SLE Post 3: Manufacturers

Consoles and fixtures are the main tools in a system using automated lights.

Some lighting console manufacturers include Avolites, ABD Lighting, Compulite, Barco/High End, ETC, Jands Vista, ChamSys, MA Lighting, Zero88, and Martin Professional.

High End Systems, a Barco Company, has the Wholehog 3 console, and MA Lighting has the GrandMA 2. These are the two systems that will be explored this month. Also, I have been on the Avolites previously - the Pearl 2000 and Pearl Tiger.

As for fixtures, manufacturers include Martin, Philips Vari*Lite, Robe, Barco/High End, PRG, Coemar, and Clay Paky, among many others.

Martin has its MAC series, Vari*Lite its VL series, Robe its Robin series, ColorWash and ColorSpot, High End its Intellaspot, PRG its AutoPar, Best Boy and Bad Boy, and Clay Paky its Alpha series.

In FSL-1 we use various Martin fixtures, Vari*Lite VL 500Ds, and High End's Technobeams. Previously, (almost) all I had gotten to use were Robe ColorWash 575 ATs and ColorSpot 575 ATs.

Regardless of make/model, a lighting console/board/desk is an electrical device that allows us to control multiple fixtures. DMX512, which is the most commonly used electronic control protocol, is how control data is transmitted from the console to the fixtures, usually over DMX cables with 5-pin XLR connectors. 

Intelligent lights, also known as automated or moving lights, again regardless of make/model, allow versatility and multiple functions. The luminaires use multiple channels of DMX for features such as pan, tilt, dimmer, shutter, gobo select and rotation, color wheel, CMY full color mixing, prism facet and rotation, effects wheel, gobo animation wheel, zoom, focus, iris, lamp on and off, fixture reset, and remote patching channel. 

Movers give us more attributes per fixture that can be controlled from the console, as compared to conventional lights, where everything but intensity has to be pre-set. 

Movers can now integrate digital projection capabilities, combining lighting and video projection through the addition of video content control. Control from laptops, using USB to DMX, are more common now. Also, transmitting data over ethernet (RJ45) still is being further developed.

The tools have fixed capabilities, and it is up to designers and programmers to expand on these.