The three-day 2012 event attracted 55,000 dance music fans to see, hear and experience a truly stunning line up of the best DJs and current acts 'of the moment' on the planet, at the site in Daresbury near Runcorn in Cheshire.
Creamfields - born out of legendary Liverpool super club Cream - and Adlib have a long history of involvement, and this year Adlib was again working for the event's technical producers, LarMac LIVE - Jo MacKay and Ian Greenway.
Adlib supplied the massive Cream Arena, the Annie Mac Presents Arena, the brand new Fire It Up Arena hosted by Creamfields favourite Eddie Halliwell and the Hed Kandi Hospitality.
While the production design brief was relatively open for all areas, both the Cream and Annie Mac Presents Arenas also had to be flexible enough to accommodate visiting artists with their own 'specials' packages in a fuss-free operation.
For Cream of the Show, Adlib designed a festival style rig, with lighting and video kit hung on a combination of ground support and overhead trusses flown from the tent king poles.
Moving lights were a mix of Martin MAC 700 Washes & Profiles, Clay Paky Sharpies, with an impressive array of Atomic strobes, and 2-lite Moles on the front truss pointing into the audience.
Further audience lighting - more MAC 700s - was rigged in two trusses running lengthways down either side of the tent.
Adlib also designed the video system. Supplied by XL Video, this consisted of a full LED screen upstage, with additional LED panels cladding the legs of the ground support and extending outwards towards the stage edges on stands. The stands were also rigged with more Sharpies.
The Annie Mac Presents stage ran for two days (Friday & Saturday) with an overnight change to incorporate Groove Armada's headline set on the second night, again with a combination of ground supported and flown elements.
Lighting fixtures included a lot of Sharpies, with a semi-circle of CK ColorBlaze 48 x LED battens crowning the stage and another semi-circle mirroring the effect on the floor, with the DJ booth positioned in between the two sets of lights.A truss sub-hung from the ground support at the half-way point over the stage was loaded with MAC 301 LED washes and 4-lite Moles. The consoles were a Hog 3 and an Avolites Pearl Expert Touch Wing.
In the Fire It Up arena, the same design was utilised for both days of its operation, featuring a full video wall at the back (from XL) with Catalyst content and control supplied by Adlib.
A ground supported trussing goal post provided the main lighting positions, populated with MAC 250 Beam and MAC 700 profile moving lights plus a proliferation of strobes. MAC Auras were used for audience lighting on their own separate truss, with an Avolites Pearl Expert for control.
For Hed Kandi Hospitality, Adolib's design was based on more ambient overall room lighting, created with the careful deployment of PixelPARs and MAC250 Washes. Each of the Saddlespan areas was architecturally lit with well positioned MAC 350 Entours and 301s.
ADLIB's Phil Stoker co-ordinated the supply of PA systems to all these areas, with a JBL VerTec system to the Cream Arena and Coda Airline LA12 systems for Annie Mac Presents, Fire It Up and Hed Kandi Hospitality.
(Jim Evans)
