Fountain Of Euph

Active Member
Hello Internet Friends:

The University I work for is looking to purchase moving lights for our theater. We currently have a full compliment of S4's, PAR's and Fresnels, as well as 8x SpectraCYC 400's and 14x ETC Vivid-R's. Control is on a ETC ION. We do musicals, plays, and dance, and hang plots for each show.

We are looking for 2x spots/profiles, and 4-6x washes.

Here our our considerations:

Weight: We have a 500 lb max on linesets, so lighter fixtures would be good.
Power Draw: We have 5 dedicated 20A circus, so less draw the better.
Noise: Being a smaller venue we the quieter the better.
Use: I am hoping to get 7-10 years of relevancy out of the fixtures for the students.


Some of my thoughts:
HES SolaFrame 750- Concerns about brightness, lack of second gobo wheel and volume level
HES SolaFrame Theater -EXPENSIVE, HEAVY
ETC Releve Spot- No shutters, basically a moving ColorSource Spot?

For the washes I am thinking Chauvet Rouge 1 or 2 washes, or the Martin RUSH Wash MH6. I would rather purchase more expensive spots and cheaper washes.

Thoughts/Suggestions?
 
In general with moving lights, what is your ultimate goal with them?
Movable gobos, top/back light, followspot replacement or augmentation, movable frontlight or specials, decrease overall fixture count, flash & trash.
All that determines things like - ease of gobo replacement, brightness, color punch or subtlety, pan tilt accuracy, shutter or iris necessity.

Overall for theater, I avoid wash lights without a homogeneous beam, so no spider eye LEDs. They don't sit well with existing fresnels in the overall color wash, have color shift issues at varying distances - which would be a problem with drops and flown sets, and they're very obvious when your eye catches the side of the visible lens as it moves.

My go to are all VariLite. Maybe because I'm old. VL2500 wash, VL1100 with shutters, VL500. The 500s usually replace banks of fresnels and do pastels and tungsten emulation very well, 2500 are for dance, flash, soft specials and intense colors, 1100s are FOH and over stage and highsides to do specials, breakups etc.
 
In general with moving lights, what is your ultimate goal with them?

At the end of the day the first objective is to make sure students have all the skills to be prepared for the industry when they graduate. I could teach moving lights with Chauvet Intimidators, but I am also seeking to maintain or raise production values with this purchase, and give the students a higher level experience for their resume. We do have guest designers who can be "selective," and I am trying to reduce the 3k we spent on movers rentals this year. Additionally, I hope that my purchases are relevant and useful for several years. As for the washes, they will not be replacing anything, just looking for a way to add some depth to our inventory at a good cost point. The Vivids don't do saturates very well...

Take a look at the Chauvet Maverick's. I was surprised at the quality. You can easily change one gobo wheel, the second is "permanent" though even that one with some hassle is changeable. Has shutters too.
https://www.chauvetprofessional.com/products/maverick-mk2-spot/

These look really impressive, I would like to have a demo of them to see more. However, the CRI is low, and they do not publish a fixture noise level. Also the specs list full shutters (like a douser) but no framing shutters? That being said, they do look like a more than solid choice for our concert hall, or as a secondary set for the theater.
 
These look really impressive, I would like to have a demo of them to see more. However, the CRI is low, and they do not publish a fixture noise level. Also the specs list full shutters (like a douser) but no framing shutters? That being said, they do look like a more than solid choice for our concert hall, or as a secondary set for the theater.

I don't know what the noise level specifically was, but I can say they were damn quiet. We bought 16 in our first batch and set them all up and in a 15x20 room with them all sitting on road cases, fans running and going through parameters and moves, there wasn't any real serious noise. Fans were quiet, on a big move there was a little mechanical whine but definitely acceptable for a quiet environment. The Mark 2 definitely has a 4 blade framing shutter.
 
I don't know what the noise level specifically was, but I can say they were damn quiet. We bought 16 in our first batch and set them all up and in a 15x20 room with them all sitting on road cases, fans running and going through parameters and moves, there wasn't any real serious noise. Fans were quiet, on a big move there was a little mechanical whine but definitely acceptable for a quiet environment. The Mark 2 definitely has a 4 blade framing shutter.


Ha, Just spent a hour pondering the DMX layout of the SPOT... DUH...
 
I am glad to hear that you are considering both High End Systems fixtures and the new Relevé Spot by ETC. All of these fixtures have some fantastic features and uses that can be extremely useful for helping foster the next generation of lighting designers and technicians. Depending on the size of your venue, the SolaFrame 750 and new SolaFrame 1000 both represent full-featured products that are both bright and quiet, and each is offered in an Ultra-Bright or High CRI version. The SolaFrame 1000 adds a second gobo wheel and has almost twice the light output from the SolaFrame 750, but either would be a cornerstone to your lighting rig.

If you are worried about sound more than anything else, the SolaFrame Theatre gives you the quietest fixture option in the industry, but with your batten limits it would be a tough hang.

Lastly, I saw that you mentioned the Relevé Spot from ETC. This fixture could be incredibly valuable to your venue for a number of reasons. First of all, the fixture uses a derivative of ETCs ColorSource DeepBlue engine, what this gives you is brighter and more vibrant colors than fixtures that use a white light source. This means that with a 180w RGIL engine, the Relevé Spot matches and surpasses brightness for other fixtures up to a 400W+ engine, not to mention that the additive color mixing gives you the ability to better tune in colors that look beautiful with the other lights in your rig. Throw in ETCs industry-leading LED Calibration and Thermal Droop Protection, and you have an incredibly valuable theatrical fixture.

I am not going to go into the entire sales pitch here, but if you are interested, please contact me and I would be happy to speak with you further about the benefits of all of the High End Systems and ETC fixtures, I can also get you in touch with a salesman and help setup a demo.

Matt Stoner
Product Manager - Automated Lighting
ETC / High End Systems
 
Hi All,
I think you're actually looking for the MK2 Profile. At Chauvet, we use the word Profile to designate if a Moving Head Spot has shutters. The MK2 Profile has a High CRI light engine (greater than 90), Framing shutters, and is otherwise identical to the MK2 Spot.

-HTH,
-Ford
 
We just picked up a pair of Chauvet MK1 Spots. Build quality was impressive, noise level is no more than our existing LED downlight system. Can corroborate noise when moving a lot or zooming/focusing is noticeable, but not offensive. Brightness is acceptable, it seems to punch around the same weight as something like a MAC 700. Great for effects, but it has a little trouble standing out against a lot of incandescent wash. Granted this is just two fixtures. Has a lot of interface options which is nice. Would have rather gone with the MK2 Profile just because of the framing shutters but for our budget the MK1 spot worked out fine. The GOBOs are useful and it is nice that it's not too hard to swap (haven't tried yet, but I've heard positive things).

At Chauvet, we use the word Profile to designate if a Moving Head Spot has shutters.

This is one of those theatre naming convention things I came to find out in hunting for moving lights. It's the modern equivalent of cheeseborough vs. cheeseburger. It does seem like most manufacturers imply this about framing shutters when calling a light a profile/spot, but the rest of the feature list between the two is anything but consistent from vendor to vendor. Someone will make a million dollars if they create a website that is the equivalent of PCPartPicker but for movers and other intelligent lighting.
 
Having used both the Martin MH6 and the Chauvet Rogue R2 Wash (though not in the same spaces), I'd highly recommend the R2, it isn't priced much more (then the MH6), but has significantly more output, multiple DMX profiles, and options for pixel control. The MH6 is fine for small venues, or flash-&-trash, but doesn't have the punch to compete with a conventional wash. The only homogenous wash I've found in this price range is the Elation Fuze Wash Z120 or Z350.

As to hard edge movers, ones with shutters are usually called Profiles, except Robe uses 'Blade', HES uses '-frame', and Martin uses 'Performance'. :think: I guess every manufacturer just sorta does their own thing.

As for fixtures you should look into not mentioned yet:
Martin Mac Quantum, these don't have shutters, or variable CMY, but are solid performers, and have run like champs in the mouths long show runs (3 mo summer runs, 2 mo fall/winter runs) over the last two years I've worked with them.
Robe DL4S, RGBW LED engine, and the full image effects engine (shutters, rotating gobo, animation wheel), I haven't used these, but love how light and snappy Robe makes their lights
Robe T1 Profile, Just announced at LDI, simmilar to the DL4S in features, but with an RGBA-Lt Green (lime?!) LED array.
Elation Satura Profile, It's got all the features you'd expect, my only hesitation is that the shutters only have a 40% wipe across the beam (Robes have 80%, not sure about others)
Vari*lite VL2600 Profile looks good, but I've been seeing mixed vibes about the new(ish) corporate ownership​

I am not going to go into the entire sales pitch here, but if you are interested, please contact me and I would be happy to speak with you further about the benefits of all of the High End Systems and ETC fixtures, I can also get you in touch with a salesman and help setup a demo.

^As they always say, demo everything in your space, or better yet get them all in at once and do a shootout before you make your final decision.
 
This just popped up in my suggestions:
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Most of the lights they compare are bigger/brighter then needed here, save the Mac Encore, but quite interesting nonetheless.

ALSO, one big quality of life feature to look out for is auto rotating screens, makes addressing much simpler (standard on most (all?) Robe and Chauvet Mavic fixtures.)

This is one of those theatre naming convention things I came to find out in hunting for moving lights. It's the modern equivalent of cheeseborough vs. cheeseburger. It does seem like most manufacturers imply this about framing shutters when calling a light a profile/spot, but the rest of the feature list between the two is anything but consistent from vendor to vendor. Someone will make a million dollars if they create a website that is the equivalent of PCPartPicker but for movers and other intelligent lighting.
You talking about something like this?
 
Hi All,
I think you're actually looking for the MK2 Profile. At Chauvet, we use the word Profile to designate if a Moving Head Spot has shutters. The MK2 Profile has a High CRI light engine (greater than 90), Framing shutters, and is otherwise identical to the MK2 Spot.

-HTH,
-Ford
Ford is 100% right. I meant the profile. But incorrectly linked the spot. The low CRI reference confused me because that seemed wrong. Thanks for catching what I actually meant!
 
Elation Satura Profile, It's got all the features you'd expect, my only hesitation is that the shutters only have a 40% wipe across the beam (Robes have 80%, not sure about others)

Having received 16 of these and seen them in use, some thoughts;

- Intensity is good, field is good, white color is good.
- Color mixing is Meh. Mediocre field in assorted colors, with uneven saturation in the field. If doing flash and trash, the color wheel work fine.
- Shutter range and angles are OK, didn't run into issues not getting a cut desired.
- The current profile in the ETC Eos consoles cannot produce color matches when using the "Color 5/68" syntax, which is ETC speak for Roscolux R68. Nothing is correct as far as I can see, resulting in the need to build color palettes from the color mixing system for anything you want to get close to a gel color. For what it's worth, my Martin MAC 700's (arc lamps) as well as MAC Aura's produce matches pretty close, given their much different "lamp" types and as compared to an incandescent S4. A query to ETC in the summer about the Satura profile informed us that Elation hasn't been forthcoming with info about the fixture for ETC to make the profile work better.

I'll let them duke it out, but a heads up that I'd rather have a Martin.

Oh and a comment that EVERY gobo in wheel 2 for 16 fixtures got installed at the factory in reverse order from the manual and the ETC profile. With 16 fixtures, that's going to cost me in terms of hiring some crew to go in and move gobo's. So not impressed with Elation quality control.
 
Having received 16 of these and seen them in use, some thoughts;

- Intensity is good, field is good, white color is good.
- Color mixing is Meh. Mediocre field in assorted colors, with uneven saturation in the field. If doing flash and trash, the color wheel work fine.
- Shutter range and angles are OK, didn't run into issues not getting a cut desired.
- The current profile in the ETC Eos consoles cannot produce color matches when using the "Color 5/68" syntax, which is ETC speak for Roscolux R68. Nothing is correct as far as I can see, resulting in the need to build color palettes from the color mixing system for anything you want to get close to a gel color. For what it's worth, my Martin MAC 700's (arc lamps) as well as MAC Aura's produce matches pretty close, given their much different "lamp" types and as compared to an incandescent S4. A query to ETC in the summer about the Satura profile informed us that Elation hasn't been forthcoming with info about the fixture for ETC to make the profile work better.

I'll let them duke it out, but a heads up that I'd rather have a Martin.

Oh and a comment that EVERY gobo in wheel 2 for 16 fixtures got installed at the factory in reverse order from the manual and the ETC profile. With 16 fixtures, that's going to cost me in terms of hiring some crew to go in and move gobo's. So not impressed with Elation quality control.

This is perfectly timed for me, Thank you @SteveB! I was looking into getting some Satura B-Stock and you managed to hit on all of my possible concerns before getting a demo unit into my space.
 
It looks like an amazing spreadsheet and I'd love for it to be a living public document, not sure how that could work though.
I'll take a look and see I have the link still. I saw something like that as a google spreadsheet for that exact reason.

Edit: don't seem to have the link anymore
 
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