Nippy has been a rigging supplier at the National since 2001 and works closely with the National's rigging department including rigging resources technician, Matthew Wheeler and his colleague Rob Barnard, head of stage facilities.
Wheeler and Barnard first saw the Kinesys system on the Nippy Industries stand at the 2005 ABTT show, and were immediately struck by its potential flexibility for the National. The theatre has an action-packed production and repertory schedule across all its theatre spaces. "The demands of the theatre are really quite considerable," says Wheeler, and with sets and productions getting every more ambitious and changeover times ever more compressed, they were interested in a compact, cost-effective system to help them move large set pieces about quickly, easily and safely. A key factor in their choice was also that they wanted a '"plug and play" system - something that came out of the box, plugged in and worked without any fuss or compatibility issues.
They initially tested the Kinesys system with a hire from Nippy Industries which went extremely well. Then, when the decision came to make the purchase, they also needed to act extremely quickly as an incoming production needed to utilise the system immediately. Both Nippy and Kinesys were able to respond accordingly and turn this around.
The deal was completed for Nippy by Hannah Sneath. The full system consists of the 14 Kinesys Elevation 1+ controllers, the 14 20-metres-a-minute Liftkets, a Kinesys Array PD-ES power distro and a laptop running Kinesys' proprietary Vector software.
The Elevation 1+ mounts close to the motor, and has a 32A 3-phase inlet and outlet allowing units to be 'daisy-chained' together. Data is provided via an RS485 data link and an LED display on the front and full menu system are integrated, together with movement and speed controls. Nippy industries co-ordinated full training sessions on the new kit between Kinesys and the National's staff.
The new system went straight into use on two Lyttleton productions Voysey Inheritance and a production of the Stanislavsky's classic, The Seagull.
Wheeler says: "It's proving hugely versatile - quick to rig allowing units to be swapped around quickly and it's easy to operate and programme. The hoist noise is also minimal. Nippy Industries has been a great help in all stages of the hire that preceded the sale, the subsequent purchase and the training."
This is one of a number of high profile theatre projects in which Nippy Industries has been involved recently - other installations include the Mumford Theatre, Cambridge, the White Rock Theatre, Hastings and regular dry hires to cutting edge production houses like The Donmar.
(Chris Henry)
