In 2014, Movievision was approached by Concilium Technologies to join them in the project which eventually became Sky Rink Studios.
Movievision’s part in the project would be to handle the erection of lighting grids in all six studios, as well as provide technical power and DMX to these grids.
They would also handle the tracks and curtaining for the studios and provide broadcast quality LED lighting and control for the project.
With the ice rink eventually taken out of the Carlton Centre the Movievision team could move in and see what they had to work with. Massive beams across the roof made the job easier. However, these beams were not even and had a wicked camber across the area. Special sound absorbent brackets were designed and manufactured to go on the beams, from which the aluminium piping that would make up the grid could be hung. So far so good. The problem of getting equipment up to the seventh floor was exasperated by other companies trying to do the same thing at the same time.
Power and lighting control was provided in trunking above the grid via Powercon outlets and DMX outlets every 1 to 1.5m across the grid with LDDE booster boxes provided. The grid is designed for ease of use with LED in mind, although provision has been made for non-LED lighting through DMX controlled online dimmers.
Curtaining and tracks were made up in the Spanish factory of Rosco. There is a double curtaining track in each studio, which was erected and aligned by laser to allow the drop of the curtains to be the same length. There was a variance of nearly 300mm over the length of Studio 5 in the original beams installed in the building.
The originators of the project were insistent that the lighting in the studios was to be LED as they wanted Sky Rink to be the first set of studios in South Africa and possibly the whole continent to be totally LED. This would allow them to have a small electrical load, a smaller air conditioning bill and eliminate the need for the large power sources and dimmers currently associated with existing studios. LED is currently cutting edge technology and Sky Rink wanted to be at the forefront of this.
Accordingly, Movievision went to one of the foremost suppliers of LED lighting in the world – Spotlight Italy, who have over 50 years experience in the Industry. Their eco-friendly range was the product of choice. A selection of Fresneled 450w WW, Fresneled 200w WW and Fresneled 100w WW fixtures were identified together with a number of Profiled RGBW 250ZS units. All of which are DMX controlled and pole operated.
Added to the mix are a number of the new, award-winning and revolutionary Cyclorama 300 RGBW LED. These units, with their specifically designed optical system, allows illumination, in an absolutely even way, an area of approximately 6m wide by 7m high, all from a distance of 1.5m from the backdrop.
For softlights they turned to Filmgear’s new Softpanel 200 LED series. With a range of 2700° to 5600°, pole operated, DMX controlled with barndoors, filterframe and eggcrate, these units give a wonderfully even, soft light and will hang on droparms provided on the grid.
Filmgear is currently one of the world’s leading manufacturers of lighting. From the smallest 100w units to the biggest 24Kw Fresnel, each fixture in their range is amazing. Leading the way in fluorescent and LED fixtures, their range of facetted PARs from 800w through to 9k are currently setting the trend in South Africa.
For lighting control Movievision turned to one of the world’s best kept secrets – ChamSys. Their controllers are in use by a number of the leading touring companies, as well as in TV studios and theatres worldwide. At the forefront of their field, they are easy to use and able to patch over 14 000 fixture personalities. The consol provides simple attribute selection and programming, as well as flexible live lighting control, including a powerful inbuilt pixel mapper.
The units going into the studios are the MagicQ MQ60 range, which handles 12 universes. The units are quick and easy to programme, with a wide array of features, advanced media server support, fixture morphing and cloning, fully featured theatre tracks and LED pixel mapping. They can be connected via a network to a PC or MAC running ChamSys free MagicHD media player software for full visualisation of the all the universes at no extra cost. The MagicQ MQ 60 has 10 playback faders, 200 pages with 20 execute buttons and built in UPS.
In the bigger studios Movievision have provided MagicQ Extra Wing Compacts, which will add to the flexibility by providing 12 playback faders and execute buttons. This will allow the user to extend the number of physical playbacks available to them.
Movievision proudly represents Filmgear, Spotlight, ChamSys, Rosco, Kupo Grip, LDDE, RVE, Socanland, DTS, Neo-Neon, Silver Star, Le Mark, Dirty Rigger, Desay and Studio Due in our basket of products to provide our clients with the best equipment in the world.
