How Show Lighting Can Enhance Stage Performances
Show lighting is a key ingredient to captivating stage performances. It can highlight focal points, create shadows, and transform the stage’s atmosphere.
A professional lighting designer has the technical expertise and creative insights to add an extra layer of magic to a performance. It’s important to communicate your goals with them before the rehearsals begin.
Vari-Lite
The Vari-Lite lighting system helps educators grow student confidence on stage and behind the scenes with a powerful automated luminaire that can adapt to a wide range of assemblies and productions. It also saves on installation and control costs by eliminating the need for a dedicated console or an expansive control network.
The VL5 was a response to calls from entertainment lighting designers for lighter, simpler and (above all) cheaper moving light technology which did not require being controlled by a proprietary console. The simple workings, low cost and high reliability of the VL5 meant that it has remained one of the most popular rental units ever made and is still in use to this day.
Signify, the brand that powers the world’s most iconic entertainment lighting solutions, recently announced the release of a new, higher output light engine upgrade for their workhorse VL2600 Series fixtures. This change brings significantly increased output to the most versatile LED fixture on the market, while aligning with Signify’s commitment to sustainability by minimizing waste by extending product lifecycles rather than making iterative new versions.
The new VL2600 SE series will also offer a number of additional feature upgrades that increase functionality and versatility. This includes an enhanced beam homogenization system, delivering smooth, natural colours without the ‘colour shadowing’ effects experienced with other LED fixtures.
SGM Light
SGM Light provides the latest LED technology in a variety of powerful stage lighting fixtures. These products are designed to meet the needs of a wide range of customers. Whether you’re a designer, producer, or rental company, SGM Light has a solution for you. SGM Light offers the best value for your money, with high-performance fixtures that offer impressive brightness and vibrant colors.
All SGM Light fixtures use a patented DynaMix drive design to maximize output across the entire spectrum. This feature uses larger, more powerful LEDs than would typically be chosen for a given power rating, which results in a huge boost in color and white output. Combined with SGM Light’s industry leading calibration method, TrueColor, and the active and passive ThermalDrive cooling designs, this patented technology ensures that your lights perform at their best.
In addition to providing superior color rendering, SGM Light’s Q-8 DualSource touring fixture has a very low energy-use per lumen (TM66 score). It also features an innovative thermal management system that includes advanced sensors and software, as well as passive heat dispersal and fan-assisted forced air cooling. Its DryTech integrated dehumidification system removes trapped hydrogen molecules from polluted air to avoid destructive corrosion and ensure the performance of your lighting fixtures.
SGM’s P-10 all-in-one LED luminaire is a wash light, strobe light, and show lighting long-throw blinder in one compact, lightweight, and versatile fixture. It features pixel-mapping control, a native 10o front lens, and magnetic easy-fit filter frames. It also comes with a standard VersaPath color engine, which includes a designer selectable algorithm for advanced control of color transitions. This algorithm allows users to warm up or cool down their mixed RGB values over the black body curve, as well as emulate specific color filters.
Eurolite
Achieve your show lighting vision with Eurolite’s powerful and versatile control systems. From beam effects and mirror balls to stage lights, pixel systems, and decorative lighting, Eurolite’s products help you create stunning visuals that amaze audiences. The company’s lighting controls are easy to use and provide endless possibilities for enhancing your stage shows.
For beginners and those without extensive training, Eurolite’s EASY SHOW controller offers pre-programmed shows that can be played from a USB stick. The device has 2 USB sockets in addition to the usual connections for DMX and power supply unit. One of the USB sockets is reserved for the QuickDMX system, which enables you to quickly convert your console for operation with wireless DMX.
The Pro Control DMX software 1024 lets you control up to two DMX universes and features advanced functions for DJs, bands, and professional lighting engineers. The user-friendly interface is perfectly adapted to touch screens and smartphones, and its graphical live window is ideal for creating, triggering, and playing scenes.
The Lightkey app controls bulbs, LED strips, and smart plugs by Philips Hue, as well as DMX-compatible fixtures. With its built-in FX engine, Lightkey is easy to learn and quick to set up. It also works with any DMX interface, including USB, Art-Net, sACN, beam moving head led or ESP-Net. This allows you to use your own DMX hardware, avoiding the cost of expensive proprietary solutions.
LED Tubes
LED tubes are among the most popular options for modern, clean-looking lighting in all types of rooms and display areas. They can be found in commercial displays and workshops, offices, foyers, hallways, factory floors and even car parks.
These tube lights use solid-state technology and don’t have filaments or glass enclosures to break. They’re also available in a range of color temperatures and have a high CRI (color rendering index) that delivers accurate colors and natural-looking light.
They’re also highly durable and require less maintenance than traditional fluorescent tubes. The average life of an LED tube is between 50,000 and 100,000 hours, which is significantly longer than the 15,000 to 20,000 hours of typical fluorescent bulbs.
Most LED tubes are designed to work with existing magnetic ballasts or newer electronic ballasts. Some are hybrid or Type A, which allow for plug-and-play installation without modifying the fixture’s existing wiring. Other LED tubes, such as Type B or hybrid+, require bypassing the existing ballast and are wired directly to line voltage.
It’s important to select the correct LED tube for a particular fixture. To determine what kind of replacement tube you need, first take out the existing bulb and look at its markings on the end. This will tell you whether it’s single-ended or double-ended. Single-ended LED tube lights are compatible with shunted tombstones, while double-ended tubes require non-shunted sockets.