Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Ryan C. Davis]

Hey Guys,

I'm a lighting moron, I know very little about it- except some people can make it look REALLY cool…

So I do this gig every year in the middle of the desert here in utah. We build a stage and a bar, bring generators, a full sound rig, lights, a fire, and play for a group of 50 ish people for a couple hours. It's a great time and the fact that it's in the middle of the desert is a real trip.

So here's the deal, this stage of ours has evolved over the past 2-3 years but I'm always looking for a better mouse trap. Top of my list is lighting- I have the sound really dialed in already. The first iteration used rope light around the top of the stage, and 2 CFL's on the procenium arch (haha, that terminology may be a tad overboard) for light on the performers. Last year I bought 4 Chauvet Slim Par 38's and I attached them around the top ring of the arch. They made a cool backdrop but I aimed two of them on the performers and they ended up being so close and with such a narrow beam width that they really shadowed the faces and made everyone look ghoulish. This year I wanted to amp things up a tad more so I bought a Chauvet 6 Spot . My plan was to use this up and behind the performers for an effect, keep 2 of the par 38's up on the arch for backdrop lighting, then move the other 2 par 38's out to the speaker stands and use them as white spots (or floods) for the performers.

Basically I have no clue what would look the coolest so I'm looking for some advice from the lighting guys. All of these lights have a sound mode where they'll chase around a bit with the changing sounds but I don't know if that just get's annoying or if it's really useful. They are also all DMX controllable and I do have a cheap little chauvet DMX controller as well but I don't know if it's worth implementing.

Below is a pic of the stage and I've drawn what I wanted to change this year. Any input?

Thanks in advance!

[TJ (Tom) Cornish]

Hey Guys,

I'm a lighting moron, I know very little about it- except some people can make it look REALLY cool…

So I do this gig every year in the middle of the desert here in utah. We build a stage and a bar, bring generators, a full sound rig, lights, a fire, and play for a group of 50 ish people for a couple hours. It's a great time and the fact that it's in the middle of the desert is a real trip.

So here's the deal, this stage of ours has evolved over the past 2-3 years but I'm always looking for a better mouse trap. Top of my list is lighting- I have the sound really dialed in already. The first iteration used rope light around the top of the stage, and 2 CFL's on the procenium arch (haha, that terminology may be a tad overboard) for light on the performers. Last year I bought 4 Chauvet Slim Par 38's and I attached them around the top ring of the arch. They made a cool backdrop but I aimed two of them on the performers and they ended up being so close and with such a narrow beam width that they really shadowed the faces and made everyone look ghoulish. This year I wanted to amp things up a tad more so I bought a Chauvet 6 Spot . My plan was to use this up and behind the performers for an effect, keep 2 of the par 38's up on the arch for backdrop lighting, then move the other 2 par 38's out to the speaker stands and use them as white spots (or floods) for the performers.

Basically I have no clue what would look the coolest so I'm looking for some advice from the lighting guys. All of these lights have a sound mode where they'll chase around a bit with the changing sounds but I don't know if that just get's annoying or if it's really useful. They are also all DMX controllable and I do have a cheap little chauvet DMX controller as well but I don't know if it's worth implementing.

Below is a pic of the stage and I've drawn what I wanted to change this year. Any input?

Thanks in advance!

Lighting for people looks most natural if it's 45° above and ideally 45° off to the side.  Too high and eyes get overshadowed by the eyebrows, too low and it looks like flashlight face.  I would try to get your front lights higher - maybe they can be set on top of your speakers?

You may want to move your amp rack off your sub - it's a convenient shelf, but the vibration isn't good for the electronics.

Is that a propane cylinder on stage? 

[Ryan C. Davis]

thanks for the points!

[Richard Turner]

If you are in Toronto or Ottawa I doubt you would find a better rental house than christie lites. Call for a quote and do the moth on owning somthing that just gets the job done verus renting exactly what you need a few times a year.

[James Feenstra]

If you are in Toronto or Ottawa I doubt you would find a better rental house than christie lites. Call for a quote and do the moth on owning somthing that just gets the job done verus renting exactly what you need a few times a year.

Christie has many US locations as well.

[ProSoundWeb Community]