ETECH spoke to head of lighting department, Glenn Duncan to find out more of the technology he used to bring this all-South African production to the international stage.
Friday, September 13, 2019
Lights, Consoles... and all that Jazz
ETECH spoke to head of lighting department, Glenn Duncan to find out more of the technology he used to bring this all-South African production to the international stage.
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The portability and flexibility of the Eos series consoles from ETC is one of the many reasons it has cornered the market from the smallest community theaters to international tours. Having the same software across these platforms allows an incredible amount of flexibility in offline programming, running backups, running clients, and switching to more compact consoles. In particular, the ability to obtain a personal license to run off a laptop (which we as students get a steal of a discount on) allows for even more flexibility for small shows and venues with older 2 scene preset consoles. This past summer I was working as the programmer and board op at a summerstock where I would often set my personal laptop running a client or backup during the shows, and it worked flawlessly. Additionally, with the explosion of show networks and systems available, it is even easier to plug-and-play directly into the network. All in all, the consistency ETC is giving to its user base allows for an incredible amount of adaptability for designers and technicians.
I am a big lighting person and a big Chicago fan, so having an article about the lighting in Chicago is a really fun read. This article talks about the international tour of Chicago and the lighting equipment they used which was all ETC based. From the boards in each city to the fixtures, Glenn Duncan, the head of lighting for the tour, chose ETC for the reliability. In my time as a lighting designer in high school, we primarily used ETC fixtures and boards. Even our oldest board from 1995 that got used once a year was ETC and while it had its quirks, it was still reliable almost 25 years later. I did not know that you could take a show programmed on one console and be able to plug it in to a nicer board and still get the same show, so learning that was really cool and a piece of helpful information that I may need in life someday.
The scope of ETC’s work in the lighting industry is truly amazing to me. Every theater I have ever worked in has had some type of ETC product, whether is be their entertainment fixtures, architectural fixtures, show controls, power controls, or whatever else they make. They’ve had their failures (ETC REVOLUTION), but overall they have been a reputable name in the industry for decades. It’s really interesting to me to see how adaptable and flexible their equipment is with other members of the Eos family. This compatibility is crucial when wanting to upgrade to the latest technology, without undoing the work that has already been done for a show. It is nice to know that there is an easy way to hop from desk to desk without losing any components of the show, only gaining new features from the latest equipment. ETC’s LED technology has always blown me away in that all of their colors are so bright and crisp. They have really created some awesome technology and I can’t wait to see what is next for their company.
This article caught my attention with its Chicago reference and held my attention with all the information about the wide variety of ETC products and systems that exist. Chicago holds a special place in my heart as the final show I worked in high school. To me, it was the culmination of my humble beginnings in theatre and the beginning of turning my hobby into a future profession. In reading the article, I was interested to learn more about the ETC Eos family of consoles. The fact that a show can be designed on one console, such as the Eos Ti, then be run on any of the other Eos family console merely by loading the show file on it is amazing. This cross-compatibility can make many performances, especially travelling shows, much easier to load in and run. After reading the article, I actually went to the ETC website and spent at least twenty minutes just browsing all of the products ETC offers, from their consoles, to rigging systems, fixtures, dimmers, and everything else.
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