The versatile FX-200s were specified by lighting and visuals designer Ed Warren from Next Level Lights.
The band has been touring for the last three years with various different arrangements of tungsten lightsources over and around the stage as an integral part of the lighting rig.
Earlier in this tour, Warren introduced LED festoon lighting, going from the stage and reaching right out into the audience ... and he wanted to take this up another level and add another dynamic and adaptable lightsource to the mix - enter the FX-200.
He had seen the product in action at various festivals over the summer and thought it ideal for the next evolution of his design. "I wanted something far more than just a standard light bulb or lightsource, and something that could produce high-impact low-res effects like the stars at night or burning embers."
Apart from that, he needed to be able to get a good tungsten to match and complement the rest of the lighting aesthetics.
The FX-200s were mounted on small different length steels and hung on two independent trusses. Their layout and where they were positioned onstage was critical to the rest of the lighting rig, and when in position they brought two distinctive additional curved visual layers to the stage.
Content from a Catalyst media server triggered from Warren's Chamsys MQ100 console was run through all the FX-200 balls which certainly brought the desired whole new dimension to the show, "But without it being too elaborate or over-done", confirms Warren.
The more complex FX-200 effects in the show included spinning and chart-wheeling impressions for I Will Wait and an arc-like rising sun accompanied by bouncing sun-beams from the VL3500 moving lights in Awake My Soul.
Crowning the top of the stage were three of XL's Pixled F11 LED screens, an eight panel wide by three deep section in the centre, flanked by two sections of 3 x 3 panels wide per side last year.
XL supplied a 2ME Grass Valley HD Kayak mixer and full PPU with five Sony HXC100 HD cameras - two positioned at FOH, two in the 'pit' and one onstage, plus four Sony BRC H700 Robo-cams stations around the drums and piano - for the IMAG mix directed by Woody.
XL's crew chief was Al Bolland. He was joined by Myway, Steve Jones, Steve Clarisse, and Connie Glover on the road, and the tour was project managed for XL by Jo Beirne and Phil Mercer.
(Jim Evans)
