School Stage, the performing arts installation company, has completed a lighting project, using Chauvet Professional fixtures, to a multi-functional assembly hall in the newly built Lees Brook Community School in Chaddesden, Derby.
The assembly hall now features a lighting rig, with a stage area boasting 12 Chauvet Professional COLORdash Par-Hex 12 fixtures, four Chauvet Professional Q-Wash 419Z-LED moving heads, and four powerful 240W LED CHAUVET Professional Rogue R2 Spot units for authentic award ceremony presentations or school band concerts. Eight Chauvet Professional COLORado Batten 72 Tour wash lights are positioned across the back wall lighting cyclorama.
School Stage company director Chris Newton, commented: “The Rogue R2 units are robust in design and just the brightness I was looking for. The hall roof is very high and the R2s have the power necessary to provide real punch.”
The separate drama studio now features six Chauvet Professional COLORdash Par-Hex 12 units, illuminating the space. The COLORdash Par-Hex 12 satisfies the need for bright ultraviolet light without a separate UV fixture providing extra versatility across the performance suite installation. Conventional tungsten halogen fittings from Philips were also installed and Newton was impressed with how well the LED verses conventional worked together in this environment.
The lighting system is controlled via an ETC Ion lighting console, which can be operated via an iPad. Separately, the lighting can operate via the main Crestron control system that is the brains behind the operation of the halls complete AV inventory; operated also via iPad, as well as by a wall-mounted and portable touchscreen. Into these control interfaces, School Stage programmed various pre-set lighting schemes to enable simple operation of the lights and presentation systems in the hall.
“Due to the proximity of the Chauvet UK office to the school, I really wanted Chauvet to be involved in this project”, stated Newton. “Indeed, the original spec was changed to Chauvet Professional lighting fixtures from competitive models, once I realised the extra factory-finishing Chauvet added to all of its products to ensure the highest quality, uniquely robust and innovative lighting fixtures.”
Newton concluded: “Chauvet’s ‘local service’ appealed to me with its UK-based technical support. From a point where I’d never used the fixtures, I’ve now built up a really strong relationship with Chauvet and at the end of this project I have a lot of confidence in the Chauvet Professional brand.”
