philosophy

Video is lighting. That’s right, we’re going to dive right in. Start the article in medias res1 because that’s how we do things in the production industry. No long-winded exposition on the history of media servers, how LED technology has changed the face of lighting and video both, no comments about the Icon-M (Remember those?). We’re gonna jump right in and talk about how to think about and design with video elements when one comes from a mostly lighting background. Designing with video   One of my very first jobs was full-time technical director at a big church in a flyover state. We had several projected screens in the auditorium, which we fed IMAG and content from a media server.… Read More »Approaching video as a lighting designer

A few years ago when I started working with one of the country music artists that I design lights for now, we had a backline and patch tech from a very large, very well-known sound company1 who, to put it mildly, had opinions on what concerts should and should not be. According to this individual, concerts are places for nothing but big sound systems, big guitars, and big hair. For him, moving lights, strobes, cryo, lasers – these are all superfluous and should be shunned. As near as I can articulate of what I think his position was, big rock shows should be lit by a PAR rig and a few followspots. Anything more is just spectacle, fluff, ostentatious flash… Read More »Spectacle or art: backline techs weigh in