Variety: it’s one of the most critical creative elements a lighting and video designer can bring to a show. Coming up with fresh looks for a 90-minute concert can be a challenge, but imagine doing it for eight straight hours on a livestream stage! Blessing Bero, Tatenda Gaylord Rushwaya, and the rest of the Events Evolution team faced this formidable task recently when they worked a noon to 8 pm pay-for-view show by platinum Epic Records star Benjamin Dube.
A legendary South African gospel singer (he performed at Nelson Mandela’s Freedom of the City Award presentation), Dube was joined by a large group of other performers on stage. This helped the Events Evolution team achieve the diverse looks they were after. Also contribution to the variety, was a flexible lighting rig that included 11 Maverick MK2 Spot, four Rogue R2 Spot and four Rogue R2 Wash fixtures, plus a Net-X node from CHAUVET Professional.
“We created a wide range of backgrounds with our videos and the rainbow of colors we were able to get from our lighting fixtures matched them all,” said Rushwaya, who programmed the show and ran the videos, while Bero handled the lighting design. “Color was key to keeping things visually fresh and interesting throughout the entire show. The design we went with called for a great many bold color mixes.”
Relying on the wide beam angles of their fixtures, which were hung on three rows of overhead truss, as well as on stage left and stage right structures, the Events Evolution team frequently changed the coverage area of their colorful displays. They also didn’t hesitate to overlap shafts of light in different bold color combinations, going with red, green and yellow one moment, they moving to purples and blues for another song.
Changing the configuration of shapes from the overhead and side lighting and altering the combination of colors was one way the designers kept things interesting. Another was by working split white beams and rotating gobos from their Maverick MK2 Spot fixtures with compelling video images and ample amounts of haze.
Setting these beams and gobo patterns against the rich purples from their washes, the team created sleek elegant looks on stage. This contrasted with some of the intensely powerful impressions that resulted from the bold color combinations; but in the end both worked toward the same goal.
“We wanted to create scenes that were very different, but all supported the same message of the program,” said Rushwaya, noting that this support involved “keeping things interesting visually.”
That’s precisely what the Events Evolution team accomplished, by serving up eight straight hours of fresh looks.
