Asbury United Methodist Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma has chosen an ArKaos PRO Stadium Server running ArKaos MediaMaster 4.0 software to handle the environmental projection mapping at their church. Controlled with a Vista S1, Lighting Director, Tim Ottley uses it to present some stunning visual backdrops across their 300ft wide/30-60ft tall walls enhancing both modern and traditional services.

This Christmas season sees the interior of the church awash with imagery, produced by Jason Yang of Invisible Element, based on the Christmas story and depicted in colourful visuals reminiscent of stained glass. Advent is a season of anticipation and Ottley’s theme is to present a beautiful and welcoming environment as the congregation enters each week in the build-up to Christmas.

“Our aim was to create a short video clip as an opening sequence to the services over the five week period of Advent,” he says. “We then break the video down into pieces. We use these individually as static images on each sidewall to change the appearance and mood of the room, and also transpose them in layers to build a more detailed picture, for example, adding the Wise Men or Angels to the scenic backdrop, which we can also run as a video sequence.”

“We achieved this using MediaMaster to put each picture on its own surface and layer them on top of each other. We can choose on a week-by-week basis which picture we want as a welcoming image on each side of the room and, using the ‘Output’ function, I can output the same image to two different places. I can then replicate the output multiple times, having first removed the foreground detail and edge-blended the background imagery, and merge the repeats so they blend seamlessly into a backdrop that fills the space.”

The ArKaos Stadium Server is controlled by a Jands Vista S3 lighting and media controller: “We put the still images on one channel and the video clip on the other and I can crossfade from one to the other directly from the lighting desk with MediaMaster running in the background over Art-Net.”

Ottley created the surfaces and masking for each area of projection in the room using MediaMaster’s video mapping function. “MediaMaster makes it easy to tinker with the idiosyncrasies of a building as a projection surface, and once I had the templates in place I simply use them as the basis for dropping in new images. It makes the whole thing very fast and easy to use and I can achieve stunning and very different effects in a very short time.”

“Environmental projection is an exciting medium for a church as it transforms the environment and mood of the services from a passive experience to an engaging one that engulfs the congregation and draws them in.”

“ArKaos makes environmental projection simple as well as spectacular. MediaMaster is an easy way to provide and control powerful images in an impactful way. It is super-versatile, looks good on entrance, engaging during performance and even takes care of some of the decoration of the room – how else could I cover a 300ft wide wall with fir and holly so easily and quickly? It’s like painting on the surface of a building and I can’t think how I would do this without ArKaos. MediaMaster does it all for you, everything you need is built into the box – simple!”

A.C. Special Projects Ltd. (ACSP) have specified, supplied and installed cutting-edge performance lighting systems for two separate drama studios at Buckinghamshire New University’s High Wycombe Campus.

Having previously supplied lighting systems for several other performance areas on the Campus, the University approached ACSP to deliver solutions to meet their latest studio technical needs.

For the campus’s main Drama Studio 1, which is utilised by a variety of Performing Arts courses, the brief was to enhance the existing conventional tungsten lighting system with a range of the very latest LED solutions, as well as upgrading the existing lighting console to cope with the new rig.

The University were keen to invest in LED technology, to help improve the campus’s overall lighting and heating energy efficiency rating, and thus reduce their carbon footprint. In addition, they wanted to minimise the requirement for students or technical staff to work at height in order to change fixtures’ coloured gels or lamps.

Another consideration was to provide the students that would be operating the equipment, with the opportunity to get hands-on experience using brands whose products were widely adopted in the Performing Arts industry.

ACSP chose options from the ProLights lighting range, to deliver outstanding results from the available budget. These included ProLights StudioCob full colour LED Pars, offering an extremely bright, consistent and wide 60° beam; ProLights Evo 160F Fresnels and Evo 190E Profiles to deliver tungsten-style theatrical performance from an LED source, both featuring excellent optics and smooth dimming; and finally, ProLights Reflex moving washlights, for adding the flexibility of its extensive zoom and vibrant colour range.

In the Studio’s control room, the University needed a lighting console that was easy to use but still capable of controlling the latest lighting technologies, along with being flexible enough to suit the individual show performance needs of students.

ACSP specified the award-winning Jands Vista v2 control solution due to its intuitive, graphical user interface, and the versatility of programming and playback methods it offers. Vista allows students and teachers to concentrate on the creativity and design of their show lighting, rather than complicated lighting programming, by letting the Vista v2 software handle the technical details and simply deliver the target stage look they require.

With limited space to accommodate a large lighting console, ACSP recommended the compact Vista S1 wing. All Vista products run the exact same software and offer the full feature set as found in the range’s largest consoles, therefore the S1 connected to a Mac mini provided this small footprint solution without compromising on power, features or performance.

For the campus’s Drama Studio 2, which is utilised as a rehearsal space for dance performances and other drama-related applications, ACSP provided a whole new lighting system – also featuring ProLights StudioCob full colour Pars and Evo 160F Fresnels fitted with barndoors.

This second studio is also controlled by Jands Vista combined with an even smaller, ultra-portable M1 wing connected to a laptop. With both studios running the same control software, and taking advantage of Vista’s modular wings, this allows students and teachers to freely transition between the two spaces without having to learn differences between two products. Show files can also be seamlessly transferred from one studio to the other, and in addition, the S1 and M1 can be combined to offer a physically larger console for those one-off productions which may require more hands-on control.

In both studios, Jands Vista provides flexible lighting control to suit a variety of Drama productions, ranging from simple Plays to highly animated Dance Shows featuring lighting choreographed to musical numbers.

ACSP provided comprehensive Jands Vista training for the University’s technical staff at their office in High Wycombe.

Frazer Mackenzie, Head of School – Media Production & Performance at the University, commented:

“We are very pleased with the tailored solutions that ACSP delivered. The systems are state of the art and yet very simple to operate by both our Performing Arts staff and their students – some of whom may be considering a technical production role within the industry in future. As has been our experience working with ACSP, they again provided a high level of service, and no job was too big or small for them.”

More information:

www.acspecialprojects.com

Gallery

Photo © Handerson-Yau

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 & M1 wings, combined with a Macbook Air, but selected the Jands Vista L5 for this particular arena performance, which was 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 21 inch 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.

“Having used an L5 on some previous Australian shows, I really got to experience how quickly and comfortably you can program with it,” says Ben. “I chose it for Wembley because I knew the bigger screen and extra faders would be really useful when dealing with a show of this scale. Having the 21 inch screen meant I could fit my entire rig in a single layout and have absolutely everything I needed right in front of me.”

“Furthermore, I also really like being able to lean into the Wacom tablet and use the stylus without accidently selecting things, or my arms starting to ache.
I think it’s a much better solution for controlling lights than sensitive touch screens or other alternatives.”

In addition to this, Ben is impressed with Vista’s simple approach to lighting control whilst still enabling programming of complex shows, commenting: “BMTH’s music is very fast-paced most of the time, so I needed a way to make complex cuelists easier to program and trigger in a live show environment – Vista’s ‘learn timing’ feature was perfect for this.”

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.

“Having the ability to build quick but complex looks, set precise timings in Vista’s timeline feature, and then fire them from a much simpler action opened up a new, faster way of programming for me. I found myself creating hundreds of events for even the smallest little inflections in songs, simply because Vista allowed me the time and creative freedom to do so. Vista has definitely made a difference to the final look of the show.”

In addition to playing the show back on the L5, Ben used his existing S1 and M1 combination to pre-program the show offline. “Hopping between Jands’ Vista consoles couldn’t be easier. The way you can organise your entire show and use ‘virtual consoles’ means that 90% of my programming was done in advance on a laptop, and everything was already set up for the L5’s fader layout exactly as I wanted it, when I eventually loaded the show into the L5,” says Ben. “All of this is made even better by the fact that the software runs on a Mac – having access to my show files literally anywhere at any time means I can be editing show files long before I set foot near a console.”

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.
“All in all, the L5 is a really intuitive and enjoyable console to use,” Ben concludes. “I think the community around Vista is fantastic: reading the forums and noting how many suggested features actually get added into the software – and a steady stream of interesting new features being released – is really cool.”

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.

Gallery

Florida’s fast-growing Celebration Church is utilising Jands’ flagship Vista L5 console to control state of the art lighting and video productions during worship services for its 12,000-strong congregation.

The services held at the Jacksonville-based Church’s newly constructed worship Arena are often broadcast internationally via web stream. They are renowned for being an energetic, immersive next generation praise and worship experience that infuses diverse genres and styles.

Celebration Church’s Lead Lighting Designer and AVL Technician, Trey Smith, specified the Jands Vista L5.

“The Jands Vista L5 is so user-friendly and easy to grasp that it’s a hit not only with us tech guys, but also with the church’s volunteers, who often operate the lighting and media during shows,” says Trey. “The L5’s Timeline feature was a key factor in us specifying it, making it easy to control media via timecode, and to make changes on the fly.”

“In the Arena alone, around 700 fixtures are controlled by the Vista L5. For the entire building, there are 2,200 fixtures, including 93 Chroma-Q® Inspire™ LED house lights. Only 140 of these 2,200 are not LED, and all the fixtures are controlled by the L5 via Pathway’s Pathport Connectivity system, which we use to link together the lighting throughout our building.”

“Currently, our L5 is connected via Ethernet and Fiber to our Pathport nodes onstage and in the catwalk – two nodes for onstage, and two for catwalk that run all of the house lighting and wall lights around the seating,” says Trey. “We also have Pathport throughout the rest of the building, to control lobby lighting, kids’ lighting, nursery hallways, and the Loft Cafe.”

“Everything is on one large network, but data is managed using VLANS so that lighting data doesn’t cross into the Arena. However, we have made it possible for the L5 to control the rest of the building if the situation calls for it.”

Trey and his team are currently using more than 30 universes for the entire building.

In addition to the L5, the Church uses 2x Jands Vista M1s in the Kids’ Ministry rooms, 1x Jands Vista S1 at its nearby Orange Park Campus, 1x Jands Vista I3 for tracking backup in the Main Arena, 2x M1s at the Midtown Location, and 2x M1s at its nearby St. Johns Campus.

In the Main Arena, the L5 is used to trigger media content as well as lighting, which is designed in-house and loaded onto a Coolux Pandora’s Box media server. The Vista range is also compatible with other media server solutions.

“The L5 is able to send Art-Net data to the Pandora’s Box Media Manager,” says Trey. “Pandora controls our stage 60’ x 20’ projection wall (15x 8,000 lumen Titan Projectors edge blended) as well as our 32x Sony LCD TVs that surround the projection wall.”

“We set up Jands to be able to control 6 video layers in Pandora through Art-Net. During regular Sunday services, Jands triggers almost all graphics and videos that go up on the projection wall and TVs. During special events and video elements, Pandora runs the visuals and sends LTC Timecode back to Jands Vista to trigger lighting cues.”

Trey adds that the Celebration Church had been using their Vista I3, M1 and S1 consoles for four years before upgrading to the L5 for the new Arena. “Vista has always worked well for us, and moving up to the L5 meant more power and features – but without a steep learning curve, as it uses exactly the same v2 software as our other Vista consoles.”

The L5 comes with the world-renowned Vista v2 software, a program that has been embraced by its growing number of users for being innovative, intuitive, powerful and easy to use, all at once.

The Church’s show planning is very precise. Songs are often planned a month in advance, with lighting and media programming happening weeks before the service.

“Using the L5 to control so many fixtures and demanding media, we are putting a lot of responsibilities on the console, but it works beautifully,” says Trey. “And due to the L5’s integration with Pathport, it’s a seamless operation.”

Featuring a massive 21-inch High-Definition TFT screen, the L5 offers a lot of space to add and re-arrange windows, making data easy to view and respond to.

The Jands Vista was supplied to the Celebration Church by design firm WAVE, which was contracted to design, supervise and install the new lighting and sound system.

Gallery – click to enlarge

The Vista range includes a choice of portable, flexible control surfaces and self contained consoles all running the same Vista v2 software.

Jands’ award-winning Vista lighting & media control system has been embraced by leading designers, companies and venues all over the world on
a wide range of shows. Covering entertainment, education & drama, installations, corporate, events and worship, there’s a Vista system to suit all levels of user and almost any scale of show.

Recent shows featuring lighting or media control by Vista include international concert tours by Fall Out Boy, Bloc Party, Deftones, Dierks Bentley and Little Big Town.

To arrange a Jands Vista demo or discuss your requirements contact your nearest distributor.

Or for more information and a list of international Vista users, visit jands.com/vista/users.

Renowned lighting designer, Rob Sinclair has used a Jands Vista L5 lighting and media control console to deliver an atmospheric visual feast for the latest Peter Gabriel ‘Back to Front’ world tour.

Celebrating the 25th anniversary of hit album ‘So’, the tour spans Peter‘s illustrious career, including a performance of the album in its entirety and features the original ‘So live’ 1987 band lineup. It is described by the innovative artist himself as a ‘three course show’.

In response, Rob’s inventive and dynamic lighting kicks off with the house lights up, then slowly slips into performance mode. Rob chose to use Jands’ Vista control platform for a number of reasons: “Firstly, it’s fast and instinctive to use. At The O2 arena, London I needed to modify every cue for filming and it only took me a couple of hours!” Rob says it feels like it’s actually an extension of his brain.

Secondly, the latest Vista v2 software release has Rob impressed: “Some of the time I need to do relatively simple programming and the console makes that easy and frictionless. However sometimes I need to set up more complex sequences. This is where the console really comes into its own, allowing me to burrow deep into the detail of a cue.”

“Thirdly, I use the cloning, copy and pasting features regularly. I can change an entire rig, and by adjusting a few presets I know my show will run as I expect.”

Rob has used the Jands Vista platform since 2005. “The console operates visually, so I don’t need to do any unnecessary math,” he explains. “The timeline shows me exactly what I’ve recorded and allows me to identify where something needs adjusting. The ability to copy and paste events between completely different types of fixtures in different songs is nothing short of miraculous!”

Rob comments. “I love that the show file is constantly evolving. Every small change, every slight move forward gets me closer to the never attainable dream of perfection.”

The premise of the design began with an idea to re-use and re-engineer the camera style boom arms from the original ‘So live’ tour. The design featured over 100 Martin Mac Auras, Mac 2k washes and Clay Paky QWO 800s.

For Rob, the Jands Vista platform is the only choice. “The Vista helps me by being powerful yet simple, enabling me to get the artist’s and my ideas from our heads and onto the stage. It’s quick to achieve the simple, yet I can also delve deeper and deliver complex programming quickly. The added bonus is the support. It’s comforting to know that there are always people on my side if ever I have a problem, regardless of where I am in the world.”

The European leg of the ‘Back to Front’ world tour commenced in September, culminating with a series of UK dates which were recorded for a future DVD release. Following the phenomenal response, Peter recently announced further shows in April/May 2014.

A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd, one of the industry’s leading entertainment technology suppliers, provided spectacular video projection for the British Racing Drivers’ Club’s (BRDC) dazzling annual British Grand Prix party at Silverstone racing circuit.

Staged every year on the eve of the F1™ Santander British Grand Prix, this year a party was held for the first time at the BRDC Farm, which is adjacent to the celebrated race track. The legendary event attracted high-profile members and personalities from the world of motorsport.

AC-ET, which is a Patron of the British Racing Drivers’ Club’s exclusive ‘Rising Stars’ Programme, worked closely with the BRDC events team to deliver the temporary video and lighting installation.

Although AC-ET has a long-standing relationship lighting the event, with the new Farm location this year, AC-ET’s technical manager, James Bawn, decided to bring the façade of the space’s Georgian building to life. For this he used dynamic, high-speed racing footage from the BRDC’s own film archive.

“The brief from the British Racing Drivers’ Club was that they wanted a spectacular, jaw-dropping visual event,” explains James. “We decided to utilise cutting-edge video projection technologies, and add in some eye-catching outdoor lighting to set the mood around the grounds. Within ten minutes of my initial site meeting I knew that we had to project onto the Farm building itself – it provided the ideal canvas.”

BRDC’s Stuart Pringle was delighted: “It was fantastic to see the BRDC Farm transformed into a dynamic, visually vibrant space full of light and video,” he says. “Video projection brought a new dimension to the site and the idea of projecting archive racing footage was inspired. Not only that, it looked stunning and genuinely set the mood for the evening.”

To achieve the overall look James specified a Green Hippo GrassHopper controlling Barco HD20K Projectors and TV One signal transmission for the projection.

To bring the surrounding site to life and further complement the projection he specified various cutting-edge lighting including eight Chroma-Q™ Color Force Compact™ fixtures, three A&O Falcon Beam 3K and six Robe Robin 300E Spots. All lighting was programmed and controlled on a Jands Vista S1 control surface connected to a PC laptop running the Vista v2 software.

“The Green Hippo GrassHopper was used to full effect – we blended 2 x 20k projectors and used archive racing footage from the BRDC,” explains James. “The effects were stunning. Although the content was relatively straight forward, the ease and speed in which the GrassHopper was programmed on site made it a very easy set up for us.”

The site itself is pitch black at night, so James had to deal with various health and safety challenges: &ldquoHowever as there were so many trees in the gardens it gave me a fantastic opportunity to light them with a number of slow rainbow chases,” he explains. “With the Vista S1’s FX engine I quickly created the look I wanted, yet still managed to provide sufficient illumination to make safe walkways around the site.”

Images – Click to enlarge

A corporate event for 24,000 attendees, featuring several speakers and bands, shows off the Vista’s advanced control and networking capabilities. Regular Vista user Jeff Monuszko programmed the show.

Production Team

• Production Designer: Jeff Reeks
• Programmer: Jeff Monuszko
• ME: Jason Rosenstock
• Electricians: Greg Pfrommer and Mike Kennedy

Control

• 2 Jands Vista S3 with touch screen desktop and external touch monitor
• 1 Jands Vista S1 with touch screen laptop connected wirelessly for remote control
• 1 touch screen desktop used for tracking backup and configured to autosave
• 2 iPads running VNC for remote focus
• 4-way Pathport nodes with sACN for data transmission
• 12 universes of fixtures
• 7 universes of media servers

Fixtures

• 40 Mac Aura
• 35 Clay Paky Sharpy
• 24 Martin Viper Profile
• 30 Vari-Lite VLX
• 10 Vari-Lite 3500 Spots
• 8 Mac 2000 Wash
• 24 Mac 700 Wash
• 4 Mac 301
• 16 Color Kinetics ColorBlaze TRX
• 12 Color Kinetics ColorBlaze 48
• 
190 ETC Source 4 Leko

Digital Scenic

• 8 Green Hippo Grasshoppers
• 600 LED Tiles


Images – click to enlarge

Indie pop duo/couple Matt & Kim who hail from Brooklyn, New York, have just toured Australia as part of the Groovin’ The Moo festival. Lighting designer Ian Lyles uses a Jands Vista L5 console for the arena, club and theatre shows that the band play in America and so when he found out that he would be visiting Australia, Ian made calling into Jands HQ a priority. Ian was particularly keen to see the Vista M1 and S1 consoles.

“We were interested in trying out the Vista S1 as we’re thinking of buying an M1 or S1 for our small Catalyst rig in the US,” said Ian. “We run bullet security cameras as iMag along with content running on Resolume from our playbacks rack. I was also intrigued to see if I could run a larger show, such as an arena show, on a smaller console like the Vista S1.”

Jands kindly lent Ian a Vista S1 console for the Groovin’ The Moo tour and Ian also had the opportunity to use it on a couple of theatre-size shows to see just how versatile it could be.

“I loved it!” he declared. “I can take the show from the Vista L5 and rearrange it to fit comfortably onto the Vista S1. The work flow is the same in fact you can bounce around between all of the Vista consoles very easily. It’s compact size means it is portable and I could carry it onto a plane which is rather convenient for summer fly dates.”

Ian believes the wide range of Vista hardware options a great benefit offering a very flexible, powerful and customisable solution, all running the same reliable software.

“The Vista consoles are intuitive, easy to set up and quick to program,” he added. “You can have a show up and running very fast if need be. As for adapting larger shows day to day, I really like the ease of use for cloning and cue editing. It’s unpretentious and straightforward.”

The Vista S1 delivers five playbacks, including faders and flash buttons, a complete programming section with three encoder wheels, a rotary master fader, two LCD displays and lots more to make controlling your show a breeze.

Italian based lighting designer, Aldo Visentin is using his own Jands Vista S1 lighting console running the next generation Vista v2 software, plus two Vista M1 Wings, to control lighting for Italy‘s most beloved tenor, Andrea Bocelli.

Aldo‘s creative relationship with Bocelli started in 2006 and this tour‘s natural innovative design contains lots of subtleties, with slow colour changes and no visible movement. It is operated completely ’live‘ every night using the Vista‘s powerful visual interface and just a few pre-programmed presets. This allows Aldo the creative freedom to reflect the spirit of the evening in the lighting, and flow organically with the mood of the set.

Rather non-conventionally, a typical Bocelli tour will feature two or three shows a week over a three week period – often on different continents. Instead of touring a production lighting system, lighting equipment is normally hired locally for each concert.

At each show, Aldo has around 105 different moving lights to incorporate in to the design. Vista‘s powerful fixture swapping allows him to quickly and accurately replace any previously programmed fixtures. He finds this to be incredibly fast and intuitive, and a real time saver.

Aldo needed a system that was both easily travelable and cost-effective, so that he always had the right tools to deliver his shows. He checks the Vista S1 into the plane hold, while the two Vista M1s and laptops come onboard as carry-on luggage. In this way he is able to use his travel time to work on upcoming shows while on the move.

On this tour, he most appreciated Vista‘s livetime functionality. This allows him to set a time and then simply choose what he wants the fixtures to do – whether programmed or completely ad-hoc. “It‘s really nice to have no creative restrictions when you are operating” he confirms, adding that he feels so comfortable with the overall ’visual environment‘ of the console.

He thinks the extensive range of Vista hardware options available is a great benefit, offering an “extremely flexible, powerful and very customisable solution for any application or situation, all running the same reliable software architecture.”

Click images to enlarge

Australia’s Scene Change, ‘the #2 AV Company’, has purchased a Jands Vista S1 console to accompany their existing Jands Vista I3 console.

“We‘ve been more than happy with our Vista I3 and it made sense to purchase another console that was already in line with what we were using,” commented Jordan Renouf from Scene Change. “By adding the Vista S1 we‘ve gained more functionality and because it is the same software as the Vista I3, the ease of usability for the guys has been very simple.”

Jordan states that the surface of the Vista S1 is particularly good with a good number of playback handles for such a small surface.

“Again, it has a similar surface to the Vista I3,” he added. “The Vista is such an intuitive console – easy to use and quick. Because of this intuitive design it‘s very quick to patch and program and have a show up and running quickly. Also, as it‘s designed locally, it‘s really easy to get someone on the phone or to answer your email quickly if you have a query.”

The Vista S1 delivers five playbacks, including faders and flash buttons, a complete programming section with three encoder wheels, a rotary master fader, two LCD displays and lots more to make controlling your show a breeze.