Gorrod following pre-production. “At PRG, we certainly enjoy a challenge,”
Holdsworth chuckled. “There were points where we didn’t know if we would
be able to get our own crew into the show because it was so busy and sold
out!” he exclaimed.
The large PRG rig housed 96 Icon Beams, mainly covering six
automation trusses. On four of the trusses, 12 Solaris Flare LRs outline the
trusses. On the side automation truss, 48 Showtec Sunstrips nodded to
the carnival theme of the tour, with festoon-style lighting partnered with
tungsten light definition.
A convention of Dalgleish’s lighting designs, a backwall of 60 Claypaky
Scenius Unicos and 30 Claypaky Mythos moving lights punched through the
haze. The LD professed: “The Unicos are the only lights that I find are able to
keep up with video in terms of brightness while using gobos,” he explained.
“There are plenty of looks in the show which feature complex gobo chases
and effects. Having a bright fast spot is key for this which I why I always tr y
and use the Unico.”
A total of 48 Robe MegaPointes were housed on the roof of the rig and
used as a hybrid spot as well as beam. A range of GLP fixtures, specifically
60 GLP JDC 1s, 28 GLP impression X4L and 24 GLP impression X4 20 Bars,
were used, while a large number of traditional 4-Way Moles and 34 Chauvet
Professional Strike 4s helped light the crowd along with the GLP JDC1
strobes. “It’s a ver y bright show,” Dalgleish stated. “Travis wants to see the
crowd a lot and the JDC1s are invaluable with their tilt function, plus being
able to have a colour wash or a bright white strobe.”
For control, PRG provided a trio of MA Lighting grandMA2 full size
consoles, two for lighting and one for video, along with a grandMA2 lite
console, four NPUs and four PRG Super Nodes. To match Travis Scott’s on-
stage unpredictability, the show was run completely live. “We’re constantly
tr ying to push the envelope to make the show feel fresh each night,”
Dalgleish continued. “You couldn’t timecode the show and make it feel the
same way each night because it’s so big and brash. It’s controlled chaos forsure.”
PRG identified early on that the four lighting trusses needed to be
automated above the audience, so there was only one option. Twelve
500kg/1,250kg Movecat Hoists and V-Motion Hooks controlled four
automated PRG Bat trusses over the audience. Holdsworth said: “The
production team were absolutely blown away by the capabilities of
Movecat.”
Overseeing the automation for the tour was Peter MacDonald who was
brought in by PRG to work closely with Dalgleish to enable the LD to get the
most out of the powerful Movecat automation system. “He’s the go-to guy
for Movecat in the UK, and on a prestigious project like this, there is nobody
else we wanted to use; we were really fortunate to have him onboard,”
Holdsworth said.
With hordes of Travis Scott fans leaving the venue happy, Holdsworth
reflected: “Overall, I’m really pleased with the outcome. There were lots of
sleepless nights and extra hours put in to get the show off the ground, but
as soon as we saw the smiling faces in the crowd, that’s when we knew it
was all worthwhile.”
Holdsworth thanked Gorrod and Q Willis from PRG who “invested
a huge amount of time” on the project and without whom, he said, the
show “wouldn’t have got off the ground.” He concluded: “I think there are
champions of ever y genre – from hip-hop, to rock ’n’ roll, rap to pure pop.
It’s our privilege to be working with artists at the top of their game in ever y
genre.”BUTTERFLY EFFECT
To partner the lighting, Dalgleish brought in Notch Designer, Ryan Sheppard
of Dark Matter Technologies. “Notch is such a big part of the show. Travis
recently posted a photo on his Instagram feed captioned ‘the real me’,
while he was stood in front of the Notch-generated screen content,”
Dalgleish commented. “I think he really enjoys seeing manipulating visionsTRAVIS SCOTT