This year, Festigal's lighting designer Ronen Najar - who has lit the show for the past eight years - spec'd 24 of Robe's new BMFL Spot fixtures to be the centrepiece. The BMFLs were part of a delivery of 60 units purchased by high profile Israeli rental company, Argaman Systems.
Ronen, among the country's leading LDs, is known for his 'out of the box' approach and the great style he brings to lighting any project. He once again produced a stunningly colourful and dramatic show for the tour which played three cities - Haifa, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv - with up to three two hour shows a day clocking up an impressive total of 108 performances! All are completely sold out.
Robe's reporting team caught up with Festigal at the Congress Centre in Haifa, where the majority of the lighting was flown on large ground support structures that enabled a circular truss to be secured above the in-the-round stage.
The design concept of fast and poppy lighting matched the velocity and pace of the show - an environment that seriously tests any lighting fixtures!
In addition to the BMFLs, Ronen also used 24 x Robe ColorWash 2500E ATs and eight ColorWash 1200E ATs. Robe is one of the brands he regularly specifies for his work which includes several music based TV series including the runaway success, Rising Star.
The BMFLs were used for all Festigal's major effects lighting. He also utilized them as specials, as well as gobo projections to help create the different locations and planets involved in the intergalactic theme of this year's performance.
Ronen used 24 x BMFLs on Motek, another Hanukkah touring show for which he was LD, this time for three-five year olds and more theatrical, less poppy but equally as interesting to light. Staged at the Konchya Arena in Beersheba as well as touring to Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, it had a slightly less hectic schedule than Festigal, however still played 46 capacity performances!
Ronen was happy that the BMFLs were able to satisfy all his requirements for specials together with numerous big, bold, bright and colourful looks, and the lighting contractor for this Motek was also Argaman Systems.
Argaman has made major investments in Robe in the last three years, all of which have been delivered by Robe's proactive Israeli distributor, Danor Theatre and Studio Systems.
(Jim Evans)
