"We needed a viable replacement for our Martin MAC 2000 profiles," said Sean McKernan, CCP's general manager. "Reducing our lamp overheads was very important to us, and having an LED source saves us considerable money over a year. We did the sums, and over a fixture's working life of 50,000 hours, lamp costs are around $18,000 per unit."
The SolaSpot's 400W bright white engine LED kicks out a more-than-respectable 20,000 lumens, good for keeping the luminous output at over 70% over 50,000 hours.
"The SolaSpot Pro 1500 gives us low overheads and running cost," Sean continued. "The low power consumption means we can put more units on single circuits, and having a unit that's got consistent colour temperature and intensity over the duration of 50,000 hours is phenomenal. It means we never have to worry about an LD complaining about inconsistent colour temperatures or intensities on different units when using them in the same rig."
Along with efficiency and longevity, the other big feature that won CCP over is the SolaSpots framing shutters. "The framing in the SolaSpot is brilliant," praised Sean.
"Our SolaSpots have been out on numerous theatre shows and the LDs are loving it. A lot of people are saying its framing is better than a Philips Vari-Lite VL3500."
The notoriously perfectionist theatre crew are also loving the SolaSpot's colour temperature and dimming. "We've had it in a few theatres and they've more than held their own," Sean reported. "The dimming is very, very precise. I've had 20 second crossfades on shows and there's no problems. The CTO is fantastic; you'd think you have an ETC Source Four hanging over you. There's nothing it can't do. It's got everything you could ask for in a Profile, plus the framing as well."
(Jim Evans)
