Weekend Warrior Stage Lighting Discussion

[DirtDog]

Just picked up a Chauvet EZ Gobo fixture and had a custom metal gobo made. This negates any need for banners, etc. on stage. Can work on less than optimum backdrops even when ambient light is strong. Here's an example of what it looks like at scale. That fence in the background is about 8' tall and I'm about 30-40' away from the fence. Taken at night where street lighting is fairly bright sodium vapor. Should work nicely in a bar where I may have a foot or two horizontal space to work with!

 

[PCR]

Just picked up a Chauvet EZ Gobo fixture and had a custom metal gobo made. This negates any need for banners, etc. on stage. Can work on less than optimum backdrops even when ambient light is strong. Here's an example of what it looks like at scale. That fence in the background is about 8' tall and I'm about 30-40' away from the fence. Taken at night where street lighting is fairly bright sodium vapor. Should work nicely in a bar where I may have a foot or two horizontal space to work with!

View attachment 2822971

Awesome idea!

 

[JRA]

https://www.talkbass.com/members/dirtdog.24075/ , that's neat! can you share the how-to and ballpark cost of the custom work? thanks.

 

[Big Hoss]

Just picked up a Chauvet EZ Gobo fixture and had a custom metal gobo made. This negates any need for banners, etc. on stage. Can work on less than optimum backdrops even when ambient light is strong. Here's an example of what it looks like at scale. That fence in the background is about 8' tall and I'm about 30-40' away from the fence. Taken at night where street lighting is fairly bright sodium vapor. Should work nicely in a bar where I may have a foot or two horizontal space to work with!

View attachment 2822971

Never heard of GOBO until I saw your post. Looked it up. That is awesome! That gives you some real branding power for the band, and if it's yours, you can get a new custom gobo done for the next band when the guitarist and lead singer rage quit...

 

[DirtDog]

https://www.talkbass.com/members/dirtdog.24075/ , that's neat! can you share the how-to and ballpark cost of the custom work? thanks.

Thanks!

The fixture is a bit older but still available on the usual e-commerce sites for about $180. Comes with a bunch of stock gobos - none of which I would use for band. I did use one of them for Hallowe'en lighting on my front porch, though!

Custom gobo (metal disc only for this fixture) was another $60 or so from thegobo.com. I developed my own artwork, uploaded the file (image or PDF is acceptable), approve the proof and wait a few days for the disc to come in the mail. Insert custom disc into the fixture and you're done! Limitation is this is just white light with the rest blacked out. Also, the projection is static, not dynamic. Pretty simple. Other more expensive and complex gobo fixtures can accept glass gobos that can be coloured and where the artwork can be more refined and that have animations, etc. Check out thegobo.com for examples and pricing. Apparently, you can make your own color gobos by using transparencies and home printer. I have not figured out how that works but seems like it would take some trial and error to get scaling/colours in the artwork just right.

The EZ Gobo fixture has a built in rechargeable battery and an IR remote so can be mounted without cabling. Has an extremely strong magnet on its base or could be used with a standard Chauvet fixture clamp. It's a one trick pony but as you can see, it's scaleable (from characters just inches high to something measured in feet) with good results. So for around $250 I have an effective tool that can be used for on-stage branding in a way that's more effective and efficient than a banner or something similar. If I need a different logo projected, I just need to pony up $60 for a new gobo disc.

I did look into picoprojectors, but they don't scale as nicely and are not as bright - so the image is washed out if ambient light is too high. More flexible in what can be projected, just doesn't work as well. And you need power cables.

 

[JRA]

Thanks!

The fixture is a bit older but still available on the usual e-commerce sites for about $180. Comes with a bunch of stock gobos - none of which I would use for band. I did use one of them for Hallowe'en lighting on my front porch, though!

Custom gobo (metal disc only for this fixture) was another $60 or so from thegobo.com. I developed my own artwork, uploaded the file (image or PDF is acceptable), approve the proof and wait a few days for the disc to come in the mail. Insert custom disc into the fixture and you're done! Limitation is this is just white light with the rest blacked out. Also, the projection is static, not dynamic. Pretty simple. Other more expensive and complex gobo fixtures can accept glass gobos that can be coloured and where the artwork can be more refined and that have animations, etc. Check out thegobo.com for examples and pricing. Apparently, you can make your own color gobos by using transparencies and home printer. I have not figured out how that works but seems like it would take some trial and error to get scaling/colours in the artwork just right.

The EZ Gobo fixture has a built in rechargeable battery and an IR remote so can be mounted without cabling. Has an extremely strong magnet on its base or could be used with a standard Chauvet fixture clamp. It's a one trick pony but as you can see, it's scaleable (from characters just inches high to something measured in feet) with good results. So for around $250 I have an effective tool that can be used for on-stage branding in a way that's more effective and efficient than a banner or something similar. If I need a different logo projected, I just need to pony up $60 for a new gobo disc.

I did look into picoprojectors, but they don't scale as nicely and are not as bright - so the image is washed out if ambient light is too high. More flexible in what can be projected, just doesn't work as well. And you need power cables.

thanks! the overall cost isn't really that much more than a huge vinyl sign: and it's obviously less of a PITA to 'mount' at gig time. thank you for your response and for walking me through the customization process. neat stuff!

 

[-Asdfgh-]

Thanks!

The fixture is a bit older but still available on the usual e-commerce sites for about $180. Comes with a bunch of stock gobos - none of which I would use for band. I did use one of them for Hallowe'en lighting on my front porch, though!

Custom gobo (metal disc only for this fixture) was another $60 or so from thegobo.com. I developed my own artwork, uploaded the file (image or PDF is acceptable), approve the proof and wait a few days for the disc to come in the mail. Insert custom disc into the fixture and you're done! Limitation is this is just white light with the rest blacked out. Also, the projection is static, not dynamic. Pretty simple. Other more expensive and complex gobo fixtures can accept glass gobos that can be coloured and where the artwork can be more refined and that have animations, etc. Check out thegobo.com for examples and pricing. Apparently, you can make your own color gobos by using transparencies and home printer. I have not figured out how that works but seems like it would take some trial and error to get scaling/colours in the artwork just right.

The EZ Gobo fixture has a built in rechargeable battery and an IR remote so can be mounted without cabling. Has an extremely strong magnet on its base or could be used with a standard Chauvet fixture clamp. It's a one trick pony but as you can see, it's scaleable (from characters just inches high to something measured in feet) with good results. So for around $250 I have an effective tool that can be used for on-stage branding in a way that's more effective and efficient than a banner or something similar. If I need a different logo projected, I just need to pony up $60 for a new gobo disc.

I did look into picoprojectors, but they don't scale as nicely and are not as bright - so the image is washed out if ambient light is too high. More flexible in what can be projected, just doesn't work as well. And you need power cables.

Add in a few corporate sponsorship messages and remind patrons to tip the wait staff? Perhaps project from the stage to a flat surface and it's an indisputable set list

 

[DirtDog]

Add in a few corporate sponsorship messages and remind patrons to tip the wait staff? Perhaps project from the stage to a flat surface and it's an indisputable set list

The possibilities are endless.

 

[Pat C.]

That is awesome. How and where do you mount/position the fixture on stage? Does it have to be a certain distance from the backdrop? Do you mount it elevated on a truss? Could it be positioned off to the side, like on a front stage corner and still give a clean, legible projection?

Just picked up a Chauvet EZ Gobo fixture and had a custom metal gobo made. This negates any need for banners, etc. on stage. Can work on less than optimum backdrops even when ambient light is strong. Here's an example of what it looks like at scale. That fence in the background is about 8' tall and I'm about 30-40' away from the fence. Taken at night where street lighting is fairly bright sodium vapor. Should work nicely in a bar where I may have a foot or two horizontal space to work with!

View attachment 2822971

 

[DirtDog]

That is awesome. How and where do you mount/position the fixture on stage? Does it have to be a certain distance from the backdrop? Do you mount it elevated on a truss? Could it be positioned off to the side, like on a front stage corner and still give a clean, legible projection?

Thanks!

Really depends on the stage and mounting options available. Ideally it would be mounted out front of the stage alongside other rigged lights, as in clamped onto the bar with the other fixtures and pointed towards the stage - with the logo appearing above and behind the drums. You can get a decent resolution and useful character size from anywhere between say, 5 feet and 25 feet, I'd guess. Characters can be an inch in height if you're really close to the wall or 2-3 feet high if you're farther away. The best placement is 90 degrees to a flat wall about 15-20 feet away from the surface. If you mount off the side, you'll get some distortion of the image. But that might not be a terrible thing if you want to get "artsy" about it. Works on wood and brick nicely as well. Will also work with cloth backdrops even if the surface is irregular. Still gets the point across.

there are two sliders on the top of the unit that allow you move the lenses around to change the size of the projected image (as a function of the distance from the surface) as well as focus the image. There's an infinite amount of control within the limits of the device.

Reality is I have had to be creative in certain spaces. We played a place Friday night where almost every wall was covered in pictures and memorabilia and there was no decent place to mount it that pointed towards stage. So I mounted the fixture to a door frame (metal) using the built in magnet on the base and pointed the image up on the sloped ceiling of the room where you would have had to be blind to miss it! Worked not too badly, but the ceiling was white so there was not as good contrast as I would have liked. That said, the characters were projected about 2.5 feet high and the fixture was mounted about 25-30 feet away from the surface. Another option I had was to affix the light above the stage with the logo projecting down onto the dance floor. That was my backup option

 

[Scottkarch]

My next project is going to be an inexpensive 32" TV with a Raspberry Pi attached to the back.. We'll clamp it onto the pipe-riser for our PA tops. I'll be trying out slideshows of different color logos or finding some free animations on youtube and put our logo over the top... It will be a fun Raspberry Pi project and should be really bright and simple to run. The slideshow auto starts on boot.. nothing to it.. and easy to update. Less than $200. I'll post once I get started.

 

[Scottkarch]

Making great progress. 2 x 32" monitors, VESA mounts and O brackets to mount in between the Subs and PA tops. Video player into splitter into both monitors. So far it's looking great. I'll take pics of it live this weekend. We can show our logo, drink specials, information... hopefully better than printing banners... we can change these and they can be animated. Here is a quick movie using a remote to hit many of the movies I've made.

It's not uncommon for bars to have large screens behind us and we usually just ask to have them turned off.. I may ask to run HDMI cabled out of my splitter into the monitor(s) behind us to get our name more visible... I'll post back how it turns out. we may pick our favorite single 3 min loop and leave it all night, we may let it randomly play all the loops.. I'm not sure at this point.

 

[Big Hoss]

Making great progress. 2 x 32" monitors, VESA mounts and O brackets to mount in between the Subs and PA tops. Video player into splitter into both monitors. So far it's looking great. I'll take pics of it live this weekend. We can show our logo, drink specials, information... hopefully better than printing banners... we can change these and they can be animated. Here is a quick movie using a remote to hit many of the movies I've made.

It's not uncommon for bars to have large screens behind us and we usually just ask to have them turned off.. I may ask to run HDMI cabled out of my splitter into the monitor(s) behind us to get our name more visible... I'll post back how it turns out. we may pick our favorite single 3 min loop and leave it all night, we may let it randomly play all the loops.. I'm not sure at this point.

What OS / Software are you running on that pi?

 

[Scottkarch]

What OS / Software are you running on that pi?

I forgot to mention.. I found a digital video player that is as cheap as a pi and just works... that's what I'm using now... I'm still planning on using the Pi to make an ambilight.. But for now this is what I used in that video.. https://www.amazon.com/AGPTEK-Player-Remote-Optical-output/dp/B01CCRYIN8/ This one has buttons on it so if you lose the remote you can still get something playing. I'm not sure if I'll try and re-split the signal to feed to the bar or just get a second one to put at the back of the stage and drive the screens behind us... I'm sure some bars wont let us do it.. but I'm pretty sure some will.....

 

[Scottkarch]

The TVs worked great! Lots of positive comments.
the bar has a DVD player hooked up to the rear 3 TVs. between setup and the show I ran home and burned a DVD with the band logo playing and they played it most of the night. I may try and have a few options for bars with big flat screens behind the stage.. a DVD, thumb drive with logo pictures/videos and maybe an extra digital video player handy and if they are open to putting something up on their screens, it saves you setting banners etc.

 

[maxmaroon]

View attachment 2839187 View attachment 2838961 The TVs worked great! Lots of positive comments.
the bar has a DVD player hooked up to the rear 3 TVs. between setup and the show I ran home and burned a DVD with the band logo playing and they played it most of the night. I may try and have a few options for bars with big flat screens behind the stage.. a DVD, thumb drive with logo pictures/videos and maybe an extra digital video player handy and if they are open to putting something up on their screens, it saves you setting banners etc.

Looks awesome!

 

[Scottkarch]

In the top picture you can see the box our drummer made with our logo cut out of it and lit from the inside. It's about 48" long and mounts On the light stand. It's not DMX but the lights change. It looks good and that's what gave me the idea to try the TV thing. Drummer is handy with wood. I'm handy with electronics. I'm gong go try and get our logo and the screens running vertically and see if that's better or worse. They will fit really well between the speaker if put vertically. 39" may be a better choice TV

 

[maxmaroon]

Recently had a month off without needing lights so I spent some time programming some new stuff. I turned over about 40% of the 100 patches I trigger from the behringer fcb1010. I focused on setting up longer scenes that would keep me from having to stomp on the fcb so much. I also changed the snap of the movers on all the new patches to fade and I really like how the transitions work now.

 

[squarewave]

Recently had a month off without needing lights so I spent some time programming some new stuff. I turned over about 40% of the 100 patches I trigger from the behringer fcb1010. I focused on setting up longer scenes that would keep me from having to stomp on the fcb so much. I also changed the snap of the movers on all the new patches to fade and I really like how the transitions work now.

Cool

 

[superflybass]

Recently had a month off without needing lights so I spent some time programming some new stuff. I turned over about 40% of the 100 patches I trigger from the behringer fcb1010. I focused on setting up longer scenes that would keep me from having to stomp on the fcb so much. I also changed the snap of the movers on all the new patches to fade and I really like how the transitions work now.

ok what is the FCB triggering? software or an controller ?