ON LX brings innovation to Glastonbury’s Greenpeace Field
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The most noticeable element of the field consisted of a huge 18m tree constructed by Factory Settings. When combined with ON LX’s bespoke lighting solutions, punters could interact with the 40 Universes of WS2811 Pixels within the tree. This interaction, triggered by a plethora of Raspberry Pi setups, was crafted by Bailes+Light’s Barri Mason.
For this setup, GPIO inputs were utilised to allow OSC to trigger the system creating an effective way to communicate Greenpeace’s ideas through punters participating in the activity. This lead to people becoming more engaged with the campaign and influenced to consider future behaviour.
In this case, linking hands around the ‘Giant Rave Tree’ completed a circuit causing caused two sensors to trigger large LED Mapped chases showing punters how working together could achieve things that may seem impossible alone.
Bailes & Light took care of architectural, aesthetic and functional fittings, masterminded by Ben Bailes. Whilst ON LX provided all control, infrastructure, programming and operation of entertainment lighting.
RDM via an Enttec USB Pro allowed addressing of the 51 SGM fixtures from the ground, significantly reducing the time required for rigging.
Alongside the big looks created for the DJ Sets and ambient sessions sat an extensive time-coded light show. Titled the Four Seasons Show, the sequence lasted 15 minutes and displayed the tree throughout the seasons. The show was programmed on a HedgeHog4 by ON LX’s Matt Didon and involved a wide range of fixtures and atmospherics including two large snow machines from Snow Business.
Matt Didon added, “The SB-200’s from Snow Business were fantastic units that helped create the idea of the seasons. The instantaneous output and variable flake size allowed us to quickly create aerial effects with lighting fixtures and the RTI Femto RGB lasers. Having these units was certainly beneficial as smoke or haze in such an open environment definitely provided some challenges.”
The timecoded lightshow interfaced with ON LX’s custom Spektrum Systems hardware which saw its debut at Glastonbury. Providing rock solid performance, the two Spektrum machines balanced workload handling pixel mapping, show playback and audio output independently. The pixel mapping was programmed by ON LX's James Walton using ENTTEC’s ELM software. Once setup, the system was interfaced with the main lighting system and remote triggers allowing for intuitive control.
ON LX’s James Walton adds: “A massive thank-you to the guys on the Greenpeace build crew for the invaluable contribution and to ENTTEC, Snow Business International Ltd, Dry Hire Lighting, SGM, White Light and AC Lasers for the support given and kit lent we wouldn’t have been able to do it without you!”
(Jim Evans)
