Like the revellers themselves, the Shamrock festival's musical performances represented a diverse mix. Irish music dominated the festivities with groups like Dropkick Murphys and the Fighting Jamesons getting everyone on their feet, but there were also DJs like Vanilla Ice and rockers too. Lighting this eclectic lineup of talent called for a flexible rig, which is why lighting designer Zach Bunner of Show Time Sound (Frederick, MD) built his design for the festival's two main stages around Rogue fixtures from Chauvet Professional.
"Festivals are always fun to design -- this one in particular. Being that there is such a broad range of artists, I threw my whole arsenal at both stages: profiles, beams, washes and strobes," said the LD. "I wanted a rig that was flexible and fast enough to keep up with the variety of high-energy music and dancing on stage. Aside from our own design, our stages gave the LDs for the different groups the full capability to make their shows stand out. The Chauvet Rogues were key to helping us do this. They gave us a lot of creative options on each stage, because they can do so many different things."
Bunner used 18 Rogue R2 Washes on his main stage rigs. Output from the fixture's 19 15-watt RGBW LEDs, which reaches up to 8,650 lux (measured at 5m) depending on the zoom, was bright enough to make a bold St. Patrick's Day statement, even during the sunlight hours of the outdoor festival.
"The output from the Rogues and our entire rig was awesome day and night," said Bunner. "Rogues have a terrific output, but what I especially liked about them was their versatility. Their zoom range (12°-49°) let me cover a lot of area, and their fast pan and tilt movements along with their colour mixing increased my creative options throughout the festival."
With the ShamrockFest running eight straight hours (3-11 pm), Bunner needed the variety of looks he could create with his upstage mounted washes. "I wanted to give the stage a fresh look throughout the festival without repeating things," he said. "Washing and backlighting the stage with changing colours from the Rogues, changing the zoom and using the different LED zones on the fixtures really helped give us the variety we wanted. In the end, we created the kind of lightshow that people will be talking about after they leave the festival."
(Jim Evans)
