The Royal Danish Ballet’s recent performance of “A Folk Tale,” which recently ended a four week run at the Copenhagen Opera House, is a classic Bournonville ballet that included several new interpretations and visual elements. Part of the new look included lighting effects from Martin Professional MAC III Profile luminaires under the command of lighting designer and programmer Mikki Kunttu.
“It was one of the main ideas of the design to have the brightest source of light originating from the center of the stage so we created a cluster of MAC III’s in the center of the space,” said Kunttu. “I wanted a very silent moving light with a lot of brightness, wide beam and good gobo projection and the MAC III delivered all these.”
Kunttu made the decision to use the 1,500 watt fixtures after studying scale models of the sets. “With the set’s white ‘paper’ legs and borders I wanted to have as many possibilities with the MAC’s as possible,” Kunttu continued. “Placing them central quite close to each other gave me the best shots. It also concentrated the stage view nicely and worked very well with the sets.”
The MAC III Profiles were supplied to the Royal Danish Ballet for “A Folk Tale” by Nordic Rentals. Capable of delivering over 33,000 lumens of brightness, the MAC III Profile also features an 11.5 to 55 degree zoom range.
“The brightness is exceptional and the optics are very good, but for years moving lights have been advertised as ‘silent’ and for me the MAC III is the first fixture that really delivers silence outside of the brochure and sales talks,” concluded Kunttu. “At the moment, I’m using them in Philadelphia with the Pennsylvania Ballet and Philadelphia Orchestra. The fixtures hang 7 meters straight above the orchestra and they add no noise whatsoever.”
