CMU School of Drama


Wednesday, October 16, 2019

LD John Featherstone Creates Interactive Art with Robe Fixtures at Cisco Live 2019

PLSN: John Featherstone of lighting and visual design practice Lightswitch worked as part of the XD Agency team to help create a stunning high-impact environmental design for Cisco Live! 2019. Featuring a series of light-based artworks, this project was conceived to catch the eye and quicken the pulse of delegates entering the main presentation space at San Diego Convention Center. To do this, Lightswitch used over 400 Robe moving lights – 200 x Pointes, 180 x MegaPointes and 24 x Spiiders.

3 comments:

Alexa Janoschka said...

I would love to be able to go to an event like this. I have never been able to go to a lighting convention but it sounds like a great time. It's kinda crazy to read about how many people attended this event! I think it is really smart that the LD used the time that the audience was coming in to showcase some of the fixtures that the event was using in the actual program. The idea of putting light installations in the event center that gave the audience something to look at was very smart and made sure they wouldn’t get bored. I wonder how they select the LDs and installations. Reading about how many fixtures that used is honestly just mind-boggling. I know that shows have many fixtures, but for an event to have 380 moving heads in one space is crazy! I would also love to be apart of a project like this. Hearing about these events and the projects that are out in the industry motivated me to be at CMU and hopefully learn the skills I need to one day work on something really complex.

Dean Thordarson said...

What an impressive and incredible setup for the Cisco Live event. The pictures look stunning. Lighting a space that can hold sixteen thousand people is a feat in and of itself, but Featherstone and Lightswitch took it one step further and made the lighting an installation on its own. Walking into a seated venue and waiting for an even to start can be such a dreary time, and in the case of Cisco Live and having to wait an hour for sixteen thousand people to file in, I believe an excellent choice was made for create this light show. I can only imagine how captivating it must be, and whether I watch it for the last five minutes or the full hour, I feel I would still come out of it satisfied, rather than being bothered to have waited an hour for the event to start after nothing. Someday I think it would be an unforgettable experience to either attend or even work one of these big convention-style shows.

Mattox S. Reed said...

Wow, what a cool set up. I have unfortunately never been to an event like this before but seeing this level of production and work is really interesting and presents a lot of cool ideas to look forward into the future. I mean lighting and creating a space like this for so many people would be so cool. I remember the closest thing that I’ve ever been to like this would either be the fan events at the CFP or Final four but often I felt they were just large events held in a conference center with little to no care for design. There was no art in the lighting or environment. They were simply trying to put things in a space to fill it and show vendors and sell merchandise. Creating an environment and a show within a show is such a cool idea I can’t wait to see what places do this in the near future.