Denver-based
lighting designer and programmer Andrew Cass has been a fan of the famously
multi genre blues-rock-jam band String Cheese Incident (SCI) from Colorado
since his schooldays. In April 2014 he was lucky enough to land himself in the
hot-seat of designing their lighting – a long term dream job he absolutely loves!
String Cheese
are known for their intricate compositions, spectacular live shows and great
connections with their audience all parameters giving Andrew plenty of
opportunity to focus on lighting for a client that appreciates his vision and
gives him the creative freedom to do what he thinks will look best.
On the new
design for this latest fall tour, he decided to use 18 x Robe BMFL Spots, which
were supplied by lighting vendor, Upstaging.
The tour
ran for three weeks around the U.S., concluding at the Suwannee Hulaween
experience at Live Oak Music Park in Florida, and will continue through the New
Year. “I plan to use the BMFL as my main spot from here on,” stated Andrew
enthusiastically.
Ahead of
the tour he looked at all of the venues on the itinerary and the available
truck space before making his fixture choices. His drawings started with the
largest room on the list, and from this info, he constructed a rig that could
be scaled and adapted to fit all the others without compromising the overall
look of the show.
It was the
first time he’s specified BMFLs, a decision based on the recommendation of
several LD friends and colleagues who “reckoned they were great!” By the time
he first saw the rig, despite a level of confidence and his already substantial
expectations for the BMFLs, he admits he was still blown away by the “Sheer
clarity of the optics!”
Six BMFL
Spots on the front truss were used as downstage washes to cover ‘all bases’ and
the others were deployed, six each, on the mid and upstage trusses. They were
used extensively throughout the set for all sorts of things – washes, profiles,
specials, projection effects, etc.
With LED
screens, surfaces and scenic elements getting brighter by the day, Andrew has
been looking for a mega bright fixture for some time that could hold its own
against these sources and the BMFL certainly does!
In addition
to the brightness and the optics, other things impressing him were the gobos, animation
wheels, the variety of effects that can be created, the massive zoom and the flat
beam field throughout the entire zoom path.
“The
animation wheel is cool for in-air and on-surfaces projections” and the way it
tapers in to the middle is way better than most fixtures.
The BMFLs
and other lights were all controlled via a grandMA2 console, and a number of
Saber video strips were also integral to the design and fed with content from
an MA VPU.
With the
music encompassing anything from Bluegrass to full-on banging EDM, the lighting
always has to be dynamic, highly flexible and prepared for anything! The
biggest challenge for each show was balancing everything visually within the
different room sizes and performance spaces, and ensuring that no one element –
lighting or LED – dominated.
The crew
from Upstaging were Jason Blaylock and Robin Sheridan and Andrew’s design
associate with whom he worked closely, was Cassidy Miller-Halloran.
These were
the only Robe products on the tour, but Andrew also loves Pointes and the
little LEDBeam 100s.
“Robe has
really cemented its foundations as an industry leader with the BMFL range and
fixtures like the Pointe,” he concluded.
http://www.robe.cz
Photos :
Dave Vann
