The quadrennial show is one of the largest print media exhibitions in the world, and Heidelberg - among the world's major printing machine manufacturers - featured the biggest single stand, occupying all of hall eight and half of hall seven in their entireties.
All lighting fixtures for the Heidelberg Print areas, the 1.8 kilometres of trussing and 220 points on which it is hung was supplied by Siegen-based Trendco, and designed by Michael Diederichs. Trendco also supplied all the stand's audio systems. The stand consisted of numerous different product areas showing: types of printing, dye-cutting, folding, packaging and other associated machines, plus four presentation areas and several hospitality suites.
Lighting fixtures included 400 1K fresnels, 90 2Ks and assorted cyc units and profiles. The Diamond 4 was the main desk, and was used to control all Heidelberg Print's lighting in both halls. They used Avolites ART dimming throughout, with nine 48 channel racks, two 24 channel, two ART2000s single dimming modules and two older FD 60 x 10 amp racks which are still going strong despite advancing years! These were all spread across four dimmer cities in different parts of the halls.
Two of the four presentation areas were controlled by sub-desks, for which they made use of the ART dimmer's DMX 'Merge' facility explains Diederichs. He has used a Diamond 4 (in this case an Elite version) on several other projects - from festivals to large concerts - but this is the first time it has been used on a major exhibition by Trendco. It was chosen because of it's power and flexibility.
"It's so quick and easy to programme and record cues," expands Deiderichs. "You can set it out exactly as you want - with functions and lights wherever you need them. It's ideal for this scenario where you have a large generic rig and a pressured time window for programming." He adds that he although there were no moving lights on the job, he's used the D4 for controlling them on plenty of other occasions for which it is also an excellent tool.
The main challenge in setting up the lighting for IPEX was time and logistics - and Trendco had to be highly organised. Some of the points were put in during a pre-rigging period a few weeks earlier, but the main build time took a crew of 16 a total of four over-nighters to complete the work in hall eight, with an additional night to finish hall seven.
(Chris Henry)
