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Robe BMFLs “Whisper” To Passenger

AUSTRALIA

U

K based folk singer / songwriter
Passenger’s recent leg of his
“Whispers” tour, drew to a close with
the acclaimed penulti mate leg of the tour in
Australia. The stage featured a show design
by James Scott of UK based visual design
collecti ve ‘Okulus’, a new collaborati on with
LD / Visuals designer Louis Oliver.

In Australia, James was able to take
advantage of Robe’s latest BMFL Spot moving
lights for the fi rst ti me as part of the rig,
which were supplied by MPH Australia, a
leading lighti ng rental specialist.
The rig contained 22 x BMFL Spots and 12 x
Robe LEDWash 600s.

The BMFLs were used extensively

throughout the performance for

key and back lighti ng, with some

positi oned on the fl oor for eye-

catching ‘aerial sculpture’ moments.

It was the fi rst ti me that James had used
BMFLs on one of his own shows – having fi rst
seen them demonstrated by Robe UK’s Amy
Schofi eld at Hammersmith Apollo, where the

UK leg of the tour ended with two sold out

shows. As soon as he saw the capabiliti es,

he was keen to incorporate some units into

the show ... for which he had to wait unti l

Australia!

He was delighted with the results and loves

the crispiness and clarity of the opti cs

and zoom range ... amongst many other

features, and his expectati ons were defi nitely

“exceeded” once he had a few gigs under his

belt.

The Passenger show included subtle

projecti ons onto fi ve upstage gauze columns,

and James found himself having to inhibit the

BMFLs down to make sure that the projecti on

wasn’t washed out by their extreme

brightness ... even when using the darkest

and most saturated colours.. in the lowest

lamp power mode...

8 x BMFLs and 6 x 600 LED Washes were

fl oor mounted on eight diff erent height

white wooden plinths positi oned in an arc

surrounding the down stage mic positi on.

With three more on either side of the stage

on booms at the front providing main key

lighti ng onto the arti st.

“The LEDWashes are a very fl exible fi xture,

they are ideal for key light because you can

force virtually any colour out of them and sti ll

maintain good skin tone for the cameras,”

he commented, also recalling a DVD shoot

earlier on the tour at London Hammersmith

when the camera crew and DOP were

looking at the key-light and, seeing it was

LED, ordered a set of conventi onal profi les as

back-up!

As it turned out, with the quality and

fl icker-free operati on of the LEDWashes, the

conventi onal profi les weren’t even taken out

of their boxes!

Designing the Passenger tour was an

intelligent and precise blend of lighti ng and

video. Lighti ng needed to augment and work

alongside the projecti ons whilst also be

powerful enough to kick in and change the

whole feel of the performance space when

the video was not running.

88

LIVE!

March - April 2015

Photography by Jarrad Seng