With its concrete canyons and bustling crowded streets,
Osaka resembles many other big international cities. In terms of culinary
excellence though, Japan’s third largest city is in a league of its own.
Sometimes called “the food capital of the world,” the city, which boasts 108
Michelin restaurant stars, lives by an ethos the Japanese call kuidaore,
a joyful gastronomical indulgence. Now with the opening of Vanity Osaka, the
city has a nightclub that equals its dining excellence, thanks in no small part
to a sweepingly bold lighting design by Michael Meacham that draws upon the
brightness, color and pixel mapping capabilities of over 400 fixtures from
CHAUVET Professional.
Meacham of iDesign Productions (Miami) has designed some
of the highest profile clubs in the world. He faced a special challenge when
lighting Vanity Osaka. “This is a single level club with both sides of the
dance floor elevated for VIP seating, so my design was going to be broad,
horizontal and expansive,” he said. “The challenge I faced, though, is that
there are these huge structural columns that land right in the center of the
dance floor.”
Instead of trying to “work around” the wide columns,
Meacham used EPIX 2.0 bars and EPIX 2.0 strips along with some adroit pixel
mapping to incorporate them into his stunning design. “I figured the columns
would be a great place to start my design,” he said. “Once I started the design
utilizing the huge columns on the dance floor, the rest came together quickly.
It was a really smooth, fun process.”
?
Fun indeed… it is impossible to see the end result of
Meacham’s efforts without being awestruck. His artful pixel mapping and overall
lighting design has transformed the Vanity Osaka dance floor into a free
flowing, almost cosmological swirl of patterns and colors that instantly
envelops visitors, creating a visual experience they aren’t likely to forget.
“My vision for this project was to create an expansive
look inside the club,” said Meacham. “The idea is to have an intimate lighting
and video experience in every direction. We want people to be immersed in the
entire space, no matter where they are in the club. Our goal is to create
something that surrounds everyone.”
As Meacham noted, the creation of this immersive
experience started when he used the EPIX 2.0 bars to illuminate the center
columns on the dance floor. “The EPIX fixtures on the columns, just flowed so
well with the DJ booth and ceiling lighting,” he said. “It created a very
smooth look.”
In addition to the EPIX 2.0 bars and strips on the
columns, Meacham built EPIX 2.0 bars into the wall behind the DJ booth and
added five configurations of 32 EPIX 2.0 strips each on the ceiling. He also
positioned EPIX 2.0 strips behind the frosted glass in the VIP area. The LD
accented the EPIX lighted columns with 20 Intimidator Spot LED 350 moving
fixtures from CHAUVET DJ in four groups of five. Meacham’s design utilizes the
motorized focus of the Intimidator Spots to project crisp gobos over the dance
floor.
Meacham positioned eight Strike 882 white SMD LED strobe
panels with pixel control and special effects macros above the VIP areas on
either side of the dance floor. “The Strikes have an impressive big punch, plus
the individual pixel cells make for great chasing effects,” said the LD.
The pixel mapping capabilities of the Chauvet fixtures
was essential to Meacham’s vision for his Vanity Osaka design. When asked
to describe his creative vision for this club, the LD simply replied, “Deep
abstract video immersion. I wanted to push pixels all over that club!”
Elaborating on that point, Meacham explained, “I love
high contrast abstract video. It\’s much more captivating to use it as moving
art and interesting eye candy. There is a lot of color matching between the
video and moving lights that gives the guests an exclusive experience that\’s
different than most other clubs. Vanity has an ambience of pixel mapping
effects.”
The Chauvet fixtures were praised by Meacham for being
easy to use with a variety of control options. “I used the GrandMA to
send DMX out to the Chauvet movers, strobes and hazer,” he said. “I also used
Arkaos Media Master Pro in fixture mode talking to GrandMA via native MA NET with
CITP enabled. All the EPIX, including the VIP uplighting, is mapped with
Kling-Net. There\’s a huge video content library set up and by having CITP
enabled, it allows the lighting operator to see a still preview of the video in
the MA windows.”
Meacham’s gear list at Vanity Osaka included 299 EPIX 2.0
strips, 59 EPIX 2.0 bars,
41 EPIX Drive 642s, 8 Strike 882 panels, 12 Q-Wash
419Z-LED RGBW moving yoke fixtures, 20 Intimidator Spot LED 350s and one Amhaze
II water-based haze machine.
The Chauvet fixtures were amazing,” said Meacham. “We
were very happy with the quality of the Chauvet products that we chose for
Vanity. I had used the Intimidator Spot 350 previously in other clubs with
great success, but I never used the EPIX series before. The EPIX fixtures
worked out perfectly for this design.
“My client was thrilled,” continued the LD. “Vanity is
one of the most original and unique clubs. There is nothing like it in Osaka.”
So a city acclaimed for its eateries, now has at least one very special
nightclub too.
