Cyc light
- Thread starterzackconn44
- Start date
I use ETC ColorSource Spots (Deep Blue model) with cyc attachments.
Pros:
1) Using an LED Leko unit means I have the flexibility of converting my cyc lights into standard Lekos when not needed.
2) I’m throwing over a 32 foot trim with no noticeable loss in apparent luminosity, even in deepest blues and reds (thanks to the Deep Blue LED unit). Great for a cyc that you don’t want to overwhelm your upstage realm.
3) The CYC attachment for S4s is usable on any S4 model. That means getting a CYC attachment for the CSSpts means I’m actually getting cyc attachments for all my Lekos. +10 for usefulness.
4) I’ve been running these suckers into the ground for four years now, three shows or more a week, all year, and they’re still kicking with great color matching and no noticeable loss in luminosity.
Cons:
Moderately pricey if you’re a very small or very-low-budget venue. But the investment pays dividends.
Here’s the link to the data sheet, for your perusal: *click here for number overload*
EDIT: Just saw you mentioned “cheap”. Sorry, these are definitely not most people’s definition of “cheap.” However, if we’re talking good return on investment, it’s a hard fixture to argue against, in my humble opinion.
Pros:
1) Using an LED Leko unit means I have the flexibility of converting my cyc lights into standard Lekos when not needed.
2) I’m throwing over a 32 foot trim with no noticeable loss in apparent luminosity, even in deepest blues and reds (thanks to the Deep Blue LED unit). Great for a cyc that you don’t want to overwhelm your upstage realm.
3) The CYC attachment for S4s is usable on any S4 model. That means getting a CYC attachment for the CSSpts means I’m actually getting cyc attachments for all my Lekos. +10 for usefulness.
4) I’ve been running these suckers into the ground for four years now, three shows or more a week, all year, and they’re still kicking with great color matching and no noticeable loss in luminosity.
Cons:
Moderately pricey if you’re a very small or very-low-budget venue. But the investment pays dividends.
Here’s the link to the data sheet, for your perusal: *click here for number overload*
EDIT: Just saw you mentioned “cheap”. Sorry, these are definitely not most people’s definition of “cheap.” However, if we’re talking good return on investment, it’s a hard fixture to argue against, in my humble opinion.
Jay Ashworth
Well-Known Member
We just got 16 strips of SL660, but we won't be able to hang them for almost a month; more when we know more, but they passed our shootout.
soundlight
Well-Known Member
If you want a traditional cyc light, I'd suggest the Chauvet C-805FC. Nice cyc distribution, and adjustable tilt on the cells for the spread necessary for your cyc. Crazy punch. If you'd prefer strips, the Chauvet Ovation battens are pretty great. Both have the very nice RGBAL color system. Depends on how far your throw is - if it's right up above the cyc or far enough out from it to allow for a traditional cyc light.
I have to laugh. For some of us, a "traditional" cyc light uses gels. You know those plastic colored filters you cut to put in the frame ?.
Sadly and wholeheartedly agreed. That’s one reason I’ve started religiously recommending multi-purpose fixtures; for lower-budget venues it just isn’t as fiscally wise to have specialized task fixtures, particularly if the cost of two specialized fixtures exceeds the cost of one fixture that can do both jobs to the level desired. Using Lekos or battens with cyc adapters/attachments is a great investment because those lights can be repurposed on any gig that doesn’t require the other function. Just my 2¢.
OH, those things? I thought that was colored Glad Wrap. Used it to wrap my Tupperware’d lunch. Wondered why it didn’t cling very well......
soundlight
Well-Known Member
Yeah, and in the old Altman SkyCycs and Strand Iris units in college we had to replace the saturated blue 2-3x during a tech/run... I said traditional because too many places now are putting cheap LED strips above their cyc and expecting it to look like it did with something like a SkyCyc. The C-805FC even looks like a baby skycyc - and it lights up a cyc real nice!
ETA - Oh and cyc silks. The best. I never did it because I was OCD about silk direction, but someone wasted a few sheets of cyc silk cutting the wrong direction one time. What fun! Uncolored silk is one of the few "gels" I still use for LEDs these days, can make an LED "PAR" look more like an oval Parabolic Aluminized Reflector lamp used to.
@soundlight Toured a production to Broadway's Shubert. We were carrying enough of the colored silks to re-gel our Strand Ianaro's for Broadway. One of Local One's finest taught us how to conserve gel by rotating the frames 90 degrees and cutting two per sheet instead of the one per sheet we'd been counting on. You can already see how this worked out. We ended up with a pile of wasted gel, a half lit cyc and a stage hand heading over to Mutual Hardware for more gel.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard
Ancient Engineer
Well-Known Member
Way, way, way back in the mesozoic era, I was carded in #1 and I will never forget my second ever (full) paying gig for the IA: Cutting cyc silk...
The Steward was telling me to cut them 90 out because "Nobody would notice"... I got a royal dressing when they discovered that I had cut them the correct way.
I played the Ig and got off with a "These stupid @#%-ing kids today... <grumble> <cigar chomp>". The young SM noticed though, and 25 years later he and I worked a European tour together.
I was not affiliated any more and this guy who was the tour manager (astonishingly) remembered me. We reminisced about old times and rats as big as loaves of bread and the next thing I know I got a promotion and a good pay bump.
I asked about it. He said, "I'd like to get ten of you. You know, with integrity to the show".
So the lesson is: Integrity is EVERYTHING. I'd rather lose a gig because I did something safely (it happened once) or because I took 10 extra minutes (and 40 sheets of gel) to do the job right the first time.
Oh, and to the OP: Old-school (not-LED) cyc instruments are a pretty good value considering the quality of the light vs. cost. A stack of gel is pretty cheap and the results are high quality. If you are hell bent for LED, I have seen LED battens with cyc adapters look reasonable. Be aware though that the FC will be lower than with burners.
The Steward was telling me to cut them 90 out because "Nobody would notice"... I got a royal dressing when they discovered that I had cut them the correct way.
I played the Ig and got off with a "These stupid @#%-ing kids today... <grumble> <cigar chomp>". The young SM noticed though, and 25 years later he and I worked a European tour together.
I was not affiliated any more and this guy who was the tour manager (astonishingly) remembered me. We reminisced about old times and rats as big as loaves of bread and the next thing I know I got a promotion and a good pay bump.
I asked about it. He said, "I'd like to get ten of you. You know, with integrity to the show".
So the lesson is: Integrity is EVERYTHING. I'd rather lose a gig because I did something safely (it happened once) or because I took 10 extra minutes (and 40 sheets of gel) to do the job right the first time.
Oh, and to the OP: Old-school (not-LED) cyc instruments are a pretty good value considering the quality of the light vs. cost. A stack of gel is pretty cheap and the results are high quality. If you are hell bent for LED, I have seen LED battens with cyc adapters look reasonable. Be aware though that the FC will be lower than with burners.
Les
Well-Known Member
CS fixtures with Cyc adapters are a good value, but if you have the money, spring for dedicated cyc fixtures. If nothing else, mark your batten for the cyc setup so you don't have to re-measure it every time. I don't know about anyone else, but I've always found focusing cyc lights to be kind of tedious and I'd rather do it once and be done with it.
This is venue-specific, but I also don't think adapters would work very well in a space without much technical oversight. I've worked with groups that had very little in the way of technical direction and organizational structure and I could just see myself walking around the venue for an hour looking for that one missing cyc adapter. That alone isn't much of a reason to spend more money than necessary, but it is one potential pitfall that I can think of.
This is venue-specific, but I also don't think adapters would work very well in a space without much technical oversight. I've worked with groups that had very little in the way of technical direction and organizational structure and I could just see myself walking around the venue for an hour looking for that one missing cyc adapter. That alone isn't much of a reason to spend more money than necessary, but it is one potential pitfall that I can think of.
Pretty sure this is untrue.
From https://www.etcconnect.com/S4LEDSystem/?LangType=1033 :
Yep. Will NOT WORK with incandescent (conventional) SourceFour.
https://www.controlbooth.com/threads/source-4-led-fresnel-adapter.37690/#post-326553 and subsequent.
I stand completely corrected. Not sure how I confused the two, but maybe I meant the LED S4. Thanks for the correction, derek.
EDIT: Just checked my rig, and I know where I must have made a bad assumption. Electrics 2 through 4 have only S4 LEDs, while 1 has conventionals. Since I've flown CYCs as far downstage as 2nd, I might have forgotten I have only LEDs upstage of the first. Sorry bout that.
You don't want to skimp to much on your cyc lights in cost if at all possible.
I would suggest the ColorSource Cyc.
The S4LED with Cyc Adapter is a nice option, but the parts and pieces for the engine and adapter it will be slightly more than the dedicated ColorSource Cyc Unit.
If you wanted to be a little more cost effective you could move to ColorSource Linear products and lensing to evenly light the cyc.
For a 42' wide cyc you would need a minimum of 6 fixtures at 3'6" away from the cyc. I would suggest 7 ColorSource Cycs. is a good number to use, as you will most likely want center control of your cyc so odd numbers of fixtures are helpful.
In a linear format you would probably get away with not having fixtures end to end with 4 or 5 ColorSource Linear 4 (2meter versions) spaced evenly.
Check out the Cyc Tool to help calculate how many you need.
Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.etcconnect.cyctool&hl=en_US
Iphone: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cyc-tool/id728810531?mt=8
I would suggest the ColorSource Cyc.
The S4LED with Cyc Adapter is a nice option, but the parts and pieces for the engine and adapter it will be slightly more than the dedicated ColorSource Cyc Unit.
If you wanted to be a little more cost effective you could move to ColorSource Linear products and lensing to evenly light the cyc.
For a 42' wide cyc you would need a minimum of 6 fixtures at 3'6" away from the cyc. I would suggest 7 ColorSource Cycs. is a good number to use, as you will most likely want center control of your cyc so odd numbers of fixtures are helpful.
In a linear format you would probably get away with not having fixtures end to end with 4 or 5 ColorSource Linear 4 (2meter versions) spaced evenly.
Check out the Cyc Tool to help calculate how many you need.
Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.etcconnect.cyctool&hl=en_US
Iphone: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cyc-tool/id728810531?mt=8
Attachments
Derej
Member
Previously we were using 40 year-old Ianaro Iris top and bottom units on a 60'wide x 30' high cyc. The cyc lights are about 5' downstage of the cyc.
I love the ETC cyc adapters for the Lustr fixtures and I like the ETC colorsource cyc units. They are beautifully engineered for color rendering. My feeling is excellent color rendering is less important on the cyc. Since the cyc lights don't hit skin or costumes, I can get all the colors I want from an RGBW fixture. (Feel free to disagree.)
After looking at many fixtures (ETC, Altman, Arri, Phillips Strand), I chose the Elation TVL RGBW cyc light. The list price is around 1,000USD, but an Elation dealer will get you a better price on quantity.
They good value for the price, and I've had a great experience using them theater and dance over the past two years. The profile in EOS is pretty good. The dimming curve is good for an LED -- we will all miss the lovely fades with skycyc and ianaro units.
We went from 52,500 watts on the cyc (top and bottom) to 4080 watts; we went from using 30 20amp dimmers to using 4 20amp non-dims. We added a DMX universe just for cyc lights (added a ETC gateway, Ion had more universes available). Best of all, we received a sustainability grant to fund the project (roughly 26,000USD).
BTW, I kept a few of the old fixtures to use in class.
