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The form factor of any particular object may serve to obfuscate its unique features, to whatever extent they exist. Humans are wonderful at categorizing – at placing the things in our environments into kinds and sorts as a mental shortcut. Where this fails us is when it causes us to overlook what lies beneath the surface, to ignore the incremental but very real evolution of a familiar object. For instance, the humble LED wash light. There will always be similarities between luminaires – these are, after all, lights, but a peek beneath the hood will reveal the craft and care that goes into a fixture, and perhaps reveal an interesting trick or two the engineers have dreamed up for us.… Read More »Review: Chauvet Maverick Storm 1 Wash

One tool that has never found its way into my workbox is a DMX tester. Over the years I’ve tried a few in shops and at trade shows and never found one that quite fit into my workflow. In general, I’ve found that some of the popular models are either too fiddly to use, have poor visibility in low-light environments like a stage, and I even used one that required the user to memorize a series of colored lights and blinking patterns to figure out what was going on. This seemed odd to me; after all, we live in an age where there’s an App For Everything. Why could our smartphones, tiny and capable computers most of us carry around… Read More »A Review of the DMXCat by City Theatrical