Set & Light: Spring 2015 (Issue 114) by STLD_Magazine

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Issue 114: Spring 2015

www.stld.org.uk

Set & Light from the Society of Television Lighting and Design

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Editorial

AGM was a great start to the year (and a great opening feature)

015 is off to a great start. Our AGM visit to the Rembrandt exhibition at the National Gallery was gallantly arranged by Ian Hillson and was an instant hit. We had 50 members turn up for the visit and stay on for the AGM. Read all about it on the next page. We have a great mixture of stories in this issue. Bernie Davis briefs us on lighting Children in Need on p20; we have a report of our visit to Syon Park on p16; and a member recollects working on Open All Hours on p25. There’s also a summary of BVE on p36 and birthday mentions to RML, which is now 30, on p24. Please note the update to the Society Rules on pages 13–14. Any queries about these, please contact our Secretary, John O’Brien. The next issue of the magazine will be out in July. The deadlines for the next issue are 15 June for advertising and 26 June for editorial, which includes Sponsor news. Have a great spring and we hope to see you all at one or more of the visits we have planned over the next few months. Look out for details in your email inbox. If we don’t have your email address then you will miss out, so please contact us and let us know what it is.

Emma Thorpe Editor

Contents 4

AGM/Rembrandt exhibition

Lighting: Hampton Court

Chairman’s report/updated rules

Profile: Strand Lighting

STLD visit: Syon Park

Event: BVE

Lighting: Children in Need

A view from across the pond

Profile: RML

Sponsor news

Recollection: Open All Hours

Society sponsors

Profile: Lights Camera Action

Index of advertisers

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: With thanks to Kelvingrove Art Gallery

Printed by: Gemini Brighton

Deadlines for the next issue: Editorial: 26 June 2015 Advertising: 15 June 2015 Advertising is accepted only from sponsor members of the Society © Society of Television Lighting and Design 2014

Set & Light | Spring 2015

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STLD visit

An AGM, art and an angel Words: Ian Dow Once again the STLD caused London’s transport network to grind to a halt. Tube drivers came out on strike when we visited Charlie and the Chocolate Factory last year, but on the occasion of our visit to the Rembrandt exhibition on 13 January it was the bus drivers who took the day off, possibly fearing that lots of technophobes, many of them clutching ‘old folks’ bus passes’, would climb aboard demanding ‘The crypt, my man, and don’t spare the horses’. Despite this, 50 of our members made their way on time, by foot, Tube, or mobility scooter, to a circular glass dome set centrally in the pavement within sight of Trafalgar Square, descended a spiral staircase, then down one more level to appear in the modern extension to the crypt of St Martin-inthe-Fields. Following a welcome coffee and biscuits, we entered St Martin’s Hall, except for those who hadn’t been paying attention and ended up in a t’ai chi class in the room next door. The STLD is a society populated by experienced practitioners in the arts of lighting and design, but where were they? The lectern and microphone stand were positioned, very artistically it must be admitted, but centrally in front of the screen – which meant we couldn’t see the very paintings we had come so far to appreciate! And a room of lighting directors, under the leadership of our organiser Ian Hillson, completely failed in an attempt to control the lighting and were rescued by a young waitress from the Czech Republic, who showed us how to work the dimmers! Ian welcomed Joe Padfield, Conservation Scientist at the National Gallery, who gave a fascinating explanation of the effect of different light sources on the paintings in the gallery. What Joe didn’t explain was how, as a mathematician and scientist, he ever thought of applying to the National Gallery for a job! Joe showed graphs of the spectrum of light produced by tungsten, fluorescent strip lights, blue LED, blue tungsten daylight lamps and daylight itself. 4

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Many of them have peaks of intensity at the blue end of the spectrum, well outside the sensitivity of our eyes, and, more importantly, not registered by some light meters. Joe indicated that the concern of art galleries on the effect of LED lights in the blue area was unfounded. The National Gallery has to take the decision on how to light each area, and replying to a question, Joe said it was thought better to keep the lighting consistent, rather than lighting landscapes in ‘daylight’ and then adjacent portraits in warmer ‘candlelight’ in an attempt to match the conditions in which they would have been painted. Having lit a live OB from the National Gallery, I was most impressed by how helpful the staff were, particularly on lighting levels. Joe explained that the effects of light on the paintings are cumulative, and short bursts of brighter light for TV or film are not critical. We then moved into the vestibule for lunch, lit by daylight from the pavement level two floors above down a circular light well. A good choice of sandwiches and the like, but a bit of a challenge to eat the selection of large slices of soft fruit without the aid of any cutlery! We then went back into the hall for a talk on Rembrandt from Linda Bolton. Since talking to us three years ago before our visit to the Leonardo exhibition, Linda told us she had become a film star! She appears in National Gallery, a documentary directed by Frederick Wiseman, who shot 170 hours before editing the material down to three hours for the film’s release – a bit like working on The X Factor. We are so lucky at these STLD events to have talks from people such as Joe and Linda, both renowned experts in their own fields. Our tickets to Rembrandt: The Late Works were for entry between 2.30pm and 3pm. There were so many questions to Linda that we were cutting it neat on time, and so there was a rush to the tiny cloakroom to grab coats for the walk across Trafalgar Square to the National Gallery. I inadvertently picked up the

wrong black coat for my wife, who is 5ft 3in. She realised all was not well when finding a glove in the pocket which wasn’t hers. We headed back quickly wondering how to trace who had taken her coat only to find Dave Roberts, 6ft 2in, looking in surprise at his coat sleeves ending just below his elbows! It was an inspired idea by the exhibition organisers to display Rembrandt’s famous sculpture of the Cockerel on a plinth in Trafalgar Square. Joe’s explanation of how some pigments were more affected by light than others could be clearly seen, as only the blue pigment had escaped the ravages of the weather and pollution in central London. Ian had emphasised that our tickets allowed us to bypass people in the queue waiting for the 3pm entry slot, and so we were able to swan straight in, thumbing our noses at them. It was very busy in the exhibition and mostly one could only shuffle along following the crowd, but it was easy to spot members of our STLD party – they were the ones with their backs to the paintings looking up at the LEDs! We particularly looked out for features that Linda had mentioned in her talk, and The Three Crosses, from Rembrandt’s etched oeuvre, showed his development of a theme. He could print about 50 impressions from an etched plate, but was then tempted to change the composition slightly as he refreshed the plate. However, I felt he had gone too far with his fourth version as the horse had turned round and was facing the other way – surely not an error that should have escaped his continuity person! Then it was back to the Crypt for the highlight of the day: the AGM, for which most people had stayed. Unfortunately, our Chairman, Stuart Gain, was unable to attend for family reasons, but Secretary John O’Brien and Treasurer Mike Le Fevre, ably assisted by the usual interjections from Bill Dudman on the floor, carried through the agenda with great flair. There is a formal report of the AGM

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AGM/Rembrandt exhibition

on page 13 but I feel the Treasurer’s report in particular is worth comment. Mike got our attention by announcing that the STLD had made a loss of £10,000 in the financial year under review. We were directed to the 10 A4 sheets of his report for an explanation. Unfortunately, in printing the details, one of Joe Padfield’s diagrams must have been transposed with Mike’s chart of STLD Income Expenditure Trends. We could clearly see that the lack of red response in the blue LEDs had reduced the VAT from Exempt Sponsor Nominees from £22,500 to £15,000, and that the back subs from the previous year had been caused by a spike in the logarithmic extrapolation of the fluorescent curve. Such incomprehensible detail led the membership to approve the report unanimously – a cunning ploy! Members were then asked to consider giving approval to arrangements to deal with business more speedily in this modern age. Apparently some financial matters were delayed recently as Mike was lighting camel racing in the desert and couldn’t get a signal. The suggestion was that selected members of the committee could have permission to make financial decisions quickly, as long as they had sent an email to a ‘person of responsibility’ outlining the action. If the two of them then disappeared to South America with the proceeds, the ‘person of responsibility’ would then become known as the ‘accomplice’. This was passed unanimously as the aroma of dinner was wafting into the meeting, and there were still no buses. John King rounded off Any Other Business by offering his congratulations to Alan Woolford for his perseverance in attending STLD meetings, even though he now has to use a mobility scooter to get around. On the way to the meeting, Alan’s wife had trapped and broken her finger while lifting and unfolding his new lightweight scooter from the car at Walton Station. Unfortunately, the delights of an STLD meeting weren’t tempting enough, so she wisely went to A&E, leaving Alan to continue his journey alone, including a change of trains. We then dined on a splendid meal of steak and kidney pie, rounded off by pudding with custard – reminiscent of the BBC canteen in the good old days. However, the evening was not over

Pictured: Linda Bolton. Photo by John O’Brien. See feature, page 8

yet. As I also went home via Waterloo, I offered to accompany Alan on his scooter as far as the station. Bad decision! Alan knew that the disabled lift that went directly to the street was broken and so we used an alternative lift to go up one floor into the 18th century crypt, where we found our path blocked by a locked door. Luckily, an angel appeared unto us in the form of the Czech waitress who had already rescued the STLD once that day. She summoned a security guard and we were told we would need the assistance of (drum roll and long pause): the Vicar. Was this perhaps some underworld godfather from Soho who could pick the lock? No, it was actually the vicar, the Rev’d Canon Dr Samuel Wells and his ecclesiastical bunch of keys. The disabled lift leading to the surface was now in sight – but no amount of button pushing or climbing the stairs and slamming the lift door could stir it into action. Once again our angel came to the rescue, saying we could use the goods lift which served the kitchens. And so a strange procession wended its way in single file through the narrow corridors of the catacombs: a Czech woman dressed entirely in black, a security guard with a torch, a man on a mobility scooter, a man wondering what he was doing there and a vicar in a dog collar. All accompanied by the

rumble of trains on the Jubilee Line not many metres below our feet. Bags of potatoes and sacks of rubbish were manhandled to clear the way until we eventually arrived at the welcome sight of the goods lift, so vast it could have held a complete lighting rig. The mighty motors whirled into action and we ascended to the surface. The folding metal doors slid open and Alan and I were ejected into the cool night air. The doors clanged shut and the Czech woman, security guard and vicar descended back into the labyrinth, leaving us alone. We found ourselves in a narrow side street about three roads away from where we had entered the Crypt. After a short trek to civilisation, we hailed a taxi to Waterloo, where Jane, of South West Trains, struggled down the platform with a wheelchair ramp, allowing Alan to engage hyper drive and surge up the steep ramp onto the 10.12pm to Shepperton. The end of another uneventful day, courtesy of the STLD! Our thanks to Ian Hillson for all his hard work in making the meeting such a success, as well as Joe and Linda. Ian managed to obtain more tickets to accommodate all of our members and partners who wished to attend, even though tickets were at a premium as the exhibition closed five days later. Set & Light | Spring 2015

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STLD visit

Pictured above: Paolo Veronese, The Dream of Saint Helena, about 1570, oil on canvas, (197.5 x 115.6 cm) © National Gallery, London. The sky is painted using smalt (unstable cobalt glass pigment), which has faded away. Below: A simple digital reconstruction of the blue smalt sky.

Pictured: Joe Padfield, a conservation scientist and lighting specialist at the National Gallery, talks pigment (top), layers (centre) and Venus (bottom – no pun intended!) to STLD members

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AGM/Rembrandt exhibition

LEDs and the National Gallery Words & photos: John O’Brien In 2014, an article in Lux Magazine caught my eye: ‘An interactive experiment is under way at the National Gallery to test people’s perceptions of colour using a prototype tunable LED system’. The experiment is part of the gallery’s Making Colour exhibition, which uses scientific methods to demonstrate artists’ use of colour and how they created the colours in their paintings. The lighting experiment looks at the way the eye and brain respond to colour under different lighting conditions, and how this affects people’s perception of artworks. It uses computer-controlled LEDs operating at varying wavelengths to simulate different lighting environments, such as candlelight. Members of the public watch the effect of the changing light on a painting and indicate their preferred lighting. The experiment also tests their perception of the colours as the lighting changes. The experiment was developed in conjunction with Professor Anya Hurlbert, Professor of Visual Neuroscience at the University of Newcastle, who will analyse the results. Making Colour opened at the National Gallery in June 2015 and ran until 7 September. The findings will be used to inform future developments of the viewing experience for the public, which could lead to systems that would allow the gallery’s illumination to be individually adjusted to suit particular paintings. Joe Padfield, a conservation scientist and lighting specialist at the National Gallery, told BBC Radio 4’s Inside Science: ‘If you have an exhibition looking at very old paintings that were all produced under candlelight or daylight, you may want some kind of combination of both lights. However, if you have more modern paintings that were produced under tungsten or fluorescent light, you may want to change the exhibition lighting.’ He believes that tunable lighting is

Pictured: Diego Velázquez, The Toilet of Venus (‘The Rokeby Venus’), 1647-51 © National Gallery, London

the key, since it would be costly and unfeasible to install new lighting for each exhibition. The National Gallery has been converting its former tungsten lighting to more standard white LEDs for the last few years. In addition to energysaving benefits, LED lighting has a significant advantage over tungsten: the colour temperature does not change when it dims. The gallery has installed an automated system that activates the LED lighting in small increments according to the level of daylight coming through the many skylights. The goal is to ensure a more consistent viewing experience for visitors as they walk round the galleries, regardless of the ebb and flow of sunlight.” Ian Hillson managed to get Joe to take time out from his busy schedule at the gallery to talk to the STLD about some of the investigations he has been carrying out to help preserve the National Gallery collection. Joe gave us an insight into a few of the considerations taken into account. All light is potentially damaging to art works but without light we cannot see it. How do we resolve this? The main part of the electromagnetic spectrum we are considering in the talk is the visible light. The National Gallery uses a Konica Minolta CS1000 A Spectroradiometer, which, Joe told us, Konica Minolta will no longer calibrate after the existing certificate expired, but it still works

incredibly well! This device can be used to measure the visible Spectral Power Distribution curve of any light source, which shows the relative intensities of all wavelengths of light across the visible range. In July 2013, the PhD thesis of an Italian student seemed to indicate that blue light was disproportionately damaging the pigment used to create Van Gogh’s Sunflowers. This received considerable press coverage. Lead chromate, the pigment being examined, is susceptible to light damage and this has been known for some time, but it was the actual chemistry of the process that was being examined in the PhD project and the work indicated a possible much higher rate of change under a ‘blue’ filter. In the press, this ‘blue’ filter was then linked to the use of ‘blue’ LED-based white LEDs systems in museums and galleries, leading to a lot of headlines indicating the LEDs where fading Van Gogh’s Sunflowers. However, the ‘blue’ test light used by the student actually covered a wavelength range from 335–525nm, so it was not just the visible blue part of the spectrum that was causing the damage – most of it will have been the result of the much higher energy UV proportion of the light from 335–400nm, which would be expected to speed up the fading process. Later press coverage picked up on the errors in the earlier stories but, unfortunately, in much smaller publications. I really do recommend that you watch Joe Padfield’s talk to the Smithsonian if you wish to see him explain this in more detail: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqJ CT28EVto. For more details on the examination of Spectral Power Distribution Curves, complete with examples of measured lights, where you can also test your own readings for comparison, go to the excellent National Gallery website at http://research.ng-london.org.uk/ scientific/spd/?page=home Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Rembrandt: The Late Works Words: Jane Shepherd Rembrandt: a man who gave his name to boxes of paint, a hat, cigars and, of course, a style of lighting in studio portraiture using a single light source. Some 50 STLD members and their guests listened to a talk in the crypt of St Martin-in-the-Fields by art historian Linda Bolton in preparation for a visit to the sold-out exhibition. Linda has previously shared her enthusiasm for Leonardo da Vinci with members and is to be seen in Frederick Wiseman’s three-hour documentary, National Gallery, on current release. Her combined biography and room-byroom analysis, interwoven with comments on Dutch social history and Rembrandt’s painting techniques, was an invaluable introduction to the exhibition of works from the last two decades of Rembrandt’s life. Rembrandt van Rijn (1606–1669) was born in Leiden, the ninth child of a miller, and he abandoned schooling as soon as he could to become an apprentice to a painter. In 1625, at the age of 19, he was successful enough to set up an establishment as master to pupils of his own and in 1631 he moved to Amsterdam, at that time the busiest and most important port in the world. In the 17th Century, Holland was the world’s richest country per capita; its moneyed classes austere, civic minded and mercantile. For the next few years, Rembrandt was employed by the art dealer Hendrik Uylenburgh, concentrating on commissions for portraits, including his first group portrait (the innovative The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp for the Amsterdam Guild of Surgeons) but also landscapes, seascapes, biblical and classical scenes. In 1634 he became a member of Amsterdam’s prestigious guild of painters and took a step up in life by marrying his employer’s neice, Saskia Uylenburgh (1612–1642). Now working independently, he prospered, enjoying a lavish lifestyle and reckless spending. He collected art and relished curiosities – an armadillo, a Roman bust, a suit of armour from Japan... For 13,000 8

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guilders, mostly financed by loans, he bought a magnificent home for his family. He and Saskia had four children, but of these, only Titus survived to adulthood. Titus was born in 1641. A year later Saskia died and Rembrandt hired Geertje Dircks (1610–1656) as Titus’s nurse - who, almost inevitably, became Rembrandt’s mistress. Then, in 1647, Hendrickje Stoffels (1625–1663) began work as Rembrandt’s housekeeper, eventually becoming his mistress and common-law wife and driving the usurped Geertje to sue for breach of marital promise. Rembrandt was ordered to pay her alimony of 200 guilders a month but retaliated by accusing Geertje of stealing his wife’s jewels and she found herself imprisoned. Under the terms of Saskia’s will, Titus would forfeit his inheritance if Rembrandt remarried and poor Hendrickje was hauled in front of the authorities and accused of ‘practising whoredom with the painter Rembrandt’, but this relationship survived. A daughter, Cornelia, was born to Hendrickje, but in his fifties Rembrandt’s star was waning as the loan on his house was called in and he was forced to sell assets, including paintings from his own collection. He was declared bankrupt and Titus and Hendrickje formed an art-dealing partnership, relieving Rembrandt of all financial control of his affairs – a prudent move as, even on the day he was declared insolvent, Rembrandt was in negotiation to buy a Holbein at auction. (An unforeseen bonus of the seizure of Rembrandt’s house is that a detailed inventory of contents was made, so that an accurate reconstruction of his home and workshop in Amsterdam is now open to the public in the original building, Jodenbreestraat 4). The last 10 years of Rembrandt’s life were a downward trajectory, both personally and professionally. In 1662, he had to sell his wife Saskia’s grave to raise funds – in the plague-hit city it was a saleable commodity. A major

work was commissioned for Amsterdam Town Hall: The Conspiracy of the Batavians under Claudius Civilis was a dark, rough-hewn and enormously powerful part of an even larger project. The canvas, portraying the one-eyed Claudius and a group of his warriors, a low central light source giving a sinister ambient glow, was hung, then rejected and cut down, possibly by the humiliated artist himself. Rembrandt was never paid. His glory days were over, popular taste was now for the smoother Flemish style of painting – slick, colourful and low cut. Rembrandt, however, never tempered his style to court popularity or pay off his debts. He continued to celebrate the loaded brush, often using the brush handle to etch in the wet paint, smearing the pigment with his fingers, smudging and showing the prolific workings of his art. In 1663, Hendrickje died, possibly of the plague, and in 1668 Titus, now married, died before his own daughter, Titia, was born. Rembrandt, nursed by Cornelia, died a year after Titus in 1669 at the age of 63. He is buried in an anonymous grave in Amsterdam’s Westerkerk. The seven rooms in the basement of the National Gallery where the exhibition was hung (it closed on 18 January) each had a different theme and the effect of Room 1 – ‘Self Scrutiny’ – was described by Ben Luke in the London Evening Standard as ‘the artistic equivalent of a punch in the solar plexus’. The room contained five self-portraits of Rembrandt looming from the darkness. The first, at age 52, is a delicate etching showing himself creating the self-same image, and capable of being printed for sale to his admirers. The rest are oil paintings ending in the last year of his life, at 63, when he took a painfully candid view of himself – signs of mortality in his pasty complexion, limp hair, in a fur-trimmed doublet harking back to the illustrious past of the 15th Century Netherlandish painters (pictured top).

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The spare contents of this first room were worth the price of admission: five Rembrandt selfportraits out of 80 painted, drawn or etched over his lifetime. 17th Century collectors coveted these as they combined a recognisable likeness of a famous artist with an example of that artist’s style and they allowed Rembrandt to act as his own unpaid model, exploring expressions, costumes and dramatic lighting effects whilE producing saleable commodities. As his popularity waned, his portraiture became more introspective and painfully honest. These portaits illustrate Rembrandt’s technical mastery and exuberant energy: the paint thickly applied in highlighted areas, more thinly in the darker areas; a swift brushstroke to highlight the pouch under an eye; thick layers of paint applied and then scratched away with the end of the brush. He was the first artist known to have employed a palette knife, often used his fingers and relished the layering of the paint itself, using thin washes and almost sculptural impasto applications of colour. Not included in this first, breathtaking introduction to Rembrandt was Self Portrait with Two Circles. Itwas in a later room exploring his experimental techniques. Magnificent but appearing unfinished, it is thought that Rembrandt intended to draw attention to his own virtuosity, proud but slightly sad, holding palette, brush and maulstick with the circles in the background: a reference to the tradition that the ability to draw a perfect circle freehand was the ultimate proof of an artist’s skill. The second room of the exhibition was headed ‘Light’ and contained works that illustrate Rembrandt’s interest in strong lighting contrasts and the manipulation of light and shade for dramatic effect. He used surface texture to add glittering highlights in his paintings. As a master of the art of print making he experimented with engraving (a burin or graver gouges lines in the plate), drypoint (where the plate is scratched with a needle to produce a furrow edged by a burr, which gives a softer but more ephemeral line), papers and vellum of different absorbencies so that the monochrome effect ranged from total

Pictured above: Rembrandt, Self Portrait at the Age of 63, 1669; oil on canvas, 86 x 70.5cm © The National Gallery, London. Below: Christ presented to the People (Ecce Homo), 1655 © The British Museum, London

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blackness to brilliant illumination. The play of light was often used to convey spiritual and intellectual enlightment. Rembrandt deliberately smeared the ink with his finger or a dry brush to achieve a particular effect. Mainly on religious and classical themes, these prints were very saleable to the Burghers of Amsterdam. Rembrandt changed and reworked etching plates from edition to edition. Sometimes the original composition might be radically transformed with lighting and mood changes or the addition of figures. A strong tonal quality was much prized by collectors. Areas left unfinished produced the effect of bright light. In Christ presented to the People (pictured on the previous page) , the first drypoint print on Japanese paper includes an animated crowd in the foreground, which in later impressions was eliminated (possibly due to wear to the plate) and replaced in one state by a pair of arches and later, a lone, bearded figure. There were at least eight variants of the plate. Surprisingly, in a central case in the room that focused on Rembrandt’s experimental technique, was a brush and wash sketch of great simplicity: a snatched image, tender and intimate, of a figure believed to be his commonlaw wife Hendrikje. ‘A Young Woman Sleeping’ (pictured right) is a work of supreme assurance and economy, possibly never intended for public view. It is reminiscent of Oriental brush paintings. The third room was devoted to Rembrandt’s interpretations of work by other masters, often works in his own extravagant collection. Emulating the work of others was regarded as a legitimate path to a proper understanding of artistic traditions. In the design for the fragment of The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Joan Deyman that survives it is possible to deduce the influence of anatomical textbooks, and the foreshortened cadaver is reminiscent of Mantegna’s dead Christ. In the etching Abraham entertaining the Angels, the Old Testament scene has the exotic style of a Mughal miniature, even in the style of the clothing worn. Juno, heavyweight goddess of marriage and wealth, is a monumental figure strongly reminiscent of Titian’s portrait 10

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The Sampling Officials of the Amsterdam Drapers Guild (The Syndics), about 1662 © Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, P.O. Box 74888, 1070 DN Amsterdam

A Young Woman sleeping (Hendrickje Stoffels?), about 1654; brush and brown wash with some white bodycolour, ruled framing lines in pen and brown ink on paper; 24.6 x 20.3cm © The Trustees of The British Museum

La Schiavona and Rembrandt’s rendition of the varied textures in the brocade, jewellery, pearls, metal and feather is masterly. Elsewhere in the exhibition were suggestions of influence by the works of Raphael, Ingres, Rubens, Hogarth and Caravaggio, among others. In same room was a selection of works that record Rembrandt’s observations of everyday life, recordings not governed by traditional preconceptions of beauty and which

branded him an artistic heretic to critics and theorists before and after his death. In this section, among some pen-and-ink sketches and prints of modest landscapes and a scruffy lion, are a pair of objective pen-and-brush sketches of an 18-year-old girl hung for killing her landlady. With holes in her socks, Elsje Christiaens hangs on a gibbet with the murder weapon, an axe, beside her. Rembrandt made the pilgrimage by boat to the gallows field north of Amsterdam to record with meticulous compassion the gruesome sight in three surviving small drawings. In a space devoted to Rembrandt’s testing of conventions in the field of commissioned portraiture, The Sampling Officials of the Amsterdam Drapers’ Guild, known as The Syndics (1662, pictured top), stands out for the energy of its composition and its unusual viewpoint. The officials are in suspended animation, caught from the viewpoint of the artist/viewer as he ascends to join them. On the table lies a bag (of coins?) and a book of accounts. Original sketches for this painting have been found drawn on account book paper and it is interesting to speculate that the Syndics were in fact in the process of viewing Rembrandt’s preliminary sketches for the portrait as he comes up to meet them. The light falls

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AGM/Rembrandt exhibition

strongly from the left, the Syndics all black hatted in white puritan collars suggesting their uniformity. In a dark composition, the table is angled, more clearly defined where the light hits its carpet covering, the wrong end of the brush digging in to the paint to give a palpable sense of texture. The effect is mesmerising, the tension and balance perfect, but preliminary drawings reveal Rembrandt’s numerous changes as he worked towards the dynamic end result. The portraits of wealthy industrialist/arms dealer Jacob Trip and his wife Margaretha de Geer (1661) can be seen as part of the National Gallery permanent collection (pictured oppposite page). He is a hawkish figure painted in the year of his death in a informal loose robe and night cap, a figure of almost Old Testament authority despite his age and fragility. His wife wears sober garments reflecting the fashions of her youth. Her face, rising above the harsh ruff, portrays her iron will and extraordinary dignity. Rembrandt’s empathy with his sitters made him a supreme chronicler of the human face. The Dutch Reform style of dress worn by many of his clients and models was mostly black, with white only for those parts that showed the dirt. The magnificent ruffs, cuffs and collars seem to abet Rembrandt’s skills by guiding the eye to explore the planes of the face without distraction. Room 5 contained works of a intimate and private nature, including many studies of friends and family. His son Titus was a frequent model and in A Woman Bathing in a Stream (pictured right, bottom) it is thought that the model was Hendrickje, a somewhat voyeuristic oil painting possibly intended to suggest the biblical subject of Susanna spied upon by the lecherous elders. It is not known whether the painting The Jewish Bride records a loving father about to deliver his daughter into marriage or the tender embrace of a betrothed couple, his hand on her breast, hers gently covering it. It may be Rembrandt’s depiction of the Old Testament figures of Isaac and Rebecca, legendary in their marital affection, but the ambiguity makes the picture universal in its representation of love. His technical

skills as painter are illustrated by the way that he turned paint into gold, captured the nap of velvet, the tracery of lace and embroidery, and gave weight to the flesh and colour to the cheeks. In Room 6 is a collection of portraits with the common thread of contemplation: figures depicted deep in thought, religious or philosophical. The Apostle Bartholomew (1661) is startlingly modern: the sitter could be an Edwardian statesman, slightly weary, with sagging skin in rough dabs of paints in a surprising range of colours. The earlier depiction of the same subject (The Apostle Bartholomew, 1657) shows the heavily lined but powerful saint fingering a knife symbolic of his own martyrdom by flaying. The brushstrokes are loose, the colours and glazes restricted. Titus in Monk’s Habit (1660) is a painting of soft, blurred brush marks, Rembrandt’s 19-year-old son depicted as a member of the Franciscan order of solitary prayer and reflection. The last room fell into two sections. ‘Inner Conflict’ records strong passions – Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane – and the Roman heroine Lucretia (1664), torn between her desire for life and the shame of a rape victim. This canvas has a sleepwalking quality to it. In a later (1666) version of the same subject, Rembrandt chose the moment after Lucretia has withdrawn the dagger from her suicidal wound, the canvas layered with colours and glazes, the muslin shift showing a spreading stain, the blood has hardly begun to flow. Both pictures are immensely moving. The end of this magnificent body of work is titled ‘Reconciliation’: images that show Rembrandt’s fascination for the moment of calm before or after the storm. Jacob blessing the Sons of Joseph (1656) unfinished, shows the unorthodox blessing bestowed on the younger son, a gesture which appears to be understood and accepted by Joseph. An etching, Abraham’s Sacrifice (1655), depicts the moment when the angel relieves him of his terrible obligation to kill his son, Isaac. Simeon with the Infant Christ in the Temple (1669) was Rembrandt’s final painting, the face of Mary probably completed by another hand. It is

Portrait of Jacob Trip, about 1661; oil on canvas; 130.5 x 97cm © The National Gallery, London

Portrait of Margaretha de Geer, Wife of Jacob Trip, about 1661; oil on canvas; 130.5 x 97.5cm © The National Gallery, London

Rembrandt, A Woman bathing in a Stream (Hendrickje Stoffels?), 1654; oil on oak; 61.8 x 47cm © The National Gallery, London Set & Light | Spring 2015

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blurred and unfocused as if seen through aged, rheumy eyes: the frail Simeon holding the swaddled baby on stiff, stick-like arms. It feels as though the dark night is closing in on Simeon and on Rembrandt. In trying to write up this exhibition I was very conscious of the fact that it is now over and the likelihood of such a collection of unexpected and unfamiliar works from abroad being assembled again in one place is very slim. It was a privilege to see, even under conditions so crowded that there was no opportunity for a moment of quiet contemplation or a step back to take in the seemingly chaotic brushstrokes that become convincing at a remove. It isn’t possible to reproduce more than a handful of images in this resume so the choice may seem idiosyncratic, but for those who missed the chance, here is a brief survey of where works by Rembrandt can be seen in the London area: The National Gallery has a fine collection (for free) in Rooms 23 (Rembrandt and School/Followers) and Room 16 (Early Rembrandt and Dutch Landscapes). No doubt the five paintings that featured in the exhibition will be back on the walls of these rooms shortly. Dulwich Picture Gallery has two Rembrandt portraits. The V&A has nothing on display currently but a fine online catalogue of Rembrandt’s prints and drawings, and it is possible to see these by prior appointment. The British Museum, likewise, has a comprehensive online catalogue of prints and drawings with images. The Wallace Collection has a portrait of Rembrandt and one of Titus with three other paintings on display. The Courtauld Gallery has a collection of prints and drawings, which can be viewed by appointment, and it puts on regular exhibitions, rotating the pieces so they are not damaged by exposure to light for long periods. Kenwood House in Hampstead currently has two Rembrandt oils on loan from the National Gallery to cover the absence of Self Portrait with Two Circles, which should return from exhibition in May. This is the painting to make a pilgrimage to visit. 12

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A Man in Armour © CSG CIC Glasgow Museums Collection

Rembrandt reflections The picture that I shall take away from our day at the National Gallery – and which I would like to hang on my wall – is ‘A Man in Armour’, on loan from Glasgow and one of its finest European oil paintings. If you wish to view it, it will be back on the walls of Kelvingrove Art Gallery from the end May as the ‘Late Rembrandt’ exhibition is now at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam until 17 May. In photography we were always encouraged to emulate ‘Rembrandt lighting’ in our studios – and to avoid reflections! – but Rembrandt was a master at observing both, as you can see from the cover of this magazine. Dating from around 1655, it’s a sombre and powerful depiction of a figure dressed in heavy armour, lost deep in thought of battles ahead. The soldier’s armour, shield and lance are all of a style essentially obsolete by the time this scene was painted. I wonder if his housekeeper ever got tired of dusting a suit of armour? Or did Rembrandt have a shed? Ian Hillson

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Chairman’s report: 41st AGM, 13 January 2015 Firstly, my sincere apologies for not being with you tonight. Unfortunately, I have family problems that require my attention and I hope you all understand that I have to give this priority at the moment. I do hope you have had an entertaining day and the talks and visit to the gallery have been fascinating. I would like to thank Ian Hillson for setting this up for us, and coming up with a really good meeting idea. I’d also like to thank John O’Brien, who has put everything together for the AGM, and also Mike LeFevre for deputising for me at short notice. I would usually start with a review of the year but as I’ve had little time to prepare this statement, I intend to do a full report, which will be printed in the Summer issue of the magazine, so take it as read that there will be a mention of all the activities we have had during 2014. There is, however, one special meeting I would like to mention and that was our 40th anniversary event held at The Shard. This certainly lived up to expectations and was a great way to celebrate our 40 years. My thanks go to Andrew Dixon (and friends!) for setting this up and making it a

memorable meeting. I hope those who weren’t able to attend enjoyed reading about it in the magazine. I would like to thank the whole committee for all their work they have put in during the year. We are losing a few members this year and I would particularly like to thank Les McCallum, David Laskey and Ian Davidson for all their work during their time on the committee. Les and David have not been on the committee that long but have managed to make their mark. Les in particular has done an excellent job in organising the last few AGMs and the Illuminated Gardens meeting at the end of last year. Les has a large workload organising events for all sorts of societies and manages to do the odd day’s work as well. He has said that he’ll still come up with meeting ideas behind the scenes and I very much hope he may still pay us a visit at the odd committee meeting to say hello. Ian Davidson has been on the committee for many years but has found it increasingly difficult to make meetings with commitments at home and a heavy workload with Sky. It’s great to see an organisation like Sky

actually employing people but boy, do they expect their pound of flesh! During the coming year we tend to concentrate on recruitment and finances. I intend to give more time in committee looking at ways we can attract new members. This needs to be through existing members finding new members and appealing to students. I feel there is a lot we could be doing to introduce ourselves to students and the old phrase ‘Get them while they’re young’ certainly applies here! Although we have managed to reduce costs, we still need to reduce the deficit. There are some exceptions last year (The Shard meeting, for example) but the trend is still going the wrong way. I’m sure the Treasurer will have a lot more to say on this in his report. Finally, I thank you all for your continued support and hope we can move the society forward during the coming year, particularly in the areas of membership and finances. Ladies and gentlemen, this is my mini report and I would move its adoption.

Stuart Gain Chairman

An update of our rules following the AGM meeting The Society of Television Lighting and Design (Incorporating the Society of TELEVISION LIGHTING DIRECTORS)

RULES 1. NAME

The Society is called the Society of Television Lighting and Design, and also commonly known as The STLD.

2. AIMS

n To provide a forum neither political nor union affiliated, to stimulate a free exchange of ideas in all aspects of our profession and to encourage discussion on the use and design of new equipment and techniques. n To organise a professional and social events calendar throughout

the country. n To publish a periodical Journal reporting the meetings. n To acquire affiliated membership to other Societies and Guilds so that our members may gain advantageous access to all art forms and activities both at home and abroad.

3. MEMBERSHIP

Any application for membership shall be ratified by the Committee. The membership shall consist of the following categories: Honorary Membership This will be awarded at the discretion of the Committee Full Those who are, or have been, actively

engaged in the Direction and Design of the creative craft of Television, or anyone whose occupation is associated with our profession. Must be proposed by one Member.

AFFILIATES Retired Any Member who is no longer working in the industry. Overseas Open to those who come under the Full category of Membership, but who reside outside of the United Kingdom. Student Must be proposed by a Member or by a recognised Course Leader. Student Membership will only be valid for the Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Student’s training period and until one year after finishing the course.

include the following nominated officers:

SPONSOR NOMINEE

Chairman Secretary Treasurer

The Society will be supported by Sponsor Companies at the discretion of the committee. Sponsoring companies will be allowed to nominate members of their staff as Society members subject to payment of a subscription agreed by the Committee. All applications for membership are subject to acceptance by the Committee. Members and Affiliates (excluding Students and Overseas) only shall be entitled to vote at General Meetings.

4. SUBSCRIPTIONS Annual Membership: Members: £75.00 Affiliates, Retired & Overseas: £50.00 Student £25.00 These sums may be altered from time to time, as shall be agreed at the Annual General Meeting, and take effect from the end of the following month after the AGM, the change becoming due on the Member’s next renewal date. Subscriptions becoming due on the annual anniversary of the member joining: If a member has not paid within four months of the subscription becoming due, they are deemed to have lapsed. Acceptance of an application to re-join shall be at the discretion of the Committee. Members becoming eligible to change the category of membership to one with a higher annual subscription during the first six months of the Society’s year shall pay an additional subscription Pro rata. Members changing to a category with a lower subscription will not be entitled to a refund, but will pay the appropriate subscription when it falls due.

5. MANAGEMENT

The affairs of the Society shall be managed by a Committee of not exceeding 15 members, the majority being Full Members, who shall be elected at the Annual General Meeting, and hold office for one year, and shall 14

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The Committee may co-opt three members as they consider appropriate. The committee may co-opt any Member to fill a vacancy on the Committee that may occur during the year until the next Annual General Meeting. The Committee may also appoint sub-committees for specific purposes. A quorum of the Committee shall be five Members, at least one of whom, must be an Officer of the STLD. Nominations for Chairman, Secretary and Treasurer and the remaining members of the committee must be received in writing by the Secretary prior to the Annual General Meeting and must be proposed and seconded by two Members. The proposer must ascertain that the nominee is willing to stand for election. All members of the Management Committee are deemed to have full voting rights. The Secretary shall keep records in writing of the proceedings at all General meetings and Committee meetings of the Society.

6. ACCOUNTS

The committee shall cause to be kept true accounts of the receipts and expenditure of the Society. Cheques shall require the signature of any two of the following: Chairman, Secretary, Treasurer. To reflect the modernisation of the Banking system, the Treasurer may use Electronic Transfer of funds for payments, prior notification of which must be sent to the other two Nominated Officers. The accounts shall be closed on 31 August annually and shall be prepared for auditing by an Auditor who is not a member of the Society. The Auditor shall be appointed annually at the Annual General Meeting.

7. GENERAL MEETINGS

An Annual General Meeting shall be held once every calendar year. Notice of this meeting and agenda shall be given not less than 21 days prior to the meeting. At this meeting the

Chairman’s report and accounts for the preceding financial year ending 31 August shall be presented, having been duly audited. By resolution of the committee, or upon notice in writing by not less than 20 paid-up Members, the Secretary shall convene an Extraordinary General Meeting at not less than 21 days’ notice stating fully the reasons for which the meeting is called. At any General Meeting a majority of votes shall decide a resolution and if the Committee deem if necessary a postal vote may be taken and these votes included with those cast at the Annual General Meeting. The Chairman will have the casting vote.

8. ALTERATION OF RULES

These rules may from time to time be altered, rescinded or new rules added, by a two-thirds majority of those voting by post and at the Annual General Meeting. Notice of any change of rules must be submitted in writing to the Society Secretary, at least 60 days prior to the meeting.

9. DISSOLUTION

If at any General Meeting a resolution for the dissolution of the Society shall be passed by a majority of the members present and such resolutions shall be confirmed by a majority at a Special General Meeting held not less than one calendar month thereafter, the Committee shall thereupon or at such future date as shall be specified in such resolution proceed to realise the property of the Society and after discharge of all liabilities shall divide equally the same among all paid-up Members of the Society and upon completion of such division, the Society shall be dissolved.

10. GENERAL

Every member binds himself or herself by the Rules of the Society. In all cases of dispute or disagreement as to the interpretation of the Rules of the Society, the decision of the Committee is final and binding. Revised January 2015

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Syon Park

Pleasure park Words: Albert Barber Photos: John O’Brien As a small boy, pointing my bicycle lamp onto the Michelmas daisies in our garden always gave me thrill. Now a team from Yes Events has the knowledge and skill to do the same on a bigger scale, in a bigger garden and with bigger lights at Syon House.

Historical background

Syon House was built on the site of a medieval abbey established in 1431. It was one of the wealthiest nunneries in the country and a local legend recalls that the monks of Sheen had a ley tunnel running to the nunnery at Syon. Who knows what they got up to? In 1541, Catherine Howard, Henry VIII’s fifth wife, was brought to Syon and executed the following year. Five years later, Henry VIII’s coffin was brought to Syon on its way to be buried in Windsor. Because of the dissolution of the monasteries, legend had it that dogs would lick his blood. His bloated body burst in its coffin and leaked and, sure enough, in the morning they discovered the dogs licking up the result! The 1st Duke of Somerset became the owner after the dissolution of the monasteries and had Syon built in the Italian Renaissance style. By the 18th Century, Hugh Percy, 1st Duke of Northumberland, commissioned architect and interior designer Robert Adam and landscape designer Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown to redesign the house and estate. The house was opened to the public in 1951. The Percy family still live here. Syon Park looks across the river to Kew Gardens and contains more than 200 species of rare trees. Despite the park and lake being designed by Capability Brown in 1760, the Victorians couldn’t help ‘improving’ it! Still, it is quite magnificent. Those who have seen Mike Leigh’s film recent film Mr Turner may be interested to know that the house, the park and the house in the background were painted from across the Thames by J.M.W. Turner in the painting Zion House, Isleworth (c.1802–10). Not that the film mentions Syon Park.

The event

‘The Enchanted Garden’ is an annual event, now in its ninth year, which runs from the third weekend in November to the first weekend in December. It attracts about 2000 people every evening, averaging between 70,000 to 80,000 adults and children a year. The brief is to produce an ‘enchanted garden’ for a family event and not a Christmas garden. This is partly so that it is not in competition with nearby Kew, which is specifically a Christmas event. Nick Ratcliff, whose company, Yes Events, sets up the

event, says the major challenge is to do the same but different each year and in two weeks on a tight budget.

Lighting

Nick, Lighting Designer Tom Chennels, Lighting Programmer Adam Nichols and a team of eight have just two weeks to plan and install 16,000ft of cable, 2,000 light fittings, three 100KVA three-phase generators and a ;aser light show – all earthed and child-proof. The recent laser light show needed extra measurements of levels for small children, meaning extra vigilance, with a member of staff in attendance at all times. This is to meet the Health and Safety and EU Regulations for brightness distance and duration of laser output on the five lasers used. The contrast between the front and back is also measured to meet regulations. Adam took two nights to set up the programmes useing a DMX, Midi with timecode. With children visiting, safety is a major consideration, although not for the badgers. The animals seem to have noticed that the cables smell of wine. They were the prime suspects after 6ft of cable, including plugs and sockets, disappeared. The three generators are pretty reliable, although they have excellent co-operation from the generator engineers, and if power does go down, they can use a system of powering in sections to split off a phase until things can be sorted. Where appropriate, some lighting is powered by local mains.

Summary

With families in mind this works as a magical view of the park. There is something for all, from the spectacular laser show to a tribute to the anniversary of the outbreak of the First World Ward with a woodland lightshow to the music of Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance March. From the reaction of the audience we could see why we enjoy lighting and why we do it. From the teddy bears in their magical tree, Japanese lanterns floating on the lake and hooting owls, it had something for everyone. Younger children were fascinated by the lightshow with, as if by magic, smoke coming out of the ground. The animated dragon’s lair beneath tree roots, despite being simply realised with an electric motor, simple engineering and some red lighting, was very effective and scary for junior visitors. This was an event that might have escaped the STLD’s attention but a visit well within the sphere of what lighting is all about. It is part of the magic that we do to give pleasure to our audience, whether they know how it’s done or not. For me, too, what a delight, what a fun thing to do! It will give many as much pleasure and sense of adventure as lighting gave when I was that small boy at home, all those Set & Light | Spring 2015

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The laser show needed extra measurements of levels for small children

The reflection of the tree lights on the water

Les McCallum and David Laskey address the meeting

Bernie Davis, centre, with Yes Events crew member Tom Chennels, Lighting Designer of the Syon Park display (left), and Chris Harris (right)

Andrew Dixon with Yes Events programmer Matt Chidzey

years ago, with a bicycle lamp. Without going too over the top, it is a tribute to that childish pleasure and raising the spirits that is behind all we do in the pursuit of our craft. There is something in this seemingly simple endeavour that tells us why we do it and what we are. ‘Ok, enough,’ I hear you cry!

Thanks

Our thanks go to Les McCallum for organising the event, the Hilton Syon Park for excellent hospitality and to Yes Events for an enjoyable evening.

Credits

Syon Park Enchanted Woodland Proudly presented by Syon Park & produced by Yes Events Ltd. Concept –Nick Ratcliffe Project Management/Lighting Design –Tom Chennells Lighting Programmer/Systems Designer –Adam Nicholls Laser programming – Matt Chidzey 18

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An illuminated fountain

Senior Lighting Technician – Elgan Howells Lighting & Audio Technician –Gary Chennells Lighting Technician –Thomas Halton Lighting Technician – Charlie Snowdon Lighting Technician – Craig Riseley

Special thanks to ...

Elation Lighting, Avolites, Laserworld, Prolyte Group, Chauvet, Highlite, Studio Due, RCF Speakers, American DJ, PE Generators, CLD, AVSL, Neo-Neon UK, Antari Effects, Le Maitre, LED Technologies, Distribution Zone, Beccy, Emma, Laura, Topher, Mac, Simon, Stephanie, Michelle, Molly and the whole team at Syon Park. www.enchantedwoodland.com Facebook: SyonEnchantedWoodland Twitter: @EnchantedSyon

Nick Ratcliffe of Yes Events

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Syon Park

This picture: the laser show and, below, in the greenhouse

The greenhouse

vents Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Lighting

Lighting the Square Words & photos: Bernie Davis

BBC Elstree Studio D

Unless you were abroad or don’t have a television, you can’t have missed the BBC’s annual Children In Need marathon in November. Like it or hate it, Children in Need raises staggering amounts of money from the British public, all wanting to be part of this great cause. Since 1980 Children in Need has raised over £600 million to change the lives of disabled children and young people in the UK by staging a nationwide TV extravaganza as the focus to fundraising events on radio and TV and all around the UK. In 2014, on the night of the broadcast alone, they raised a record-breaking £32,620,469 in pledges – and it doesn’t stop there: donations are still coming in and the final total, to be announced later this year, could well exceed £50m for the first time. 20

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The method is simple enough: devote a mainstream channel to the cause for the whole evening showing – a mixture of pre-recorded and live performances from artists, all giving their time freely, punctuated with video clips of what the charity wants to do and what it has achieved in the past. The viewers get drawn into the excitement of the evening and the general public’s wish to do good, and between dancing news readers and special editions of favourite programmes, the BBC raises loads of money for good causes. The programme involves every

region of the UK, with local programmes opting in to the main programme for surprisingly short transmission slots, often recording more for regional transmission and highlights packages, but of course, this sort of programme has the inevitable double sting of high ideals and low budgets! Many of you will have been asked to work on such programmes and been told how little money there is ‘this time’, and we all fall for it every time. The hub for this marathon transmission was always BBC TV Centre until the BBC decided to sell it off, and so in 2013, it moved to BBC Elstree Studio D, where Lighting Designer Gurdip Mahal was commissioned to light the studio and Aurora Lighting Hire was booked to supply the lighting for Dominic Tolft’s set design.

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Children in Need

Making a virtue of the move to Elstree, the EastEnders lot was used for part of the broadcast, with a dance sequence staged by the EastEnders cast in a collection of locations around the famous east London square. And so it was that Gurdip stayed in the warm studio as overall lighting designer, and I was drafted in to look after the lighting in the square. Viewers in 2013 might well remember the biggest mirror ball I have ever seen suspended by a crane over the square, adding to the spectacular finale of that year’s EastEnders dance sequence. With the show being so successful in 2013, it was little surprise that the decision was made to go back to Elstree in 2014, but the BBC wanted to do something different. Having secured One Direction for a live performance, it was decided to stage them as a concert on Albert Square, and the first thought was to put a stage on the roof of the Queen Vic. Unfortunately, the structure of the building is not as robust as it looks, with much of the building being fibreglass, but the second suggestion of using the famous rail bridge over Bridge Street was approved. However, even the bridge is just scenery, and although it could take the load, it was not straightforward as to how to attach anything. Personally, I would have gone for the easy option of putting the stage in the middle of the square where it was easy to light and easy to cover on camera, but that is why I am a lighting director and not a producer. Stage Director Tim Van Someren had recently seen a documentary showing Mark Fisher’s great stage designs from the 1980s and 1990s, and he and Gurdip both came up with the concept of having fingers of truss above the stage and below the bridge, helping to disguise the buildings beyond. A week later, One Direction’s production management Kenny Underwood came to see the site and pretty much floated out a similar concept to Tim and the lighting team, so, by chance, everyone had similar visions. All they had to do now was work out how to make it. Following a chance meeting with Barry Dennison of ELP, Barry thought ELP could build what was wanted all

This picture: a mirror ball was suspended over Albert Square in 2013 as part of that year’s EastEnders dance sequence. Below: the stage plan for One Direction 2014, featuring overhead trusses cantilevered back to massive ballasts at ground level

from stock items and, working with Dave Morrell of DLM Events, came up with a striking 12m by 12m structure, with the overhead trusses cantilevered back to massive ballasts at ground level, so leaving no apparent means of support downstage. Stage truss legs had to extend to the ground as the bridge could not take the weight, but the fingers below made a feature of this rather than being a problem. The design even had an optional clear vinyl roof in case of bad weather – always wise for Children in Need. The truss structure was lined with SGM P-5 and X-5 Strobe LED units

with Pixel Par truss toning, and the stage was garnished with MAC Quantum washes and High End Shoguns, with Nova Flowers filling the space below the bridge. Keying the band on the bridge was not easy, and ended up mostly from a row of floor pars at the front of the stage, with just a couple of Source 4 profiles filling in from convenient buildings. Controlling this from the dry of the EastEnders portable gallery was a Grand MA desk with Alex Passmore programming. Another major performance from the square was the cast of EastEnders performing a selection of songs from Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Children in Need

This picture: One Direction play Albert Square. Below left: ‘Grease Enders’; right: a small Cirque du Soleil performance was thrown in for good measure

Grease as live from various locations around the square. As in 2013, we added LED washes to most of the buildings and windows around the square giving us the ability to treat the whole square as some sort of LE backdrop. This served well for the One Direction performance as well as ‘Grease Enders’ as it became known, and a small Cirque du Soleil performance thrown in for good measure. The schedule was tight, with the square only being handed over to Children in Need on the Wednesday 22

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after lunch. That evening, Alex Passmore started entering addresses and setting a few focuses, but time is limited by when you are allowed to work on the site. By Thursday evening, we were already pre-recording and rehearsing as soon as it got dark. On Friday – show day – we rehearsed in daylight (not great for lighting) but again, as soon as it was dark enough we started recording and rehearsing pretty well straight through till One Direction stopped playing. Full credit must be given to the DLM crew for getting everything

built more or less on schedule, with very little time allowed between dayto-day recording of EastEnders, and even having to work within hours agreed with Elstree residents. And of course to James Tinsley, who was gaffering for Aurora Lighting, and who was pretty well rigging up to the moment when the derig started with his team. You wouldn’t want to take on a show like that with anyone less behind you. It is not too late to give to Children in Need, just go to the BBC website for details.

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Profile

RML

1982 Richard was working at the BBC Training headquarters in Wood Norton, near Evesham in Worcestershire, when he was invited down to TV Centre along with a group of others to visit the Top of the Pops (TOTP) studios. After a while he approached the production team to see if they would allow him to build some lights to make the set look more modern and fresh.

time. Continues to be involved in the show to the present day.

2000 RML makes a substantial investment in the Stage Zoom 1200 (main picture).

2002 RML provides the lights for first Top of the Pops live event at Sheffield Arena.

2002 RML becomes lighting supplier for Popstars the Rivals.

1984 Richard built his own lighting equipment, including Twists, Pillars and Barrel, and began to focus on the rental market. RML was born! (see STLD magazine feature, bottom right).

1986 RML becomes the main lighting supplier for Top of the Pops. It lit the show until the end and still provides lights for seasonal specials and TOTP2 (pictured, bottom left).

1996 Steve Wells starts work at RML.

1999 RML provides the lights for Comic Relief for the first

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2007

Happy 30th birthday RML!

RML moves to new premises on Sovereign Park, Park Royal, London.

2010 RML invests in 100 Clay Paky Sharpys and is the first rental house in the UK to own them.

2014 RML invests in Vari-Lite VL4000 Spot and is the first rental in the UK to own them (bottom left).

December 2014 RML celebrates 30 years in business!

2015 The company kickstarts the new year by investing in Clay Paky Mythos (pictured, top right)

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Recollection

Open All Hours

Talking shop Words & photos: Les McCallum At Christmas, viewers to BBC were able to see a sequel to Open All Hours called Still Open All Hours in which Granville, played by David Jason, now runs the nation’s favourite corner shop. I worked on several series of this popular sitcom back in the 1980s. After reading the scripts, I would travel by train with Tim Gleeson, Designer, to Doncaster and measure the shop for any new requirements of the latest story line. The corner shop is in fact a ladies’ hairdresser. It was owned and run by Helen Ibbotson and is now run by her daughter. The shop is in Lister Road, Balby, a short drive from the city centre. When the time for filming arrived we would travel up on a Saturday morning ready to prepare the shop for filming early the next day, which gave us about six hours to get everything just right. Sometimes, we arrived to find several women still under the large egg-shaped hairdryers. No problem, as we would unload every thing on to the pavement, beginning with the shop sign. We even took along a replacement front door. Why you may ask? Well, to start with, it was much easier to take off the existing door and fit our one, which we could then use in the studio set of the shop. The door didn’t have to be repainted and all the signs and notices could be kept in place for continuity. Arkwright would not have paid for an open or closed sign, so I would always make one back in the office for Ronnie to use as a prop. The reason for so many signs on the glass door was to obscure the interior of the hairdressers. The real shop was only 10ft deep and our studio set was much deeper to allow for all the action that would take place in the coming series.

When the women had left with their new coiffures we would go inside and take out as much as possible: fittings, chairs and driers. We then fitted shelves on the back wall and dressed the shop windows, obscuring as much as possible. Hooks would be fitted to the facia to take all the hardware props such as the tin bath, brooms, mops, buckets and newspapers. I had to do all the writing on the window, leaving Ronnie to finish off the last words with a brush and a jar of white window paint. Each episode had different wording, usually referring to the plot for that week. Continuity is always a problem. When Granville loads the basket of his bike with a huge pile of cardboard boxes that he can neither see through or round, they all have to be in the correct order when we see them again, some weeks later in the studio. Photos are taken and then the boxes marked so that they can all be put together in the right order when he wheels the bike in through the studio set. A table would be set up outside to take grocery items and various other odds and ends, such as a dustbin, sacks of potatoes, vegetables and fruit. Sometimes special effects would be required, perhaps a table that had to collapse. This would be rigged up ready to replace the real table. You may see on the closing credits that the side wall had an array of old enamel signs. These were fitted to the wall in the first series, but come the morning, they had all disappeared. I do hope whoever took them got a good price. They were hired from a prop hire company and that was an expensive mistake. The next year we asked Maurice Plumb, our sign writer back at Television Centre, to paint them on to sheets of 4mm ply as though on a brick wall. This worked Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Recollection

Pictured above: Ronnie Barker, Lynda Baron and David Jason. Below: Les McCallum’s article for Best of British magazine

perfectly and saved us a lot of time and effort in the following series as we used them every year from then on. Arkright’s sign had been cut and painted at Television Centre and given a coat of polish to give it a shine and protect the lettering. Imagine our horror one cold, gloomy morning to see that the sign had turned a milky white and we were unable to read it. This meant we had to do close-ups to avoid seeing it. Luckily for us, when the sun rose an hour or so later the varnish returned to a clear finish and we were able to do long shots again. The weather when we were there was often cold, wet and miserable; it was nicknamed pneumonia corner as so many of us went down sick with colds and flu. Night filming is something I have never enjoyed, especially during winter, and we had quite a few night shots and early morning scenes to do. Any time after six in the evening, the local residents would come along to see Ronnie Barker, David Jason and Lynda Baron (Nurse Gladys) in the flesh. More noisy members of the public would call out from behind the camera, making silly remarks. Ronnie, witty as ever, always came back with some funny, cutting quip that instantly put the heckler in his place and, with the locals laughing, the offender usually slipped away, tail between his legs. All the products on sale in the shop and in the window – sweets, chocolates, cans, packets and newspapers, etc – were purchased from a nearby cash-and-carry. I made a mistake once that I would never repeat again in offering the local youngsters something from the sweet jars. The local kids were polite, friendly and always wanted to help, so a few sweets kept them happy. They, of course, would tell their friends, who then told their friends. Before you could say ‘GGG-rrannnn-villlle!’ we would have kids from the surrounding neighbourhood all asking for sweets. At the end 26

Set & Light | Spring 2015

Faye’s Boutique

of filming we passed on all the vegetables and fruit to local residents, but everything else was taken back to Television Centre for use in the studio. Did you know that Nurse Gladys was not half as big as she appeared on camera and had to wear specially made undergarments that were padded out, plus an uplifting bra? Lynda Baron was also a jazz singer and often appeared on That Was The Week That Was. Usually sitcoms take off in popularity in the second series. I remember standing by the bay window of the house next to the shop along with David Jason while the camera crew was setting up. On the TV at the time we could see Open All Hours being broadcast. It had become a big hit and David Jason’s career took off from then on. I might add that the owners were quite happy for us to look into their front room and they would often get up and look to see what was going on and give us a big smile and a wave. The trade bike that Granville had to ride was in constant need of attention. The spokes were rusting away and various parts kept breaking. We were glad when all the bike scenes were over and done with as we thought it would collapse while doing a take. One resident wasn’t happy with the disruptive film crew and would complain if anyone parked outside his house and he made it clear that we were not welcome. That is until one night we had a rainy scene to film. The special effects lads arrived to set up the sprinklers in the road and then connected them to the hydrant. Imagine our surprise the next morning when we were confronted by this resident with a a big smile. He told us that for years his water taps had dribbled water, but this morning, after an initial spluttering of a muddy brown water, he’d had fast-flowing, crystal-clear tap water – a friend to us at last. I am a keen birdwatcher and when away I would try to

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Open All Hours

find somewhere to go that might provide a break from filming. Exactly one mile from the shop was Potteric Carr, a nature reserve formed by the collapsing of disused coal mines. The area above the mines flooded and drowned the trees, eventually forming reed fringed lakes and marshland. When we broke for lunch I would drive straight there, taking only two minutes including parking. Forty-five minutes later I would return and the guys on the chuck wagon would have my lunch ready for me. Ronnie was one of the true greats of TV and could never stop joking. In fact, it was hard to talk to him as he turned everything into a joke. A good-hearted, friendly man, he was one of the few so-called celebrities who invited the crew to his house in Ruislip for dinner when the series had been completed. He once showed me his study room, which was filled withh is collection of postcards, mostly rude, and his wonderful collection of porcelain bathing belles. I spent a good hour going through it all. The last time I saw Ronnie was at Television Centre. Just as I was about to go into a studio I saw him sitting on his own on the other side of a glass partition nursing a cup of coffee. He had a distant look on his face; his thoughts were somewhere else. I tapped the glass as I walked by and held up a hand. He looked up and waved but it wasn’t the same Ronnie. Just two hours later a bulletin on the news announced ‘Ronnie Barker to quit showbusiness’. His last two sitcoms were Magnificent Evans, about a rather foppish photographer, which I worked on with him in

David Jason

Wales, and Clarence, about a short-sighted removal man. Magnificent Evans was not a success and Clarence failed to get good reviews. Ronnie did in fact return to television as a straight actor, playing a butler in a BBC drama The Gathering Storm, which had excellent reviews.

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Set & Light | Spring 2015

STLD_114 pp1-59:TL 85 Spring 2005 23/03/2015 22:38 Page 28

Profile

Moving lights Words & photos: Bernie Davis

Things are moving at LCA. Long-term loyal supporter of the STLD Nick Shapley, who runs LCA (Lights Camera Action), invited me along to see its new premises in Greenford. It’s not a large move in distance but it’s to a much more inviting building with a very useful small studio, which acts as a demonstration area. Nick is keen to offer this area to members who wish to try out equipment, and the STLD is hoping to hold a meeting there in the not-too-distant future. In part, this move has been enabled by a recent business development.

Cinetile

Set & Light | Spring 2015

Nick with Cinetile’s Sticks and Bricks range

LCA now comes under the A.C.E.T umbrella, although the plan is that Nick very much keeps running his unique business under its own brand. Nick has a reputation for seeking out goodquality products from around the world, chosen to suit the ever-changing needs of the film-style sector of the industry, and even though he had only just moved in to the new premises, there was already a few interesting products rigged and working. Cinetile makes a few different products: the BM series using concentric rings of alternating tungsten and daylight LEDs aimed at reducing shadow artefacts. With the FP-series, similar tiles can be configured to make larger panels of LED soft sources. Cinetile also make a range it calls Sticks and Bricks: a sort of LEGO-style kit of small panels that lock together in a flexible way, which allows them to curve around structures as required. Another flexible product on display was the LED LiteRibbon: a product from the US mounting LEDs on fabric strips, coming in choices of tungsten, daylight or a hybrid mix. Strips are

easily cut and reattached to shape as wanted. And acting as agents for Rosco, LCA was showing an impressive scenic offering called SoftDrop. Rosco has always offered much more than just its well-known colour filter range, with swatches of scenic reflectors and glitters, but this is a new departure

Lite Ribbon

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Lights Camera Action

SoftDrop night

adding to its range of fabric drops. A cloth panel had been printed with a photograph of the Royal Albert Hall, and by a clever process of double-sided printing you can light it from the front for daylight and from the back for nighttime. I have seen this method used for film work in the past but I am told that SoftDrop offers a more affordable version. Rosco offers the

SoftDrop day

full service, printing from stock images, or from your own image, or they can do the photography for you. Being cloth it is easily folded for storage, and easily hung. With its new association with A.C.E.T. LCA has been able to fit its demo studio with cyc track fitted with Rosco green-screen drapes and grey cyc. The company is

happy to have visitors if any of you are in the area. Nick Shapley and LCA can be found at: Unit 14 Fairway Drive, Greenford, Middlesex, UB6 8PW United Kingdom tel: 020 8833 7600 email: sales@lcauk.com www.lacuk.com

Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Lighting

The Great Hall

A lesson in UV Words & photos: Bernie Davis I thought I might share this recent experience with readers, and if nothing else, it goes to prove there is always something new to learn (certainly for me anyway!). I recently recorded an insert for a history programme for the BBC History unit celebrating 500 years of Hampton Court Palace. Mostly set in and around the Great Hall, it was an evening recording, which could only take place after the public had left. The finished programme, as I understand, will be about the christening of Henry VIII’s son Edward, to become Edward VI. Our recording, showing the processional route through the palace to the Chapel Royal and involving about 90 extras, all in period costume, was to be illustration to the finished documentary. We were recording in various locations, including the famous Clock Courtyard and The Great Hall, all to be recorded between about 20.00 and 24.00 using Onebox Television’s multi-camera derig facility. The Great Hall is a wonderful piece of Tudor architecture built by Henry VIII and beneath its magnificent 30

Set & Light | Spring 2015

hammer-beam roof, it is still decorated with its original tapestries. The palace conservationists are rightly very protective towards the building, and the priceless tapestries in particular, and at the technical recce we went through in fine detail where we could place lights and, in particular, about light levels allowed. I was more than happy to work within the 200 lux limit they insisted on, and planned my lighting around this. The route through The Great Hall involved a procession towards camera from the far end, through the hall, then out past camera. The Director, John Kirby, was happy to offer the righthand wall as a dead area, and with Crew-Chief James Tinsley’s help, I planned to light the procession mainly with a series of large LED panels from one side – 10 of Panalux’s Tektiles (pictured right),

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Hampton Court

Ten Panalux Tektiles were used to light the procession through the Great Hall

which are 600mm by 600mm-thin LED panels and come as daylight or tungsten colour temperature, with DMX control. Each mounted on a medium stand with a chain bag at the base, the palace staff were comfortable with this arrangement as long as the stands were not too near the walls. A single soft source on the balcony at the near end filled the procession as they approached camera, and for this I used one of Panalux’s large fluorescent fittings: a FloBank 220 (pictured right), also DMX controlled. The hall was then decorated with three 650W fresnels lifting the beautiful hammer-

beam roof and a few pars through the side windows. The larger stained-glass window at the far end had a 4K MSR through it mounted on a convenient roof location outside. By luck, the roof also worked as a place to back-light the Clock Courtyard for a different part of the procession. I then covered the procession across the courtyard with more fluorescent fittings and a few 2K fresnels picking out the buildings. Two corridor locations used more Tektiles and some Kinoflo fittings. So, we all arrived on site at 4pm and were ushered in for a safety briefing, and I received my first surprise of the evening. As we were given a well-prepared talk about on-site safety, one unexpected item was found in the list of requirements: we were told that UV filters must be fitted to all light sources Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Lighting

in the Great Hall to protect the tapestries. Well, I had not been told this before and had not ordered any, but as I was not using any discharge lighting indoors, I was not too concerned. Had I already attended this year’s STLD AGM bonus meeting about the lighting of exhibits at the National Gallery, I might have been better informed about the needs and concerns with lighting and long-term damage! As the public departed we were allowed to rig the Great hall – slowly and carefully as requested. The first lighting fitting to go on was the fluorescent fitting on the balcony, and to my surprise, the conservationist whipped out a UV meter and pointed out that it was giving a reading of 142. I asked what the safe limit was and was told it was zero. Alarm bells started to ring in my head but I pointed out that it was a little difficult to be told on site in the evening that I was obliged to have UV filter as this wasn’t necessarily carried in the gel stock. I was then told that I had signed a contract promising to use UV filter, and another alarm bell rang. I had signed nothing of the kind, but probably some location manager had and no one had told me. I turned off the fluorescent fitting and began to wonder about the rest of the rig. Next came the tungsten fresnels for the roof – and as they came on the meter was produced again and UV was detected. Now to me, tungsten lighting has problems making blue, let alone any shorter wavelengths in any quantity worth noting, but I was told the readings were unacceptable. I even pointed out that they were focused on the roof and not the tapestries, but that made no difference to the response – they had to go off. I tried to bluff a little, asking exactly what the meter measured – was it UV-A, UV-B, UV-C or a sum of all of them? The very nice conservationist did not know and had no idea of the units on the meter. She just knew that if there was a reading, the lights had to go off. I remembered once working on the Leonardo da Vinci exhibition at the National Gallery, where we were limited by light level verses time (the product of light level and time was their concern). That seemed to make more sense than this and on that occasion, UV was never mentioned but clearly things have moved on even in that time. I was now a little worried for the recording as I fully expected the LED lights to fail, too, but the conservationist said they liked LED lights as they produce no UV. And sure enough, she was right: a zero reading on the UV meter. Thankfully, Panalux had included a HiLo in case it was useful. For those like me who have not met a HiLo before, it is a large LED unit originally developed by Panalux to make an LED spacelight replacement. It had found popularity on film sets as a powerful LED soft light source with DMX control of level and colour temperature from 3,000K to 6000K. We replaced the FloBank on the balcony with the HiLo (pictured right) and got another zero reading from the UV meter. But the next surprise of the evening was on its way: the lovely Hampton Court Palace staff produced a roll of UV filter! Unknown to me, there was a 32

Set & Light | Spring 2015

Hampton Court

Extras prepare to film

The famous Clock Courtyard

single camera team on site also working on the same show, and unlike me they had been suitably warned. Sure enough, fitting the UV filter to the small fresnels reduced the UV reading to zero. Feeling happier that I now had a zero UV rig, I dared to ask the Hampton Court Palace staff how they coped with the daylight that came in through the windows and was told they all had UV filter on all the windows. I should have guessed. The lesson learnt then is that if you are working anywhere such as museums and art galleries where there might be concern for the exhibits, then use LED lighting or take UV filter. It did remind me of an occasion some years back when a reporter at Wimbledon suffered from UV burns working outdoors under a discharge light source. We all questioned whether the sun might have played more of a part than the light (as reported in TV Lighting) but the BBC brought in a rule insisting that all discharge lighting from then onwards should be fitted with UV filter. Personally I have never heard of that rule being enforced since then, as other safety rules take over as the latest fashion for risk assessment, but I for one will start using it again. Lee 226, for instance, gives 90 per cent transmission evenly over the visible spectrum with a sharp cut-off at the violet end, dropping to just 50 per cent at 410nms wavelength – right in the middle of the violet band. And according to the Hampton Court UV meter, it goes right down to zero at the UV section, and who am I to argue?

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Profile

Strand Lighting

A century of innovation behind the scenes Words: Anna-Louise Fairtlough One of the entertainment technology industry’s most iconic and longstanding brands celebrated its 100th anniversary last year. As Philips Strand Lighting embarks upon its next century of innovation, we take a look at how it has shaped the television lighting landscape since its inception in 1914 and continues to remain one of the most respected and widely-used brands in studios all over the world. The company’s founders, Arthur Earnshaw and Philip Sheridan, were two private theatre electricians who unwittingly established themselves as the forefathers of the modern entertainment lighting industry. Setting up a small office and workshop at 66A St Martin’s Lane in the heart of West London’s theatre district, the colleagues registered their first design under the name Strand Electric and registration number 642614. What followed was a whirlwind of rapid growth, with the company becoming an important part of the cultural fabric of London, delivering such momentous projects as lighting Nelson in Trafalgar Square, the National Gallery and St Martin-in-the-Fields before moving into the global market. Twenty-two years later, in 1936, Strand unveiled its first television installation: BBC Alexandra Palace television studios, with Studio A and B both equipped with a Strand Electric Grand Master dimmer board. This new venture went from strength from strength, with Strand Electric making such waves in studio lighting as it had in theatre. In 1960 the BBC opened BBC Television Centre at White City in West London, with many of the studios utilising Strand pole-operated Pattern 243 pressed-steel Fresnel spots and System C controls. STLD member Alan Luxford, who has worked within Strand since the age of 16, has close ties with the BBC after dealing with the institution on behalf of the brand for many years. He recalls developing specialised luminaires – discharge effects projectors based on the Patt 252 – during his time as a lab

BBC TV Studios. Mike Andrews © Strand

tech in the Research and Development department. The BBC snapped up seven for use on such programmes as Top of the Pops, which meant Alan was often present as tech support during taping. This came in handy in more ways than one. “There was an occasion when no one knew how to connect all of Stevie Wonder’s keyboard instruments together for a live performance,” he says. “However, I played the organ so jumped in and helped with that.” He adds: “As well as the discharge effects projectors we were also developing follow spots for TV lighting, so I was working with a lot of lighting directors at the time to make sure the luminaires were balanced for colour TV. I worked in most of the BBC’s studios, sometimes modifying equipment to meet the high BBC specifications, other times just watching and learning. Back then it took 20 years to become a television lighting director TM1, now it doesn’t seem to take that long!” For a while, Strand control systems were not overly present in TV. However, they made a comeback in a

major way with the introduction of the Modular Memory System (MMS) in 1975, and then the Galaxy system in 1981, usurping the previous Thorn Q file system to become the market leader. This was down to the fact the systems were modular and so could be configured to how the user wanted it. They also had more than one channel control panel – something even today’s consoles don’t have. It comprised several Thorn Q file aspects, alongside a lot of unique Strand features. Alan says: “I was at what used to be Thames TV last October to see Not Going Out, ransmitted by the BBC on a Friday night and lit by Martin Kempton, and they’re still using the Galaxy I sold them in 1983. It’s been running for all these years and people still love it. The BBC tends to keep its Galaxies because they’re such fantastic systems.” Alan also worked on Strand Lighting accounts with Sky, opening up four studios for the broadcasting giant in 1988. A couple of years before, The Rank Organisation, which owned Strand at the time, acquired Italian brand Quartzcolour, which meant Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Strand Lighting

Pictured right: A PATT 243 at BBC Studios. R.W Sheppard © Strand Below: A Galaxy TV Studio floor control. Dawson Strange Photography © Strand

Iain Davidson at BBC Glasgow with a Galaxy and Gemini © Strand

The Strand System CAE at BBC TV Studios. R.W. Sheppard © Strand

Luxford and his team kitted out the studios with ‘Strand consoles, dimmers, suspension and of course Quartzcolour lights – Polaris, Pollux and Castor’. Also brimming with memories about the Sky/Strand relationship is Richard Bunting, who started at Strand in 1986. “I started on the sales desk, before moving into the Projects department,” he explains. One of the first things I was involved in was Sky’s move from central London to new industrial units in Isleworth in 1988. Strand had moved to the same location that year, too, so it was a matter of immense importance to win the supplyand-fit contract for the new studios, as Sky was just across the road! “I built a relationship with many of the people at Sky, which proved useful later on when I came to organise the lighting for TV training courses that we ran with Bill Lee, as we were able to borrow cameras and tripods from just 34

Set & Light | Spring 2015

across the road.” Sky’s studio set-up was radically different to the BBC’s high-ceilinged studios with saturation grids that Strand had worked with for many years. Instead, it used industrial warehouse buildings complete with concrete box, which worked as an insulated studio. At this time, fluorescent lighting was just making inroads into TV and Strand launched Videolux in an attempt to move into this market. Interestingly, Videolux was manufactured in Kirkcaldy, alongside the theatre product range, rather than in Rome like Quartzcolor, as its technology came from the architectural lighting world. Other studio products made in the Scottish facility included Lightscope (a steel sprung telescope), motorised and pole operated pantographs, and a range of self-climbing hoists, all designed by Paul Matthews of Evans Engineering. “I remember on one occasion Bill

Summers called me from Playlight in Manchester at lunchtime on a Friday with £30,000 order for HMI Fresnels and electronic ballasts,” says Richard. “He had been haggling over the price during the previous few days and now he announced he needed the gear the next day (Saturday). I went to see our Sales Manager Ian Haddon and even though Kirkcaldy (where the stock was being held at the time) closed at 12.30pm on a Friday, we just managed to catch the warehouse supervisor, who called in a courier especially, and Bill got his delivery the next morning.” Strand is now part of the Philips Entertainment group, which consists of three brands: Philips Vari*Lite, Philips Selecon and Philips Strand Lighting, and a product line called Showline. Philips Entertainment is continuing to supply Philips Strand Lighting consoles, including the latest NEO console, and dimmers to TV studios globally. Philips Selecon luminaires, especially the PL range, are also being purchased for crucial studio lighting, including at Channel 5 here in the UK. “Although I’ll not be around for the next 100 years, I have no doubt that Strand will be!” concludes Alan.

STLD_114 pp1-59:TL 85 Spring 2005 23/03/2015 22:38 Page 35

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STLD_114 pp1-59:TL 85 Spring 2005 23/03/2015 22:39 Page 36

The STLD stand at BVE

The Arri L10

Cirrolite Dedos LCA’s stand

Tiffen black diffusion and variable grad filters

Matthew Addison and Nick Mobsby of LSI

AC Entertainment Technologies’ stand

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Event

BVE

Back to BVE Words & photos: Andrew Dixon

s d

The STLD has not had a stand at BVE for several years. The committee felt there were very few lighting companies exhibiting and we were swamped by camera-kit and mediaediting stands. It became obvious that we were not getting new members either; we saw so many students who felt overawed by the idea of being involved in the big world of TV lighting and design. However, we have had a change of heart as it’s important that industry professionals see we are doing good work, promoting the skill and art we all know about so well. Chris Harris has taken on the challenge of managing the stall and so at this year’s BVE, held at ExCeL London from 14–26 February, we were back again in the Production Services Zone next to the GTVC. Only 11 of our sponsor companies had stands and I visited them all. Here are a few things that stood out to me. The first was the word ‘workflow’ – obviously one of those words that the new kids on the block use. It seemed to be used wherever I looked. I bumped into Danny Popkin and Neil Dormand, true up-to-the minute BBC types. It seems that workflow covers a multitude of processes, but the one I could relate to was to do with media handling. Media being, I suppose, the combination of video and sound. It’s a way that assets (media plus meta data) movements are tracked. Do you understand now or is what I have written all twaddle? Let’s talk lighting... well, studio installations anyway. LSI, represented by Nick Mobsby and Matthew Addison, do just that. They have just completed new studios for Sky Skills Academy in Livingston, West Lothian: a scheme for introducing nine to 13-year-olds to the idea of making TV programmes with a CSO studio and all the kit. It’s quite incidental that the children might also come away with a enough enthusiasm to encourage Dad to invest in Sky, too! LSI is working on two new stages for the BBC’s EastEnders at Elstree and it is providing a prestigious pair of studios on the 16th floor of The Shard for Aljazeera TV. One completely blacks out the view and uses a large video wall but the other does overlook the City of London via the Roscoview system. Whatever else, it’s expensive! There was talk of all the lamps being LED and 96 being Robe movers. What’s next? Only a new studio in Qatar with an even greater number of Robe lamps. They are forever being told to provide Desisi fresnel lamps, the biggest so far being the LED 100, which is equivalent to a 2K TH luminaire. These are particularly popular in the new studios they equip for Sky in Osterley. Quality stuff! Off now to Doughty. Julian Chiverton was very proud of its new pole-operated mounting bracket for cameras and monitors and also a rather neat looking trolley for all sorts of mobile uses: grips, sparks, tea ladies! Lee Romney of Arri showed me the new big brother of the L7 LED fresnel, the L10. A big beast for a 2K tungsten

Main picture: Lowel on Tiffen’s stand. Inset: Tom Bell of BECTU

equivalent, but available in tuneable daylight/tungsten and RGB variations. It has a good set of eight leaf barn doors, weighed 19kg and listed at 4,200 Euros. On to an impressive array of lights on the Litepanel stand. Spency Newbury told me all about its range of lamps with high-quality colour redition LEDs, all rated accurately using the TLCI (the Television Lighting Cosistency Index worked on, of course by our own Alan Roberts). Spency showed me the Astra range of 1ft by 1ft softs, some of which are four times as bright as the originals but nwith a higher price tag – up to £930 list. The entry point is a mere £412. There is also the Caliber set of three little fresnel lamps for £600 boxed and ready to go with Gorilla grips. They use 110W each and are daylight colour only. Not far to the Cirrolite stand and the cheery faces of David Morphy and John Cobden. Dedos abound in even more exciting forms. The big LED Drama, a soft light giving 720 lux at six metres. And the PC hard source D LED 12.1 using 225W but delivering the sort of wide-variation powerful beam that you’d expect from such a quality manufacturer. For the small jobs there are D LED 2, 4 and 9, all in tungsten, daylight or variable colour variations. Kinoflos have also gone LED, with options 24in by 15in, 30in by 26.5in and a very familiar 48in by 15in – all with excellent colour rendition, naturally. Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Lighting

Television lighting: Inverse Square Law Words & photos: Bill Klages The law

The Inverse Square Law of Illumination has been with us for so long, and is so commonly taken for granted, that it might seem a questionable subject for discussion. However, I feel a revival of interest in this deep-rooted rule is justifiable as a result of surprising results observed in a recent set of tests that I conducted.

The basics

The Reverse Square Law states that it is only applicable in the case of a point source of light. Usually we don’t use point sources directly, only as part of an instrument. Typical practical point sources of a small size would be short-arc discharge lamps, as well as compact tungsten filaments. A corollary that is always added to the Reverse Square Law is that, for the purpose of estimating illuminance (foot-candles or lux), a source can be assumed to be a point source if the distance from the source to the illumination plane is at least five times the widest dimension of the source. Some more conservative illumination experts say that this distance should be greater than 10 times. For example, to be able to use the law for a six-inch Fresnel spotlight – and taking the more cautious approach – the distance from the fixture to the light meter must be greater than 30in. Therefore, if I measure 600 foot-candles at 5ft from my spotlight, the Inverse Square Law says I should measure 150 foot-candles at 10ft:

candles at the centre of the beam of the instrument every 2ft from the front of the fixture from 2ft to 49ft. Then I plotted the data on a log/log scale graph. First, I chose to plot distances greater than 10 times the instrument’s width in order to be as conservative as possible – in other words, distances greater than 30ft (10 times 3ft width of the Softlite). The resultant curve was, happily, a straight line when plotted in the log/log scale, indicating that a simple power function of the form:

could describe the curve (k being a constant). If the Square Law is, in truth, a law, the value of the exponent should be -2 in this case as the measuring distance is greater than 10 times the fixture’s aperture. Disappointingly, when I applied the curve fitting ability of my spread sheet application, I came out with an exponent of -1.828: close, but not -2.000. This is shown in graph below. I have included an idealized plot (in red) that shows what the curve would look like if the Square Law represented the data.

Very straightforward.

The question

While gathering data as preparation for the article on the Shadow Factor (Set & Light, Autumn/Winter 2014), it seemed an ideal time to determine the answer to a question that I had always wondered about. If the Inverse Square Law should not be applied at distances closer than, say, 10 times the maximum size of the source, what is the relationship between the measurement distance and the incident light at points close to source, within the 10 times limit? Could it perhaps magically approach a linear relationship? I must warn the reader at this point that the results I obtained were, disappointingly, not as neat and orderly as a ‘law’ should dictate.

The method

To attempt to answer my question, I used a conventional 4kW Super Softlite for the test. The aperture of the fixture is 30in by 36in: a relatively large source. I measured the foot38

Set & Light | Spring 2015

Checks and balances

At this point, I thought I’d better check to see if I could find any published photometric data for similar large sources to compare. What I found was interesting. One reputable company just gave a figure for candlepower and two values for illuminance at selected distances – the illuminance obviously calculated from the candlepower listed using the Inverse Square Law. I think this was in order to simplify the data, as the casual user may be interested only in the order of magnitude of the illuminance rather than a value carried out to 10 places. The manufacturer’s data for the Softlite that I used did not have as many measurement distances as were in my test, but I was relieved to see that the data did not obey the law either. The exponent was -1.919 compared to the -1.954 that I calculated for similar range of distances with my data. I could only find one other set of data for a large source. These readings were extensive, except they were only in range of less than 10 times the width – in other words,

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A view from across the pond

where the Inverse Square Law should not be applied – and revealed an exponent of -1.869, which I felt gave some credibility to the data I acquired.

The answer

Going back to the original problem of what function could define the illuminance where we are in the unacceptable distance range. Referring to graph above, I have split my measurements into three sections in order to see if a trend exists. Success at last. You will notice that the exponent of the function decreases from the nominal theoretical value of -2.0 as we measure closer to the lamp. In my case, the three ranges gave exponents of decreasing values as the distance decreases from -1.954 to -1.895 and, finally, to -1.583. (I would guess that the exponent might actually be -1.0 at some point very close, perhaps a millimetre or so, from the fixture). As a result of my efforts, I think I can safely make the following statements with some degree of conviction. 1. The Inverse Square Law may be used to approximate illuminance at other distances where illuminance is known at one distance, if all distances are greater than 10 times the source’s maximum dimension. 2. Where the distances are less than 10 times the large source’s maximum dimension, the Inverse Square Law does not apply precisely but can be used to yield a useful guess. Not too scientific, but no one said lighting is a science. The following article was first published at TVTechnology.com, for whom Bill writes a regular column, on 1 February 2013. 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 Set & Light | Spring 2015

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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 AC-ET appointed exclusive UK and Ireland distributor for GLP Lighting Solutions

A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd are pleased to announce their appointment as the exclusive UK and Ireland distributor for the GLP range of award-winning LED lighting solutions. The agreement follows AC-ET’s success supplying the innovative impression LED moving heads line-up and other GLP products to various entertainment sectors, and helping to strengthen the brand in the UK market. Founded in 1994, the Germany-based company is one of the leading manufacturers of high-quality, innovative LED products designed for many different applications within the professional entertainment and architectural lighting sectors. Featuring the latest LED technology, GLP offer an extensive line-up of wash and spot fixtures to suit venues and productions of various sizes and budgets. The moving heads range includes the impression X4 S, X4 and X4 XL washlights family, as well as the impression Spot One and Volks Licht Spot models, among others. The solutions provide extraordinarily quick colour changes as well as all the advantages of LEDs as a light source, including low power consumption, lower heat dissipation, and lower maintenance. Recent GLP LED lighting applications include the British Racing Drivers’ Club’s British Grand Prix party and fundraising event, held during the weekend of the 2014 F1 Santander™ British Grand Prix at Silverstone racing circuit, and the prestigious London College of Fashion.

Discover Prolights

The Prolights high-value and high-performance range of lighting, video and effects products offer designers innovative technology solutions delivering reliable, creative tools at a price that all productions can afford. Knowing that you are probably currently planning your next exciting events, we thought we would present a selection of lighting products from the ProLights range, which we feel will be of interest to you. SMARTBAT is an unbelievably cost-effective, portable battery-powered uplighter designed as accent luminaire for all kind of events. It is equipped with a lithium battery pack and a built-in WiFi module for cablefree operation. This battery powered LED Pinspot can highlight anything from table centres to wedding cakes. With a magnetic base, and a six-hour battery life, this superb little fixture is a costeffective addition to any event lighting toolkit. The BATGOBOIR Battery LED Gobo projector is the first image projector with LED light source and battery operation, designed to reinvent a new standard in the field 40

Set & Light | Spring 2015

of gobo projectors. The STUDIOCOB LED Par fixture family ties a new optical system with COB technology to provide a light that truly performs like a traditional source, offering a single shadow, high CRI, ultra-smooth HD dimming, various lens options and functional barn doors. It is available in the following configurations: full colour, cool white, warm white and ultra violet.

AMBERSPHERE Magic Blades cut it with DPL

Ayrton is the latest manufacturer to join the family at Ambersphere Solutions, who have exclusive distribution and customer service for the Ayrton range of products in the UK. Among the new ‘R’ (Radical) range is the Magicblade-R: a moving-head luminaire comprising seven 15W LED sources and flicker-free management, which makes it ideal for TV.

Magic Blades take a slice of the action at the MTV Awards

The red-carpet moments at the MTV EMA Awards have grown into an occasion in their own right, demanding the kind of production values usually discovered once inside the show itself. This year’s event at Glasgow took the red-carpet celebrations to yet another level. Lighting specialists for the film, television and entertainment sectors, Panalux, chose to invest in the new Magic Blades from Ayrton especially for this event. Panalux gaffer for the MTV event was Mark Gardiner. For Lighting Designer Stuart Pring, this was his first encounter with the Blades. He opted to use 36 units, so the original order of 25 had to be increased from Ayrton’s new UK distributor, Ambersphere Solutions. Such was the urgency for the fixtures, Panalux GB’s Managing Director Ed Pagett drove the van over himself to pick them up. Once rigged at the Glasgow venue, it was up to Pring to put them through their paces. He was extremely grateful to Panalux and Ambersphere for pulling out the stops to get 36 units up to the venue.

Hans Zimmer cooks up a Stormy at Hammersmith

The back catalogue of composer Hans Zimmer reads a little like a review of some the best films of the last 20 years. Academy Award winner for The Lion King in 1994 Grammy Awards for The Crimson Tide and The Dark Knight and the WAFCA Award for 12 Years a Slave in 2013: the list is quite remarkable. So the opportunity to see the man in action with a live orchestra at a venue like the Hammersmith Apollo is one not to be missed. Lighting such a unique event fell into the safe hands of

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

Pictured: Clay Paky Stormys purchased from Ambersphere Solutions had their first outing at composer Hans Zimmer’s show at the Hammersmith Apollo

Designer Marc Brickman and it was PRG who were contracted to supply the rig. Part of the spec included units for a strobe-effect light. PRG opted to supply the new Clay Paky Stormys to fulfil the request, as PRG’s Rich Rowley explains: “We purchased the units from Ambersphere Solutions and the Hans Zimmer show was their first outing.”

ANNA VALLEY BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2014

For the second consecutive year, Anna Valley, the leading AV rental specialists for the broadcast and events sector, were appointed by the production team on behalf of the BBC for the highly prestigious Sports Personality of the Year 2014 Awards. The show was presented by Gary Lineker, Gabby Logan and Clare Balding live from the SSE Hydro Arena in Glasgow. TV Production Designer Rudi Thackray included multiple LED displays, supplied and installed by Anna Valley. The central flown 4mm LED screen was surrounded by a superwide curved screen in F30 LED, with SP14 logo screens in new Hybrid 18mm. The most challenging installation involved fixing hundreds of metres of Video flex onto the myriad of sinew wires, creating an original and effective result across the expansive SP14 stage.The lighting direction for the show was by Gurdip Mahal and his team.

The X Factor

Anna Valley collaborated with Thames, Weider Design and LD Dave Davey to deliver an exciting new twist to the toprated X Factor studio set during the live show series on ITV1 HD. The LED components are AV-4, Toshiba 6mm, Lighthouse 12mm, Barco MiStrips and Flexible Video and DMX Led Strip. Big Band Week saw an Art Deco feel, with 35 music desks and LED band-stand rostra throughout the show.

New LED floor

The latest technology high-resolution 7mm black-faced LED floor is available now from Anna Valley. The AV NX7 floor is fully load-bearing, quick to install and gives superb results. It is art of Anna Valley’s ongoing investment in the latest and best screen technologies.

ARRI ALEXA 65 impresses at Los Angeles launch event

ARRI Rental’s ALEXA 65 camera system has been officially launched in front of a packed audience at the Linwood Dunn Theater in Los Angeles. Attended by ASC members and key Hollywood figures, the launch event came just 11 months after proof of concept allowed the ALEXA 65 project to be green-lit in January this Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Sponsor news

year. The system, comprising camera, lenses and a complete image workflow, will be available to productions from January 2015. Significant interest has already been shown by cinematographers attached to high-profile feature films. Harking back to the golden age of 65mm widescreen filmmaking, the ALEXA 65 camera is a scaled-up version of an ALEXA XT, equipped with a sensor slightly larger than a 5-perf 65mm film frame, which is able to capture an uncompressed ARRI RAW 65mm image of staggering intensity and definition. Collaborations with key technology partners IB/E Optics and Codex have allowed the ALEXA 65 system to offer a complete large-format solution for high-end theatrical motion pictures, incorporating custom-designed prime and zoom lenses, and fast, efficient workflow tools. ALEXA 65 is available exclusively through ARRI Rental: a global network of ARRI equipment rental facilities. Acting together, these multiple operations give ARRI Rental the scale and reach to service any type of production, in almost any location.

AMIRA SUP 3.0 scheduled for release mid-2015

The key new feature of AMIRA SUP 3.0 is the ability to record MPEG-2 422P@HL at 50 Mbit/s in an MXF wrapper. This XDCAM-compatible MPEG-2 recording format allows television productions to take advantage of AMIRA’s superior image quality and ergonomics, while utilising a lowbandwidth codec that can easily be integrated into typical broadcast environments and workflows. Recording MPEG-2 MXF with AMIRA ensures 100 per cent compatibility with the format already used by many low-budget or time-pressured television productions, for which a streamlined workflow through ingest, editing and post is vital. This cost-efficient format minimises the number of memory cards needed on set, but also reduces postproduction and archiving costs through reduced data rates and seamless integration with standard tools. In order to further ease the integration of AMIRA into fast-paced television production environments, a new audio accessory will be released. Taking the form of an extension to the back of the camera body, it will equip AMIRA with a slot for a portable audio tuner/receiver. This will allow signals to be received wirelessly from either the sound recordist’s mixer or straight from radio microphones, accommodating the needs of ENG-style productions that capture audio directly in-camera and value the most cablefree configuration possible. Other features of SUP 3.0 will include a versatile camera remote control interface for multi-camera live or scripted productions; Super 16mm lens support; an intervalometer function for time-lapse applications; and a host of general usability enhancements.

AMIRA SUP 2.0 scheduled for release March 2015

4K UHD recording is the major new feature of AMIRA SUP 2.0. Enabled by the software update, it is activated through the purchase of a 4K UHD licence at the ARRI Licence Shop (and a camera-sensor calibration at an ARRI service centre for cameras purchased in 2014). 42

Set & Light | Spring 2015

The new 4K UHD recording format has been developed for productions that need to generate high-resolution deliverables. It allows ProRes codecs up to ProRes 4444 to be recorded in Ultra High Definition, 3,840 by 2,160 resolution, directly onto the in-camera CFast 2.0 cards, at up to 60fps. Optional in-camera de-noising, sharpening and detailing tools permit the image to be optimised for specific applications or matched to different cameras and lenses. Further enhancements provided by AMIRA SUP 2.0 include ProRes 3.2K recording (allowing cross-compatibility with ALEXA cameras running ALEXA SUP 11.0); WiFi remote support; the ability to monitor audio channels individually; additional lock functions to prevent the accidental pressing of buttons or switches; frame rate adjustments while in pre-record mode; frame grabs from the live camera image; and many more.

ARRI enlarges its LED L-Series with new L10 Fresnel

ARRI is proud to announce the L10: the newest edition to its L-Series family of LED Fresnels, which also includes the portable L5 and mid-range L7. The introduction of the L10 fulfills ARRI’s mission to provide a full line of highperformance LED Fresnels to the film, broadcast, theatre and live entertainment markets. The L10 is the brightest and largest L-Series lamphead to date. Its substantial 10in Fresnel lens and powerful output allow for more distant fixture placement and the wrapping of light around objects in a natural and pleasing way. At more than twice the brightness of the L7, the L10 is also one of the brightest LED Fresnels on the market. The L-Series family signifies a paradigm shift in the way television studios and motion picture sets can be lit. The flexibility and tuneability of the L-Series allows for rapid and easy changes of colour, which in turn makes more creative options available in a shorter period of time. The colour quality and rendition outperform most LED products on the market. With the L10 now released, the ARRI LED family represents a full line-up of powerful and versatile fixtures. Whether for a small television studio or a major motion picture, the L-Series can provide the perfect Fresnel light source.

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AURORA 2015 has already seen Aurora supporting a wide range of shows that have pulled product from every corner of their increasingly busy West London warehouse. The Brit Awards 2015 saw Lighting Director Oli Richards’ versatile stage installation for the Nominees Announcement Show create a host of moods complementing a diverse array of acts, who included Jesse Ware drenched in blue for a low-key rendition of ‘You and I (Forever)’. Things were livened up for Clean Bandit and Jess Glynne’s mash-up on ‘Real Love/Rather Be’, before being toned right down to surround James Bay in an almost monochromatic atmosphere for ‘Let it Go’. Oli used a combination of Vari-Lite VL3000 Spots plus Clay Paky Sharpys to add tightly focused shards of light that created individual moods for each exclusive performance, while also remaining in full control of keeping Reggie Yates’s band introductions and links crisp and clear for broadcast. Always keen to try out a new trick or two, of particular interest during the Clean Bandit spot was Oli’s desicion to avoid the usual source 4 approach, favouring instead Martin’s Viper Peformance to key the band members using the head’s animation wheel and shutter. A subtle and interesting approach to key lighting. Lighting Director Chris Rigby (pictured right), fresh from his RTS ‘Craft and Design Award for Lighting for Multi Camera’ for his work on Alan Carr: Chatty Man, returned to the studio with Aurora on Backchat with Jack Whitehall and His Dad. Recorded live at the ITV London Studios, with an installation mainly consisting of Martin MAC Aura Washes, augmented by a carefully selected array of set practicals, Chris was able to create an intimate almost front-room feel to the show. Over at the BBC’s Elstree Studios, Aurora have supplied a huge selection of equipment to LD Gurdip Mahal for Harry Hills’ prime-time Stars in Their Eyes. The show required an ultra-showbiz feel to light up performances by a diverse selection of rock lookalikes and pop wannabees. Gurdip was able to count on Aurora for an array of fixtures, including Martin Viper Profiles and Clay Paky Sharpys, which were used to full effect to add some fire to a variety of Saturday-night spectaculars, including performances from ‘Debbie Harry’, ‘Britney Spears’ and ‘Tina Turner’. Meanwhile, Gurdip Mahal has also kept Aurora busy with his work on the weekly National Lottery: Win Your Wishlist show. To accompany this list of prestigious of shows, Aurora are also proud to have supported this year’s Red Nose Day

for Comic Relief with a huge selection of equipment for LD Oli Richards. Faced with the usual challenges associated with events of this scale, this year’s show required razor-sharp planning and logistics to ensure everything ran to schedule before, during and following the live broadcast on 13 March.

CHROMA-Q Chroma-Q Color One 100 provides premium performance for Dry Hire Lighting

Buckinghamshire-based Dry Hire Lighting have become one of the first hire companies in the UK to invest in a quantity of the new Chroma-Q® Color One 100™ premium performance, homogenised output LED Par fixture. Dry Hire Lighting carry an extensive inventory of technology equipment from leading manufacturers and pride themselves on providing customers with access to the very latest high-performance lighting solutions. Dry Hire Lighting’s Rob Merrilees invested in the Color One 100 fixtures following a demo at PLASA London 2014 and a further onsite test at the company’s headquarters. The new Color One 100 LED Par features an innovative fully homogenised beam, virtually eliminating the colour separation and shadows synonymous with LED lighting, delivering above-Par performance from one source. The unit’s optical design provides a smooth, uniform and defined 20-degree beam. This makes it ideal for use as a front and backlight with clean shadows, and an uplighter with a smooth, even beam. An extensive RGBA colour-mixing palette delivers outstanding colour blend across the spectrum, including deep-cold blues, red-hot lava looks and super-soft pastels, as well as a complete range of whites. In addition, the high CRI of 93 ensures extremely accurate colour matching. Theatrical grade dimming emulates the extremely smooth dimming curve of tungsten fixtures. With convection cooling for near-silent operation, a versatile mounting yoke enabling the fixture to be floor-, truss- or wall- mounted, and a choice of IP20/IP65 models, the Color One 100 is suitable for numerous entertainment lighting applications. Other innovative features include a simple-to-use infrared remote control, enabling users to be up and running within minutes without the requirement of a lighting console, as well as compatibility with industry-standard 6.25in accessories such as egg crates, barndoors and top hats. The Color One 100 fixtures were manufactured to order in a Silver enclosure and supplied by Chroma-Q UK dealer A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd. The Chroma-Q range of premium performance solutions is designed and built to exacting standards in North America, and has been adopted by many leading designers and specifiers for some of today’s most demanding Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Sponsor news

and prestigious lighting applications, including opera, theatre, TV, venues, touring, events and other sectors. As a result of this, the brand has received awards from several industry associations.

Pledging support for Behind the Scenes charity

The Chroma-Q® premium performance lighting brand’s North American and UK resellers are showing their support for the industry by making a contribution to highly deserving industry charity, Behind the Scenes, for every Chroma-Q Color One 100™ LED Par sold. The PLASA (formerly ESTA) Foundation’s Behind the Scenes charity has been assisting industry members in North America since 2006, providing financial assistance to entertainment technology professionals, or their immediate family, who are seriously ill or injured. Originally modelled on the UK-based Light Relief charity, Behind the Scenes was recently extended to cover the UK entertainment technology industry as well, bringing Light Relief under its umbrella. Under the charity’s Pledge a Product programme, Chroma-Q North American master distributor, A.C. Lighting Inc, will make a contribution for every Color One 100 sold in their territory. In addition, UK sister company, A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd, will make a contribution for every Color One 100 they sell.

CIRRO LITE The Celeb® 400Q DMX LED is one of the largest LED soft lights available in the market today, measuring 30in by 26in (76cm by 66cm). The Celeb produces a soft, broad wraparound light quality (PRI 95) and produces colour faithfully and beautifully on HD or film, in the studio or on location. The Celeb boasts technical innovations such as dial-in white light from 2,700K to 5,500K and presets with programmable settings, as well as full-range dimming without flicker or colour shift. Light levels do not change when selecting Kelvin settings. The Celeb 400Q DMX operates at universal input from 100VAC to 240VAC. The slim profile fixture produces more lumens than a 1K tungsten soft light, yet uses only 1.8A (120VAC) compared to a tungsten softlight at 8.3A. The Celeb 400Q can also be powered by 24VDC battery. The Celeb 400Q comes complete with moulded accessory holders, removable gel frame and honeycomb louver and is available in two styles: Yoke Mount and Pole-Op. The New DLED2 LED from Dedolight is small, powerful, and extremely versatile. The powerful focusing 20W LED light head is available in both daylight and bi-colour versions, and two different powered configurations. The colour temperature range is 2,800K to 6,000K. The DLED2 uses Dedolight Patented Aspheric Optics in combination with specially developed LED light sources in daylight and bicolour variations. Due to the highly efficient Dedo optical system, the light head does not require a fan with moving parts as it does not require a high wattage to achieve its impressive output. The DLED2 can be used as an on-board or off-board light. It is multi-functional and versatile and can be used for tiny interview and documentary lighting, for accents and special effects. The unit is especially useful and versatile in combination with FELLONI bicolour multi - LED panels. Contact Cirro Lite with any technical questions at info@cirrolite.com

CLAY PAKY Bringing Ant and Dec from screen to stage

The Chroma-Q Color One 100 launch at LDI 2014 in Las Vegas. Pictured left to right are Lori Rubinstein, PLASA Foundation; Rick Rudolph, PLASA Foundation/Stage Equipment & Ltg; Fred Mikeska, A.C. Ltg Inc; and Curt Contrata, Stage Equipment & Ltg

Set & Light | Spring 2015

Two of the biggest names in British entertainment, Ant and Dec, have recently turned their hugely popular TV show Saturday Night Takeaway into a touring arena show, which saw a more than 100 Clay Paky fixtures delivering unparalleled brightness and portability to the complex production. Lighting Designer Adam Bassett, of Woodroffe Bassett Design, specified 57 Clay Paky Alpha Wash 1500s, 32 Alpha Profile 1500s, four Alpha Spot QWO 800s, 20 Sharpys and

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

12 Sharpy Wash 330s, supplied by Neg Earth, to add ultimate versatility to the design. The design house also relied once more on their associated collaborator Roland Greil, of Einstein and Sons, as lighting director and operator during the run of the tour. The Clay Paky Alpha Profile 1500 combines the output power of a 1,500W lamp with an exclusive framing system that gives the beam unlimited shape capabilities, allowing for a multitude of different lighting looks. The Alpha Wash 1500 provides designers with a plethora of vibrant washes with its combinable CMY system and two colour wheels with pure dichroic filters. The Sharpys were used as part of the floor package, with the Sharpy Wash 300s rigged on an arch truss over the stage, while the Alpha Profile, Spot and Wash fixtures were all hung on overhead trusses. The Sharpy Wash 330 is a compact, lightweight 330W washlight, with the luminous efficiency, graphic and optical performance of a 1,000W fixture.

Driving dynamic looks on Sky Sports F1 show

To mark the end of 2014’s F1 season, Sky Sports created a unique film called The Ballad of the Duelling Drivers that told the story of the intense battle between Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg. To enhance this special project, Lighting Director Richard Bowles chose Clay Paky Mythos and Alpha Beam 700 fixtures to deliver stunning effects and sharp beams of light throughout. Bowles specified three Mythos and eight Alpha Beam 700 fixtures from Richard Martin Lighting for the film, which was created and directed by Sky Sports F1’s Alex Rodger, performed by composer and pianist Tokio Myers and narrated by actor Peter Guinness. The film was recorded at Sky’s West London studios and broadcast during their live coverage of the season’s final race in Abu Dhabi, with Bowles positioning the Alpha Beam 700s on the floor of Sky Studio 5.

Clay Paky Sharpy fixtures help deliver Stand Up to Cancer blockbuster special

When the fourth biennial Stand Up to Cancer special aired in the US and Canada, it raised more than $109 million for its groundbreaking collaborative research efforts. Some 60 Clay Paky Sharpy fixtures were deployed for the event. More than three dozen broadcast and cable networks in the US and Canada telecast Stand Up to Cancer. The show, staged at LA’s Dolby Theatre, featured celebrity guests and music by Lupe Fiasco, Jennifer Hudson and Common, The Who, the Dave Matthews Band, and Ariana Grande, as well as inspiring stories about patients who have benefited from

the research supported by the organisation. Atomic Lighting of Lititz, Pennsylvania, provided the Clay Paky fixtures. Allen Branton was the lighting designer for the special, with Felix Peralta, Daniel K. Boland and Darren Langer the lighting directors. Peralta worked closely with Branton on the show design. Since the special was a strong, video-driven show, Peralta teamed with Laura Frank, screens producer and media programmer, on the media canvas Darren Langer, the floor lighting director, worked closely with Boland to ensure consistent exposure levels for the talent and the audience. Peralta himself was responsible for lighting the environment for the show, including the scenic pieces and architecture of the house. He says Production Designer John Calkins partnered with Branton to create a ‘tasteful and powerful’ environment that helped deliver the show’s strong message.

ELP Celebrity Mastermind

The ELP Manchester team provided LD Andy Stagles with more moving light options for the latest series of Celebrity Mastermind. “The celeb version of the show has an extra level of glitz compared to the more sober version,” says ELP Manager Darren Fletcher. “We provided Andy with the usual range of Alphabeam 700s, Alphaspot HPE 1500s and VL1000s, but it was the addition of 30 Clay Paky Sharpys that gave this series that extra sparkle. Andy created a superb beamy look”

Festival of Remembrance

The Royal British Legion’s annual Festival of Remembrance (pictured overleaf) took place again at the Royal Albert Hall, with Bernie Davis at the lighting helm. ELP provided Bernie with an assortment of gear, including HPE 1500s, VL1000s, TW1s and Sharpy Wash/Spots. But it the most noteworthy inclusion this year was ELP’s new MAC Viper Profiles. These were used to illuminate large poppy projections on both sides of the stage. The MAC Viper Profile is a new breed of high-output profile luminaire with an exceptional feature set, superior light quality and a highly efficient optical system. It currently outperforms all market-leading profiles in the 1200W range and is even an alternative to 1500W fixtures. The Queen, the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall were among the audience to see the spectacle.

Blue Peter

A special Blue Peter OB from Media City saw Presenter Lindsey Russell attempt a 30-metre live abseil down Quay House. The CBBC programme hoped to inspire young viewers to ‘be a hero’ for Children in Need, and the presenter was challenged to complete the feat by the Royal Marines. LD Lee Allen called on the ELP Manchester team to provide a range of OB services, including dimmers, distro Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Pictured: ELP provided the lighting for this year’s Festival of Remembrance at the Royal Albert Hall – LD Bernie Davis – with MAC Viper Profiles used to illuminate the poppy projections on both sides of the stage

and an outdoor lighting package containing 2.5 MSRs, five Half Dino and Chromaflood 200s.

BBC Children in Need

As part of BBC Children in Need activities in Wales, ELP provided rigging equipment and expertise at Newport Leisure Centre for LD Andy Stagles. The main set comprised giant video screens, which needed to be flown securely. ELP built a truss structure, which also hung an assortment of MAC Auras, VL1000s, plus a range of generic lighting. The six finalists took to the stage at Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall in December to compete for the title BBC Choir of the Year 2014. This spectacular conclusion to the national competition was recorded for broadcast on BBC Four. Bernie Davis was the LD. ELP supplied VL1000s, TW1s, MAC Auras and Chromafloods in addition to their LC+ Video Screens, which were a key integral part of the stage set. A Christmas Cracker was a festive variety show on ITV hosted by Bradley Walsh from the Hammersmith Apollo. It was 46

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broadcast at prime time on Boxing Day, with guests including Al Murray, Katherine Jenkins, The Muppets, The Vamps and Flawless. “This was a really big production and we loaded in the entire show in under 24 hours,” recalls ELP Manager Darren Fletcher. Darren’s team provided a full rigging service for LD Nigel Catmur, supplying all the rigging equipment, truss and hoists. A massive moving light rig comprised HPE 1500s, Vipers, VL3500s Wash, MAC 700s Wash, MAC 700s spot, TW1s, VL1000s, Pixel pars, MAC auras, MAC 301s and Chromaflood 200.

ETC ETC at the Hollywood Costume exhibition

The words ‘costume exhibition’ don’t promise a lot of drama. Perhaps we have seen too many costumes imprisoned in glass cabinets under bland eco-friendly display lighting. Perhaps we got bored reading the vital statistics of each item of clothing as we strolled through hushed museum halls. But a visit to the recently opened Hollywood Costume exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art

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(LACMA), lit with ETC Source Four Mini fixtures and powered by ThruPower power control, will make you forget all you ever knew about museum visits – and may change forever the way you view exhibitions. Here, the costumes receive as much direction and attention as the actors who once wore them. The creators of these remarkable displays realised that without great lighting, sound and video, costumes are just old clothing once inhabited by a famous person. Instead, the costumes on show inherit the charisma of the stars who wore them. Many convey the sense of joy and confidence that an actor might have felt inside such a creation. Costume designers rarely get the recognition they deserve. Like editors and writers, their work is often overshadowed by directors, producers and actors. In modern-dress movies, the public assumes that costumes can be found at the local mall. This exhibition is a narrative that defines the pivotal role of the costumer in the creative process, with each step of the process meticulously displayed on acrylic projection surfaces with synced audio tracks. Lighting Designer Trevor Burk of Visual Noise Creative gives the costumes something they never had before: a sculpted, theatrical look with front, back and side light.

Fuji TV wakes up with ETC Selador LED fixtures

It was a challenge for the technical crew of Fuji Television Network (Fuji TV) and Fuji Media Technology (FMT) to find the right fixture to light a set built in the globe shaped observation studio located on the 24th floor of their building. But in the end, they realised that ETC’s Selador® Desire® D60 Daylight luminaires were the perfect fit. The set was built for the live morning breakfast show Mezamashi TV (‘Alarm Clock TV’). Behind the cast are windows with a view of Tokyo that creates a backlight that changes with the time and weather. The biggest challenge was balancing the natural light from the windows and the front light on the cast. Fuji TV’s Chief Lighting Designer Atsuhiro Kobayashi had to put a filter on the window to tone down the natural light. Sold with the help of Syncro-Rise, a dealer for Ken Production Service, FMT provided the lighting package, which included 12 Selador Desire D60 Daylight fixtures. Kobayashi also used some flat-panel LED fixtures for front light and some small HID floodlights for backlight, to fill in areas that had no light from the windows, to create the total look he wanted. The Desire luminaire had the best colour balance of all the fixtures they tested and the D60 format gave them the coverage they needed.

ETC lighting system brings Shanghai Symphony Hall in perfect harmony

The 135-year-old Shanghai Symphony Orchestra now has a new home in the Shanghai Symphony Hall, which celebrated its long-awaited grand opening in September. The hall has a full complement of ETC equipment, including a Sensor®3 Power Control system with ThruPower modules, Source Four® PAR fixtures and an Eos® family lighting control system.

The venue contains two separate performance spaces: the Main Hall with 1,200 seats, which serves as a performance and rehearsal space, and the 400-seat Chamber Hall, which is used for recording and broadcasting. ETC Sensor3 power control racks dim both halls’ stage lighting. There are 100 Source Four PAR MCM fixtures used in the hall, with their delicate lighting complementing the interior design and immersing both the musicians and audience into the experience. Controlling the lighting fixtures are Ion® and Element® desks.

GREEN HIPPO Hippotizer V4 Product Launch – Taiga

Green Hippo is pleased to present Hippotizer Version 4, which saw its official launch at LDI in Las Vegas in November 2014. At ISE 2015, we will be showcasing the new systems to the European market. Every V4 system features front-panel indication of system status, removable hard drives as part of the STRATA Caddy System, all Solid State Drives as standard and the latest graphics technology to deliver unmatched performance. The powerhouse of the range, Hippotizer Taiga, redefines the possibilities within a single media server. Featuring six Display Port 1.2 or six DVI Dual Link outputs, Hippotizer Taiga can drive at least three 4K displays at full frame rate. Taiga uses the newest generation of server-class computer hardware to deliver unrivalled performance, and includes new feature components such as SHAPE, our 3D modelling software and our 3D Visualiser, which combines broadcast-quality video with a 3D model to accurately simulate even the most complicated shows.

Par4Keet wins InAVation Awards 2015

Green Hippo is proud to announce that Par4Keet, the flagship of the AViary Video Tools product range, was awarded ‘Best Display Product 2015’ at the InAVation Awards. The ceremony took place on 10 February at the Gashouder in Amsterdam and saw the attendance of many industry professionals, manufacturers, integrators and AV specialists. The InAVation Awards are the only AV industry awards event in the EMEA regions that recognises achievement, skill and creativity across all aspects of the professional AV industry. According to InAVate Publications: “This year’s InAVation Awards judges had to select finalists from nearly 200 entries. Finalists for the categories were decided by a weighted public vote. Using a points-based system, votes from technical managers, consultants, end users and integrators scored higher than those from manufacturers or distributors. A total of 24,452 legitimate votes were cast and many categories were hotly contested till the very end.” The award-winning Par4Keet is the first video player to combine class-leading video playback at 4K resolution and beyond, along with true realtime media manipulation and multi-screen. Par4Keet can deliver media at arbitrary Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Sponsor news

Pictured: HSL supplied lighting, plus all the necessary trussing and rigging, for 21 pantomines during the 2014/15 season for producer Qdos, including Cinderella at Clyde Auditorium in Glasgow

resolutions, untying AV professionals from the restrictions of standard aspect ratios and opening the doors on unrestricted and creative display configurations. Green Hippo’s Technical Director and Product Manager of the AViary Video Tools range, Sean Westgate, took receipt of the awards at the celebrations.

HSL Oh yes they did: HSL supplies 21 pantos

Blackburn based lighting and visuals rental company HSL supplied lighting, plus all necessary trussing and rigging, for no less than 21 pantomimes across the UK during the 2014/15 festive season for premier panto producer, Qdos. Panto done well is a fantastically perennial English performance institution, and all the Qdos shows combine lively narratives with slick, fast-paced, quick-witted interpretations of time-worn classics, loaded with heaps of slapstick and innuendo, to produce some superlative, very funny family entertainment. Fundamental to Qdos’s success is their investment in excellent production values. Project managed for HSL by Lee Farrell, the clutch of productions saw HSL working with a host of talented theatre lighting designers, including Nick Richings, Ben Cracknell, Matt Clutterham and others. 48

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Some intense logistics included dispatching 23 trucks from HSL containing about 1,013 moving lights, 838 generics, 74 standard strobes and more than 1,000 egg strobes fitted into festoon. This year, HSL purchased 1,051 new moving-light gobos and 234 new generic gobos to supplement the already massive Qdos gobo stock managed by the company. Over all the 21 shows, HSL fitted in excess of 2,000 gobos into moving lights and dispatched more than 800 generic gobos, both for their own stock and for venue in-house fixtures. In addition to the lights, HSL provided 704 lengths of Socapex cable, 2,223 lengths of TRS, 3,010 data cables and 704 by 15A to 16A adaptors. With a large number of motors, trussing and rigging equipment, 615 derig arms were provided, together with 117 assorted scaffolding bars, plus a lot more kit, to the 21 destinations the length and breadth of the country. The various productions played between three to eight weeks each. The largest ones included Cinderella at the 3,000-seater Clyde Auditorium in Glasgow, starring John Barrowman in another amazing performance, with The Krankies and lighting designed by Nick Richings; and the colourful and beautifully detailed Aladdin at Edinburgh’s King’s Theatre, with lighting designed by Ben Cracknell. Other notables included Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs at the Alhambra Theatre in Bradford, starring Billy Pearce and

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sponsornews@stld.org.uk

Joe McElderry in another show-stopper, with lighting designed by Matt Clutterham.

Cinderella, Glasgow Clyde Auditorium

Panto is one of the most galvanising and also the most fun genres of performance to light, and Cinderella at the Clyde Auditorium was the largest in terms of production on the Qdos list this year. The stage at Glasgow’s famous ‘armadillo’ is completely bare, so HSL supplied a full trussing and rigging system, and the first task saw the rigging crew, led by Paddy Neilly, install a substantial mother grid flown off the building’s structural steelwork and a Kinesys automation system, which was used to fly all the scenic pieces, Foyes personnel-flying track and a plethora of cloths. The riggers and the Qdos LX crew then installed five LX trusses, two pros trusses, an advance truss and six ladders – three in each wing – all of which provided lighting positions. The mother grid was constructed from 52cm heavy-duty Tomcat trussing, measured 12m wide by 11m deep and was designed by Paddy and HSL’s Rupert Reynolds. It was all about maximizing height, and in the 25m-high space to the building’s roof, they were able to gain 19 metres of travel for the Kinesys elements. The Kinesys system offered 16 axes of automation via 36 Liftket half-tonne motors fitted with Kinesys Elevation 1+ vari-speed controllers (32 active) – out of a total of 81 active motors supplied for the project. These moved five sets of set portals, five LX trusses, the dual Foyes track for the flying gags and various drapes trusses. All the moving elements were secured via the mother grid and the Foyes track was also integrated. About 200 lighting fixtures were supplied to fulfil Nick Richings’ vibrant design, and as is the oeuvre of panto lighting, everything is colourful, near-psychedelic, slightly offthe-wall and extremely pacey. Great for the imagination to run riot! The side-ladders were rigged with 22 Martin MAC 700 Profile moving lights, there were six MAC 3s on the front of the circle and nine MAC 2K Washes: two each on the left and right pros/side trusses and the rest on the advanced truss. Twelve Robe Pointes were divided into four on each pros truss and four on the advance bar, and these were used for various bits of eye-candy and doubled as audience illumination. Twenty-four Robe LEDWashes were dotted around the LX bars and used for general washing duties. Specials included two MAC 3s fitted with Quadray lenses upstage, which came into play for a couple of large magical effects, and two Novalight Nova Flowers located in the pit, activated for big powerful break-up effects in ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’. No panto would be complete – rock ‘n’ roll style – without a few strobes and these came in the form of Philips Nitro 510s, nine of which were spread out on the advance truss and overhead in the LX trusses, where they looked very punchy and cool. Fifteen Robe CitySkape 48 LED floods fitted with barn doors made powerful and versatile footlights and also for set dressing. Also along the front of the stage were some Philips SL10 LED battens. Twenty-three i-Pix Satellite LED bricks

highlighted the portal headers and a couple of i-Pix BB4 LED blinders were positioned for pros and portal up-lighting. The various cloths were washed with 20 PixelLine 1044 LED battens located on LX bars 2 and 5. In addition to all these moving and LED sources, a wide selection of generics, including ETC Source Four profiles and Pars, were rigged across all the overheads and ladders. A custom portal starcloth was supplied as commissioned by Qdos and atmospherics included two Gem Glaciators, two K1 hazers in the auditorium together with a Mini-Mist and a ZR33 for smoke effects. The lighting picture was completed with two Robert Juliat Cyrano follow-spots. The show was programmed by Nick Richings and Nick Beagley onto a grandMA 2 full-size console – running with two NPUs onstage – and the daily show operation was taken over at the dress rehearsal stage by Jamie Chaloner, who saw it through to the final show-stopping performance. HSL also supplied a large quantity of custom gobos for the various moving lights – and across the whole range of pantos, co-ordinating the production and supply of the custom gobos was one of the biggest brain-teasers for Lee Farrell and his team back at base.

JANDS VISTA Jands Vista L5 provides simple control for Bring Me the Horizon at Wembley

Lighting Designer Ben Inskip selected Jands’ flagship Vista L5 console to control his technically ambitious design for British metalcore band, Bring Me the Horizon, who recently played London’s iconic SSE Arena, Wembley. Ben has had success for some time touring on Bring Me the Horizon’s (BMTH) shows with a portable Vista setup consisting of S1 and M1 wings, combined with a MacBook Air, but he selected the Jands Vista L5 for this particular arena performance, the band’s biggest show to date. In addition to having plenty of computing power to deal with the demands of today’s largest shows, the Vista L5’s sleek design is dominated by a stunning 21in high-definition Wacom tablet that provides a crisp, detailed image of the same Vista v2 software that is used across the entire Vista console family. In addition to this, Ben is impressed with Vista’s simple approach to lighting control while still enabling programming of complex shows. Learn timing enables a whole number of cues, or cuelists, to be triggered from a single button press after the sequence has been played through once by the programmer. In addition to playing the show back on the L5, Ben used his existing S1 and M1 combination to pre-program the show offline. For this show, Ben ran the L5 as his master console, with an M1 wing connected for additional hands-on control. Ben’s S1 and MacBook then provided a fully tracked backup system. The Vista range includes a choice of portable, flexible control surfaces and self-contained consoles, all running the same Vista v2 software. Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Recent shows featuring lighting or media control by Vista include international concert tours by Queen + Adam Lambert, Kylie Minogue, Peter Gabriel, Dierks Bentley, Thompson Square, Fall Out Boy, Bloc Party, Deftones and Little Big Town.

momentum in the music industry. Using 5K Softs, pars bars and dusting off the four-way cyc lights, DOP Stu McCardle created a smoky blues club look. Using an ultra-bounce backdrop hung from the studio’s electric hoist truss grid, they were able to quickly produce stunning effects.

Jands Vista runs lighting and media for WaterTower Theatre’s production of Bonnie and Clyde

MARTIN BY HARMAN

The Jands Vista system was used to control the lighting and visual media elements for Texas-based WaterTower Theatre’s spectacular production of Bonnie and Clyde. Founded in 1996, the multi-award-winning WaterTower Theatre is a not-for-profit professional theatre company in Addison, Texas. It produces six main stage shows each season in its flexible, state-of-the-art facility, which is part of the Addison Theatre Centre. The centre already owned two Jands Vista consoles – the ultra-compact M1 and the original Vista T2 model – but recently added the range’s flagship L5 console to their inventory. Dan Schoedel of FullStageProductions.com, who was the lighting designer for Bonnie and Clyde, specified a fairly large rig for the show, which included Elation Design Spot and Power Wash fixtures, Chroma-Q Color Scrollers and K-9 Pup and Bulldog fixtures. The Jands Vista consoles and the ArKaos MediaMaster Pro 4.0 software were demonstrated and sold to the centre by North American distributor, A.C. Lighting Inc. The Addison Theatre Centre is currently celebrating its 21st anniversary year of providing live theatre to the Dallas area and has won numerous major awards in this time. The flagship Vista L5 console has an Intel Quad-Core i72600 (3.4GHz) processor and 8GB of dynamic randomaccess memory (DRAM). This combination is ideal for even the biggest show, where using lots of fixtures, LEDs and media servers can place significant demands on the console’s processor.

KEY LIGHT HIRE Mogwai – ‘Teenage Exorcist’ video

We were approached by Director Craig Murray and Producer Charlie Mather, who we have worked with on a number of projects in the studio, to film the video for the new single Teenage Exorcists by Mogwai. Mogwai are a Scottish post-rock band, formed in 1995 in Glasgow. Being artists themselves they approached Murray to direct the video due to his creative strengths and ambitious use of camera affects. DOP Colin Elves gave us a basic lighting list at the start to work with, but made full use of the onsite stores to achieve the looks he wanted.

The Wanton Bishops – ‘Sun Rising’ video

The Wanton Bishops (Nader Mansour/Eddy Ghossein) – a two-piece blues and garage rock band – have supported the likes of Guns N’ Roses and Lana Del Ray in the past and their newly released album ‘Sleep With The Lights On’ has seen them grow from strength to strength, gaining more 50

Set & Light | Spring 2015

HARMAN’s Martin Professional now shipping new flagship P3-300 System Controller™ LED Video Processor

HARMAN’s Martin Professional has announced that the P3300 System Controller™ LED video processor is now shipping. As the new flagship model of Martin’s P3 System Controller family, the P3-300 combines the award-winning P3 workflow with a new high-performance video-processing engine that can drive an unprecedented 2,000,000 pixels. Compatible with all Martin LED video products, the P3300 is the most versatile and user-friendly controller available on the market. The controller comes packed with a DVI-I video input and two SDI input ports (up to HD and 3G for use with professional broadcast equipment). A DMX input and a dedicated Ethernet port allow for real-time integration with lighting control protocols (DMX, ArtNET) and industry-leading automation systems. With an output capacity of more than 2,000,000 pixels, the P3-300 eliminates the need for stacking multiple controllers by allowing more fixtures to be driven from a single controller. All showfiles on the P3-300 are fully compatible with Martin P3 family controllers (P3100/200/PC). The controller also supports all input resolutions up to full HD, 1,920 by 1,080, and mounts in a 2U rack space.

HARMAN’s Martin Professional VC-Grid and VCStrip LED Video family now shipping in additional pixel pitches

The VC-Grid and VC-Strip LED Video family is now shipping in 15mm, 30mm and 60mm pixel pitches. Ideal for architectural installations, stage design and television set elements, Martin’s VC family ensures design freedom for lighting designers and integrators on any creative LED Video project. Martin’s VC-Grid is a compact and powerful LED video panel that offers individually controllable pixels in RGB and cool, medium and warm-white colors. The VC-Grid can be controlled via DMX or Martin’s awarding-winning P3 protocol, which provides high-quality image processing that eliminates the need for DMX pixelmapping, loose power supplies and cabling. A hybrid power/data cabling systems also allows multiple VC-Grids to be easily daisy-chained for more creative designs. The VC-Strip is a narrow and extremely flexible LED video strip that can be cut to any required length directly on site. The strips are fed power and data via Martin Professional’s P3 PowerPort 1500 and can be controlled by Martin’s P3 System Controller family. The VC-Strip is also fitted with colour temperature control, colour target control and gamma curve control, and is guaranteed to perform at

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the same frame rate as the video source. Additionally, the VC-Strip is fully compatible with Martin’s VC-Grid panel for more innovative and creative LED video designs. With the new 15, 30, and 60 pixel pitch options, designers are afforded an unprecedented versatility that ensures the VC-Grid and VC-Strip LED Video family can satisfy even the most demanding elements of a design.

Martin Professional introduces RUSH PAR 2 CT Zoom Lighting Fixture with pre-mixed white light

Recently, at Integrated Systems Europe (ISE) 2015, HARMAN’s Martin Professional introduced the RUSH PAR 2 CT Zoom lighting fixture: the latest addition to the RUSH by Martin line for the installation and entertainment markets. The RUSH PAR 2 CT Zoom is a bright single-lens LED PAR can that offers fully pre-mixed white colour temperatures for a range of applications. With 12 by 10W WW/CW (warm white and cold white) LEDs and a motorised zoom ranging from 10 to 60 degrees, the RUSH PAR 2 CT Zoom provides bright pre-mixed white colour washes as well as electronic dimming and variable strobe effects. The fixture features a unique temperature-controlled cooling system that ensures smooth, low-noise operation. While the RUSH PAR 2 CT Zoom is DMXcontrollable (five-pin XLR), it also offers a stand-alone mode via an LCD-display control panel. The luminaire is housed in black aluminum frame and is supplied with a flexible bracket for either floor or truss mounting.

PHILIPS Winner of the Philips Strand Lighting upcycling competition announced

The Philips Strand Lighting centenary competition to upcycle a vintage Strand PATT 23 or 123 lamp has announced its winner. The competition saw much success, with numerous international entrants and 175 people following the Pinterest inspiration board. Award-winning architectural lighting designer Paul Nulty’s ‘Anamorphosis’ was the winning entry, beating fellow finalists architectural lighting designer Joe Vose’s ‘Back to The Future’ and artist/designer Derek Goldsmith’s ‘321 Zero’. The three designs artfully reflect the brand’s significant history, while giving the iconic luminaires a new lease of life. “The old Strand designs are classics, so it was interesting to see how people responded to the challenge of upcycling them, while retaining the heritage of the original products,” says Philips Lighting Application Design Lead and competition judge Mike Simpson. “I think in the winning entries we have different perspectives, from something more akin to a piece of art to practical designs that could work as

modern lighting pieces.” ‘Anamorphosis’ sees Nulty use the Strand PATT 23 as the focal point of a dynamic feature chandelier, highlighting the technological advancements in the lighting industry by ‘taking the good of the old and combining it with the ingenuity of the new’. Vose’s ‘Back to the Future’ design replaces the lamp of a PATT 123 with a WiFi connected media projector, creating a fun tool for watching films or television, which also works as a beautiful decorative object when not in use. Goldsmith’s ‘321 Zero’ is a multi-functional flying saucer design, which can work as a small table downlighter or, with the addition of a Philips pocket projector and the replacement of the Fresnel lens with clear glass, can project moving images onto a surface below. All three finalists had their designs brought to life by Howard Eaton Lighting and exhibited at The Society of Light and Lighting Fresnel Lecture on 10 March. The special event, which took place at The Royal Institution, was chiefly sponsored by Philips and marks 200 years since Augustine Fresnel invented his Wave Theory of Light. The anniversary also coincides with the UNESCO International Year of Light 2015. Attendees witnessed the announcement of Paul Nulty as the competition’s overall winner.

Philips Vari-Lite continues VL4000 Spot training at RADA

Philips Vari-Lite is currently rolling out training for the industry standard VL4000 Spot, with one of the most recent workshops taking place at London’s RADA. Highly experienced Vari-Lite trainer for EMEA, Coral Cooper, was hosting the hands-on session, where the VL4000 Spot luminaires were disassembled to the subassembly level to demonstrate ideal maintenance techniques. Cooper also explained the VL4000 Spot luminaire’s broad range of features, informing the end users and potential customers at the session on how to maximise its vast potential. Among the attendees was James Ashdown, Director at Automated Ltd. Also there to get up close and personal with the luminaire was Bianca Mastroianni, a freelance lighting technician working in the UK on fringe theatre and in Australia on large musicals and festivals.

Set & Light | Spring 2015

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Sponsor news

Pictured: An array of Philips Selecon luminaires were used by Rapenburg Plaza to light the new National Military Museum in The Netherlands

Rapenburg Plaza provides Philips Selecon colourchanging solution for National Military Museum

King Willem Alexander of the Netherlands has opened a prestigious new cultural and historical institution at The Netherlands’ former Soesterberg air base. The National Military Museum (NMM) is the largest of its kind in Europe and displays the significance of The Netherlands’ armed forces in the past, present and future, with an array of Philips Selecon luminaires lighting the majority of the exhibits. Amsterdam-based agency Rapenburg Plaza was in charge of the lighting design, AV and control systems for the entire museum, choosing 42 Philips Selecon PLcyc1, 12 PLprofile1 RGBW and 269 PLfresnel1 RGBW luminaires for key lighting in six of the museum’s themed halls. The NMM is a specifically designed building by architects Felix Claus Dick van Wageningen with a floor area of 35,000 metres squared and an overall height of 17m. Rapenburg Plaza designed sophisticated technical lighting bridges installed in the high ceilings for access to lighting and AV equipment for maintenance, as well as long-distance cable runs and multiple server rooms. As visitors wander through the space they experience real-life soldier stories, live action demonstrations and numerous awe-inspiring historical images, artifacts and large objects such as tanks and aircraft, carefully illuminated by the energy-efficient and intelligent Selecon luminaires. The National Military Museum is open Tuesday to Sunday, 10am to 5pm, and on Mondays during school holidays.

PHOTON BEARD PhotonBeam 80

Photon Beard Ltd is delighted to introduce their new PhotonBeam 80. This is their first LED fixture, adapting their 52

Set & Light | Spring 2015

PhotonBeam 800 Redhead to be able to house a powerful remote phosphor LED source. This has the advantage of bringing tried-and-tested remote phosphor technology to a compact flood that can provide good shadow definition where required. A high CRI above 90 in both ‘daylight’ and ‘tungsten’ balance ensures good colour rendering on camera. The PhotonBeam 80 provides a 60-degree beam angle and 335 lux at 3m, which is a touch over their PhotonSpot 300 Fresnel on its 60-degree flood setting (or around one third of the output of the standard Redhead), with just 80W of power. The PhotonBeam 80 can be mains or battery powered and is supplied with a universal PSU for 90V to 260V mains power, with optional V Lock and Gold Mount battery adaptors available for cable-free use. The lampheads come with a daylight phosphor as standard, but tungsten phosphors are available and changing between them takes a matter of seconds. And as it’s in the same shell as their Redhead, all standard Redhead accessories are fully compatible with the PhotonBeam 80.

Platinum Blonde

The Platinum Blonde is a new light based on tried-and-tested technology. Photon Beard Ltd have taken a much-used and widely available lamp, the double-ended 1,200W HMI, and utilised the housing of their 2kW Tungsten Blonde. The result is a lightweight, portable, high-output, low-cost daylight source with known colour characteristics and great quality of light. The open-faced format is ideal for any situation where raw output is the main requirement, such as a bounce light, or punching through diffusion. Because the Platinum Blonde is only 1,200W, it can be powered from virtually any domestic supply worldwide and can also be run from small

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generators for location and mobile shooting. Much like a standard ‘Blonde’, the Platinum Blonde can be focused from 30 to 65 degrees, to allow flexibility in use without the need for additional lenses. The Platinum Blonde is available as a complete system, including lamphead with lamp, barndoors, attached header cable and a 575/1200W electronic ballast. The ballast is wired with the standardised pin configuration. It can also be supplied as a lamphead complete as above but without ballast.

The goal of Behind the Scenes Happy Hour was not only to throw a great party but to raise money for the Behind the Scenes charity, which provides financial support to entertainment technology professionals when they are ill or injured or to their surviving family members. Funds can be used towards medical care, basic living costs and funeral expenses. Behind the Scenes, an initiative of the PLASA Foundation (formerly the ESTA Foundation), brings help and hope in times of great need.

PLASA

PLASA announces 2014 election results

PLASA announces winners of 2014 Members’ Choice Product Awards

On 22 November 2014, PLASA announced the winners of the 2014 Members’ Choice Awards during the LDI Awards Ceremony. These awards recognise newly released outstanding entertainment technology products. Voting on these awards was open to all employees of PLASA member companies who attended the LDI Tradeshow in Las Vegas. In the Expendable Category, Rose Brand won for the Pro-Gaffer’s Tape in Fluorescent Blue. In the Gadget Category, Electronic Theatre Controls (ETC) won for the Nomad. And in the Equipment Category, Interactive Technologies won for the CueServer 2. Congratulations to the winners!

PLASA’s Behind the Scenes Happy Hour a success

The Behind the Scenes Happy Hour, hosted by PLASA, was the biggest pre-LDI party of the year, with over 400 guests attending. Twenty-three sponsors donated towards the event and all proceeds went to the Behind the Scenes charity, totalling over $18,000. Event co-chair Steven Way, President of ALPS, said: “Our entire committee was very pleased with the new ‘happy hour’ format for this PLASA event. Our sponsors really stepped up, allowing us to expand the food and drink offerings, reach a wider audience of industry professionals and, more importantly important, present the Behind the Scenes charity with a wonderful donation. Many attendees said this was our best event, with amazing networking, and they look forward to next year.” The Behind the Scenes Happy Hour took place on 20 November 2014 at the Westgate Las Vegas (formerly the Las Vegas Hotel). PLASA would like to thank the sponsors: 4Wall Entertainment (Diamond), Altman Lighting (Diamond), CHAUVET Professional (Diamond), I.A.T.S.E. (Diamond), LDI (Platinum), Nemetschek Vectorworks Inc (Platinum), Ultratec (Platinum), Barbizon Lighting Company (Gold), PixelFLEX (Gold), RC4 Wireless (Gold), Stage Equipment and Lighting Inc (Gold), TOMCAT USA INC (Gold), Total Structures (Gold), TRUSST (Gold), Heartland Scenic Studio Inc (Silver), iWeiss Theatrical Solutions (Silver), LEX Products (Silver), Alan Rowe & Tristan Smith (Silver), Sapsis Rigging Inc (Silver), Shepard Exposition Services (Silver), Stan Pressner (Silver) and Mike Wood Consulting, LLC (Silver). The official media sponsors were Lighting&Sound America and Protocol. Event lighting was donated by A.C. Lighting Inc.

PLASA’s month-long elections to determine positions on its European and North American Regional Boards, together with its central Governing Body, concluded at midnight on Wednesday 19 November. Companies and individuals from PLASA’s worldwide membership voted in the elections, which were conducted via a secure online poll. There were four positions available on the European Regional Board. Ed Pagett, of Panalux, was elected for a second term as Chairman; Peter James, of Shure Distribution, as representative to PLASA’s Distributor members; and Malcolm Burlow, of Highlite, was voted as the Dealer/Retailer representative. Robert Kronman joins the Board as the new Individual representative. Four positions were also up for election on the North American Regional Board, with Todd Spencer, of PSAV, elected as Vice-Chairman; Tracey Cosgrove, of Rosco Laboratories, as Secretary; Orestes Mihaly, of PRG, filling the position of Production Services representative; and John Cini, of High Output Inc, voted on to represent Rental members. The Governing Body elections, which ran alongside the Regional Board elections, aimed to fill a single ‘at-large’ position voted for by the combined Business and Organisational memberships. John Simpson, of White Light, successfully retained his position and will continuing working with Individual Member John McGraw and Steve Terry of ETC as the three ‘at-large’ members who sit on the Governing Body alongside the Chair, Vice Chair and Treasurer of each of the Regional Boards. All the candidates commit to three-year terms on their respective Boards, which commenced on 1 January.

PROLYTE Experience the new website from Prolyte Group

Prolyte is proud to announce the launch of its new website. Setting out to create a modern, fully-functional online platform to offer not only product information, but also inspiration and technical support, Prolyte aimed to reach out to its users by offering diverse yet relevant information for product as well as technical aspects. Featuring a modern pageless design and up-to-date functionalities, the website is now also available for mobile devices, such as Smartphones and tablets. Apart from detailed and extensive product information, the website offers interactive functionalities such as a forum and Set & Light | Spring 2015

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integrated social media links, including share buttons and a Facebook feed. The Inspiration homepage offers cases and a gallery, where pictures can be downloaded once registered. Prolyte plans to release more information, an updated symbol library, a multi-language platform and more blogs in the near future, so stay tuned to watch our online platform grow into a real tool to help you build great things.

Massive roof structure for PROmontaje

Operating in the Latin American market, the Venezuelan based PROmontaje needed a solution to host large outdoor events and concerts. PROmontaje owns a large event site, just outside Caracas, which they plan to use for a range of outdoor concerts and sports events. PROmontaje is the main provider of technical resources for events in Venezuela and dedicated to supplying the best possible technical resources for the production of sporting events, shows and corporate events. Jean Paul Gaspard of Audio Concept, Prolyte distributor in Latin America, brought PROmontaje in contact with Prolyte. The structure PROmontaje was looking for needed to have enough loading capacity, paired with a large-sized stage and sufficient clearance. Recently, PROmontaje invested in a large sound system by Meyer, so the roof system should also be able to accommodate that weight. The XXL roof system is based on 13 CT towers, of which one is a stack tower underneath the back span. The roof has a main grid based on B100RV truss and a pitched roof structure based on B52SV truss, which is the standard S52SV truss adapted with a main chord of 60mm by 6mm. Layher adapters guarantee a flawless integration of the towers and the stage. ProLyft Aetos hoists lift the 17-ton structure in place.

RML Children in Need Scotland

Children in Need needs no introduction; after so many successful years of fundraising and achieving greatness, everyone wants to be a part of it. The line-up for the main show, filmed in London, is always huge, but in addition to that they have regional shows across the country. This year Richard Martin Lighting (RML) continued our support by providing lights for the Glasgow show, filmed in the BBC Studios at Pacific Quays. With all of the changes to studios in London, over the past few years we have done more and more work in Manchester and Glasgow and now our brand is a recognisable one there, which is a great achievement. To ensure we at RML can provide the type of service our customers can and should expect, we work with local company Teknique Systems Ltd (TSL), who oversee our projects in Scotland. Tony Kennedy and his team have a great rapport with customers and know the crew and studios like the back of their hand, making them an obvious choice to work with. Roger Williams designed the huge lighting show, which was formed of Robin LED 600 Wash, MAC 500, MAC Auras, 54

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Sunstrips, a Followspot and an incredible 50 LC2140 panels! The extravaganza was hosted by Jackie Bird live throughout the evening, and in Scotland alone, the generous public raised £2.2 million, with the grand total now standing at a £32,620, 469.

Eggheads

Teatime quiz show Eggheads is currently filming a new series. The show, hosted by Jeremy Vine, sees two teams going head-to-head through five rounds of gruelling questions and intense brain teasers. Highly regarded quiz and gameshow champions (rotating each episode) are pitted against a team of five ‘challengers’, who attempt to beat the ‘Eggheads’. Lighting Designer Martin Kempton, supported by Richard Martin Lighting (RML), continues to originate the show, which now features our latest purchase the VL4000 Spot. To go with the rest of the set Martin chose MAC Auras, Chroma Banks and MAC 250s The 12 Yard Productions show is filmed at the Pacific Quays, Glasgow, and so, as with all of our other Scotland shows, Tony Kennedy and his team at Tecknique Systems are on hand to make sure that everything runs smoothly and that all of the team are happy.

F1 – The Musical

Formula 1 is one of the most popular and far-reaching sports in the world. Not only are there fast cars, amazing tracks and exotic locations, there are also beautiful woman, champagne and super-rich people. Something for everyone, you might say! As part of the coverage on Sky Sports F1 HD, an unusual and yet fascinating collaboration took place, which was filmed in Sky Studios 5. The Ballad of the Duelling Drivers is a musical journey through the 2014 season’s battle between the two Mercedes drivers, which has been created and directed by Sky Sports F1’s Alex Rodger. Musical performance on the day was by Tokio Myers, one of the most exciting and creative composers, pianists and all-round musical geniuses of this generation. Actor Peter Guinness narrates the viewers through 2014’s turbulent season. LD Richard Bowles designed the lights for the performance, which was supplied by Richard Martin Lighting (RML). The specification included VL 1000s, Clay Paky Alpha Beam 700s, VL 3000s and the new Clay Paky Mythos.

The RML review

Over recent years there have been so many changes in the lighting industry, the most hard hitting being all of the London studios closing down. However, one studio that is going from strength to strength is Sky. We have been doing a number of shows there over the past few months and here are just a couple of the highlights: Sportswoman of the Year Awards – Now in their 27th year, the awards celebrate the outstanding contribution to sport made by elite performers, coaches, administrators, community volunteers and inspirational female figures. Nominees are voted for by readers of The Sunday Times and SkySports viewers. This year’s winner was Olympic dressage

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

champion Charlotte Dujardin. Our lighting brief was to produce a ‘glamorous look without the use of much smoke’. We supplied Sharpys, which were used to punch beams through the slight haze, Robe ROBIN 100 LEDBeams to light each table and a few MAC Auras to light the underside of the header. Lighting design was by Iain Davidson with Mark Ninnim. The exterior was also lit with some P5s for a dramatic openingsequence shot using a helicopter drone mounted camera. The Rory Peck Awards – Lighting Designer Malcolm Reed chose a mixture of LED and moving heads to light this year’s Rory Peck Awards. The evening is supported and aired as part of Sky, although it is held in London’s BFI National Film Theatre. The rig included VL3000 Spots, GLP Impressions, ROBIN 100 LEDBeams, Pixel Par 90 (IP20) and 12 X1TC Strip. When we watch the news and see some of the intense and horrific situations in which people around the world live, we often forget to stop and remember the crew who bring that news and those visuals to us: the people who are so often risking their lives to do so. The Rory Peck Trust supports freelance newsgatherers and their families worldwide in times of need and promotes their welfare and safety. It was set up back in 1995, two years after Rory was killed filming in Moscow. This totally independent trust relies on income from grants, sponsorship and charitable donations, so when Richard Martin Lighting were asked to provide lights for the annual awards again, we were more than happy to be involved.

The Great Culture Quiz

Leading arts institutions go head-to-head for the ultimate test in a new quiz show. From cave paintings to Lady Gaga, The Great Culture Quiz pushes the experts, and viewers at home, to the very limit of their arts knowledge. Richard Bowles designed the lighting show, which is hosted by Anita Rani. The lighting rig includes MAC TW1s and VL2000 Spots, which enhanced the bold and bright set.

ROBE Ein Herz für Kinder show ‘Hearts’ 100 Robe BMFLs

German lighting designer Manfred ‘Vossi’ Voss used 100 Robe BMFL Spots to light the 2014 Ein Herz für Kinder (‘A Heart for Children’) show: a high-profile charity fundraiser produced by Schwartzkopff tv, staged at the new and trendy Tempelhof airport, Berlin, and broadcast live on German national public services channel, ZDF. Technical provider was the Berlin-based PRO LIGHT Lichttechnik Vermietung GmbH. The BMFL Spot fixtures were supplied by NicLen. Sixty of the BMFL Spots were used to light the audience and 40 were dotted around the stage – all hung on trusses in the roof. They were used throughout the show for a variety of tasks, including creating general lighting ambience and scenes, as well as spectacular effects for the cameras and the live audience.

The show featured special live performances from The Voice Kids, Norske Talenter star Angelina Jordan, awardwinning international singer/songwriter James Blunt, folk musician Andreas Gabalier, maverick German musician Peter Maffay and superstar Chris de Burgh, while the guests included a glittering array of A-list celebrities and VIPs from the worlds of business and politics, plus social and community activists. Voss chose Robe’s BMFL for its low weight – under 36kg – its fantastic zoom range from five to 55 degrees, as well as its incredibly bright light output. Frank Hofmann and Andreas Haslbeck operated the event’s lighting using a GrandMA1 console. The set was designed by Hassler Made GmbH and the programme directed by Ladislaus Kiraly. The event raised over 16 million Euros for the Ein Herz für Kinder organisation. It was founded in 1978 by publisher Axel Spinger and the BILD newspaper, originally to promote traffic safety for children. Now ‘A Heart for Children’ raises large sums of money year-round, which goes to help children living tough and challenging lives, supporting nonprofit organisations, projects and children’s hospitals, kindergartens, schools and food banks. In collaboration with hospitals, the organisation also enables life-saving treatments and surgeries for overseas children and help for children and young people caught in war and conflict zones and disaster areas.

Robe BMFL 1,700W lamp life confirmed

Robe Lighting’s RnD department has finished an extensive and comprehensive piece of research and testing in conjunction with lamp manufacturers Osram, relating to the longevity of the Lok-it!® HTI® 1700/PS lightsource used in Robe’s new signature BMFL™ fixture, when run consistently in its brightest 1,700W mode. This confirms that the lamp life expectancy is exactly the same when the fixture is run in 1,700W mode as in 1,200W and 1,500W modes. Therefore, Robe can categorically announce that the BMFL lamp lifetime is the same in all three modes – 750 hours. The project also examined the lumen maintenance of the source at 750 hours when run in 1,700W mode and reports that lumen output was measured at 60 per cent compared to that of a new lamp – representing a 40 per cent drop over the full lifespan. Thanks to two years of extensive RnD work by Robe, a special driving and heat management system has been devised for the lamp, resulting in a proprietary solution to maintain the same colour temperature in all three power modes, as well as when dimmed from 100 per cent to 20 per cent. This technology has been patented by Robe. Robe will soon launch the second product in the BMFL range, the BMFL Blade: a framing shutter luminaire using the same Osram Lok-it!® HTI® 1700/PS lightsource.

Robe launches new French subsidiary

Czech Republic based lighting manufacturer Robe Lighting s.r.o. announces the launch of a new wholly-owned subsidiary, Robe Lighting France S.A.S, which will be Set & Light | Spring 2015

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On joining Stage Electrics she was tasked by Adrian Searle, Head of Technical & Hire Operations, to refocus the company’s hire sales team.

Stage Electrics & Northern Light strengthen executive board

headquartered in Paris. Robe Lighting France S.A.S. will be headed up by two senior managers. Managing Director Bruno Garros, a familiar face in the world of the French professional entertainment lighting market, takes the helm of the French operation alongside Elie Battah, who as Business Development Manager for France, will spearhead the parent company’s business plan. The new subsidiary is part of Robe Lighting s.r.o.’s planned medium-term expansion strategy, and follows robust trading worldwide in recent years. Robe Lighting France joins four other highly successful fully Robe-owned operations worldwide – in the UK, USA, UAE and Singapore. Also responsible for Robe Lighting France will be Ingo Dombrowski, Key Account Manager Europe, who has already been active in the territory for several years, and International Sales Director Harry von den Stemmen, coordinator of Robe’s global sales operations.

STAGE ELECTRICS Stage Electrics appoints Colette Carter as Hire Sales Manager

With Colette Carter having recently joined Stage Electrics as Sales Manager with responsibility for developing growth in hire, she has been swift to act by restructuring the customer-facing hire team. Based at the company’s headquarters, Colette brings a wealth of experience to Stage Electrics’ London and Bristol operations, having worked for more than 20 years within the engineering and distribution industries. Previously, Colette was branch manager at Buck and Hickman, one of the UK’s leading distributors of tools, maintenance and health & safety equipment. Prior to that she had moved up ‘through the ranks’, holding a number of key management positions. 56

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Greg Wood has been appointed to the Group Executive Board in the position of Chief Operating Officer, further strengthening the senior management team. Greg, a CIMA qualified accountant, joins the business from the Avesco Group, where his senior positions included Group Finance and Operations Director for Presteigne Broadcast Hire. With considerable experience in the live events and hire markets, Greg is perfectly positioned to utilise the experience he has gained at Avesco and apply it to his new role.

TIFFEN The Tiffen Company’s Lowel PRO Power LED – serious lights, serious kits

A compact LED lighting solution for the run and gun shooter, the PRO Power LED allows photographers and videographers to get the most out of their location The Tiffen Company, a leading manufacturer of awardwinning imaging accessories, has announced that the PRO Power LED, Lowel’s newest LED lighting solution, is now available for purchase. The Lowel PRO Power LED is a compact focusing light available in hi-CRI tungsten or daylight colour, with impressive output and a wide fresnel 8:1 focus range. It is comparable to a 150W tungsten-halogen fixture with similar optics. Dimmable without colour shift, the light works with both AC power and its special DC accessory battery system, which can clamp-mount to the stand or be used with a shoulder strap for handheld lighting. The Lowel PRO light is perfect for onthe-go shooting and small location studio setups. Lowel has always gone the extra mile in quality of design and product manufacturing, with the real-world needs of the location shooter in mind. As such, the PRO Power LED has a host of available light control and mounting accessories available, plus a full range of compact and versatile lighting kits. The Lowel PRO Power LED is now available for $850 USD. For purchasing details, technical specifications and other information, visit http://lowel.tiffen.com/pro-power-led/

Steven Tiffen, Jeff Cohen and Michael Fecik honoured with award

Recognised for efforts in developing infrared-reducing dyebased filters for digital cameras, the honourees received the Academy’s Special Plaque during the Scientific and Technical Awards presentation Steven Tiffen, Jeff Cohen and Michael Fecik of The Tiffen

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Company were honoured with the Scientific and Technical Academy Award of Commendation during the academy’s Scientific and Technical Awards presentation on 7 February. Portions of the evening’s event were included in the Oscars telecast on 22 February. The trio were recognised for their efforts in developing dye-based filters that reduce infrared contamination when neutral density filters are used with digital cameras. The academy’s Scientific and Technical Awards acknowledge industry experts whose discoveries and innovations have contributed in significant and lasting ways to motion pictures. The Tiffen pioneers are the only recipients of this year’s Academy Award® of Commendation. The Academy honoured 21 scientific and technical achievements in total at its annual presentation at the Beverly Wilshire in Beverly Hills. The full list of honorees can be viewed at http://www.oscars.org/news/21-scientificand-technical-achievements-be-honored-academy-awardsr

UNUSUAL RIGGING Oh what a circus with Barnum

The much-anticipated tour of the smash hit musical Barnum opened at Leicester’s Curve Theatre on 5 September 2014. Running there for just over a week, three days later, the performance was opening to audiences at the Bristol Hippodrome. This has set the pattern for the rest of the tour, which continues well into 2015. The cast and crew and the show’s riggers have just two-and-a-half days to get out of one venue, travel to the next and reassemble the entire set before performances begin. Chris Boone, the production manager behind the show, said: “It’s been a long time since a tour like Barnum has been undertaken, and in the whole of Barnum’s history, never has such a complicated set of automated scenic effects been designed and produced. If you then add in the tight turnaround between venues.” Due to the demands of the tour, Unusual dedicated two production riggers to the tight weekly schedule. Howard Dandy and Mark Davies played a number of roles within the design and build process, from rigging to winch technicians, programmers and operators. Howard said: “To be able to work effectively, we’ve had to leave as much of the rigging and circus truss built and prerigged from show to show. The gantry and the circus truss has been fabricated to split into sections to provide a structure and a system that’s completely flexible and changeable, as the needs of the theatres change from venue to venue. All of the winch cables, circus equipment, safety lines, gantry steel wire rope, lights, sound for the truss and gantry, live and slot inside each other to save time and space.” With just two-and-a-half days for the move between shows to be completed, Unusual Rigging streamlines the load-ins by splitting the crew. One goes ahead to start at the next theatre, while the other loads out and then travels to the next venue. To make the most efficient use of time, Unusual splits the kit across trucks so it travels with the set, sound or lights that it is being rigged with.

WHITE LIGHT Alicia Earls joins White Light

Events production supplier White Light is pleased to announce the appointment of Alicia Earls as Business Development Manager for Events. Alicia joins White Light after more than seven years as Communications Manager for the Science Museum Group, where she helped develop the hugely successful #StrictlySW7 event showcase involving the Science Museum and neighbouring venues the Natural History Museum and the Victoria and Albert museum. Originally intended to be a one-off event to celebrate the transformation of Exhibition Road in the run-up to the Olympics, the event has now become an eagerly-anticipated date in the industry calendar. Alicia joins the White Light Events team from April 2015. In her new role, she will focus on expanding the company’s relationships with corporate clients and strengthening links with key events venues. She brings to the role more than a decade of experience in the events industry working with a broad range of clients, including Coca-Cola, EE, Virgin Media Business, Friends of the Earth, Siemens and Condé Nast.

White Light Super Dealer for RUSH

Entertainment production supplier White Light has recently been named a Super Dealer for the RUSH brand of lighting effect products made by Martin Professional. The company will also keep stock of selected RUSH products, to be shipped directly from its London facility. Launched earlier this year, the comprehensive RUSH product line brings to the market the latest effect technology at an affordable price, backed by the Martin Professional reputation for quality products. All RUSH by Martin products will be available for sale through White Light, including the new RUSH MH 5 Profile – a bright, compact LED profile moving head suitable for touring bands, live music venues or any installation where size and weight of fixtures is a key concern. With the addition of RUSH brand products, White Light further enhances its selection of quality lighting effects products available for sale. The company already carries equipment from leading entertainment manufacturers, including other Martin Professional products. Customers who buy through White Light benefit from the company’s extensive expertise, as well as superior after-sales support. Those looking to buy from White Light can get a quote by contacting White Light over the phone, email or online at the White Light web shop.

Expanding tech knowledge with Unique Venues

Leading lighting and AV supplier White Light recently partnered with the National Gallery to host a special educational session for event professionals from venues in the Unique Venues of London group. White Light is an approved supplier across many of London’s premier events venues, including Unique Venues of London spaces. The morning event, hosted in the National Gallery’s Sainsbury Wing Theatre, was designed to help attendees broaden their knowledge of the technical aspects of event production. Set & Light | Spring 2015

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

LCD monitor and two 50in plasma screens for autocue, plus a 65in Samsung LCD monitor for the backstage VIP area.

XL Video supplies projection for QI

More than 80 professionals attended the event, which featured a seminar, workshop and Q&A session with White Light’s technical experts. Guests were also treated to a gourmet breakfast provided by caterer Peyton Events, an approved supplier across the UVL group. White Light’s Project Manager Jason Larcombe and Head of Audio Lee Dennison spoke on topics including lighting, audio and video for events. The White Light panel also discussed best practices for safe working and important considerations for technical teams working in unique and historic spaces.

Working with Production Manager Sarah Chaloner and Designer Jonathan Paul Green, XL Video supplied a projection system for studio recordings of ‘Series L’ of the popular QI Ltd/TalkBack Television show, QI. Created by John Lloyd, QI is a comedy quiz show hosted by Stephen Fry and featuring regular panelist Alan Davies, broadcast on BBC Two. The set includes two projection screens that are key to the quiz show, displaying clues and visual alerts throughout the game. For the projection, XL Video Project Manager, Jeff Bailey, specified two of XL’s Barco SLM R12+ projectors, each of which fed to a 13ft by 7.5ft screen. Bailey chose the R12+ projectors for their three-chip DLP colours and bright 12,000 lumen light output. For screens, XL supplied Repro H screens. These were selected as they minimise the hot spot that the camera sees in the projected picture – particularly important when projection is used for broadcast media.

XL VIDEO XL Video in Bruce’s Hall of Fame

XL Video supplied LED and video screens for an hour-long special – Bruce’s Hall of Fame – produced by Hat Trick Productions. The show was recorded on 1 November at the London Palladium and aired on BBC1 on 27 December 2014. The special celebrated Bruce Forsyth’s long career in showbusiness and featured artists paying tribute to the stars who inspired them. Stars appearing included Jessie Wallace, who recalled music hall legend Marie Lloyd; Jamie Cullum, who performed a Tony Bennett song; and Alfie Boe, who was inspired by Dean Martin. Working with Production Designer Markus Blee and Line Producer Charlene Farrell, XL Video supplied two types of LED for the show’s set: a 5.4m wide by 3m high LED screen formed of its ROE MC-7T product and a 7m wide by 2.5m high Unilumin 3.9mm LED screen. The high-resolution ROE MC-7T screen was flown and used as both an audience relay screen and backdrop with graphics to match the set. As part of the stage design Markus Blee required a central screen for VT packages and graphics that could also be used as a sliding door entrance for Bruce Forsyth and the other star performers. This screen needed to be very high resolution to minimise moire from tight camera shots, and be lightweight enough for a curtain track. Jeff Bailey selected XL’s high-resolution Unilumin 3.9mm LED as the perfect solution. The tiles were built into two 3.5m wide by 2m high screen doors, with a 500mm 3.9mm LED header to cover the curtain truss. Each LED door was independently processed and the two pictures seamlessly stitched back together. XL Video also supplied the production with a 75in Samsung 58

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XL Video supplies video for X Factor

For the most recent run of Thames TV/SycoTV’s popular talent search, The X Factor, XL Video supplied custom video set-ups for several of the guest artist appearances. Working with One Direction and their Creative Director, Lee Lodge, XL Video provided 144 Barco MiStrip LED batons, which were housed in a custom structure created by design studio Artisan as a backdrop for the band’s performance of their recent single ‘Steal My Girl’. The MiStrips complemented a sea of lasers behind the band, and content for the batons was controlled by two of XL’s d3 media servers. When Take That performed as a three-piece on The X Factor’s Sunday night results show, their Production Director, Chris Vaughan, contacted XL Video to provide projection mapping for a multi-surface stage set incorporating more than 40 blocks of varying sizes. For this mapped projection, XL Video supplied six of their brightest Barco HDQ-2K40 projectors, which covered the surfaces of the rear blocks and dancer podiums. The platform on which Take That performed their hit ‘These Days’ was covered by two of XL’s Panasonic 20K projectors. The complex mapping and content control was supplied using three of XL Video’s d3 media servers.

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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 13, Mount Road Industrial Estate, Feltham, Middlesex TW13 6AR 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

Set & Light | Spring 2015

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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

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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

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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 | Spring 2015

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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 Clay Paky Doughty 64

Set & Light | Spring 2015

23 35 29

ELP ETC Lee Filters

BC 27 IFC

Unusual Rigging White Light

19 39

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Set & Light | Spring 2015

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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 66

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