What Now? Inventory...

[tyler.martin]

I'm kind of stumped on what kind of gear to put in my lighting capital budget this year...

My current inventory is

120 Source 4's (Various lenses from 10 degree to 50 degree)
30 Par 64's
24 Strand 3380's
14 Scrollers
8 Iris Cyc Cells
5 iCue's
4 DMX Rotators
2 DMX Irises
2 Radiances
2 Strobes
2 Foggers
1 Ion w/Fader Wing
2 Touch Screens
1 Opto
Designer Remote
RRFU

We run 5 theatre productions a season plus a larger musical. There is no existing house plot, and the designers rotate between the three houses that our company operates. We have a double purchase fly system, 36 linesets, 192 Dimmers. From Prosc the stage is 48ft wide x 15 ft deep. With apron the stage ends up being 54ft wide x 31 ft deep.

Our designers are hesitant about adding movers to the rig. I'd like to invest in some Desire 60's as LED's or ColorForce 72's but other than that Im not sure what else I could buy? Ive read Gafftaper method, and we follow that for the most part, but I do think some movers *could* be a benefit.

Any Ideas?

 

[Esoteric]

I love movers when I am designing musicals. Six 150W moving heads might be a good start.

 

[DuckJordan]

are you guys wanting to move into another type of show? such as concerts?
that seems to me a very small number of Par cans, but I also work in a facility that does touring concerts about once a month.

Maybe update your fresnel inventory, possibly with some of the S4 fresnels. Then you can start consolidating your lamp inventory.

 

[Aman121]

Maybe some LED source 4s just for giggles? More scrollers, rotators, ect are always nice to have.
Movers are a big jump, and ongoing maintenance is pricey. Ususally it's more economical to rent movers rather than own.

 

[danTt]

Striplights
More source 4's, 120 seems low to me, but do you ever feel you are missing coverage?
CXI scrollers or some sort of LED par perhaps

I think movers would be a great addition to any space, however renting definitely makes more sense if it works out budget wise to do it. If you need to spend the money to get the money, you could look at buying some, but you'd still have maintence expenses on them. Don't get anything dimmer than 575 watts though and I'd suggest more like 700, or they are just going to be glorified moving toys that you'll never see.

 

[xander]

iPad and iRFR and WAP. Since you have an ION I assume you mean RFR, not RRFU. Either way, piece of crap.

More instruments. More scrollers. Doesn't really seem to me like you have enough of any of your conventional gear to justify movers "just for the fun of it."

Do you have any accessories that you didn't list? If not, you should have a top hat or half hat (eyelash) for every ellipsoidal and barndoors for wash units.

-Tim

 

[z2oo]

iPad and iRFR and WAP.

Beat me to it! This is great to have - we've got 2 iPads, an iPod Touch, and iPhone, and Android phone, and a Kindle Fire (coming soon) all using the RFR apps. It's awesome.

I'd agree with the OP about some of the D60s from ETC, or depending on how much you use your cyc, good coverage with the Selador Vivid-Rs for great color mixing. I just did this during a show and it was absolutely terrific. Every color I've ever wanted (including emerald green), plus a great rainbow effect (I've got pictures somewhere) and cool chases.''

Other things I might add would be maybe to instead of getting more scrollers, definitely go with the D60s (though we use Vivid-R's for dance sides). Can you tell that I really love ETC's line of LEDs? They're absolutely fantastic! Random, but I should have 8 x Vivid-Rs and 8 x Palettas for a show next February/March. Very excited that I get more!

 

[tyler.martin]

Since our stage is so wide and shallow we have more than enough coverage with the fixtures we have. We are not a roadhouse. All the productions done in the venue are in house, professional level theatre shows.

We do have a "Show Control Network" with the Ion, qLab and Audio consoles on their own standalone network with a collection of iPads, iPods and tablets for designer remotes and controls.

The inventory that i posted is just my inhouse inventory, I can often borrow gear like striplights, rotators and iris's from one of our other venues. All of our Fresnels have a set of Barndoors as well as tophat barndoor combos. I have a collection of tophats for the source 4's. I'm not a huge fan of the S4 Fresnel, and since our whole company wide fresnel inventory is 3380's it seems strange to start phasing out one fixture for another.

Next season we got allocated a sizable capital budget to replace our dimming system, but it more than likely will not need replacing, so even more money next year, hopefully to pull out the DMX network and convert to ETCnet

My plan as it stands: 8-10 ETC Desire D60's, 6 Scrollers + Power Supply, 2 More Auto Iris -or- buy 6 Colorforce 72 and replace our cyc lights.

 

[erosing]

If you don't have what you'll need already: tools, testers, safety equipment, current NEC 70 and 70E (or the highly recommended NECPlus subscription). Also spare parts, gel, patterns, amd extra lamps are useful. Distribution equipment is always good, same with extra booms, couplers/burgers/locks.

 

[soundlight]

If you're looking to replace cyc lights I'd strongly recommend the Altman Spectra Cyc fixtures. Get a demo and try them out in your venue. Great RGBA mixing, with a very nice Phosphor-transposed amber similar to the Color Force fixtures (which I also love, but are a strip light not a cyc light). The reflector is the thing that sets the Spectra Cycs apart.

I'd get enough DMX irises to use with all of your I-Cues so you can change beam size on all of them. That's one of my favorite Gafftaper Method Movers - Source Four with I-Cue and DMX iris.

I'd wait to get movers till enough people have reasonable power hard-edge LED movers out to give you some options. Currently there's the GLP SpotOne and the Robe Robin DLX in the color mixing mover category, and that's about it. Both good fixtures, but we're just on the very edge of what's possible with them so wait for another product iteration.

 

[Esoteric]

If you are going to upgrade your cyc units, check out Phillips LED cyc units. Really awesome units at a tremendous price point.

 

[SamUpdike]

The D60's are very bright units, unless you need the extra throw I would suggest getting more of the D40's instead.

 

[jglodeklights]

If you're looking to replace cyc lights I'd strongly recommend the Altman Spectra Cyc fixtures. Get a demo and try them out in your venue. Great RGBA mixing, with a very nice Phosphor-transposed amber similar to the Color Force fixtures (which I also love, but are a strip light not a cyc light). The reflector is the thing that sets the Spectra Cycs apart.

I'd get enough DMX irises to use with all of your I-Cues so you can change beam size on all of them. That's one of my favorite Gafftaper Method Movers - Source Four with I-Cue and DMX iris.

Good to know about the Spectra CYC fixtures, soundlight. My company is purchasing them for our new space.

I agree, I'd get those additional DMX irises. As you are looking at purchasing LED wash fixtures, I'd be sure to look at previous plots to determine the appropriate number your designers will end up using. Since they are most likely going to be taking the place of the PAR 64s and Strand 3380's in roles such as downlight, make sure you are getting enough to cover each acting area. Also, if you are interested in or beginning a shift towards LED's, I would avoid purchasing a significant number of additional scrollers. Again, I'd look at past plots and see if there is somewhere you need to fill in.

 

[Wood4321]

I would be cautious about the spectra cyc units.
Check them all and send them back if they don't match, I have seen a few threads concerning matching problems on that line of fixtures.
Here is the most recent on the Lightnetwork
If it were me, I would concur with Esoteric take a long hard look at the Strand phillips cyc, the PLCYC
It looks to be very impressive.

 

[Esoteric]

I would be cautious about the spectra cyc units.
Check them all and send them back if they don't match, I have seen a few threads concerning matching problems on that line of fixtures.
Here is the most recent on the Lightnetwork
If it were me, I would concur with Esoteric take a long hard look at the Strand phillips cyc, the PLCYC
It looks to be very impressive.

I loved our demos. Great units.

 

[kicknargel]

Another possibility to consider: how are your lighting positions? If you don't have booms, taildowns, ladder positions, box boom/torm position, balcony rail, perhaps an anti-proscenium, that might be a use for capital funds that will really give your designers options.

 

[tyler.martin]

Unfortunatly this year we dont have enough capital to do structural modifications to they building. The theatre is a 1930's movie house that was converted in the mid 90's. Next year along with the proposed dimmer upgrade there is capital to add a third FOH truss.

 

[Kelite]

As mentioned several times throughout this thread, the Gafftaper Method is a sensible way to approach lighting inventory, regardless of the size of one's space. To get your money's worth from existing lighting gear, two Right Arm units with your favorite flavor of profile, Fresnel or LED wash fixture would give you an added dimension of movement without fan noise.



The Right Arm has an onboard power supply to drive color scrollers, irises, gobo rotators and other accessories teamed with your Source Four-

 

[Esoteric]

Right arms are nice. Although, I have never thought "I need a light that moves, but doesn't change color, change gobo, have a prism, remote focus, etc". Although I have converted a bit to the Gafftaper method (in theaters), and I agree that if you are only using them once a year or so then renting moving lights is probably the better option (which I always agree with, mostly because of my rental business, also of course that only holds true if you aren't being given the money and being told to spend it or else it goes away, in which case buy a few of your own), I think you are covered with your iCues as far as things that I would normally use a right arm for (unless you wanted to mount projectors to some), I normally use them interchangeably because if I want a moving unit, I also want it to have all the other features of a moving light. I like our Visioneer Spark90, Spark150, and Spark150i moving heads for theater use. We also have the Spark36 wash which is a powerful wash unit that also has graphics and chase abilities. But then again, I came up using movers in all kinds of theater (not just musicals) and have learned to incorporate them into straight plays, musicals, live music, basically anything.

To each their own.

 

[tyler.martin]

So the plan for this year is as follows:

16 Desire D40's
3 Auto Iris's
24 Tophats
12 S4 in the more unusual lenses (90's 5's and more 50's)
a Ultratec LSG
**FINALLY** upgrading from a homemade houselight rack(installed in the 1950's when the building was still a movie house) to Paradigm

After much thought, I really started to talk my self out of LED cyc cells, we only use our cyc maybe once or twice a year and I cant justify the capital at that point. With some experimentation maybe we will use the Desires to light our cyc which is very wide, but not tall.

Next year I plan on ripping out the DMX system and start coverting to ETCnet. At this point I have about 50 DMX points around the theatre, half of the lines dead, so pulling Cat5 and some nodes will make the system future proof and expandable.