, ‘brute’ arcs were still in wide use, but use of HMI at the low end of 200W and 575W was coming into use. Today, HMIs go up to 24kW. Producers of film lighting equipment were principally Arri, Quartzcolor and Mole Richardson in the US.

Gobos

Gobos, or patterns as the Americans called them, were being made by David Hersey’s company DHA, which he founded in 1971. By 1974, they had a catalogue range of Set & Light | Winter 2014

39

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 40

Recollection

designs both in steel and, later, in glass.

The manufacture and development of gobos has interesting origins in the UK and the USA. Francis Reid recalls ‘gobos’ for ‘dappling’ in the early 1960s, finding them useful on Tyrone Guthrie thrust stages.

Richard Pilbrow recalls the youthful David Hersey cutting gobos by hand for his and other TP lighting designers’ use – perhaps it was the monotony of this that drove him to explore technology and start his own company.

In the US, Jules Fisher suggested to Joe Tawil – an old friend of the STLD, being a good guest speaker for us – to make standard designs, and I have his first catalogue of the first 24 designs, dated 1974.

Bill Millar, a BBC LD, created his company Miltel for making glass designs.

You will have read John Watt’s ‘An affectionate farewell to Bill Lee’ (Set & Light, Spring 2014). I’ve included an image of Bill’s early work as a celebration of his flair and creativity (see previous page).

Colour filters

1974 was a time of great change in colour filters. For years, Strand had dominated the market in the UK and Europe with ‘Cinemoid’, a flame-retardant acetate made by British Celanese. It had poor heat resistance but the Strand Patt 23 was cool running, and Fred Bentham was still demonstrating colour music with ‘Cinemoid’. New generations of fixtures with tungsten halogen and HMI lamps were hotter and there was great interest in the new material, polyester.

But in the mid-1970s, the BBC colour contract was for an annual quantity of up to 50,000 sheets of Cinemoid. In the late 1960s, Richard Pilbrow found the US Rosco’s ‘Roscolene’ and was importing it to the UK. On 1 April 1974, Lee Filters started manufacture of coated polyester based on Cinemoid colours, plus correction filters for tungsten/daylight balance.

In the US, Rosco won an Academy Award for their correction range – Cinegel, which did away with the need for tracing paper and skin irritant fibreglass and included NDs, Blues and CTOs – and launched a deep-dyed polyester range of filters: Roscolux. Both companies listened to lighting designers and DPs. Two examples: Gordy Willis was the acclaimed US DP making The Godfather: Part II and he needed a sepia tone for the opening party sequence but couldn’t get a good lens filter, so Rosco modified a gelatine based 282 Chocolate with the necessary tint changes for the studio light filters.

In the early 1970s, the young Broadway lighting designer Tharon Musser was lighting Stephen Sondheim’s A Little Night Music and wanted a colour she could only describe as ‘Swedish afternoon’ for the song ‘Send in the Clowns’. Stan Miller found one of the Rosco film blues was ideal; the Kelvin numbers of converting 3,200K tungsten to nominal daylight weren’t important to Tharon but they created the mood for the song.

Francis Reid was tasked by Sir Michael Redgrave to add a greener cast to lighting which simulated gas light. Francis’s 40

Set & Light | Winter 2014

practical solution was to expose sheets of Cinemoid 38 to the sun’s UV on the roof until Rosco made 385 Gaslight Green for him.

The film industry needed lighting filters designed specifically to the spectral sensitivity of colour film, so Rosco produced a range of primaries and secondaries, each created in four densities: 15, 30, 60 and 90, corresponding to ½, 1, 2, and 3stop calibrations. It took nine months of development time, abstruse computer modelling, setting out log density exposure, etc, but when I showed Michael Samuelson, he absorbed it in about five seconds, nodded and said ‘about time, too’.

Lee Filters also has a history of problem solving: it tweaked the 164 Flame Red for Superman and devised filters for the explosion of Krypton. The 205 ½ CTO was altered for the underwater scenes in Harry Potter. For Denis Coop, on the first Superman, Lee Filters developed a Cyan filter for the CID discharge lamps for the blue-screen work.

It also developed a range of nine cosmetic filters following a client request to match a makeup colour for an ad shoot.

This became Aqua Blue and Peach, and the rest followed.

Business was becoming more international by 1974, with faster air travel, so here’s a brief look at North America.

The fixture market was dominated in theatre by Altman: a friend, John McGraw, co-founder of Production Arts rental house in New York, told me that Altman Kit was reliable, with the great advantage of being made at its plant in Yonkers in New York. Other sources were Kleigl and Century.

On Broadway, there were long-running shows like Grease and A Chorus Line. One problem was that some Broadway and Off Broadway theatres were AC and some DC, so rental houses had to have a mixture of both resistive and auto-transformers. For film lighting, Mole-Richardson still dominated the market with carbon arc-based fixtures.

Colour filters were Roscolene, and some imported Cinemoid and early polyester-based filter. Then in the mid1970s, Rosco added high-temperature resistant and extruded polycarbonate to its ranges. Lee started to spread into America, as Rosco spread into Europe.

For fixtures, I quote Bill Klages on fixtures development for projection from the book, Gobos for Image Projection, which I co-wrote with Julie Harper.

“The biggest problem was the availability of instruments that had good enough performance to work for television.

All ellipsoidals available at that time in use in theatre had very poor performance as far for projection use, particularly in the larger studios. In black and white days, the best we had was an ellipsoidal 2kW fixture made by Kliegl. It came in two spreads, 1:2 and 1:3 or approximately 30 and 20 degrees. In colour we used a monstrous instrument by the same manufacturer, but with a 3K lamp and a fan that had a tendency to emit loud screeching noises at inappropriate times. It also had a most disappointing and very erratic performance as well. Things became better with the introduction by Mole-Richardson of the 2kW Molelipso, a well-designed substitute based upon the Kliegl 2K that made projections work in the larger venue applications. The unit made its introduction late 1970s. It was made at the request of Leard Davis, who was a very fine lighting director that worked at CBS-Hollywood.”

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 41

Michael Hall

Pictured, above right: Caravaggio’s The Supper at Emmaus, 1601, copyright the National Gallery (Summer 2005 issue) – see the cinematic skills, 300 years before our film technology. Pictured, top left: St Hugh, c1600, North Italian: another example of painterly rendering of portraiture skills, ‘lovely soft key light in just the right place’, comments Andrew Dixon. Pictured, middle and bottom left: some landmarks in lighting technology: the The Patt 23 from 1953 to 1983 and now the Source Four from 1992 onwards

Peter Edwards, now retired, was co-founder and first chairman of the Canadian chapter of the STLD, and I asked him to recap 1974 in Toronto.

“After close to nine years of colour television in Canada, starting in 1966, methods and equipment had changed. No longer were the high light levels of 400 foot candles a requirement as they were in those early years, and a more reasonable level of 100–200 foot candles had become the normal with the upgrading of new cameras.

“Also, Strand ‘scoops’, which produced base, flat light, were relegated for use as colour washes, etc. Soft fill light was now mainly produced by Mole-Richardson soft lights of various wattages or by bounce boards.

“Fresnels in use were Strand 2kW Patt 243s – MR & laniro 5kW and 10kW, with an assortment of Colortran and Mole ellipsoidals, and portable equipment for location shooting.

“When colour first came in we were very aware about maintaining correct colour temperature. To this aim it meant shaking out the 2kW, 5kW and 10kW incandescent globes to minimise deposits on the interior glass prior to pre-lighting of a production. Fortunately, these incandescent lamps were finally replaced by quartz halogen, making this work no longer necessary, much to the chagrin of the lighting crew.

“Lighting studio cycloramas had normally used ‘scoops’ in monochrome television. With the introduction of colour and its higher required light levels, this meant an increase in the number of scoops. This created a major problem until it was rectified by companies such as Colortran, Ianiro and

Mole-Richardson, which brought out a range of cyclights utilising QI lamps in various wattages for equipping studios.

“One other item of importance around that time was the introduction of colour media, which could give extended life over a given production. The normal product used was Cinemoid in the early days, and when Strand discontinued this, Roscolene was used for a short period. However, for both of these products it usually meant a possible change before a recording of the show. When high-temperature Roscolux was introduced, it became the standard for many lighting professionals due to its longevity. Tough spun and other diffusion products replaced the toxic fibreglass.

“Location lighting still relied upon carbon arcs for large area lighting, requiring skilled operators to keep the MR ‘brutes’ in trim, and it was about that time that early CSI and HMI sources started to show some positive alternatives for outside broadcasts.

“CSI also became the source for follow spotlights for lightentertainment shows, usually with mixed results as far as operator comments were concerned but still an improvement over the incandescent Kliegl Dynabeams for light output.”

In summary, in 2014 there is much less insularity and more crossovers of lighting designers in theatre, television and video.

In 1977, I gave a party in London for lighting designers in theatre, television (including John Treays) and film, and found that most of them had heard of others in different fields but never met them. It is so different and better now.

Set & Light | Winter 2014

41

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 42

Recollection

The Old Man of Hoy

The view from my camera position

Words & photos: Rod Litherland Forty years of the STLD and a time for retrospection. One of your committee suggested I look back even further to before the STLD was born.

1967 – The last days of black and white television. I was lucky enough to be a cameraman on BBC Scotland’s OB crew when I heard talk of a most unusual OB: a rock climb on the Old Man of Hoy, a 450ft-high sandstone rock stack off the coast of the island of Hoy in the Orkneys. It had only ever been climbed once, and that was the year before.

Although there had been previous televised rock climbs in north Wales and Cheddar Gorge, this was to be the most spectacular and the most difficult, both in climbing and television terms. Engineering manager Bill Wishlade had a formidable task ahead. The site was three miles from the nearest road across a peat moorland, there was no vehicle ferry to the island and there was no hotel. This was the first time I had heard the word ‘logistics’.

At the end of June, two weeks before the transmission dates, we flew out to the Orkneys, the pilot taking a detour en route to show us the Old Man. Most of the crew had opted for hotel accommodation in Stromness on the Mainland (the largest of the Orkney islands), but myself and engineer George Allan had decided to camp at the youth hostel on Hoy, which was also home to the climbers, thus avoiding a ferry crossing and minibus ride every day and giving us a bit longer in bed. There was still the three-mile walk across the moorland to the site, made slightly more interesting by the fulmars – seabirds that would defend their young by projectile vomiting at anyone who invaded their territory.

The four-camera scanner, MCR 27, together with its cable tender, had come by tank landing craft from the Clyde and made its way to the nearest point by road. In those days, a scanner was provided with a ‘de-rig kit’, so that every bit of equipment could be taken out of the vehicle and reassembled on special racks elsewhere. Boxes of extra cables came with the kit all labelled at each end to show where they should be plugged. As the scanner was de-rigged, the equipment was put on a large sledge and pulled over the soft peat, with some difficulty, by a heavy duty tractor. I understand that, unfortunately, the results of our efforts can still be seen on the peat to this day. After a considerable number of journeys, the equipment was assembled in one of the three marquees provided by the Scots Guards on top of the cliffs opposite the Old Man and the engineers started the rebuilding of the MCR. The Scots Guards also provided the location catering, rabbit stew featuring regularly on the menu!

Meanwhile, a small team of experienced climbers, known locally as the Sherpas, started the task of laying cables and distributing camera and sound gear to various locations on the cliff overlooking the Old Man by building a simple aerial ropeway from the top to the bottom. I imagine that today 42

Set & Light | Winter 2014

The marquees on the clifftop The Sherpas make an aerial ropeway to take gear down the cliff

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 43

Rod Litherland

Senior Cameraman Harry Barclay and Director Philip Gilbert

everything would be picked up by helicopter and delivered to the correct place, but I guess that in 1967 that would have taken us way over budget. As I was a keen mountain walker and had done some simple rock climbing, I was allocated the camera right at the bottom of the cliff looking up at the towering pillar of rock, thereby ensuring that I was usually last in the queue when a meal break was called!

Cameras then had a lens turret that rotated to bring one of four fixed-angle lenses in front of the tube. (One of the skills of a cameraman was being able to change lens fast and quietly.) Alternatively, a zoom lens could be fitted. Zoom lenses had quite a limited range, 5:1 being typical, and were not servo driven but controlled manually via Bowden cables.

This created a problem for my camera as director Philip Gilbert wanted shots from the zoom to be as tight as possible, but also wanted to see an impressive wide-angle shot showing the whole of the Old Man. Experiments back at base had revealed that it was just possible to mount a V5 zoom lens on one side of the turret, and a fixed wide-angle lens on the opposite side of the turret without the zoom being in shot on the wide angle, provided its lens hood was removed. This was most unconventional and probably put strains on the turret when it was rotated that it was not designed to take. Also, the Bowden cables would not reach between the controls and the zoom when the wide angle was in use, so extra-long cables were borrowed from a V3 zoom.

In addition to the four cameras positioned on the cliff, there were to be two lightweight cameras carried on the

climb by four experienced climbers led by Hamish MacInnes, well known for his mountain rescue work. Lightweight is a relative term – to lift a conventional camera was a two-man job. These Ikigami cameras required the operator to carry an unwieldy backpack. Some work had been done putting anchor points on the rockface to assist the climbing cameramen, leading The Sunday Times journalist to suggest that it had all been rehearsed, which was definitely not true.

Sound had their own concerns as radio mics were very much less reliable than now, and once on the climb they would be completely inaccessible. At least they didn’t have to worry about interference from mobile phones.

The Russian Sputnik satellite had been circling the earth for almost 10 years and communication satellites had been used for the 1964 Olympic coverage, but they were still not a practical proposition for a remote OB, so a series of microwave links was needed on various high points in northern Scotland to get both sound and vision back to Kirk o’Shotts transmitter, where it could feed in to the contribution network. Picture synchronisation in those analogue days was always a major consideration as the frame store had not been invented, so in order for network control to be able to mix to us without picture disturbance, it was necessary for them to gradually alter the sync pulses at Television Centre until they lined up with our sync generator in a tent many hundreds of miles away – a process known as Genlock.

Three days to go,and on arrival on site we were greeted Set & Light | Winter 2014

43

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 44

Recollection

with the sight of a windblown and torn marquee draped over our temporary control room. After a short period of gloom and despondency, followed by the inevitable bacon butties, the Blitz spirit took over and all hands set to, derigging the equipment and rebuilding the control room in what had been the dining tent. Luckily, no serious water damage had occurred and by the end of the day, everything was working again. I remember engineer Don Smith lining up one of the cameras. The sides were folded down and his hand was in the camera among the glowing valves making an adjustment. Chris Bonnington was standing nearby openmouthed: “Wow, I’d never stick my hand in there – I’d be s*** scared.” A few weeks earlier, Chris had climbed the north face of the Eiger!

Transmissions started on the Saturday afternoon and continued through that evening and on to late Sunday afternoon. At those latitudes in midsummer it stayed light well into the evening, although there were some shots of the climbers spending the night roped to the rock, which required, I think, a spotted up 10K on the clifftop. It was nearly all live, with some recorded catching up to tell the viewers what had happened while we were off air, but the gaps between transmissions meant there was a fair amount of hanging about – literally, for some of the climbers.

I can’t remember a great deal about the programmes themselves, which means they went off pretty much according to plan. There were some impressive shots from the climbing cameras, as well as some scary climbing moves.

44

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Rod Litherland

Engineer George Allan poses on the tractor used to drag sledges full of equipment across the peat moorland

The image that sticks in most people’s minds is the shot of Tom Patey on the end of a nylon rope with an overhang above and the sea a couple of hundred feet below. Added excitement was provided by bits of loose sandstone that occasionally came away, and by the tense voice of climber Ian McNaught-Davies – he obviously thought this wasn’t a good idea after all!

All that remained for the next week was to de-rig, drag all the equipment back across the moor on the sledge and rebuild MCR 27.

Viewing estimates were between 15 and 20 million, but one of the most satisfying aspects of being part of this OB is that people still remember it to this day.

STLD_113 pp1-75:TL 85 Spring 2005 10/12/2014 22:44 Page 45

In memoriam

Mario De Sisti

Pasquale Quadri Pasquale Quadri started his journey with lighting while playing in a band with his good friend Claudio. It was the fashion then to have English nicknames, so they became Paky and Clay. At that time, before disco, live ‘beat’ music provided the most popular entertainment, and the dance halls the band played in had little in the way of effects lighting, so Paky decided to make his own.

He bought some slide projectors and fashioned some liquid oil wheels using material from the chemist shop that he worked in and used these as effects for his band. The owners of the dance halls enquired of Paky as to where he got his groovy lighting effects and a need was recognised by the young engineer. The photography shop that supplied his projectors carried very few in stock so Paky returned to his garage and started to build the optical system from scratch.

A lighting manufacturer was born and he named his company CLAY PAKY. The Golden Scan was the next milestone: a glorious silver creation that enhanced clubs and discos for years, and then came the next challenge from the industry: taking them on tour. Power correction, a black finish and handles were the main changes and the Golden Scan hit the road in various versions. Meanwhile, Vari~Lite came onto the scene with the moving head fixture the VL1, and some pretty tight copyrighting.

It was the nature of Pasquale, who received the equivalent of a knighthood in Italy for his services to Italian exporting, to respect the intellectual property of other creative engineers, and though great pressure was exerted by the industry and his own sales team, CLAY PAKY did not produce any moving head fixtures until they could be manufactured without infringing the Vari~Lite copyright.

The only time I have ever heard negative comments within CLAY PAKY about other manufacturers has been in reference to those who copy at the expense of the innovators and

avoid the expense of R&D. Like most things within the company, this ethic came straight from the top. Paky always had an ear for lighting designers as an important influence in what direction the company should move.

He reflected this by being a staunch supporter of the Knight of Illumination Awards in the UK. I spent time with Paky in his office or R&D ‘playroom’ and his desk always had various lenses and fixture parts among the company paperwork.

Though his English was limited, and my Italian poor, we communicated through drawings and gestures, and I shared his absolute passion for light.

At home he was a loving family man and his passions were reflected in a glorious collection of film projectors and a cellar of finest grappa!

Paky was the driving force behind one of the most successful professional show-lighting companies of our time and his absolute quest for quality and optical excellence, alongside a true flair for recognising trends and needs in the market, will be remembered as a benchmark of excellence for many years to come. Paky’s compassion and support of various charities such as Light Relief and Behind the Scenes have made a difference to many in the industry beyond the influence of his creative genius he will be greatly missed by all those who had the pleasure of knowing him.

The De Sisti Organisation would like to inform our friends and dear customers that Mario De Sisti, our founder, passed away on 31 October aged 73.

The lighting industry has lost a true pioneer, inventor and ambassador.

There was no one more charismatic or passionate about his family, business or the industry. Mario was highly dedicated and inhaled lighting with every breath. His enthusiasm and vigour were contagious.

He travelled the world and considered most of his friends as family. There was no one with a bigger heart and higher level of excitement and dedication to the lighting industry.

The entire De Sisti organisation expresses its immense gratitude and admiration to Mario for his genius contribution and unrestful dedication.

We will all miss you Mario. There are no words good enough to express how much we will miss you.

His sons, Fabio and Sergio De Sisti

Mario De Sisti passed away in hospital in Rome from a brain haemorrhage from which he did not wake up after surgery.

He had just finished a visit to PLASA 2014, EastEnders in Elstree, Coronation Street and Dock 10 in Manchester.

Mario was known in the industry as ‘the godfather’ and since starting De Sisti Lighting in 1982, had been a world leader in lighting innovation and equipment. He was a natural lighting engineer, happiest playing – as we all saw at Dock 10 recently, with a hoist in pieces getting rid of a squeak with him standing on a flight case! I, for one, will miss his incredible drive, enthusiasm and his great joy for life, not least his skill of being Mr TV Lighting!

Durham Marenghi Nick Mobsby Set & Light | Winter 2014

45

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 46

In memoriam

Dave Sydenham

Memories of a BAFTA-winning biker Dave Sydenham, who sadly died in August 2014, was a highly regarded, talented BBC drama lighting practitioner, whose work graced our television screens for many years.

Dave joined the BBC aged 16 as a ‘Youth in Training’ and after a period working in transmitters, transferred to the fledgling television service at Alexandra Palace.

He had a long BBC career and ultimately in the 1970s and 1980s had great success as a TM1/LD, working alongside many of the finest TV directors and designers of the day.

His work was recognised by BAFTA, receiving the award for his lighting of Testament of Youth and Matilda’s England in 1979. He was also nominated for his lighting of Dennis Potter’s ground-breaking Pennies from Heaven in 1978, for Pride and Prejudice in 1980 along with The Borgias in 1982 and Oxbridge Blues in 1984. He used to say that he prefered his BAFTA nomination certificates as they were more attractive than the famous gilded mask awarded to the winners.

Among the numerous productions he also lit over his career were, Shakespeare’s A Comedy of Errors, Dombey and Son, Absent Friends, The Diary of Anne Frank and a number of episodes of Last of the Summer Wine.

Dave was a modest thoughtful man whose lighting enhanced but never overpowered. His lighting plots were clear and concise, as were his thoughts and ideas on the pictures he wanted to see, though he always valued input from his vision team.

I remember mentioning a small blemish in the lighting of one scene, to which Dave said that if people noticed then the script had failed!

On another occasion, on asking him about a subtle area of light in a scene for which there was no apparent realistic source, he called it ‘borrowed light’, which was worth using if it enhanced the atmosphere scene.

Dave had a unique way of working with his VS (console op) in that he operated the console during rehearsals and sometimes recordings, while the VS was sent to the studio floor with 46

Set & Light | Winter 2014

a walkie-talkie to direct the sparks in adjusting the lighting according to his instructions. This provided unrivalled experience in learning the art of TV lighting for future LDs. The technique was adopted by other LDs and was eventually formalised when an extra technical manager (TM2) was allocated to enable this to happen.

However, I wasn’t too enamoured of this as a VS when, on one occasion, Hollywood actress Susan Sarandon wanted to see a soft light in her eyeline whenever she was in close up. Dave gave that responsibility to me, along with a hand-held soft light. It worked and the star was happy.

On the very day that Dave died his work was being shown on the big screen at the National Film Theatre.

It was episode one of Girls of Slender Means, part of a celebration of the work of Moira Armstrong organised

by John Henshall. She also directed the award-winning Testament of Youth and referred to the notable work that Dave had done on it.

To quote Andrew Dixon: “Well done, Dave, you really deserved it and

many thanks for the wisdom you imparted to those who had the privilege of working with you.”

On his retirement in 1987 Dave was able to devote more time to his artwork. He was a talented painter and many of his paintings were reproduced on greetings cards and notelets, of which I received a number during the course of our correspondence in later years.

Dave also had a love of motorbikes and, aged 70, surprised his family by buying a 600cc machine. His daughter Alison recalls riding pillion at high speed along the A41 hoping that her crash helmet wouldn’t fly off. She also has fond memories of him in full leathers, aged 72, stopping off at a petrol station to fill up, with her on the back.

Our deepest sympathies and condolences go to Dave’s wife, Jean, and to all his family.

My thanks to Andrew Dixon, Roy Adcock and Chris Watts, along with John Henshall, for their thoughts and contributions.

Martin Kisner

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 47

Lighting

A view from across the pond

Television lighting: The shadow knows Words & photos: Bill Klages Recently, I was browsing through some lighting manufacturer’s data sheets for a group of ‘TV softlights’.

In the data sheets, a value for ‘shadow factor’ was given for each instrument. I was quite amazed at this reference as I had never seen it used in a specification (although I did vaguely remember the term and even a little bit of its history). I thought that it would be of interest to take a look at the subject to see if there is any value to awakening its use.

The shadow factor

As far as I can deduce – based on a review of references to the shadow factor – the term was first suggested in the early 20th century by Konrad Norden, a scientist in illumination engineering. In 1948, Norden wrote and published Shadow and Diffusion in Illuminating Engineering, a book that, we can assume, is the bible about shadow factor. His idea is a simple one: a lighting instrument to be tested is directed towards a light meter and the lighting intensity is measured (yes, either foot-candle or lux). Then, an opaque disk – the ‘caster’ – is placed in the centre of the path, and the intensity in the shadow area is measured again under this new condition. The expression that defines the calculation to be used in determining the shadow factor (which was approved somewhere along the way by the International Illumination Congress, forerunner of the CIE) is given by:

Pictured: Bill Klages set up his own experiment to test Konrad Norden’s theory of shadow factor

crowded between 0.9 and 1.0. It became very obvious that the relative dimensions of the light meter, shadow caster, and distance of the caster to the meter, can greatly affect the value and usability of the calculated shadow factor. I can only guess the dimensions that were noted as being used by the manufacturer were incorrect. My solution was to set dimensions and spacing by trial and error until I obtained more practical values.

The results

This formula is straightforward enough. If the light source is small (approaching a point source), the shadow would be very dense (assuming that the cast shadow was greater than the diameter of the light meter’s disk). In this case, the shadow factor would be close to 1.0 as the illumination in the shadow area would be very small. As the size of the light source increases, the shadow area’s illumination would increase, and could, theoretically, approach zero (ie, an overcast sky).

Real life

The sketch, pictured top right, shows my test setup. The caster I used was an opaque piece of cardboard, about 1-3/8 inches in diameter. This was slightly larger than the approximate one-inch round disc of the light meter. There was a little mystery at this point. If I employed the same dimensions used by the manufacturer, the results were quite strange and not practical. All shadow factors calculated for different aperture-sized instruments using his setup were

The table shows the results of my tests of various instrument types. They are arranged in order of increasing aperture size: from the smallest – a standard sixinch baby Fresnel spotlight – to the largest – the 5kW TV Softlight, one of the two manufacturer’s instruments shown in italics. You would suspect that the larger the instrument’s aperture, the lower the shadow factor. This is true, with one exception: the 5kW TV Softlight appears out of place as the area of its aperture is larger than the 4kW Super Softlight.

This result could be true as its reflector is a specular surface as opposed to the 4k’s perfectly diffuse reflector. But, due to the conflict of the conditions between my test set-up and the manufacturer’s, I would be reluctant to state this as an accurate conclusion. I did not actually have either the 5kW TV Softlight or the 2.5kW TV Softlight to test under my conditions.

Set & Light | Winter 2014

47

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 48

Lighting

Some details

Certain specific results should be noted. When a piece of diffusion is clipped on the barn doors of the six-inch Fresnel, the ‘aperture’ size was increased to be about 10 inches in diameter (an area of 81 square inches). This increase in diffusion is reflected in its lower shadow factor value of 0.930, as opposed to the unfiltered result of 0.992. A similar increase in diffusion is noted when an egg crate is placed on a 2kW Zip Softlight. We pay for the increase in directivity with the use of this accessory with a decrease in the ‘softness’ of the Softlight. This is something that we know from experience. Note that in all this discussion about diffusion and shadow factor, the actual value of the illumination does not enter into the comparison of shadow factor between instruments and their configurations.

For example, we know that adding an egg crate will decrease the light output of the Softlight as well as changing the shadow factor.

Who knows what evil lurks?

I think that it is now possible to answer the question of the usefulness of reviving the shadow factor from its dormancy.

It was quite apparent that in order for the results to be

A view from across the pond

meaningful, the measurement must be taken under identical conditions – not only with equal dimensions and sizes, but also to the use of an identical light meter (or, at least, one with an identical disk surface area). I would guess that this requirement might be very difficult to satisfy.

Let us suppose that you do surmount all obstacles and manage to assemble a group of instruments for a shadow factor test. From this arrangement, you would obtain a whole set of values of shadow factors that I think would be predicable – just based upon the size of the instrument’s aperture, as occurred in the example. There might even be a slight departure, as was illustrated by my conjecture about the effect of the specular reflector of the 5kW TV Softlight.

Even so, would all the effort be worth it? I doubt it. In my opinion, I think that we should let the shadow factor stay in its resting place.

The following article was first published at TVTechnology.com, for whom Bill writes a regular column, on 7 November 2012.

We would like to thank Bill for allowing us to reprint his column here. He would like to extend an invitation to all the lighting people out there to share your thoughts with him at billklages@roadrunner.com

STLD event: Lighting in Rembrandt at The National Gallery You’ve all heard of ‘Rembrandt Lighting’, and so on 13 January 2015 we’re off to ‘Rembrandt: The Late Works’ at The National Gallery to see how the master did this in paint.

If you’re on our emailing list from publicity@stld.org.uk then you’ll be well aware of all this and may have already applied and been allocated tickets. As we go to press they’re selling out fast – at £15 each to STLD members – in fact, we have slightly more allocated to our 50-odd members and their guests, for our time slot of 14:30 entry, than the National Gallery box office has left to sell.

Like our acclaimed ‘Leonardo’ visit of three years ago, there is a talk beforehand by the excellent Linda Bolton on what we will see, plus a buffet lunch to tempt you.

All this takes place from noon at St Martin’s Hall, St Martin-in-the-Fields in Trafalgar Square, where we will be holding our 41st AGM that very same evening, with even more hospitality to bring you back to the hall, plus maybe even a talk about the National Gallery LED lighting (TBC).

So why not take a look at www.stld.org.uk/events.php to see more up-to-date information on this extravaganza.

48

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 49

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 50

Sponsor news

Sponsors: don’t miss out on being featured here.

Email your news to sponsornews@stld.org.uk for inclusion in the next issue of Set & Light.

AC-ET Jack Moorhouse appointed as Jands Product Manager

A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd are delighted to announce the appointment of Jack Moorhouse to the role of Product Manager – Europe & the Middle East – for the Jands range of lighting and media control solutions.

Jack has been supporting many of the leading designers, companies and venues using the award-winning Jands Vista and Stage CL product families around the world since joining AC-ET in 2011, giving him a unique insight into the strengths of these exciting ranges.

Jack will work closely with Fred Mikeska, VP of US Sales & Marketing for sister company A.C. Lighting Inc, who manages the Jands lighting console range in North America.

Laurie Giraudeau appointed as Marketing Manager

A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd are pleased to announce the appointment of Laurie Giraudeau in the company’s UK marketing team as part of their ongoing expansion programme.

A well-known lighting industry figure, Laurie joins ACET in the new role of Marketing Manager with immediate effect. Laurie will use her proven track record within digital marketing and brand communications to develop and oversee the marketing strategies for AC-ET’s specialist lighting, audio, rigging and video sales divisions, and sister installations company, A.C. Special Projects Ltd. Joining the industry in 2006, Laurie has experience on the supplier side, working for several well-known technology brands. She held the role of Marketing Manager at Litestructures for several years before moving to Rosco, where she gained valuable UK sales experience before joining the company’s global marketing team as Marketing Manager for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

Bi-lingual, Laurie will work closely with AC-ET’s many exclusive and leading brands to oversee key product launches in selected territories.

AC-ET appoints Mats Karlsson in international business development role

A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd, a ‘one-stop’ provider of cutting-edge lighting, audio, rigging and video 50

Set & Light | Winter 2014

products and solutions to users in over 80 countries, are delighted to announce their appointment of well-known industry figure Mats Karlsson in a new international business development role.

Mats has more than 30 years of experience in various roles, spanning rental and production, lighting design, sales and product development, and joins the company after some 10 years in LED display development at Barco, Martin Professional and, most recently, VER. He will be responsible for increasing the market share of AC-ET’s exclusive and key brands internationally, including the supply of Chroma-Q®, Jands, Prolights and many more marques from a portfolio of over 200 to selected territories.

Neil Vann appointed as Prolights Brand Manager

A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd are delighted to announce the appointment of Neil Vann to the role of Brand Manager – UK, Ireland & Sweden – for the Prolights range of highvalue, yet high-performance, lighting, video and effects products.

The Prolights range offers innovative technology solutions, which deliver reliable, creative tools at a price that all productions can afford. By taking advantage of highefficiency production methods, products deliver the ideal balance between quality and value to professionals looking to maximise the return on their investment.

AC-ET appoints Aaron Cripps as Regional Sales Representative for Ireland

A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd are pleased to announce that Aaron Cripps, a Regional Account Manager in the company’s International Sales division, has taken on the new role of Regional Sales Representative for Ireland (ROI) and other selected European sales territories, effective from 20 October.

Aaron has been working at AC-ET for over 10 years, having joined through the company’s sales trainee recruitment programme. During this time, he has helped to strengthen the existing business relationships with key suppliers and to develop new customer relationships across Europe.

County Limerick will be Aaron’s new base. He will be working in a roving sales and support capacity for his existing customers, as well as actively looking to generate new business relationships across all sectors of the company’s core business areas. Particular focus will be

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 51

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

placed on promoting AC-ET’s UK exclusive and other leading brands, including Chroma-Q®, Jands, Prolights, Spotlight, Mole-Richardson, Procolor, LumenRadio, Luminex, Dynamic Audio Device (DAD), Columbus McKinnon, VMB, BroadWeigh, LedGo, Green Hippo and many more marques from a portfolio of over 200 available via the company’s specialist lighting, audio, rigging and video sales divisions.

ANNA VALLEY ITV’s Spandau Ballet: True Gold

Spandau Ballet performed their greatest hits including ‘Gold’, ‘To Cut a Long Story Short’ and ‘True’ live in front of a studio audience as they celebrated 35 years of the band. TV Director Paul Kirrage and Production Designer Dominic Tolfts chose Anna Valley’s new Hybrid 18 LED display as a dynamic backdrop to the Spandau set.

Dominic created an attractive checker-style design that also allowed Lighting Director Dave Davey to point additional lighting through the checker apertures. The Hybrid 18mm screens also incorporate LED lighting for use on the command of the LD via DMX control. In addition, the two high-resolution screens used on the show were AV4 4mm LED. The LED products utilised on the show and supplied by Anna Valley are Hybrid 18 LED and AV4 4mm

Photo credit: North News and Pictures Ltd

A new software upgrade for ARRI’s documentary-style AMIRA camera will allow it to record ProRes UHD files, answering the 4K requirements of some productions. The upgrade is expected to be available for purchase at the online ARRI Licence Shop by the end of 2014.

stunning opening ceremony included mass choreography, live music, boats, giant floating sculptures, projection mapping, pyrotechnics and more to tell the incredible story of the North East, featuring a creative team who have previously worked on the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympic Opening Ceremonies.

Aurora Lighting Hire provided lighting facilities for the event, working with Lighting Designer Oli Richards, assisted

by Associate Lighting Designer Seb Williams. Working closely with the design team was Production Electrician John Nowell and Aurora Project Manager Sam Crook.

Oli Richards said: “With such a large-scale, ambitious project the main challenge was transforming the Quayside into a stage, while trying to encompass the rest of the site, which is just over a mile in circumference. Combining this with the relatively short pre-production time of four months, we had our work cut out”.

Seb Williams had his own challenges following the initial design brief, which included the practicalities of linking the 1.6km circuit around the Newcastle and Gateshead Quaysides.

Deliver any format

Aurora tumble into action

ARRI ARRI announces ProRes UHD output for AMIRA

While widespread adoption of 4K or UHD for broadcast is still a long way off, an increasing number of content owners are becoming concerned that they ought to safeguard the longevity of their programmes by ensuring that they will be suitable for UHD transmission, should that become a standard in the future.

For those productions that do need to generate UHD deliverables, AMIRA will now offer the ability to record all ProRes codecs in ultra-high definition 3,840 by 2,160 resolution directly onto the in-camera CFast 2.0 cards, at up to 60 fps. This feature, activated through an affordable software licence (and a sensor calibration for existing AMIRAs) comes in response to feedback from AMIRA customers, some of whom have been quizzed about 4K deliverables by clients.

Aurora supplied full TV lighting facilities to the BBC’s new flagship Saturday night entertainment show Tumble, which screened over the summer. Ten celebrities took part in the show, taking a leap into the world of gymnastics.

Lighting Director Gurdip Mahal said: “I really enjoyed working on the series of Tumble. There was a fantastic team

AURORA Aurora and Bupa at the Great North Run

This year, the Bupa Great North Run was the first event of its kind in the world to reach its one millionth entrant. The

Photo credit: Smith Studios Ltd

Set & Light | Winter 2014

51

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 52

Sponsor news

with great equipment and a production team who were lovely. The projection and the lighting worked very well together, giving the show a spectacular look each week.

It was a great way of spending your summer.”

Alongside Gurdip was Moving Light Operator Ross Williams, Media Operator Russell Grubiak, Generic Operator Ges Smith. Gaffer was James Tinsley and the lighting crew were Richard Shout, Adam Mitchell, Lidz Milheiras and Alan Dolan.

The last show of the series peaked to 4.2 million viewers and it is likely to return for a second series.

Awards season at Aurora

Lighting Director Chris Rigby picked up the award for Alan Carr Chatty Man within the entertainment category at the 7th Knight of Illumination Awards. Aurora have supplied lighting equipment and crew for the last 13 series of the show since its inception. Rigby paid thanks to his console operators, vision supervisors and crew who support him on the show.

Ross Williams, along with his colleagues Al Gurdon, Michael ‘Oz’ Owen and Peter Canning, won a Primetime Emmy Award in LA. Their work on the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games Opening Ceremony won in the category of Outstanding Lighting Design/Lighting Direction for a Variety Special.

Aurora report a busy summer season

Aurora have had a busy summer since the last edition of Set & Light, supplying equipment and crew to TV studios and locations across the country. Those productions are: Celebrity Squares, Weekend Kitchen Live, Surprise Surprise, Decimate, The Singer Takes It All, Fifteen to One, The Edge, The Elaine Paige Show, Big Star Little Star, A League of Their Own, British Bake Off Extra Slice, Strictly – It Takes Two, Backchat, Later with Jools Holland, 1,000 Heartbeats, Monty Python Live, Episodes, Viral Tap, The Graham Norton Show, Alan Carr Chatty Man, The Jonathan Ross Show, Mock the Week, Fanatic, Frankie Boyle’s Referendum Autopsy, Let’s Pay Darts for Comic Relief, The Only Way is Essex Live, 21st Question, Nickelodeon ‘Get Your Skills On’, Doritos’ World Cup Commercial, My Big Gay Wedding, ‘Feeling Nuts’ for Stand Up for Cancer, Relatively Clever, Win Your Wish List and Skavlan.

These productions took Aurora to the following studios: Dock 10, BBC Glasgow, London Studios, Elstree Film Studios, Pinewood Studios, Riverside Studios and BBC Elstree, as well as various locations shoots. We are proud to be working with the following lighting directors: Oli Richards, Duncun Elsalm, Chris Rigbly, Mike Sutcliffe, Martyn Rourke, Rob Kitzman and Gurdip Mahal.

AVOLITES Coming to a town near you...

Want to learn about the latest additions to the arsenal of Titan features? Avolites are excited to hit the road once again this winter to bring the power of Titan to you. In our 52

Set & Light | Winter 2014

free training sessions around the UK, we’ll be helping you get the best out of the new Titan Version 8.

The UK training roadshow features insights and suggestions from the Avolites training and sales team, so you will have access to the most up-to-date information to explore how you can drive your designs forward using Titan.

Learn about Version 8, including how it can optimise your creative visions and accelerate your workflow.

We’ll be showing you what’s new in Version 8, including multi-user functionality, offset, global palettes, and an even more refined pixel mapper.

Whether you’re new to Avolites consoles and our Titan operating system, or just want to find out all the latest features Titan has to offer, come and join us.

All seminars are held from 10.30am to 4pm and, remember, it’s free, so why wait?

To book, email your name, contact number and company to salesadmin@avolites.com, including the course you would like to attend. December’s courses are held in Edinburgh, Newcastle, Liverpool and Manchester.

Further sessions for 2015 will be held in Wales, Dublin, Belfast, Southampton, Brighton, Norwich, Birmingham and Nottingham (TBC).

Avolites Tiger Touch II controls play lighting at Invictus Games

A tip-top team of Avolites Tiger Touch II consoles were specified by Lighting Designer Matt Mawdsley for the inaugural Invictus Games held mainly at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London.

The Invictus Games is the brainchild of Prince Harry, and took place from 10–14 September. More than 400 competitors from 13 countries participated in the multisport event. All of those taking part had fought alongside the UK in recent military campaigns and had been wounded.

Two Tiger Touch II desks, known for combining maximum power with compact size, were supplied to the Games by Stage Electrics in Bristol. One was stationed in the Copper Box Arena (wheelchair rugby, wheelchair basketball, sitting volleyball) and the other in a large temporary multisport venue within the Here East building (archery, indoor rowing, powerlifting). All venues were covered by the BBC. With 20 submasters separately paged as two banks of 10, and a further 10 macro or executer buttons, the Tiger Touch II enables instant control, harnessing the power of Avolites’ Titan operating system.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 53

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

Mawdsley chose moving lights due to the fact that access to the fixtures was not possible once the competition flooring and furniture was in place. Each Invictus venue rig was mostly made up of moving wash fixtures for the all-important sport lighting, plus Martin MAC Viper profiles for custom gobo projection and effects. Both venues also required a large amount of generic audience lighting, provided by various 1,000W tungsten single and four-cell floods.

Mawdsley also specified Avolites ART 2000 24- and 48way dimmers for the Games, again supplied by Stage Electrics’ Production Manager Mike Jarvis.

Avolites’ ART 2000 Dimmer Racks provide a complete solution to dimming and moving-light power distribution, with no need to have separate mains distribution, making set-up times faster and lowering the number of individual components needed.

The Prince of Wales, the Duchess of Cornwall and the Duke of Cambridge attended the opening ceremony, along with 6,500 spectators.

Avolites Sapphire Touch controls over 600 LEDs in Paines Plough’s Roundabout Theatre

Avolites’ fully featured, dual widescreen Sapphire Touch console is controlling unique ceiling panels of LEDs in theatre company Paines Plough’s portable Roundabout Theatre.

Premiering at this summer’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the theatre has since popped up in towns across the UK. Lighting Programmer Peter Small specified the Sapphire Touch to program, control and pixel map the 627 LEDs in the complex panels built into the touring venue’s roof.

The Roundabout uses only the LEDs to light the performances, with no ‘regular’ fixtures. There are nine triangular roof panels, which surround a central pinnacle panel. Each triangle is packed with nine RGBW (Red, Green, Blue, White) and 36 WW+CW (Warm White and Cool White) LEDs, and the centre circle carries 84 RGBW pixels and 108 WW+CW LED light sources.

When Small began working on the project, he realised he would need a number of modifications and customisations to the Avolites’ TITAN software to complement The Roundabout’s unique lighting.

With 168 seats arranged in the round, The Roundabout is an intimate, dynamic and socially democratic space. From the outset, the design approach has been holistic. Conceived

by Paines Plough’s artistic directors James Grieve and George Perrin, Roundabout has been designed and delivered

by Scenic Designer Lucy Osborne, Lighting Designer Emma Chapman and Specialist Effects and Lighting Designer Howard Eaton, with technical and space planning consultation from Charcoalblue and acoustics consultation from Gillieron Scott Acoustic Design.

aerial effects as part of a lighting design by Kirell Zelenko.

TV LD Zelenko worked with Assistant Lighting Designer Ilya Piatrouski, of Minsk-based production house Blackout Studios, to design a rich, glittering light show for the popular annual event, now in its 10th year, which celebrates the best in Belarusian television.

Zelenko and Piatrouski specified a host of Clay Paky fixtures for the ceremony, including 24 A.leda B-EYE K20, 12 A.leda Wash K10, 24 Sharpy, 20 Sharpy Wash 330 and 16 Alpha Spot HPE 1500. All fixtures were supplied by Blackout Studio.

The 12 Clay Paky B-EYEs made up the event’s curved ground package that sat below the two large onstage projection mapped screens. The B-EYEs beamed jewel-like effects out towards the audience, mimicking the colours and speeds of the projection-mapped content taking place above and behind them.

As well as the multi-award winning B-EYE, Clay Paky Sharpys were also used to provide powerful beam effects across the back wall of the stage.

Televershina is Belarus’s national annual TV Awards event. Performances on the night included a ballet recital taken from Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake and choral performances made up from famous Belarusian dancers and singers.

Clay Paky Mythos wins Innovation Award at PLASA 2014

PLASA Gold Sponsors Clay Paky’s new product, the MYTHOS, was recognised with a PLASA Innovation Award at London’s ExCeL in October. Clay Paky’s Chief Commercial Officer, Pio Nahum, received the award from PLASA Governing Body Chair Ed Pagett.

Every year, PLASA recognises products that demonstrate

CLAY PAKY Clay Paky B-EYE creates beautiful projections at the Belarusian TV Awards

Clay Paky’s unique multi-zone A.leda B-EYE was the ‘star of the show’ at the recent Belarusian TV Awards, beaming complex Set & Light | Winter 2014

53

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 54

Sponsor news

Pictured: Lighting Designer Jerry Appelt chose mainly Clay Paky fixtures for the German show Keep Your Light Shining

progress through attributes such as a new style of thinking, an improvement in technical practice, new technology, materials or techniques, or an improvement in safety. The entries were considered by an expert judging panel comprising Tim Atkinson, Scott Burges, Jonathan Burton, Richard Cadena, Jenni Harris, Tapio Ilomaki, Steve Moles, Nick Read, Ben Rogers and Ed Manwaring.

Clay Paky hits the high notes in TV’s Keep Your Light Shining

An impressive array of Clay Paky fixtures recently took centre stage, or rather nine stages, on the unique new interactive talent show, Keep Your Light Shining. The show debuted on German Pro7 television, with Lighting Designer Jerry Appelt using lighting as one of the main components of this clever show.

The programme showcases talented young contestants, who take turns singing a song in brief intervals. It uses dramatic lighting to emphasise the importance of each singer’s brief chance to impress the viewing audience. With only 15–20 seconds to sing in the spotlight, they have to do their best to have an impact before the light moves onto the next performer. At the end of the song, the audience votes to eliminate one contestant. The rounds continue until the last two face-off in a duet and a winner is declared.

The show is a concept of Turkish-based Global Agency, one of the fastest growing content distributors in the industry.

Germany is the first country worldwide to air the show.

With lighting being such a key component of the show, Appelt chose mainly Clay Paky fixtures, specifying a stunning array, including 54 Alpha Spot HPE 1500, 24 Alpha Spot QWO 800, 12 Alpha Profile 800, 36 Alpha Beams, 88 54

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Sharpys and 48 A.leda B-EYE fixtures. Lighting was supplied

by MLS Magic Light + Sound in Germany.

Clay Paky Sharpy Washes turn in winning performances at the Miss America Pageant

Fifty-three contestants walked the walk on stage at Boardwalk Hall when the 88th Miss America Pageant returned to Atlantic City in September. Two-dozen Clay Paky Sharpy Wash fixtures were on hand from Atomic Lighting in Lititz, Pennsylvania, for the gala telecast on ABC Television.

Allen Branton was the lighting designer for the Miss America Pageant, with Felix Peralta and Kevin Lawson the lighting directors, Laura Frank the screens producer and media programmer and John Calkins the production designer.

Kevin Lawson was responsible for the key light and audience light – an important role for a show where 53 young ladies take centre stage With large groups on stage, at times Lawson was challenged not to just bathe the scene with light. “I wanted to shape it enough to make the girls look great and be individually visible,” he explains.

About 24 Sharpy Wash fixtures served as the primary stage wash. They were hung across the stage and acted as ‘workhorses’ for the show, bathing the contestants with backlight and colour, A.C.T Lighting is the exclusive North American distributor for Clay Paky.

Clay Paky illuminates the TV show Pequeños Gigantes

A.leda B-EYE K20, Sharpy and Alpha Profile 1500, provided

by Spanish rental company Cinelux, were responsible for illuminating the premiere of Pequeños Gigantes, a Mediaset TV show.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 55

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

Pictured: A.leda B-EYE K20s made their first appearance on Spanish television in children’s talent show Pequeños Gigantes

Pequeños Gigantes, which started in September, is a TV show where children between four and 12 years old compete to show their best abilities in dancing and singing.

Lights and effects made the stage shine, being the best complement for getting a perfect performance.

It is the first time that A.leda B-EYE K20 has appeared in Spanish television. In the centre of the stage there was a great frame formed by several A.leda B-EYE K20s where the contestant was staging. Some Sharpys and some Alpha Profile 1500 completed the light and effects of performance.

Alberto Martín was the lighting designer. Óscar Jiménez, Catalyst technician, and Javier Mosteiros and Javier Perea, moving lights technicians, were in the control.

Clay Paky’s lighting equipments, whose official distributor is Stonex in Spain, were provided by Spanish rental Company Cinelux, who trusted in Stonex.

comprehensive in existence and originates from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its beginnings to the present.

So when Lighting Designer Philip Lyons, of Lyons Photography & Lighting Design Installation, was appointed to install a unique pack-generator system into two of the museum’s new photographic studios, he brought Doughty Engineering on board.

DOUGHTY British Museum gets the Doughty treatment

The British Museum in London is dedicated to human history and culture. Its permanent collection, numbering some eight million works, is among the largest and most

© Lyons Photography

Set & Light | Winter 2014

55

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 56

Sponsor news

On each of the six rolling bars, Philip installed a Doughty lightweight pantograph mounted to a braked carriage so they can move easily along the rails. Each pantograph is fitted with one light that gives 3k of power – equivalent to the sun.

There are six of them on a 6m-long rig in a studio that measures just 7.5m wide.

Studio Rail is a neat and inexpensive track for smaller studios. The extruded aluminium rail system is equipped with sliding carriages. For most suspension methods, the safe working load is 100kg and carriages are designed to support a variety of fittings, typically luminaires and curtains/drapes.

Doughty’s Studio Rail is maintenance-free, other than regular load tests, and the kits contain all the parts required for assembly with the exception of suspension brackets, which should be ordered separately to suit the type of installation.

Doughty Engineering operates within the NHS

Lighting Designer Philip Lyons is always on the lookout for new products that are well designed and premium engineered. So when he was appointed to update the medical illustration departments, which provide images for use in treating patients, teaching and for publication, of two major hospitals in Bristol and London, he had no hesitation in specifying a full range of studio equipment from Doughty Engineering to help him fulfil his brief.

Lyons said: “Both St Thomas’ Hospital in London and North Bristol Hospital have existing departments, which were outdated and needed to be brought up to health and safety standards. Relocation to new premises offered the opportunity to design photographic and video studios to meet the clients’ needs, both now and in the years ahead, to future-proof the investment.”

ELP ELP autumn 2014 round-up

A poignant broadcast from Westminster Abbey on 4 August, called World War One Remembered, saw Huw Edwards introduce a special candlelit service marking the moment the war began 100 years ago.

The Abbey moved from light into darkness as hundreds of candles were extinguished by the congregation, until one candle remained at the Grave of the Unknown Warrior, which was extinguished at 11pm, the exact time war was declared LDs Bernie Davis and Dave Evans collaborated on the project. ELP supplied them with about 300 par cans, plus an assortment of Source 4s and Thomas Pixel Pars. ELP also supplied dimmers, distro systems, two Road Hog desks, rigging hardware and a 1kW Lite Power Generator.

The ELP Manchester team supplied a broad range of broadcast services to BBC Sport, BBC News and BBC World as part of the Commonwealth Games. They provided site power and mains distribution for the Media Hub and Production Village, which were situated at Pacific Quay in Glasgow. A 200kW twinset generator, plus two 110kW Lite Power generators, ensured back-up power with autochangeover systems in place. ELP’s Colin Goodacre was the genny op on site for the duration of the event. Steve Whittaker was the EM. ELP also provided all the rigging for the regional studios and lighting rigs for BBC News and BBC World. The lighting inventory included Arri L7s and Chroma-Q Studio Force D12s.

ELP supplied an entirely LED-based studio rig for the Invictus Games at the Olympic Park, London, in September. predominantly made up of ELP’s extensive range of ETC Source 4 LED profiles and Thomas Pixel Pars. The LD was Dave Gibson.

Broadcast on BBC One in October, Songs of Praise held its Gospel Choir of the Year show from the Hackney Empire.

Lighting Director Lee Allen worked closely with ELP’s Darren Fletcher and the in-house technical teams at the venue. ELP supplemented the in-house rig with their own moving lights, including Clay Paky Sharpy wash, VL1000s and Martin MAC TW1s. A significant number of ELP’s LED fixtures were also deployed, including MAC Aura LED wash lights, Chromaflood and Chromastrips.

According to ELP gaffer Darren Fletcher, the Hackney Empire was ‘the best theatre I’ve ever taken a TV show into.

The in-house technical people were so helpful and accommodating’.

© Lyons Photography

56

Set & Light | Winter 2014

The ELP Manchester team have recently completed a lightentertainment show for Welsh broadcaster S4C called Llywfan. The show features exciting performances by leading

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:22 Page 57

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

Welsh artists. Rondo Media were the production company and Nigel Catmur was the LD. Nigel’s design included ELP’s LC Panels, which were used as an impactful background to the stage. He also specified ELP’s range of Sharpys, VL1000s, MAC 700s and MAC Auras to create a stunning high-gloss look.

Darren and his team were extremely busy with the Scottish Referendum coverage. They provided generic lighting, pixel pars and MAC 301s for LD Joe Breslin for both of the live debates between Alex Salmond and Alistair Darling. These took place at The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow and The Assembly Rooms in Edinburgh.

Both were broadcast by STV. ELP’s twinset generator powered the OB trucks in a high-pressure live environment for both events.

On the actual Referendum results night, the ELP Manchester team looked after all truss and rigging for the BBC, STV and Sky news studios. They provided LD Joe Breslin with HMIs (575) and a selection of tungsten kit, fresnels, plus LED lite Panels and Kinoflow for the throughthe-night coverage.

The donations came from people who bought the European version of the ETC iRFR or aRFR remote control app for their phone or tablet over the past year, all of whom had the choice of whether their money went to the US charity, or its UK branch, which until recently was called Light Relief.

Handing over a cheque to John Simpson, trustee of Behind the Scenes UK, ETC’s CEO Fred Foster said: “Lighting can be easy to control using the ETC iRFR for iOS and aRFR for Android, but sometimes life can be more difficult. That’s why we’re pleased to continue to support the Behind the Scenes charity, which provides much-needed support to our colleagues and their families when times are hard.”

The apps – which turn any smartphone into a remote lighting controller – can be downloaded from the iTunes store or Google Play Store. Since the introduction of the apps, around $200,000 (over £120,000) has been donated to help industry professionals struggling with injuries or illnesses.

Behind the Scenes provides financial assistance to entertainment technology professionals, or their immediate family, who are seriously ill or injured. Grants may be used for basic living costs, some medical related expenses, transportation, retraining or funerals.

And finally, some major congratulations! LD Mike Le Fevre and his ELP lighting team, consisting of Chris Rand, Saul Harris, Tim Shotter and Morgan Evans, are part of a double Emmy-winning production team.

Christmas in Norway with the St Olaf Choir won the 2014 Upper Midwest Regional Emmy Award for Special Event Coverage. The television special also won the Upper Midwest Regional Emmy Award for the work of its director, Phillip Byrd.

A full write-up of the lighting team’s work in Trondheim, Norway, can be found here www.elp.tv/special-projects-stolaf-choir.html.

ETC ETC hands over £17,500 to Behind the Scenes UK

ETC handed over a cheque for almost £17,500 to the Behind the Scenes UK charity at the PLASA trade show in London.

Pictured: ETC’s CEO, Fred Foster, hands over a cheque to Behind the Scenes UK trustee John Simpson. Photo credit: Digital Deluxe Set & Light | Winter 2014

57

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 58

Sponsor news

parts of the play, the environment changed through a range of different colours, assisting the narrative and creating atmosphere.

For the second show, The Sound of Yellow – which was made with people recovering from addictions – the tent was used as ‘a sort of lightbox’, explains Newton. “It was more clinical – think of a forensic tent at a crime scene.” The story was of an aeroplane journey, with the Selador fixtures used to create the lighting one might see on a journey.

Slater says: “Because of how versatile the fixtures are, they really helped the performers to interact with the pieces. There was one section of Base Camp where we got the young people to lie down on the floor and played them certain lights and colours and asked the children what it reminded them of.”

GREEN HIPPO Green Hippo’s internship programme in full swing

ETC Selador helps vulnerable people light their words at the Young Vic

ETC’s Selador® Classic LED fixtures have been used in two productions for people recovering from addictions and young people with special educational needs at London’s Young Vic theatre.

For every production that the Young Vic programmes in its main space, the Taking Part department creates another in response in which the local community can take part, exploring some of the ideas in the main production.

Production Manager Anthony Newton worked with Taking Part Technician Nick Slater on Base Camp and The Sound of Yellow, which were based on The Valley of Astonishment, a play which focuses on the phenomenon of synaesthesia, where people can experience things – words, thoughts or even music – as sensory stimulations or as colours.

Slater explains: “For Base Camp, which was with the special educational needs young people, we used an eightsquare metre white tent set up in one of our small theatres, and illuminated it all the way round with the Selador Classic battens hired from Sparks Theatrical, controlled from our ETC Ion lighting desk. The fixtures were amazing in flooding the space with colour, while not adding to the temperature, keeping the performers cool.”

The show, which theatre company Parrot in the Tank performed with young people, saw everyone going on a ‘camping expedition to the Arctic’, which entailed stunning aurora borealis (northern lights) visual effects, as well as bright blues for the skies.

There were several scenarios set up, such as when a tent was given personality with a beady-eye torchlight, or balloons appeared from smaller tents and the young people had to keep them from touching the floor. During these 58

Set & Light | Winter 2014

As you may have noticed, Green Hippo have recently been talking about several of our interns and their experiences. To add to this, we have two new interns, who recently started to work with us for the forthcoming year.

Over the last two years we have had two very successful product design internships within our product department, so continuing on that streak, we have a new intern, Bella Reid, who is from Brunel University, just like her two predecessors.

Bella, 20 years of age and originally from Berkshire, is studying industrial design and technology at Brunel and has already completed the first two years of this tough degree.

Her preferred subjects are graphic design, 3D modelling and prototyping in the workshops, with metal being her favourite material to work with, since she has spend many hours building drag bikes with her father.

Bella is spending two months in our marketing department putting her graphic design skills to the test before joining the product department and concentrating on product design and technology tasks.

The last couple of years have also seen consecutive interns within our R&D department, and keeping with this tradition, Aleks Ivanov has just joined the team as their latest intern. Originally from Bulgaria, Aleks began formally studying computing at Newham College and City University after moving to London about four years ago.

Since then, his interest in programming has developed even more. He has been working on an increasing number of projects and explored different programming languages such

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 59

sponsornews@stld.org.uk

as Java (both for Desktop and Android), C#, Python, Haskell and others. During his studies he has completed modules in computer architecture, networking, programming (both functional and object-oriented), among others, and he is getting to put all his skills to the test helping out our very busy team of developers.

We wish both Aleks and Bella a very warm welcome and look forward to the next year with them. We will have a lot of work to keep them busy and hopefully build on their existing experience and skills.

OneBigStar rock their Hippotizers

Our good friends at OneBigStar have a long history with us at Green Hippo, sharing their expertise to realise tradeshow exhibition stands for us in the past. They have come to know Hippotizer very well and have developed into experts in their own rights. Owning all their kit, they are equipped for full-service live-event production, and their Hippotizers have seen action at some interesting events so far this year.

‘Move It’ is the UK’s biggest annual dance event, with about 20,000 visitors waltzing into London’s Olympia Exhibition Centre. The show features three days of dance performances and classes, with all styles covered, from ballroom and ballet to hiphop, bellydance and freestyle.

For this event OneBigStar supplied full production, including lighting, sound and video equipment, as well as operation. They were looking after five feature areas, including the main stage, the freestyle stage, the showcase theatre, the dance fitness stage and the perform zone, as well as 14 dance class stages, all with AV demands. OneBigStar ran the show with just one GrassHopper (plus a back-up unit).

Last month, OneBigStar took care of the high-profile reveal of Virgin Atlantic’s latest crew uniforms, designed by none other than Vivienne Westwood. The event took place at Village Underground in Shoreditch, in conjunction with production partners The Active Group and Rod Clay of MSPL, and OneBigStar once again supplied all the lighting, video equipment and crew.

With high-profile guests including Richard Branson, and performances by Goldie and Debbie Harry, the ambience needed to perfectly reflect the Westwood design. Run with just two synced GrassHoppers (one was acting as a backup), plus a HippoPortamus for control, OneBigStar washed the vaults of the venue in red, blue and purple hues.

Aside from having been tremendous partners to work with at dozens of tradeshow exhibitions, we are happy to hear that OneBigStar enjoy running their own projects on Hippotizer media servers.

HAWTHORN Status Quo ‘Aquostic (Stripped Bare)’ at Roundhouse, London

BBC Radio 2 presented a unique performance from one of the world’s premier rock bands on 22 October at the Roundhouse in Camden, London. For the first time ever, legendary rockers Status Quo performed acoustically. This special performance was part of Radio 2’s live in concert

Pictured: Lighting Status Quo’s first ever acoustic gig was no mean feat for Lighting Designer Ewan Cameron, who took over from Patrick Marks, the band’s LD for 25 years Set & Light | Winter 2014

59

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 60

Sponsor news

series. The BBC filmed the concert, with Jo Wiley on hand to interview the band afterwards. The recordings of the songs are available from BBC Radio 2’s website for viewing.

Lighting this unique style of performance by Status Quo was no mean feat. The band’s newly appointed Lighting Designer Ewan Cameron faced a few challenges. This was his first gig as LD, having recently taken over from Patrick Marks, who had been with the band for 25 years. The second challenge in his new position as LD was to light the band’s first acoustic gig, and in a way that was going to look good on stage as well as on film for the millions of Radio 2 regulars and Status Quo fans who would watch the concert online.

Ewan knew that lighting the concert would be tricky. His starting point was thinking that since acoustic is simple, the lighting would be, too. However, it was more complicated and a very interesting departure from the usual designs he had worked on with Marks for the arena concerts in the past. He had to balance the change of musical pace and the simplicity of an acoustic mood with a design that focused on the individual performances of each band member, alongside highlighting a string section, accordion player and two percussionists, making it look good on stage as well as on film.

The starting point was to consult with Mick Freer from Hawthorn to tie down the additional lighting requirements needed over and above the rig available at Roundhouse. This involved temporarily expanding the house rig to include more opportunities to create lots of new textures and subtle over-effects. Mood and effect changes had to be more precise to highlight the different elements of the performance, although the pace of changes was more subtle.

Hawthorn added Clay Paky 12 B-Eye K20s to create soft colour washes and aerial beam effects. Using the K20s was the enhancement that television viewers would have noticed the most. These were complemented by ETC Source 4s, which allowed the LD to include high-contrast gobo effects on to the backstage 60ft grey-velvet drapes provided by Hawthorn. In addition, eight Clay Paky QWO 800s were added to the in-house system. This allowed more options for pin spotting the band members and other performers for camera close-ups, to zooming out to the widest 55-degree angle to create more textured lighting at other points in the performance, when the BBC Director of Photography was looking for longer and wider shots of the stage. The lighting additions were also chosen for their complementarity and sensitivities to cameras. The design process started in September, with Hawthorn providing Ewan Cameron with Casts’s WSYWIG software to explore design options in a virtual environment and pre-programme the cues needed for the final design. The design was tested at the Roundhouse the night before the ‘live’ recording to see how the performances evolved and were complemented by the lighting design.

HSL HSL helps control t’force at Emley Moor Mast Installation

Leading UK lighting and visuals rental specialist HSL supplied equipment for a bold, vibrant, interactive lighting installation 60

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Photo credit: Darren Hosker

work – ‘Control t’force’ – created by Lighting Designer James Bawn, that illuminated the 330-metre-high Emley Moor Mast in West Yorkshire: the tallest freestanding structure in the UK, an iconic local landmark and the main UHF transmitter for most of the county.

Specially commissioned by TG Events on behalf of Kirklees Council as part of ‘Hypervelocity’, the five-day grand final of the 100-day 2014 Yorkshire Festival, the Control t’force project ran over two evenings and also celebrated the start of the 2014 Tour de France cycle race in Yorkshire.

James has been involved in some previous architectural lighting projects for the council, and when his ideas for lighting the broadcast transmitting station (currently owned by telecommunications and broadcast transmission company Arqiva) received the green light, he immediately turned to Simon Stuart and Mike Oates at Blackburn-based HSL to provide the equipment and additional expertise.

HSL supplied A&O Technology Falcon 6000 searchlights, Robe CitySkape Xtreme LED floods, Chroma-Q Color Force 48 LED battens and Clay Paky Sharpies, and continued its investment in Luminex with another brand-new bespoke fibre optic system especially for the project. This incorporated Luminex Gigacore 16Xt switchers and Ethernet convertors, coupled with a 350-metre run of Armourflex fibre cable.

James not only produced a stunning piece of pop-up public art involving the Grade II listed structure, he made it a truly interactive experience, utilising Kirklees Council’s events Twitter page, creating #lightthemast.

This enabled people to request their favourite colours when the installation was live each night, with James tweeting back as he changed the colours.

On the first evening, #lightthemast was the fourth most popular trending topic in the UK, inciting a phenomenal reaction that sent thousands of people flocking to the location a mile west of Emley in Kirklees to engage in the experience first-hand.

To establish the exact kit needed and its optimum location for the 360-degree illumination designed to make the tapered reinforced concrete tower shine like a giant lightsabre visible for miles around, HSL supplied some sample fixtures and helped conduct a series of site tests. After this process was complete, James finalised his lighting plot.

Seven separate Steeldeck platforms – also supplied by

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 61

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

Pictured: HSL’s lighting package for the Prodigy’s performance at Sonisphere included 140 new Philips Nitro LED strobes

HSL – were erected in a radius around the mast about 20 metres away from the structure and each 20 metres apart.

James also energised his best diplomatic skills in persuading the local farmer to embrace the project and let him locate some of the platforms on his land.

On each platform was an array of searchlights and a CitySkape Xtreme. On the floor directly in front of the platforms was another Falcon 6K and two more CitySkape Xtremes – all of them firing at the tower.

Inside the mast’s control room, which is 274 metres off the ground, were the 10 Sharpies and the 20 Color Force 48s, arranged so light bounced off the ceiling and was clearly visible through all the windows. On the roof of the control room, a 30W RGB laser was rigged and could be seen from miles around.

These fixtures were all controlled from the production platform set up in the field below via the fibre backbone. It would have been impossible to achieve it any other way.

The most popularly requested colour for Control t’force proved to be yellow – for the leader’s shirt of the Tour de France – closely followed by blue and pink!

HSL boosts show-stopping Prodigy performance at Sonisphere

Leading UK lighting and visuals rental company HSL supplied an extensive lighting specials package – including 140 new Philips Nitro LED strobes – for the Prodigy’s show-stopping headline performance at Sonisphere 2014 in Knebworth

Park in July.

Show Designer Andy Hurst developed the latest unique and spectacular look for the band, who played a series of festival headliners and own shows throughout Europe across the summer, where they are maintaining their reputation for high-production values and epic visual and sonic experiences.

Prodigy are one of a handful of artists whose music and energy can rock the house with equal force at either a heavy metal or EDM event.

HSL also supplied a standard ‘floor specials’ lighting rig for the entire tour, which was used in conjunction with a festival/venue ‘house’ rig at all gigs and which is built to Hurst’s specification.

The touring package features the band’s striking Harrier jump jet backdrop upstage, plus eight floor-based upstage trussing towers, which are wheeled on, each rigged with two Robe LEDBeam 100s, two Nitro Color RGB strobes, four ColorBlock db4 MkIIs and a Patten 2013 on the top. Then there is a ‘small’ arch that frames Liam’s keyboard hub and eight Robe Pointes rigged on top.

Both parts of the rig concept are fully scalable and can be shrunk or expanded to fit the available stage space.

Sonisphere was the first time that HSL’s Nitro Strobes had been used for a full-on rock concert.

They were arranged in three flown arrays either side of stage, taking advantage of their ability to be easily clipped together – similar to constructing a flown PA. The units were built into drops of 10 and attached to steel wire rope Set & Light | Winter 2014

61

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 62

Sponsor news

ladders – configured as 4, 2 and 1 x 10 respectively – the longest on the outside, to mimic the shape of the arch.

HSL also supplied additional smoke and haze machines to boost the already-humungous amount of atmospherics, and other extras for this show included 14 Patten 2013s – their distinctive retro look is another favourite with the band.

Our office number has stayed the same. Our new address is: Unit 14, Fairway Drive, Greenford, Middlesex UB6 8PW.

KEY LIGHT HIRE

LEE Filters Swatch app

New studio

Studio 24 is in full swing and has gotten off to a great start, with many productions taking advantage of the low-cost facility. It has been utilised for many music videos, green screen and rehearsal space, to name just a few of the potentials for the space.

The advantage of having two well-equipped companies and experienced staff from Key Light Hire and Richard Martin Lighting has proved to be of a great advantage and value for those last-minute unforeseen issues or extra takes that needs to happen and fast.

Studio 24 has a 1,200sq ft space with a 10 metre-high trim. Its electric hoists are proving to make the space ideal for a quick changeover and a 125amp three-phase gives ample power. There is plenty of secure off-street parking for production vehicles (scanner trucks, generators, honey wagons and grip), all located in Park Royal, West London.

Simon Dyke joins Key Light Hire

Key Light Hire would like to announce the appointment of Simon Dyke as Warehouse and Logistics Co-ordinator.

Simon has worked in the industry for over 10 years, starting his career with the BBC at TVC and later moving across to SIS Live’s OBs. He brings to the already-dedicated team a wealth of experience and we welcome him aboard.

LEE FILTERS LEE Filters introduces an app that gives lighting designers access to the entire LEE colour effect filter range – all from the convenience of their iPhone Inspiration is something of an awkward customer. It has no respect for timetables or boundaries, and when it does strike, more often than not it happens at the most inopportune moments – usually when it’s impossible to get access to a swatch book or a computer.

To help lighting designers out of tricky moments such as these, and to allow them to explore and save their ideas while on the go, LEE Filters has launched the LEE Swatch iPhone app, available for download from the Apple App Store (cost £0.69/$0.99).

With the complete range of filters available to view at the swipe of a fingertip, the LEE Swatch iPhone app is both intuitive and uncomplicated, and allows the user to: • Search by filter name or number, and view detailed information about each colour, including spectral charts; • View the colours in full screen; • Compare filters within the same range using the colour slider; • Use the app’s creative search terms to choose colours; • Gather inspiration from some of the world’s top lighting technicians with the LEE Filters Mood Boards; • Store any saved palettes within the app and email the results; • Compare gels with other manufacturers’ colours, calculate colour temperature and select the level of diffusion required

Martin by HARMAN HARMAN’s Martin Professional announces MAC TW1 fixture refurbishment programme

LCA Lights Camera Action Ltd LCA are delighted to have moved to a new larger office and warehouse on 27 August.

Our new location enables us to stock more products on the shelves, as well as offering a dedicated demo area for customers to come and test equipment. And if you need to work, you can utilise our hot-desking facilities.

62

Set & Light | Winter 2014

Underscoring its commitment to legacy customers, HARMAN’s Martin Professional today announced the return of its popular MAC TW1 Tungsten wash light as a certified refurbished product to satisfy the global demands of lighting professionals. All Martin MAC TW1 refurbished fixtures will bear a ‘pre-owned/certified by Martin’ label and meet the same performance standards and quality level of new Martin products.

Ideal for stage and studio lighting, the MAC TW1 utilises an incandescent lamp that provides high-quality optics with

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 63

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

soft beam edges and uniform light/colour output to ensure even distribution across projected surfaces. The MAC TW1 operates in three modes – normal, studio and silent – which are selectable from a lighting desk, and features a unique heat management system, which traps heat and silently dissipates it through the back of the fixture. A CMY colour mixing system ensures smooth transitions and delivers a multitude of vibrant colours, ranging from saturated deep hues to soft pastels.

Refurbished models will be available in 80V lamp versions that offer superior output when compared to traditional voltage lamps. In addition, all refurbished versions of the MAC TW1 wash light are backed by spare part availability and a one-year warranty.

HARMAN’s Martin Professional introduces P3 System Controller Software Version 3.1.0

HARMAN’s Martin Professional has introduced the latest software update for its P3 System Controller family of LED video processors. Version 3.1.0 includes an improved preset system, placement tools for creative projects, and a host of additional new features for improved functionality and easeof-use.

The new software’s updated preset system allows fixture/fixture-group positions and rotations to be stored for quick recall of different layouts within the same show, making it ideal for events with moving scenery as well as large-scale festivals.

Also featured in the update are upgrades to wizards and placement tools for even faster handling of creative products, such as Martin’s VC-Dots and VC-Strips. The new placement tools allow for flexible fixtures, such as VC-Dots, to be set in free placement or ‘snap-to-grid’ placement for easier system layout.

Other improvements include full copy/paste support for handling big setups, an updated fixture library sorted by product family for a better overview, and automation integration now supports Tait Navigator, Kinesys K2 and Kinesys Vector.

Software Version 3.1.0 is available for all Martin P3-100, P3-200 and P3-PC System Controllers.

HARMAN’s Martin Professional introduces the Wall of Dedication

HARMAN’s Martin Professional has revealed a new online universe in celebration of passionate people in the lighting industry – the people without whom Martin would not be what it is today.

Called the Wall of Dedication (wall.martin.com), it is a collection of personal accounts from passionate people across the globe who are involved in the lighting industry. People share their stories of how they got into the industry, their sources of inspiration, as well as pieces of advice and pearls of wisdom on a web-based platform. The people featured are a mixture of upcoming and well-established, high-profile people, and the ones in between, with one thing in common: namely, passion for their trade and for the industry.

A large portion of Martin’s success can be traced back to the dedication of people in the industry – people like the

consumers. The focus has been on products but now it is time for a different approach. Like pets rely on their owners, products rely on passionate people.

Although Martin develops and manufactures innovative and high-tech products for the industry based on feedback and market demands, it is not really about the products.

When people apply their passion to working with Martin products, magic happens.

The Wall of Dedication is a tribute to this passion.

Martin wants to celebrate the consumer’s passion, to inspire others and to be inspired by others. On the Wall of Dedication, get up close and personal with some of the passionate people in the lighting industry and find out what sparks their passion.

Martin Professional encourages all passionate individuals in the lighting industry to share their passion on the Wall of Dedication. Anyone with an affiliation to the lighting industry can apply, regardless of job title and seniority – people with extensive work experience and less experience alike. The only criterion is passion for the profession and industry.

To apply, fill in an online application at wall.martin.com and attach images of yourself. Martin will set it up and you will be contacted for final review before publishing. The Wall of Dedication will be widely exposed over the months to come, so if you want your face out, there share your passion now.

MEMS MEMS’ northern depot celebrates first year

MEMS’ northern depot has celebrated its first anniversary since opening for business on in August 2013. The multimillion-pound investment has reinforced MEMS’ position at the forefront of power rental in the UK and continued to set the standard within the industry.

The 2.5-acre facility was designed from the ground up to replicate the unique model that has been operating from MEMS’ head office in Kent for the past 36 years. The £4m investment reinforced the MEMS’ vision as a first-class fullservice provider in power rental solutions nationwide and ensured both existing and new customer experiences are of the highest possible standard.

MEMS have developed machines that are user friendly and among the most versatile and quietest in the market.

Every MEMS generator, fuel tank, HGV and support vehicles are fitted with the latest in remote monitoring technology as standard, enabling the co-ordinators in the manned 24-hour control room to monitor the generators’ performance, location and ETAs of vehicles.

Continued investment ensures MEMS remain at the leading edge of the rental market, MEMS will always be able to offer the most modern and up-to-date equipment in the market, with unrivalled service levels day or night.

MEMS provide emergency power to major business park

Due to a major transformer failure to one of Europe’s leading science and technology parks, MEMS was challenged to supply, deliver, install and commission an immediate Set & Light | Winter 2014

63

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 64

Sponsor news

temporary power solution.

The client, with its world-class facilities, attracts a host of international companies from the life sciences, pharmaceutical, biotechnology and the science and technology sectors. They offer incubator space in a flexible working environment from which businesses can grow. Their clients’ range from research and development laboratories and specialist niche manufacturing facilities to commercial office space to warehouse solutions. Any loss of power to their clients would have seriously damaged their reputation.

Irreparable damage to the transformer meant that the client required an immediate out-of-hours emergency power solution to ensure power was reinstated to their clients.

After the transformer failure caused disruption to the major science and technology park, MEMS’ out-of-hours services were called upon to undertake an urgent assessment of the site’s electrical loadings.

The client had an immediate requirement to restore power to the entire site and instructed MEMS to provide a complete temporary power solution. The solution consisted of three 1,000kVA units to operate in parallel, complete with cable, distribution and an engineering team to position, connect and commission.

MEMS’ support services were implemented to ensure continuity of supply. The services included: a comprehensive fuel management programme supported via MEMS’ remote monitoring software and a dedicated project manager to ensure reliability and also control the planned out-of-hours maintenance requirements.

MEMS response to site was under three hours from point of call. The client required the equipment for several weeks until the damaged transformer was replaced.

Following the transformer failure, the client’s immediate priority was to reinstate power via a temporary supply. As one of the country’s leading stand-by power suppliers, with an unrivalled reputation for emergency response, MEMS was the client’s first port of call.

MEMS immediately despatched a project manager to complete the urgent assessment of the client’s power requirements. This enabled a prompt response of temporary equipment to meet their exact requirements without delay.

MEMS’ out-of-hours response allowed the science and technology park to operate as normal with no disruptions to their clients’ business activities.

OSRAM Osram wins the internationally renowned ‘R&D 100 Award’

One of this year’s ‘Oscars of Invention’ – the R&D 100 Awards – goes to the Osram Itos Phaser 3000, honouring the development of the first LED/laser-based white light module.

With the Itos Phaser 3000, developers at the lighting manufacturer have succeeded in producing a highly compact, yet exceptionally powerful, light module, primarily for industrial and production facilities but also for microscopic and endoscopic applications.

The module has an output comparable to that of a 300W 64

Set & Light | Winter 2014

xenon lamp, but has a lifespan of 30,000 hours. In other words, it will last up to 60 times as long. Phaser technology, a combination of the words phosphor and laser, is based on blue beams of light focused on a phosphor converter to produce white light of exceptionally high luminance.

Applications are not restricted to the industrial sector, however. This light module from Osram can also be used in microscopes and endoscopes.

The US R&D Magazine presents the R&D 100 Awards to the 100 most significant developments to come onto the market in the last year. The winning products come from a wide range of sectors, including telecommunications, material sciences, chemical engineering and biotechnology.

PANALUX Tektile®2 by Panalux

The Panalux TekTile®2 is a super-efficient, slimline BiColour illumination solution created by Panalux exclusively for the film, television industry and entertainment media industries.

Featuring instantly variable colour temperature, from 3,000K to 5,800K, with no shift in light output throughout the transition via an on-board Tektile®2 controller or when used in conjunction with Panalux F-stop® 8way Controller units The impressive specification of these new high-quality, high-output fixtures includes: mains or battery power; local or DMX control; fully dimmable with no shift in correlated colour temperature; Panalux F-Stop® compatible; choice of mounting options; range of accessories; and optional wireless control – all housed within a sleek aluminium unit weighing just 2.5kg.

Simple to operate and just 30mm deep, Tektile®2 is perfect as an effective, balanced ‘solo’ soft light, or it can be connected to any number of additional fixtures to create unique modular lighting systems, providing flexible, practical illumination solutions that you control.

Created by and only available from Panalux, a worldleading source of lighting equipment and ideas, the Tektile® family of fittings are available now at your local Panalux base.

PHILIPS Philips Entertainment wins two PLASA 2014 Innovation Awards

Philips Vari-Lite’s VL4000 Spot and Philips Strand Lighting’s Emergency DMX Bypass Switch have both won a PLASA Innovation Award 2014.

Richard Schmit (pictured left), GM PLS Entertainment Group at Philips Lighting, picked up the award for the VL4000 Spot from PLASA’s Governing Body Chair Ed Pagett (pictured right) at a glittering ceremony presented by PLASA. Philips Selecon and Strand Lighting Product Segment Manager Bill Richards accepted the award for the DMX Emergency Bypass Switch, which was also presented by Ed Pagett.

Every year, PLASA recognises products that demonstrate

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 65

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

Thursday on the Mzansi Magic and Mzansi Wethu Channel.

Red Pepper therefore needed a cutting-edge LED rig to deliver fantastic quality lighting for the new shows and so turned to the versatile and powerful Philips Selecon PLcyc1 and SPX Zoomspot luminaires.

Alongside the Philips Selecon SPX Zoomspot luminaire’s sharp shutter cut and excellent edge control, it has an adjustable beam range of 15 to 35 degrees and 25 to 50 degrees and allows the user to simply alter from smooth and flat for gobo projection to high-intensity peak for stage washes. In addition, the LED luminaire boasts highly intuitive familiar controls, a compartmentalised heat management system and a two-plane shutter design ensuring the same focus on all four shutters. progress, through attributes like a new style of thinking, an improvement in technical practice, new technology, materials or techniques, or an improvement in safety. The entries were considered by an expert judging panel comprising Tim Atkinson, Scott Burges, Jonathan Burton, Richard Cadena, Jenni Harris, Tapio Ilomaki, Steve Moles, Nick Read, Ben Rogers and Ed Manwaring.

Philips Selecon provides ‘amazing’ LED upgrade for prime-time TV studio Red Pepper

Award-winning set designer Michael Gill recently worked alongside lighting designers Joshua Cutts and Francois van der Merwe on South African TV studio Red Pepper’s ambitious upgrade project, specifying the remarkable LED technology of Philips Selecon Studio Panels, SPX Zoomspot and PLcyc1 luminaires for three new prime-time game shows.

Red Pepper’s CEO Cecil Barry and facilities manager Marius Maritz joined forces with Gill, Cutts and van der Merwe to come up with a revolutionised set design and optimised LED lighting rig, including 14 Philips Selecon Studio Panels, six Philips Selecon PLcyc1 luminaires and eight Philips Selecon SPX Zoomspot luminaires, supplied by DWR Distribution, for their studios in Linden, Melville and Braamfontein.

The Red Pepper upgrade project began in 2013 when the studios gained a new client, Connect, who planned to produce the three new game shows, Bounce, Ka Ching and Cula Sibone, to be aired during prime time from Monday to

Philips Strand Lighting and Philips Selecon provide ‘reliability and power’ for major TV stations in Lebanon

Lebanon’s first public television network, Télé Liban, and pan-Arabist satellite television channel Al Mayadeen have tuned in to the power of Philips Selecon LED and professional studio lighting solutions from Philips Strand Lighting in a major upgrade to existing kit.

State-owned Télé Liban and private Al Mayadeen are both significant channels in the region. Télé Liban is one of the longest established TV stations in the Middle East, while Al Mayadeen is a wide-ranging news channel, owning offices in Tunisia, Cairo and Tehran, and headquarters in Beirut.

Both studios needed an overhaul of their previous lighting equipment to optimise broadcasting capabilities.

Lebanon distributor Prolites supplied and installed 26 Philips Selecon SPX Zoomspot luminaires and four Philips Strand Lighting SD6 Dimmer Packs into two newly renovated Télé Liban talk show and news studios. In addition, three new news studios at Al Mayadeen were equipped with 54 Philips Selecon SPX Zoomspot luminaires, five PLfresnel1 LED luminaires, eight Strand Lighting Wallrack Digital Dimmers and a Strand Lighting 200 plus Lighting Control Console.

The Al Mayadeen studios are also benefitting from the power of the Selecon SPX Zoomspot, which is being used as a ‘profile light’ focusing on the anchor/host, guests and screens, and blends homogeneously with the adjacent PLfresnel1 luminaire’s single source RGBW colour mixing beam.

The lighting in the Al Mayadeen studio is controlled by the Strand Lighting 200 plus Lighting Control Console, which is ideal for the studio environment as it features 12 easy-torecord effect playbacks with 48 steps each, and allows for easy lighting changes according to the change in segments and moods.

PLASA PLASA London 2014 welcomed visitors and exhibitors to ExCeL, London, for the second consecutive year in October and impressed with a ground-breaking show floor, an inspiring education programme and a host of important announcements. While exhibitors revealed their latest Set & Light | Winter 2014

65

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 66

Sponsor news

product innovations, the organisers uncovered plans for the future of the show.

Speaking at the PLASA Awards for Innovation and Sustainability 2014, held on the penultimate day of the show, PLASA’s CEO Matthew Griffiths revealed some of the changes for 2015, which will redevelop the scope and delivery of the event. Under the leadership of Christopher Toulmin, PLASA’s Director of the events division, the show is being remodelled to become a PLASA member-focused event, which includes moving from four days to three days, introducing a new floor-plan concept, expanding the education offer and investing in the audio, staging, AV and broadcast elements of the live entertainment technology at the show to accompany the phenomenally successful lighting element.

Reflecting on PLASA London 2014, and looking forward to next year’s show, Event Director James Ashwood said: “PLASA events has a new team, with a new vision for evolving and developing the PLASA show for the benefit of its exhibiting members. We are at the start of this exciting journey, and moving ahead with confidence, this has been reflected in the 80 per cent re-book onsite for 2015.”

He added: “The overall number of attendees for the show was just over 11,000, putting us slightly ahead of 2013, with a surprise increase of 55 per cent in the number of revisits to the show, demonstrating that people have been returning on more than one day.”

The Professional Development Programme benefitted from two new positions adjoined to the main floor. Both the Audio and AV Theatre and the Lighting and Stage Theatre saw a huge range of seminar content, capturing imaginations and drawing in large audiences. More than 2,000 people attended the Professional Development Programme’s sessions, indicating how important education is to the event and highlighting why PLASA plans to expand the programme in 2015.

The fifth annual Rigging Conference, which ran alongside PLASA London 2014, thrived in its new one-day format.

More than 160 delegates attended, representing an increase in attendance of 15 per cent on last year. Attendees came from 18 different countries, including New Zealand, Australia, Hong Kong, Singapore and the US. International visitors made up 30 per cent of the audience, indicating that the PLASA Rigging Conference is the global meeting point for the rigging community.

PLASA London 2014 thanks its sponsors: Platinum Sponsor Robe, Gold Sponsor Clay Paky and Silver Sponsor Shure Distribution UK. The show returns to ExCeL London from 5–7 October 2015.

PRG Video games, Michelin stars and Guinness World Records

Congratulations to Will Potts for winning the Concert Touring Stage Award at the Knight of Illumination Awards 2014 for his work with Disclosure.

We were proud to support Lighting Designer Will Potts with a full lighting system for the Disclosure UK and European tour this year.

66

Set & Light | Winter 2014

The wargaming.net stand at Gamescom: bigger, brighter and better

Gamescom is considered as the largest exhibition of video games worldwide, based in Cologne, Germany. Following their motto ‘Bigger, Brighter & Better’, Wargaming.net was pretty hard to miss this year because their booth was one of the biggest on site.

PRG were in charge of the video, lighting and sound equipment. The booth was made up of a large arena of 720m2, surrounded by three-stories-high walls covered in giant, digital screens projecting videos. Three lit up tank tracks at the entrance, which guided the visitors on their way to the centre of the stage or to one of the five spacious gaming lounges.

Lighting and rigging at Bestival

PRG is very excited to have helped support the 2014 Bestival, where we were able to light the Guinness World Record setting disco ball. Sixteen Bad Boys and two Smart Masts were used to light the mirror ball.

The festival in the Isle of Wight had a theme of Desert Island Disco, and the record-setting mirror ball measured 10.33m (33.89ft) in diameter (the previous record was 9.98m or 32.74ft).

Metallica rock the record books

Metallica has made the Guinness Book of World Records for being the first band to perform on all seven continents within a year. For the UK and Europe part of the tour, PRG Nocturne UK provided control, playback, camera system, V18 and V28 LED.

Welcome to the team

PRG Nocturne is pleased to announce that James Morden has joined their dynamic UK team as a Senior Account Manager. With 18 years of video experience in the industry, Morden is eager to help PRG Nocturne continue to expand in the UK with innovative video services, gear and support for concerts, public festivals, and corporate events.

We are also pleased to welcome Q Willis to the PRG team. Q joins us as Head of Rigging Services to strengthen and develop our customer relationships within the rigging market.

PULSAR Stoking the flames of blast furnace illumination

As part of a landmark redevelopment of Luxembourg’s largest ironworks, the Belval blast furnaces received an innovative lighting design from the studio of Ingo Maurer.

The monumental and cathedral-like structures tower over the square in Esch-sur-Alzette while the lighting installation creates a deeply moving experience, focussing on the heritage, colour, and forms of the incredible structures.

The specified luminaire for the project was our ChromaPowerLine 50. It was made with a set of specific Red LEDs to match the exact wavelengths requested by the installation and design teams at CE+T Technics and Ingo Maurer.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 67

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

RML Blue Peter

Blue Peter is one of the longest-running shows in television history. So much history, it is a national treasure (I’m still desperate for a badge and I’m now in my 30s!). Richard Martin Lighting (RML) are lucky enough to have been involved in the show for a long time now and continue to support Lighting Designer Lee Allen, who is hugely influential in the studios and TV world. He is so interested in products, technical trends and the latest innovation, that when he is super keen to try a new fixture on one of his shows, we know we are onto a winner!

Last month we announced the purchase of the new Clay Paky A.leda B-EYE K20.

Friday Download

Children’s show Friday Download has become so successful since first airing in 2011 it is now BAFTA winning. I am sure a big part of its success is the fact that it is presented by teenagers (Ceallach Spellman, Dionne Bromfield, George Sear, Richard Wisker and Shannon Flynn) which makes it current and fresh – something that kids will want to rush home and watch.

These young and talented famous faces are all experts in their different downloads. Each episode the presenters discuss their download subjects and include the crowd at every stage with debate, opinion or even teaching them dance moves or song lyrics. There is also sometimes a celebrity performance, too.

LD Roger Williams continues to design the show, supported by Richard Martin Lighting (RML). Always keen to have the latest fixtures and keep the look of his shows new and interesting, Friday Downloads’ lighting rig is made up of MAC Auras, Robin 100 LEDBeams, 12 Pixel Par 90s, Robin 600 LEDWash, Alex Followspot, as well as one of our most recent purchases, the Clay Paky A.Leda B-Eye K20s.

It’s that time of year again

In October we entered into the premature festive spirit as we were filming our first Christmas special, the Big Fat Quiz of the Year.

The Channel 4 show is hosted by comedian Jimmy Carr and filmed at London Studios. It’s a panel show made up of A-list celebrities, who are put to the test to see who can remember the most about the year. It’s like a pub quiz, with fantastic guests and brilliant banter. It’s the sort of show you can switch on over the Christmas period with all of the family and join in, which is no doubt why this will be its 10th year.

Regular Lighting Designer Chris Kempton returns for another year, supported by Richard Martin Lighting (RML).

His chosen lighting rig is made up of MAC 500s, VL1000TS, VL2000 Wash, Chroma Strips, Pixelline 1044, LED Birdies and Chroma Set Kits.

It’s a season of celebration and joy and so the set and look of the show is just that: bright, colourful and fun!

A Question of Sport

On your marks... get set... Britain’s longest continuously-running game show, A Question of Sport, is back for another series.

Remarkably, it was aired for the first time in 1968 and is still considered prime-time TV! Having run almost uninterrupted since 1970, they have filmed over 1000 episodes.

Each week two teams of sports stars, headed up by resident team captains Phil Tufnell and Matt Dawson, battle it out in numerous topical rounds, including the picture round, home or away, what happened next and on the buzzer.

LD Roger Williams continues to light the show. Richard Martin Lighting (RML) have been providing the lights for this show for a number of years now and have worked hard to make sure the transition from filming in London to Dock 10 in Salford has been a smooth one.

Roger’s rig is relatively basic in terms of moving lights but the effect it has on the vibrant set works brilliantly. Roger uses Robe ROBIN 600 LEDWashes, Robe ROBIN 100 LEDBeams, LED Par Cans, VL1000TS and Alpha Spot 575 HPE.

The Alan Titchmarsh Show

I can hear the hearts of housewives across the country breaking with the news that the latest series of The Alan Titchmarsh Show will be the last.

Earlier on in the year it was announced that Alan Titchmarsh would be stepping down and the next series would be the final one.

It is reported that Alan has said his reason for leaving the show is because he doesn’t want to be over-worked and risk health problems. We will be very sad to see the end of the show and will miss working with him and his team down at the London Studios.

In each daily episode, Alan approaches topical news and debates, as well as cooking delicious meals with resident and celebrity chefs, chatting to celebrity guests, and enjoying music numbers – no wonder he is now a firm favourite in many women’s living rooms!

Roger Williams will light the show for the final time, supported by Richard Martin Lighting (RML).

For the series Roger has used Alpha Spot 575s, MAC Auras and Pixel Par 90s to create a welcoming and warm lounge room-style environment, which the show has been famous for.

After working as a professional gardener and a garden journalist, Alan Titchmarsh established himself as a media personality through appearances on gardening programmes and since 2007, he has hosted his own ITV tea-time chat show. After seven years of being aired, it is going to leave a void, certainly, in that prime-time spot.

ROBE Robe shines bright at Commonwealth Games Ceremonies

Over 500 Robe moving lights were right at the heart of the stunning Opening Ceremony lightshow designed by Tim Routledge for the 2014 Commonwealth Games at Celtic Park stadium in Glasgow.

The two-hour highly visual show, produced by global brand experience agency Jack Morton Worldwide (JMW) and directed by David Zolkwer, featured a cast of 2,000, plus Set & Light | Winter 2014

67

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 68

Sponsor news

Pictured: Over 500 Robe moving lights were used by LD Tim Routledge for the Opening Ceremony of the Commonwealth Games

special guests including Rod Stewart and Susan Boyle, and offered a snapshot of the history, character, culture, industry, quirkiness and innate humour of Scotland. It presented the 4,500 athletes from 71 participating nations to a live audience of over 40,000, plus about two billion TV viewers.

Among the Robe fixtures were 64 of the amazing new big lights – shortly to be launched worldwide – and 28 of Robe’s new LEDBeam 1000s.

These were joined by 183 Pointes, 100 LEDBeam 100s, 98 LEDWash 600s and 60 CycFX 8s – all from Robe’s ROBIN series.

The challenges of staging the Opening Ceremony included working in Celtic Park, an absolutely iconic football venue, but one not normally utilised as a theatrical live event space, especially not of this size, so all departments had to think laterally to deal with weight loading and other physical restrictions to install their equipment in the right places.

The fast-paced OC show started with an all-action romp through Scottish tradition and landmarks and culminated with the hoisting of the Commonwealth flag and HRH the Queen declaring the XX Commonwealth Games open.

On the top level of the stadium at the back of the seating bowl, because there was limited weight loading in the roof and so a scaffolding platform was built, running 270 degrees around the stand, to facilitate lighting positions, cable management, follow spots, amp ‘worlds’ and other technical areas.

Also on this level were 96 LEDWash 600s, primarily used 68

Set & Light | Winter 2014

for lighting the underside of the seating stand roof. On the edge of the roof – the only place any rigging points were viable – were trusses with fixtures to light the audience, who were sitting at 270 degrees to the stage.

The next level down was a ring of wash lights used for show key lighting, plus 80 Solaris Flare Junior LED strobes.

At floor level, Routledge used the majority of his Pointes.

Pointes in clusters of six in weather domes were positioned around the perimeter of the field in 16 ‘floor pod’ positions. These 96 Pointes were used to shoot across the brightly coloured floor cloth and for firing up into the air and criss-crossing the pitch. They could also be turned around and beamed up into the stand roof for gobo effects, complementing the LEDWashes. Also in each of the pitchlevel lighting pods were Source Four 10 degrees, Source Four PARs and a bar of ACLs. At the back of the stage, which ran along the entirety of the south stand at Celtic Park, was a 95-metre-wide by 10.5metre-high LED screen, with another 40 Pointes alternated around this, rigged to a goal post-style truss structure.

These could be used for illuminating the field-of-play action, as well as for animated beam effects and specials like the ‘crowning’ the Commonwealth flag when it reached the top of the mast.

The flag itself had eight specially dedicated LEDBeam 1000s positioned around the base to highlight it as a core symbol of Commonwealth unity.

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 69

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

At one-metre intervals running along the front of the stage were the 100 LEDBeam 100s.

Twenty of the LEDBeam 1000s were positioned in a semi-circle behind The Queen’s Arrival Stage on the west side of the pitch. They back-lit a temporary white screen erected behind The Queen for her arrival moment.

Sixty of Robe’s CycFX 8 moving LED battens were strategically rigged around in Vom 2, the main entrance for the Athlete’s Parade into the stadium. Immediately above each of the two entrance/exit voms were ten Pointes and six LEDWash 600s.

Routledge worked with a control team of three – Lead Programmer Jonathan Rouse and Programmer Tom Young – both using grandMA2 full size consoles, and fully redundant backup systems provided by lighting contractor PRG. Chris Henry was the Design Associate for the project.

She also trained 18 volunteer operators to use the follow spots … and called them during the show.

PRG’s very efficient crew of seven, led by Rich Gorrod, looked after all the lighting equipment, and Robe’s own Steve Eastham was also onsite to assist with tech’ing all the Robe kit.

They all worked closely with Andy Loveday, JMW’s Technical Manager (Systems) for Ceremonies, and Ben Holdsworth, JMW’s Production Manager for Lighting & Rigging.

Painting With Light helps celebrate 25 years of VTM

Belgian commercial TV channel VTM (Vlaamse Televisie Maatschappij) celebrated 25 years of success in an amazing son et lumière spectacular staged on the beach at Nieuwpoort, which was attended by 17,000 people.

Lighting was designed by Painting With Light’s Luc Peumans, who has worked on many music-based projects for VTM, and was commissioned to add his own elements of eye-catching magic to the mix.

The 25-minute ‘Great Big Musical Thank You’ show was directed by Dirk Decloedt and set to a specially composed soundtrack. It featured 250 dancers, a troupe of huge Dundu puppets, a 75-metre-wide by 12-metre-high waterscreen projection surface, dancing fountains and over 2,000 pyro cues, all linked together by the vision of Scenographer/Art Director Marcos Viñals Bassols and Peumans’ dynamic lighting.

An after-movie was made of the Great Big Musical Thank You event, which was also broadcast on VTM and made available for the enjoyment of all on the internet.

Check out http://vtm.be/25-jaar-vtm/25-jaar-vtmaftermovie for the after movie.

The KLM 95 event lighting equipment was supplied by PRG. A Road Hog Full Boar console was used to run the lighting, with the lighting programmer and operators supplied

by The Unit Show control, co-ordinated of Jeffrey Goes and Daan Oomen, who also supplied the d3 system and oversaw the video content creation and its programming. The Barco projectors were supplied by Faber Audiovisuals and JG Video.

Over 35,000 people enjoyed the stunning visual experience across two intense show days.

Robe BMFL spots fly high with KLM

The first Robe Bright Multi-Functional (BMFL) Spot moving lights in rental stock in The Netherlands were right at the

heart of a spectacular show staged in Hangar 12 at Amsterdam’s Schiphol International Airport, celebrating national airline KLM’s 95th birthday.

The show’s Creative Director and Lighting Designer was Gerard Maijenburg. With an impressive 35 years as a lighting professional spanning rock ‘n’ roll, TV and special events under his belt, his high-profile clients include the awardwinning airline. In addition to designing the lighting, he coordinates the creative and technical production for all KLM’s live events.

KLM commissions a major birthday show every five years.

Robe BMFLs are pretty in pink

Full production and solutions provider Hawthorn was the first UK company to invest in Robe’s new Big MultiFunctional Luminaire (BMFL) Spot moving light fixture and the first event for their newest lighting purchase was the Pink Ribbon Ball, staged in the Central Hall of the Natural History Museum in London in support of the Breast Cancer Campaign.

The prestigious and highly-acclaimed social event – now in its 20th year – was this year hosted by TV presenter Kate Thornton. A gala dinner featured performances by the Pink Ribbon Ball house band, aerialist trio La Luna and magic from Chicks With Tricks, while Brit Award-winning artist Lisa Stansfield topped a memorable evening’s entertainment.

Robe kicks off NBC’s Sunday Night Football with Carrie Underwood

A back wall of 72 Robe CycFX 8s and Pointes helped create awesome effects for Carrie Underwood’s all-action highprofile introduction for NBC’s 2014 Sunday Night Football.

Los Angeles-based Lighting Designer Benoit Richard was responsible for lighting Underwood’s energetic rendition of Waiting All Day for Sunday Night, a re-working of Joan Jett’s classic I Hate Myself for Loving You for NBC Sports and San Francisco and New York-based producers, Bodega Studios.

It is the second year that Underwood has performed the opening intro for NBC’s number-one TV show, and also the second year that Richard has designed the lighting for her performance, which was directed by Tripp Dixon, with a production design by Evan Rohde.

Set & Light | Winter 2014

69

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 70

Sponsor news

Pictured: Stage Electrics supported the SHREK THE MUSICAL tour with Dean Chisnall as Shrek and Faye Brookes as Princess Fiona. Photo credit: Helen Maybanks

ROSCO Rosco continue their developments in LED fixtures specifically for television studios with two new fixtures: Braq Cube™ WNC – tunable white –and Braq Cube™ 4C – colour mixing.

They are both compact 127mm cubes with a low 100W power draw, but with over 7,000 lumen output and with a high CRI. The WNC unit has a tunable light output, from 2,800K to 6,500K, and an assortment of lenses for spot medium or wide angle. A flicker-free dimming facility is built in, for 8- or 16-bit resolution, plus a novel ‘filament’ mode, which mimics the delayed black-out glow of incandescent lamps. The tunability of colour temperature is through a mix of cool, warm and white LED emitters.

The Braq Cube™ 4C eliminates distracting colour shadows with conventional RGB systems by using a RGBW quad-chip colour mixing technology, enabling a good palette of natural colours, including subtle tints.

Filters for LED lights

Rosco have researched the market needs carefully and now launch the OPTI-FLECS range of filters for LED enhancement, correction and softening. They are designed 70

Set & Light | Winter 2014

to combat the LED white, which can be sterile and flat, by warming light, enhancing skin tones and minimising the green spike. The filters are in a semi-rigid format for easy cutting.

The range includes neutral densities, ¼ and ½ CTOs, a selection of warming and minus greens and a special selection of diffusions for softening the light output.

Rosco launches a new family of fog machines with a broad range of features and performance specs

Rosco has launched a line of four new fog machines designed to meet the demands of a wide variety of applications, from theatrical productions and film sets to photoshoots and training exercises. The Mini-V is easy to use as well as being the most affordable and compact machine in the series. The Vapour is the workhorse of the new line, with features and performance suited to the most demanding professional environments. Designed specifically to fill large venues and outdoor spaces with dense fog and smoke, the Vapour Plus produces a massive amount of fog in a short time. The VHazer is a rock-solid, quiet and reliable haze generator.

STAGE ELECTRICS Stage Electrics Shreks around UK and Ireland

Beloved swamp-dwelling ogre Shrek and his ensemble of friends, enemies and fairytale characters beguiled audiences throughout the UK and Ireland while on an extensive tour of SHREK THE MUSICAL®. Stage Electrics was there to

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 71

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

ensure green was not the only colour...

Coming direct from London, where it was seen on stage by nearly a million people, SHREK THE MUSICAL® UK and Ireland Tour opened in July at the Grand Theatre in Leeds and toured until September 2015. Stage Electrics supplied lighting equipment for the tour, which had to achieve West End results with a more compact, tour-friendly rig.

Richard Bullimore was overall Production Manager; lighting design was by Hugh Vanstone and Matt Daw, with Lighting Programmer Chris Hirst. Fraser Hall was Senior Production Electrician, with Stage Electrics’ Chris Sims as Hire Co-ordinator for the project, working alongside Fraser and his team. Catherine Crick is Chief Touring Electrician, with Stuart Moorhouse as Deputy.

The West End production featured 147 moving heads and an extensive inventory of conventionals. Stage Electrics helped to deliver a similar, albeit smaller-scale, show with a rig comprising 16 Martin Professional MAC Viper Performance, 16 Viper Wash DX, six Viper Profile and 12 MAC Aura LED Washes, complementing LED battens and an array of ETC Source Fours.

TIFFEN Highly-anticipated Domke Next Generation camera bags now available

Weighing in at just a half-pound, Curve is the perfect accompaniment for any journey, be it shooting school sports, taking it for a thrill ride in the skate park, or zooming down a mountain on skis or snowboard.

UNUSUAL RIGGING Dig deep: Unusual Rigging urges the industry to support Behind the Scenes charity

Unusual Rigging has become one of the first companies to donate to the UK’s new entertainment-industry charity, Behind the Scenes. Presenting a cheque for £10,000 to White Light’s John Simpson, the charity’s Chairman, at the PLASA 2014 Award ceremony, Unusual’s Alan Jacobi (AJ) called upon all organisations within the industry to dig deep and support this worthwhile cause.

Behind the Scenes provides financial support to people working in the entertainment technology industry who experience hardship when they become ill or injured, or to their surviving family members. Grants are tailored to each individual but uses can include basic living costs, medical related expenses, transportation, retraining and funeral expenses.

AJ, who is also treasurer of the charity, commented: “PLASA has provided Behind the Scenes with a springboard to reach out to all sectors within the entertainmenttechnology industry. The donations have started coming in

Building on the core Domke DNA, the revolutionary Domke Next Generation camera bags from The Tiffen Company, a leading manufacturer of award-winning imaging accessories, bring stylish new features and unbeatable versatility to photographers.

Domke Next Generation bags offer shooters unparalleled customisation via the unique, patent-pending GearProtex® insert and PocketFlex® storage compartment system.

Professional Photographer magazine honours The Tiffen Company with two 2014 Hot One Awards

The Tiffen Company, a leading manufacturer of awardwinning imaging accessories, has been awarded two Hot One awards from Professional Photographer. The revered magazine recognised Tiffen’s Diffusion Effect Filters for DSLRs in 2014’s best lens filter category, and Steadicam SOLO as the year’s best HDSLR stabiliser.

The annual Hot One Awards honour the hottest products and services for professional photographers. This year’s competition had more than 250 entries from nearly 100 companies competing in roughly 50 categories. A panel of judges, made up entirely of independent professional photographers, names the top choice in each category.

Steadicam Curve for GoPro flies into stores

Tiffen’s lightweight and compact stabiliser for GoPro action shots, the Steadicam® Curve® for GoPro®, is now available online and in stores.

A stealth camera stabiliser from the Academy Awardwinning Steadicam family of products, Curve is designed specifically for action-packed, one-handed GoPro camera shoots.

Pictured: Unusual Rigging’s Alan Jacobi presents a cheque to Behind the Scenes Chairman John Simpson © Frank Noon Set & Light | Winter 2014

71

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 72

Sponsor news

and we’ve had an excellent kickstart to our fundraising, but until we have sufficient funds we can’t start granting.”

He continued: “Behind the Scenes can only give out what it receives. None of us know when we may succumb to hard times – none of us can disaster-proof ourselves. This fund is there to help us all: industry friends and colleagues as well as our families. We need the industry’s support to make this happen, we need fundraising ideas and volunteers, but most importantly we need your donations. Our colleagues in North America are already benefiting from Behind the Scenes, which is now in its eighth year over there. We don’t want to have to turn anyone away because of insufficient funds. The success of Behind the Scenes UK lies entirely in our own hands.”

The Laureus Awards get the Unusual touch in Kuala Lumpur

The most prestigious awards in the international sporting calendar, the 2014 Laureus World Sports Awards, were held in Kuala Lumpur on 26 March. Attended by the greatest names in sport, past and present, the event was staged at the Istana Budaya, the National Theatre of Malaysia and home to the National Theatre Company and National Symphony Orchestra.

An event such as this, which is broadcast to audiences across the world, requires a first-class setting and, once again, this was staged by production company Done and Dusted. Helping to build that set was a crew of four from Unusual Rigging, led by Senior Project Manager Steve Porter.

Working alongside Paddy Hocken, Done and Dusted’s Technical Production Manager, Unusual also supplied winches to track two video screens, plus a variety of specialist rigging components not available in the region, to overcome the challenges of suspending the scenic elements in the theatre’s existing mechanical flying system.

Unique art requires Unusual Rigging – how the Richard Tuttle exhibit at the Tate Modern appears to float in the air

On 14 October, Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall opened its doors to the largest work ever created by renowned American sculptor Richard Tuttle. Entitled ‘I don’t know, Or the Weave of Textile Language’, Tuttle’s piece combines vast swathes of fabrics to create a massive winged sculpture.

Weighing in at 25 tonnes and measuring 50m long, Production Manager Jim Leaver faced the incredible challenge of how to suspend the artwork – not just safely over the heads of thousands of visitors, but also to create the illusion that the piece was floating effortlessly in the air.

Jim Leaver, who was appointed by Tate Modern to oversee the construction of the exhibit, brought Unusual Rigging on board to help develop a solution and to fulfil Tuttle’s idea that those visiting the exhibition should ‘feel like they’re in heaven’.

Working with Jim, Leon and his team installed a hoist to the existing roof beams of the Turbine Hall and lifted 52cm Eurotruss to a working height. They then secured the lifting hoist for the piece and all dead-hang brackets. Once this was done, the truss was lifted out just under the roof beams of 72

Set & Light | Winter 2014

© Andrew Dunkley, Tate Photography

the turbine hall and dead hung.

Once all the work was complete, Unusual’s team raised the sections to their final positions and suspended them on black wire to create the floating appearance.

WHITE LIGHT White Light adds CORE Lighting ColourPoints to hire stock

Customers can now hire ColourPoint uplighters directly from White Light. The London-based lighting supplier has added more than 100 new CORE Lighting ColourPoint uplighters to hire stock, further expanding the company’s range of all-weather event lighting. Manufactured in the UK, ColourPoint fixtures feature a bright LED source, long-life lithium-ion battery and wireless control, making them extremely popular for lighting indoor and outdoor events, conferences and architecture. The fixture’s sleek chrome casing and versatile colour range also make the ColourPoint ideal for on-camera applications such as studio and set lighting for TV and broadcast.

White Light expands audio expertise as Lee Dennison joins

White Light is pleased to welcome Lee Dennison to the White Light management team as Head of Audio, further expanding the company’s audio expertise. The move signals more growth for White Light as the company continues its strong market presence throughout the entertainment and

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 73

Compiled by Emma Thorpe – sponsornews@stld.org.uk

events industries.

Dennison brings more than 20 years of audio experience to the position. He has previously worked with Autograph Sound Recording and, most recently, spent seven years working with Delta Sound/Sound by Design in a Projects Director position.

In his new role at White Light, Dennison is working with Events, Sales and Installation teams on audio elements for a variety of projects using his experience, knowledge and relationships with key manufacturers, suppliers and end clients.

Dennison begun work at White Light on 3 November.

Along with the appointment, White Light will look to expand their current technical team and invest in additional sound equipment, further increasing audio options for customers.

Behind the Scenes Charity Golf Day raises £5,500

Wednesday 15 October saw the first official Behind the Scenes (BTS) Charity Golf Day, which took place just a week following the charity’s official UK launch at PLASA 2014.

Eighteen teams got through 27 holes of golf, 90 bacon rolls and the odd pint of isotonic lager at lunchtime!

The BTS Charity Golf Day has evolved from earlier incarnations, including the PLASA Golf Day and the Light Relief Golf Day, and has now established itself as one of the main charity events in the industry’s diary.

Teams from all walks of the industry battled it out, with various handicaps, obstacles and extreme points-deduction from the judges. This year, after trying so hard for the past two years, and despite massive impartial penalising by the judges, Team Meyer Sound, captained by Roger ‘Tiger’ Harpum, was victorious, closely followed by the PLASA team and Unusual Rigging in third place.

BTS trustee and golf day organiser Lee Dennison said “We had a fantastic response from the industry this year. I would like to thank in particular Crewsaders for sponsoring the ‘Nearest the 19th Hole Award’, Shure for the ‘Longest Drive’ and D&B for the ‘Shortest Drive’. I would also like to give a special mention to James Gordon and the team at Digico for embracing the spirit of the day and sponsoring the

‘Nearest the Pin’ competition. Digico arranged a surprise for all of the golfers in the form of a pre-recorded voice message that was activated when the ball went into the hole.

Anyone who was there will remember the message; it’s unfit for print but needless to say it was full of praise and admiration for Roger from Meyer Sound even before he got the award! My, how his reputation precedes him!”

With all the team entrance fees, plus the raffles on the day, £5,500 was raised for the charity. This is an amazing amount, which will benefit so many applicants.

Dennison said: “A massive thank you to all the teams who took part. This charity is so important to everyone in the industry. It’s funded by the industry, for the industry, and only we can make it successful. With a huge start made at the PLASA Show, with donations topping £40k, we have definitely got our foot into the industry but we must all now spread the word of what the charity can do and also how individuals and companies can become involved and assist.”

Following the golf day, several companies have already contacted Dennison about being involved on future BTS events through sponsorship, partnership and donations.

For further information on help, support and grant applications, see the Behind the Scenes website.

XL VIDEO XL Video sets the scene for Pointless

XL Video supplied video solutions for studio recordings of Series 12 and 13 of the popular Endemol UK/Remarkable Television show, Pointless.

The familiar Pointless set includes several video elements that are key to the quiz show, which is hosted by Alexander Armstrong and quizmaster Richard Osman and is recorded at Stage 8 of Elstree Television Studios and broadcast on BBC One. For the questions screen, XL Video Project Manager Jeff Bailey specified one of XL’s high brightness Barco HD-20 projectors, which fed the 3.2m by 2.32m screen. The high brightness unit, which supplies 20,000 lumens, was selected to counter the ambient light on set.

For the game tower, which counts down the scores towards the much-sought-after ‘pointless’ answer, 20 tiles of XL’s Barco NX6 LED product were utilised, de-populated from the standard rental frames and installed into a laser-cut curved fascia built on to a steel tower. Bailey selected the NX6 as the small module size enabled the LED to create a curved surface with no visible gaps.

A total of 67 Pointless and 14 Pointless Celebrity shows were recorded during the run, at a rate of three to four episodes per day.

XL Video also supplied several Panasonic LCD screens to BBC Resources, used by the presenters and contestants as video relay screens.

XL supplies video screens for Never Mind the Buzzcocks Photo credit: Martha Gall

XL Video, working with Production Manager Sarah Chaloner and Designer Dominic Tolfts, supplied video projection and Set & Light | Winter 2014

73

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 74

Sponsor news

plasma-screen solutions for studio recordings of Series 28 of the popular TalkBack television show, Never Mind the Buzzcocks.

The familiar set includes a number of video elements that are key to the music-based quiz show, which is hosted by Rhod Gilbert. This series was recorded at Stage 9 of Elstree Television Studios and broadcast on BBC Two. For the main screen, XL Video Project Manager Jeff Bailey specified one of XL’s high brightness Barco FLM HD20 projectors, which feeds the 16ft by 9ft screen. The high brightness 20,000 lumen unit was selected to counter the ambient light on set.

The stage left and right of the set are populated with 12 Panasonic 42-inch LCD screens. These screens were specified for their built-in videowall capability, which is essential to the look of the set. The plasmas are fed as two separate exploded videowall screens and display the iconic Buzzcocks logo.

XL Video also supplied Phillips 19-inch LCD screens for the front of the panelists’ desks and as desk inserts for the teams. Additionally a NEC 32-inch LCD is mounted on the front of the presenter’s desk.

A total of 12 shows were recorded during the nine-week run, with one to two episodes recorded per week.

BAFTA Cymru Awards. The event, held on 26 October at the Millennium Centre, Cardiff, celebrates the best productions from the television and film industries in Wales.

Working with BAFTA show Producer Jonathan Davies, and Production Designer David Marson, XL Video supplied a 15m wide by 4.2m high LED screen, formed from a combination of its ROE MC-18T and MC-7T products.

The MC-18 tiles formed the majority of the screen, with a high-resolution MC-7 screen 5.4m wide by 3m high inset to show VTs and other live footage.

The mixture of LED resolutions in one screen was specified by XL Video’s Film & TV Manager Jeff Bailey and made possible by XL’s bespoke touring frames, which can fit all four types of ROE LED, and enabled easy and quick build and de-rig.

A dual channel Catalyst system from XL Video controlled the content via the OB truck and allowed the screen to be used as a single canvas backdrop or with VT cut in to the high-resolution section.

During the evening the screen displayed nominees and winners’ VTs, as well as category graphics and logos for the awards, which were hosted by Jason Mohammad, and it formed the backdrop for a performance by Welsh superstar Katherine Jenkins.

XL Video also sponsored one of the award categories – Production Design – which was won by Arwel Wyn Jones for his work on the international hit drama Sherlock.

XL Video shines at the BAFTA Cymru Awards 2014 XL Video supplied LED screens and control for the 2014

Welcome to new members I would like to take the opportunity to welcome the following people as new members of the STLD: Sunny Singh, Full Member

Juan Jose Beloqui, Overseas Member

Nicole Timpson, Student Member

Ian Howlett, Retired Member Robert Horne

74

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 pp1-?:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:23 Page 75

Society Committee

Chairman Stuart Gain 07774 161 996

chairman@stld.org.uk

Treasurer Mike Le Fevre

Secretary John O’Brien

07956 305 662

07717 170 288

Magazine Editor, Sponsor News + Assistant Sponsor Liaison

Emma Thorpe 07850 709 210

johnobrien@stld.org.uk

treasurer@stld.org.uk

Membership Robert Horne

Sponsors Liaison Bernie Davis

07762 562 434

07860 662 736

editor@stld.org.uk

Exhibitions, Diary + Advertising Sales

Paul Middleton

07720 446 921

sponsors@stld.org.uk

members@stld.org.uk

Publicity Andrew Harris

Website Ian Hillson

07973 745 583

paulmiddleton@stld.org.uk

John King

07860 759 294

Picture courtesy of Chris Capstick

publicity@stld.org.uk

Lee Allen

07711 088 964

leeallen@stld.org.uk

Alan Luxford 07867 536 522

ianhillson@stld.org.uk

Iain Davidson 07811 256 283

iaindavidson@stld.org.uk

Les McCallum 07940 280 268

johnking@stld.org.uk

Rick Dines

07780 707 169

rickdines@stld.org.uk

Jonathan Taylor

07774 698 847

luxfora@aol.com

lesmccallum@stld.org.uk

jonathantaylor@stld.org.uk Set & Light | Winter 2014

75

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:42 Page 76

Society sponsors

A.C. Entertainment Technologies Ltd (Jonathan Walters) Centauri House, Hillbottom Road, Sands Industrial Estate, High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire HP12 4HQ Tel: 01494 446 000 ~ Fax: 01494 461 024 ~ Email: jono@ac-et.com ~ Web: www.aclighting.com

Ambersphere Solutions Ltd now incorporating MA Lighting (Glyn O’Donoghue) Unit 13 Alliance Court, Alliance Road, Park Royal, London W3 0RB Tel: 020 8992 6369 ~ Email: glyn@amberspere.co.uk ~ Web: www.ambersphere.co.uk

Anna Valley (Part of Shooting Partners group) (Mark Holdway, Doug Hammond) Unit J12 Brooklands Close, Windmill Road, Sunbury-On-Thames, Middlesex TW16 7DX Tel: 020 8941 4500 ~ Fax: +44(0)1932 761 591 ~ Web: www.annavalley.co.uk

ARRI CT Ltd (Andy Barnett, Siobhan Daly, Lee Romney) 2 Highbridge, Oxford Road, Uxbridge, Middlesex UB8 1LX Tel: 01895 457 000 ~ Fax: 01895 457 001 ~ Email: sales@arri-gb.com ~ Web: www.arri.com

ARRI Lighting Rental Ltd (John Colley, Mike O’Hara) 2 Highbridge, Oxford Road, Uxbridge, Middlesex UB8 1LX ~ Tel: 01895 457 200 ~ Fax: 01895 457 201 Manchester 0161 736 8034 (Jimmy Reeves) ~ Email: mohara@arrirental.com ~ Web: www.arri.com

Aurora Lighting Hire Ltd (Nick Edwards) Aurora Lighting Hire Ltd, Unit 21, Ockham Drive, Greenford Park, London UB6 0FD Tel: 020 8813 2777 ~ Mobile: 07710 261 838 ~ Email: nick.edwards@auroratv.co.uk ~ Web: www.auroratv.co.uk

Avolites (Koy Neminathan) 184 Park Avenue, Park Royal, London NW10 7XL Tel: 020 8965 8522 ~ Fax: 020 8965 0290 ~ Email: koy@avolites.com ~ Web: www.avolites.com

Barbizon Europe Ltd (Tom McGrath) Unit 5 Saracen Industrial Area, Mark Road, Hemel Hempsted, Hertfordshire HP2 7BJ ~ Tel: 01442 260 600 ~ Fax: 01442 261 611 Email: tmcgrath@barbizon.com ~ Web: www.barbizon.com

BBC Studios and Post Production Ltd (Danny Popkin) 77–79 Charlotte Street, London W1T 4PW Tel: 020 3327 6900 ~ Email: danny.popkin@bbc.co.uk ~ Web: www.bbcstudiosandpostproduction.com

BBC Academy (Tim Wallbank) Room A16, BBC Wood Norton, Evesham, Worcestershire WR11 4YB Tel: 0370 010 0264 ~ Fax: 0370 010 0265 ~ Email: bbcacademy@bbc.co.uk ~ Web: www.bbcacademy.com

CHAUVET® Europe Ltd (Michael Brooksbank) Unit 1C, Brookhill Road Industrial Estate, Pinxton, Notts NG16 6NT ~ Tel: 1773 511115 X.204 ~ Mobile: 07977 208435 Skype: michael.brooksbank.uk ~ Email: mbrooksbank@chauvetlighting.com ~ Web: www.chauvetlighting.co.uk

Chris James & Co. Ltd (Barry Frankling) 43 Colville Road, Acton, London W3 8BL Tel: 020 8896 1772 ~ Fax: 020 8896 1773 ~ Email: info@chrisjamesfilter.com ~ Web: www.chrisjamesfilter.com

Chroma-Q (James Bawn) Hawksworth Commercial Centre, Elder Road, Leeds, West Yorkshire LS13 4AT Tel: + 44 (0)113 386 9118 ~ Fax: + 44 (0)113 255 7676 ~ Email: james.bawn@ac-et.com ~ Web: www.chroma-q.com

Cirro Lite (Europe) Ltd (John Coppen, David Morphy, Frieder Hockheim) 3 Barrett’s Green Road, London NW10 7AE Tel: 020 8955 6700 ~ Fax: 020 8961 9343 ~ Email: j.coppen@cirrolite.com ~ Web: www.cirrolite.com

Clay Paky S p A (Davide Barbetta) via Pastrengo 3/B, 24068 Seriate (BG), Italy Tel: +39 335 72.333.75 ~ Fax: +39 035.30.18.76 ~Email: davide.barbetta@claypaky.it ~ Web: www.claypaky.it

76

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:42 Page 77

Please mention Set & Light when contacting sponsors

Doughty Engineering Ltd (Julian Chiverton, Mark Chorley) Crow Arch Lane, Ringwood, Hampshire BH24 1NZ Tel: 01425 478 961 ~ Fax: 01425 474 481 Email: sales@doughty-engineering.co.uk ~ Web: www.doughty-engineering.co.uk

Eaton – Zero88 (David Catterall) 20 Greenhill Crescent, Watford Business Park, Watford, Herts WD18 8JA ~ Tel: +44 (0)1923 495495 ~ Fax: +44 (0)1923 228796 Mob: +44 (0)7921 742803 ~ Email: DavidCatterall@eaton.com ~ Web: www.eaton.com

ELP (Ronan Willson, Tony Slee, John Singer, Darren Fletcher) 15 North Gate, Alconbury Airfield, Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire PE28 4WX Tel: 01480 443 800 ~ Fax: 01480 443 888 ~ Email: info@elp.tv ~ Web: www.elp.tv ~ Elstree Office: 020 8324 2100 ~ Manchester Office: 0161 300 2922

Electronic Theatre Controls Ltd (Mark White, Jeremy Roberts) Unit 26-28, Victoria Industrial Estate, Victoria Road, London W3 6UU Tel: 020 8896 1000 ~ Fax: 020 8896 2000 ~ Email: mwhite@etceurope.com ~ Web: www.etcconnect.com

Film & TV Services Ltd (Julie Fegan, Eddie Fegan) Unit 3, Matrix Park, Coronation Road, Park Royal, London NW10 7PH Tel: 020 8961 0090 ~ Fax: 020 8961 8635 ~ Email: mail@ftvs.co.uk ~ Web: www.ftvs.co.uk

Fountain Television Ltd (Mariana Spater) The Fountain studios, 128 Wembley Park Drive, Wembley HA9 8HP Tel: 020 8900 5800 ~ Email: Mariana.spater@ftv.co.uk ~ Web: www.ftv.co.uk

Green Hippo (Samantha Bailey) Unit 307 Parma House, Clarendon Road, Wood Green N22 6UL Tel: +44 (0)203 301 4561 ~ Email: sam@green-hippo.com ~ Web: www.green-hippo.com

Havells-Sylvania Ltd (David Hogan) Havells-Sylvania Ltd, Avis Way, Newhaven BN9 0ED Email: david.hogan@havells-sylvania.com ~ Web: www.havells-sylvania.com

Hawthorn Lighting (Dave Slater, May Lee) Head Office: 01664 821111 ~ London Office: 020 8955 6900 info@hawthorns.uk.com - www.hawthorns.uk.com

HSL Group Holdings LTD (Simon Stuart, Mike Oates) Unit E&F, Glenfield Park, Philips Road, Blackburn, Lancashire BB1 5PF Tel: 01254 698 808 ~ Fax: 01254 698 835 ~ Email: hire@hslgroup.com ~ Web: www.hslgroup.com

James Thomas Engineering Ltd (Paul Young) Navigation Complex, Navigation Road, Digilis Trading Estate, Worcestershire WR5 3DE Tel: 01905 363 600~ Fax: 01905 363 601 ~ Email: pauly@jamesthomas.co.uk ~ Web: www.jamesthomas.co.uk

Jands (Jack Moorhouse) Centauri House, Hillbottom Road, High Wycombe, Bucks HP12 4HQ Tel: +44 (0)1494 838 323 ~Fax: +44 (0)1494 461 024 ~ Email: jack.moorhouse@ac-et.com ~ Web: www.jands.com/lighting

Key Light Hire Ltd (Alex Hambi) Unit 24, Sovereign Park, Coronation Road, Park Royal NW10 7QP Tel: 020 8963 9931 ~ Fax: 020 8961 236 ~ Mobile: 07949 686 802 ~ Email: alex@keylight.tv ~ Web: www.keylight.tv

Lights Camera Action (Nick Shapley) Unit 14, Fairway Drive, Greenford, Middlesex UB6 8PW Tel: 020 8833 7600 ~ Fax: 020 8575 8219 ~ Web: www.lcauk.com

Lee Filters Ltd (Eddie Ruffell, Paul Topliss, Ralph Young) Central Way, Walworth Industrial Estate, Andover, Hampshire SP10 5AN Tel: 01264 366 245 ~ Fax: 01264 355 058 ~ Email: ecruffell@leefilters.com ~ Web: www.leefilters.com

Set & Light | Winter 2014

77

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:42 Page 78

Society sponsors

Lighting Logic Ltd (Mick Cocker, Matt Miles) The Hopkilns Building, Goblands Farm Business Centre, Cemetery Lane, Hadlow, Kent T11 0LT Tel: 0845 260 0540 ~ Fax: 0845 260 0541 ~ Email: mick@lightinglogic.co.uk ~ Web: www.lightinglogic.co.uk

Litepanels Studio Lighting EMEA (Spencer Newbury) 16152 Saticoy St., Van Nuys, CA 91406, USA Tel: +31 629 29 6575 ~ Email: Spencer@Litepanels.com ~ Web: www.litepanels.com

LSI Projects (Russell Dunsire, Nick Mobsby) 15, Woking Business Park, Albert Drive, Woking, Surrey GU21 5JY Tel: 01483 764 646 ~ Fax: 01483 769 955 ~ Email: nickM@lsiprojects.com ~ Web: www.lsiprojects.com

Martin by Harman ( Mike Walker) Martin Professional PLC, 7.G.2, The Leathermarket, 11–13 Weston Street, London SE1 3ER Tel: 020 3207 2975 ~ Email: michael.walker@martin.dk ~ Web: www.martinpro.co.uk

MEMS Power Generation (Mark Diffey) Beechings Way, Gillingham, Kent ME8 6PS Tel: 08452 230 400 ~ Fax: 01634 263666 ~ Email: sales@mems.com~ Web: www.mems.com

OSRAM Ltd (Terri Pearson, Andy Gilks) OSRAM House, Waterside Drive, Langley, Berkshire SL3 6EZ Tel: 01753 484 175 ~ Fax: 01753 484 165 ~ Email: displayoptic@osram.co.uk ~ Web: www.osram.com

Panalux Limited (Ed Pagett, Simon Roose) Unit 21, The Metropolitan Centre, Derby Road, Greenford, London UB6 8UJ Tel: 020 8832 4800 ~ Fax: 020 8832 4811 ~ Email: info@panalux.biz ~ Web: www.panalux.biz

Philips Entertainment Group Europe (Amber Etra-) Rondweb Zuid 85, Winterswijk 7102 JD, Netherlands Tel: +31 611 030 083

Philips Lighting UK Ltd (Stuart Dell) Philips Centre, Guildford Business Park, Guildford, Surrey GU2 8XH Tel: 07774 122 735 ~ Fax: 01296 670 956 ~ Email: stuart.dell@philips.com ~ Web: www.lighting.philips.com

Photon Beard Ltd (Peter Daffarn, Mike Perry, Simon Larn) Unit K3, Cherry Court Way, Stanbridge Road, Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire LU7 8UH Tel: 01525 850 911 ~ Fax: 01525 850 922 Email: info@photonbeard.com ~ Web: www.photonbeard.com

Pinewood Group (Simon Honey – Head of Studio Ops, Peter Lawes – Production Lighting Manager, Paul Darbyshire – Operations Director) Pinewood Road, Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire SL0 0NH Tel: 01753 785 200 ~ Fax: 01753 656 103 ~ Email: simon.honey@pinewoodshepperton.com ~ Web: www.pinewoodshepperton.com

PLASA (Norah Phillips) The Professional Lighting and Sound Association is a trade association representing companies and individuals who work in the TV, film, entertainment, installation and leisure industries. Its aim is to develop and promote all aspects of the industry on a worldwide basis, acting in the common interests of its membership.

Redoubt House, 1 Edward Street, Eastbourne, Sussex BN23 8AS Tel: 01323 524 120 ~ Fax: 01323 524 121 ~ Email: norah.phillips@plasa.org ~ Web: www.plasa.org

Production Resource Group (Mick Healey,Kelly Cornfield, Jon Cadbury) The Hoover Building, Western Avenue, Perivale UB6 8DW ~ The Cofton Centre, Groveley Lane, Longbridge, Birmingham B31 4PT Tel: 0845 470 6400 ~ Fax: 0845 470 6401 ~ Email: prglighting@prg.com ~ Web: www.prglighting.co.uk

Pulsar Light Of Cambridge Ltd (Andy Graves, Paul Mardon, Snowy Johnson) 3 Coldham’s Business Park, Norman Way, Cambridge CB1 3LH Tel: 01223 403 500 ~ Fax: 01223 403 501 ~ Email: andy@pulsarlight.com ~ Web: www.pulsarlight.com

78

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:42 Page 79

Please mention Set & Light when contacting sponsors

Richard Martin Lighting Ltd (Steve Wells) Unit 24, Sovereign Park, Coronation Road, Park Royal NW10 7QP ~ RML Admin: Lantern House, Old Town, Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucestershire GL56 0LW Tel: 020 8965 3209 ~ Fax: 020 8965 5562 Email: info@richardmartinlighting.co.uk ~ Web: www.richardmartinlighting.co.uk

Robe UK Ltd (Ashley Lewis, Mick Hannaford, Steve Eastham) 3 Spinney View, Stone Circle Road, Round Spinney Industrial Estate, Northampton NN3 8RQ Tel: 01604 741 000 ~ Fax: 01604 741 041 ~ Email: info@robeuk.com ~ Web: www.robeuk.com

Rosco (Cristian Arroyo, Tom Swartz, Laurie Giraudeau) Blanchard Works, Kangley Bridge Road, Sydenham, London SE26 5AQ Tel: 020 8659 2300 ~ Fax: 020 8659 3153 ~ Email: marketing@rosco-europe.com~ Web: www.rosco.com

Schnick-Schnack-Systems GmbH (Erhard Lehmann) Mathias-Bruggen-Strasse 79, 50829, Germany Tel: +49-221-992019-0 ~ Email: erhard.lehmann@schnickschnacksystems.com ~ Web: english.schnickschnacksystems.com

Sony UK Ltd (Daniel Robb) The Heights, Brooklands, Weybridge, Surrey KT13 0XW Tel: 01932 816 368 ~ Fax: 01932 817 014 ~ Neil: 07774 142 724 ~ Email: Jane.Green@eu.sony.com ~ Web: sonybiz.net/uk

Specialz Ltd (Dave Smith) Unit 2, Kingston Industrial Estate, 81-86 Glover Street, Birmingham B9 4EN Tel: 0121 766 7100 & 7110 ~ Fax: 0121 766 7113 ~ Email: info@specialz.co.uk ~ Web: www.specialz.co.uk

Stage Electrics Partnership Ltd (Adam Blaxill, Russell Payne) Third Way, Avonmouth, Bristol BS11 9YL Tel: 0117 938 4000 ~ Tel Mark: 07890 271 535 ~ Tel Adrian: 07836 540 421 ~ Fax: 0117 916 2828 Email: sales@stage-electrics.co.uk ~ Web: www.stage-electrics.co.uk

The Hospital Club Studios (Samantha Dunlop) 4 Endell Street, London WC2H 9HQ Tel: 020 7170 9112 ~ Fax: 020 7170 9102 ~ Email: samd@thehospitalclub.com ~ Web: www.thehospital.co.uk

The London Studios (Dave Stevens, Jerry Kelleher) Upper Ground, London SE1 9LT Tel: 020 7157 5555 ~ Fax: 020 7157 5757 ~ Email: dave.stevens@londonstudios.co.uk ~ Web: www.londonstudios.co.uk

Tiffen International Ltd (Kevan Parker) East Side Complex, Pinewood Studios, Iver Heath, Bucks SL0 0NH Tel: +44 (0)870 100 1220 ~ Fax: +44 (0)1753 652776 ~ Mob: +44 (0)7545 440973 Email: kparker@tiffen.com ~ Web: www.tiffen.com

TMB (Paul Hartley, Bill Anderson) 21 Armstrong Way, Southall UB2 4SD Tel: 020 8574 9700 ~ Fax: 020 8574 9701 ~ E-Mail: tmb-info@tmb.com ~ Web: www.tmb.com

TSL Teknique Systems Ltd PO Box 3587, Glasgow G73 9DX Tel: 07860 290 637 ~ Web: www.tekniquesystems.com

Unusual Rigging (Mark Priestley) The Wharf, Bugbrooke, Northamptonshire NN7 3QB Tel: 01604 830 083 ~ Fax: 01604 831 144 ~ E-Mail: mark.priestley@unusual.co.uk ~ Web: www.unusual.co.uk

White Light Ltd (Bryan Raven, John Simpson, Jason Larcombe) 20 Merton Industrial Park, Jubilee Way, London SW19 3WL Tel: 020 8254 4800 ~ Fax: 020 8254 4801 ~ E-Mail: info@WhiteLight.Ltd.uk ~ Web: www.WhiteLight.Ltd.uk HireTel: 020 8254 4820 ~ Hire Fax: 020 8254 4821 ~ Sales Tel: 020 8254 4840 ~ Sales Fax: 020 8254 4841

Set & Light | Winter 2014

79

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:42 Page 80

Please mention Set & Light when contacting sponsors

XL Video Ltd (Jeff Bailey) 2 Eastman Way, Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire HP2 7DU Tel: 01442 849 400 ~ Fax: 01442 849 401 ~ E-Mail: info@xlvideo.tv ~ Web: www.xlvideo.com

SPONSORS DIRECTORY

XTBA (Chris Cook, Fiona Fehilly, Simon Peers) 35 Fernleigh Road, London N21 3AN Tel: 020 8882 0100 ~ Fax: 020 8882 9326 ~ E-Mail: dmx@xtba.demon.co.uk ~ Web: www.xtba.demon.co.uk

The STLD interactive Sponsors Directory has been available for sponsors’ use for over a year now. It is proving a very useful tool for the STLD and, we hope, for those of our sponsors who now use it. Its main advantages are that it enables the STLD to display up-to-date and accurate information about your company on its website.

In doing so, it also helps us update our records and ensure that we have accurate mailing and invoicing details.

STLD sponsor companies can make use of this facility by contacting Bernie Davis at sponsors@stld.org.uk with the name and email address of the person who will become the company’s ‘sponsor user’. They will be registered on our secure database and will then be able to modify their company’s information within the sponsors directory.

Please note that the directory can now enable companies to be searched for by category and area.

Bernie Davis – STLD Sponsor Liaison

Index of advertisers ARRI Behind the Scenes BVE Clay Paky 80

Set & Light | Winter 2014

35 34 49 IBC

Doughty ELP ETC Lee Filters

44 BC 31 IFC

Unusual Rigging White Light

17 48

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:42 Page 81

Set & Light | Winter 2014

81

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:42 Page 82

Please return the completed form to: Robert Horne, STLD Membership, 5 Wickham Close, Haywards Heath, West Sussex, RH16 1UH Any questions, please email members@stld.org.uk 82

Set & Light | Winter 2014

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:42 Page 83

STLD_113 SOCIETY SPONSORS:TL 85 Spring 2005 07/12/2014 21:43 Page 84

COMING TO MANCHESTER? TA L K T O E L P F I R S T

If your studio or location lighting production is heading for Manchester, Media City or the Sharp Project, then who better to supply your equipment than the crew with the best local experience.

• • • • • •

Flexible dry hire and great value production packages Energy saving LED lighting systems State-of-the-art digital lighting and controls Own fleet of mobile power generators and trucks In-house structural design, rigging and staging expertise Local production office, local crew and local knowledge

Contact Darren, Sinbad or Matt on 0161 300 2922 or email darren@elp.tv

w w w. e l p. t v ELP Manchester Gold 60 The Sharp Project Thorp Road Manchester M40 5BJ •

•

•

•

•