Responsible for lighting design were Roy Bennett and Stan Crocker who had Martin gear at their disposal including Mac 700 Profiles and Mac 2000 Profiles and Washes, as well as Martin U.S. distributed BigLite 4.5 Xenon lamp fixtures. Complementing the large Mac rig were a number of conventional luminaires. Digital effects also played a key visual design role and came courtesy of Martin's Maxedia Pro media server with control from the Martin Maxxyz with Wing. Lighting supply was by Upstaging, Inc.
Roy Bennett, currently busy with the Madonna and Tim McGraw/Faith Hill tours, managed to squeeze in the time to co-design the show. Bennett and Crocker created unique designs for each of the band's performances and maintained a continuous live concert feel for the TV broadcast. "I wanted to make it look like an outdoor festival stadium show," he comments, "so we kept things moving with a rotating stage and incorporated elements like scaffolding and lots of lights. The nature of the show was rock and the whole idea was to do a classic take on the big rock show with big walls of lights, etc. We used the BigLite 4.5 as a backwash to the whole set and used some for big aerials. The Mac 2K Profiles and Washes we put in big light pods like in the old 70s shows with spots in the centre and washlights on the outside.
"But of all of Martin's spot luminaires I like the Mac 700 Profiles the most. They are awesome lights for their size - compact and powerful - and very snappy with a bit more response to it. We used them throughout the show."
Harmonising digital effects from Martin's Maxedia Digital Media Composer were an integral part of the show and ran on a variety of screens. "I remember seeing theatre horns as a kid and always thought that they were a good look so we made Plexiglas horns and backed them with video screens," Bennett explains. "Then behind the stage we had rows of Color Kinetics ColorBlast 12 controlled by Maxedia pixelmapping. We also had a rear projection screen upstage of where the performance area was, as well as three large screens above the stage."
(Chris Henry)
