CHAUVET Professional fixtures rocked on stage next to Blue Öyster Cult, during a fiery performance at The NAMM Show 2013. Blue Haze Entertainment lighting company of Los Angeles specified CHAUVET Professional SparkliteLED Drape tricolor LED star field drape, COLORado Range and COLORado 1-Tri Tour wash lights and COLORdash Batten Tri linear fixtures.
Chauvet displayed a variety of LED fixtures with French distributor Algam at the SIEL trade show in Paris, Feb. 4-6. CHAUVET Professional lights included six Legend 230 SR Beam moving yokes on center circle trussing, 16 PVP S5 high-definition video panels on each sides of the center round trussing, 18 MVP 12 video panels with three screens of different lengths handing on each side of the stand, four Q-Wash 436Z-LED and six Q-Wash 560Z-LED wash lights, six Legend 412 pixel-mapping moving yokes, Ovation E-190WW and Ovation F-165WW theatrical fixtures, COLORdash Par-Quad 7, COLORado 4 IP linear wash light, COLORado Zoom WW Tour, COLORado 1-Quad Tour, COLORado 1 Tour and COLORado 2 Tour fixtures.
Mike Graham comfortable in the spotlight.
Written by Mike Graham, product manager for CHAUVET Professional
One of my favorite lines from “The Breakfast Club” is “It’s an imperfect world. Screws fall out all the time”. Truer words have never been spoken. If you ask any seasoned show technician, they will tell you that they remember more shows that went wrong than went right. The trick is to know how to react when it all goes wrong.
This past week during the Super Bowl, the lights went out. When I saw that, my first thought was, “I’m glad I’m not there working.” My second thought was, “How will they get the lights back on and keep everyone in the stands safe while doing so?” From what I could tell on TV, it looked like the security team and the engineers at the stadium had a good action plan to cover the unthinkable happening. That could have been a complete disaster, but luckily for everyone at the stadium, it was fixed and the game went on.
Here are a few tips on how to keep show problems from becoming showstoppers:
1. Know your gear – Knowing the ins and outs of your gear will make it a lot easier to get yourself out of trouble. If you know your gear really well, you will be comfortable enough to be able to punt if you have to.
2. Have backup of important control items – If your budget allows, it is a great idea to have a backup controller on hand if the one that you are running your show from dies. Have at least one extra DMX line from the controller to your dimmers or opto-splitters. In case one of your DMX universes goes down, you will be able to change the cable. With regards to Art-Net or video control, I highly recommend having a backup Ethernet cable in your snake so that in the unlikely event of your main cable getting damaged, you have your spare ready to go.
3. Practice punting – During rehearsal, I strongly suggest practicing switching out gear, in order to be prepared if something fails. If you don’t have time during rehearsal, at least talk to your team about what to do if the unthinkable happens. Have a clear and concise method of communicating problems and what to do about fixing it. Make sure that your talent is also aware of your backup plans.
4. Keep a list of cell numbers handy of your crew – If for some reason, your headset communication dies, cellphones are a great backup. At least good enough to let people know that there is a problem and that you have lost your headsets. I also recommend that you keep their numbers written down and not just in your contact list on your phone. That way if you lose your phone, you are covered still.
5. Keep calm and rock on – At the end of it all, the most important thing is to make sure that everyone who came to the show leaves safely. We have a responsibility to make sure that happens. Don’t sweat blowing a cue. Everyone does it. Don’t even sweat losing control of your lights, just fix it. Get the house lights up, turn on work lights, but make sure that there is light. As long as people can see, even a little, they will stay calm and orderly.
CHAUVET Professional COLORado Zoom Tour wash lights are part of an upgrade in the new lecture theatre at the Royal Society of Medicine in London, UK. Specified and installed by Northern Lights lighting company, six COLORado Zoom Tour fixtures are used as backlights on stage. “We love the control we have over the LEDs, especially being able to change color without fixing gels and to create color washes at a moment’s notice for our clients,” said Kevin McLoughlin, Audio Visual Manager at the Royal Society of Medicine. “Any saving in energy costs is always a positive thing, when we are endeavoring to make the building as environmentally friendly as possible. And although not huge, is definitely a step in the right direction. We do aim to upgrade our lighting in other lecture theatres over the next couple of years.”
Six questions with Chris Allen of Red Eye Audio and Lighting,
1. How did you get into this field?
I started in theater in high school, as an actor, and picked up some of the tech side just by being there. When a friend of mine and I started a local music event, we needed lights, so since I had the most experience out of the two of us, I was chosen. It turned out to be quite addicting, and here I am almost 10 years later, still at it.
2. What do you think is the next big thing in the lighting industry?
Projection has really taken off in the past few years. I remember doing my first show with projections a couple years ago, and going into it I thought it was very new and dynamic. Three years later, I’m still impressed with what tricks people are pulling with them.
3. Do you have a favorite fixture (and why)?
My SlimPAR 64 [wash lights] offer a ton of options and pack quite a punch. They’re small enough to fit almost anywhere, and they are useful in just about any situation. 
4. What has been your favorite design/project?
My last project, designing the lights for “Valhella” with The Baltimore Rock Opera Society. They were amazing people to work with, and they gave me a lot of room to do whatever I wanted. They dared me to dream big and I did. I kept getting compliments that it was the best lighting they’ve ever had. So having lots of creative freedom, a great crew to work along side, and tons of positive feedback made “Valhella” a once in a lifetime kind of show.
5. What was the biggest unforeseen obstacle that you’ve faced in one of your designs, and how did you overcome it?
For one show, I was unsure how to get all the different colors and looks that the director wanted onstage with a limited number of fixtures. Since the set was static and all the action took place in the same areas on stage and all that needed to change was the color, we rented color scrollers. I didn’t know we had the budget to rent them, but apparently we did. They were a bit of a hassle to get to work with the design exactly how I wanted, but in the end they saved the show. 
6. Complete this thought: A show without light is like…Dancing in the dark. Sure, the music is still great, but you can’t see the REAL action.
Valhella image courtesy of Heather Keating
Graduates at the University of Derby, in the U.K., partied under the light of 42 CHAUVET Professional fixtures. Thirty MVP 12 high-resolution video panels, six Legend 412 pixel-mapping moving yokes and six Q-Wash 560Z-LED wash lights, all owned by the university, created a fiery atmosphere and kept the party going all night long.
CHAUVET Professional demoed fixtures from the Ovation line of theatrical luminaires and from the COLORado series of wash lights at the eighth annual Stage Lighting Super Saturday seminar, presented by Sonny Sonnenfeld and Scott C. Parker Jan. 26, in New York City. Stage Lighting Designers Ken Billington and Richard Pilbrow made interesting and Illuminating presentations that engaged the audience.
Fixtures from Chauvet’s Professional, DJ and TRUSST brand of trussing completed the exciting Godskitchen Christmas Party at the HMV Institute, in Birmingham, U.K. Twelve CHAUVET Professional Legend 412 pixel-mapping moving yokes worked for amazing effects from a triangular-shaped trussing system, built of four 3-meter and two 1-meter pieces of truss from TRUSST. SJ Grevett from DMX Productions of Birmingham also specified 12 CHAUVET DJ COLORband PiX eye-candy linear fixtures, which he placed on the DJ console.
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Two hundred and ten CHAUVET Professional video panels lit Deadmau5, Chris Lake and Audrey Napoleon during Audible, a EDM event at the Convention Center Hall, in El Paso, Texas. Provided by Creative Production & Design of Austin, Texas, 114 CHAUVET Professional MVP 18 and 96 MVP 12 modular video panels made up for an impressive display, conceived in layers of video walls with a 3D feel. Photos speak for themselves:
Chauvet recently traveled to Orlando for the Kempke’s Music Florida 2013 music conference held at the Wyndham Orlando Resort. Jeremy Pace, southeast territory manager for CHAUVET DJ, and Corey Silverman, president of Kor media & lighting, showcased both CHAUVET Professional and CHAUVET DJ gear to more than 300 church executives from all over the nation. Among the fixtures on display was CHAUVET Professional COLORdash Par-Quad 7 PAR-style fixture, powered by seven quad-colored RGBA LEDs projecting a deeply saturated output and any variation of white, without multi-colored shadows.
