An ADJ heavy lighting rig incorporating Focus Profile moving head and Jolt Panel FX static LED luminaires, amongst other fixtures, was used to illuminate a recent sold-out concert by Easton Corbin at Yucaipa Performing Arts Center in California.
Lighting Designer Tommy Frisch utilised the ADJ fixtures both to light Corbin and his band as well as to fill the stage with vibrant colour, movement and pattern projections, creating a wide variety of looks for a performance that included a mixture of big hits and brand new music.
Having sold over 500,000 albums and 5 million singles since his eponymous debut album was released in 2010, Corbin is undoubtedly a big name draw on the country music scene. The Florida native, now residing in Nashville, has enjoyed success with a slew of US Country chart hits including ‘A Girl Like You’, ‘Baby Be My Love Song’, ‘All Over The Road’ and ‘Loving You Is Fun’ as well as number ones ‘Roll with It’ and ‘A Little More Country Than That’. His Californian show, which was opened by local South Californian country/pop act Westward Sons, was one of a run of dates in support of new album ‘Let’s Do Country Right’, and current single ‘Marry That Girl’.
Yucaipa Performing Arts Center opened in 2019 and is a multi-purpose facility that combines a versatile indoor theater with a large covered outdoor stage and adjourning 14,000 sq. ft. open air audience plaza. The venue’s audio-visual needs are supplied by Props AV, based in neighboring Beaumont, CA. Founded in 1998 by Brady Westbrook, the company offers a full range of audio-visual services, including event production and rentals as well as equipment sales and installations. Props AV staffer Frisch served as both Project Manager and Lighting Designer for the concert. He designed the rig using ADJ fixtures almost exclusively, something he wouldn’t have imagined doing prior to joining the Props AV team.
“When I came to Props AV,” explained Frisch, “I had previously worked at all Elation houses and companies that only used other ‘high end’ brands, so I turned my nose up a little at the ADJ gear here. But every time I take it out I’m blown away, it’s better than I could ever have anticipated. I’ve completely changed my perspective and have even become a bit of a shill for ADJ, telling designers and other industry friends that they should check out ADJ’s newer products. You’re getting a professional quality light at a more budget friendly price, which is great as a designer because you can specify more fixtures for a client’s budget. If we’d have used only the type of fixtures I’d previously been working with on this show we’d only have been able to put out less than half as many and it really wouldn’t have looked anywhere near as good!”
At the heart of Frisch’s rig design for the show was the flagship model in ADJ’s extremely popular Focus Series of LED-powered moving head luminaires, the Focus Profile. The brightest and most feature-rich fixture in the range to date, it is powered by a potent 400W LED light engine that generates an impressive output of 20,000 Lumens. Offering the excellent build quality and value for money for which the series has become known, it offers a versatile array of creative features. These include four rotating framing shutters with shape rotation, an animation wheel, motorized zoom (beam angle 7 ~ 45-degrees), motorized iris, motorized focus, CMY color mixing and variable CTO color temperature control, an additional color wheel loaded with six dichroic filters, two separate GOBO wheels (one with interchangeable indexed-rotating GOBOs and the other with static metal-stamped GOBOs), a replaceable (medium) frost filter and two independent indexed rotating prisms: 3-facet circular and 6-facet linear.
“Although I had used it a few times before,” explained Frisch, “this was my first experience of using the Focus Profile as the primary moving head on a concert rig and I was super impressed. It was able to do everything I needed it to do and more. It was bright enough for the size of stage and to cut through the video wall backdrop, and I was able to use it to create everything from beautiful textured GOBO looks to, big in your face, flashy effects. One dramatic moment that I was particularly proud of came at the end of a song. I had the hollowed-out circle GOBO on the Focus Profile and, on the final note, we blacked out everything else on stage and I pulled the beams in to highlight the band. It really looked killer!”
The Focus Profile fixtures were rigged to a square truss structure that the Props AV team had hung above the stage. Four were positioned on the upstage truss, four more on the downstage truss, two on the right-side connecting truss, and a final pair on the left-side connecting truss. The fixtures were interspersed with Rayzor 760 zooming LED wash fixtures from ADJ’s sister company Elation Professional. In addition, six of ADJ’s Jolt Panel FX multifunctional LED wash / blinder / strobe fixtures were positioned around the truss square; two at back center, one on each vertical, and two on the front truss, offset to the sides.
“I loved using the Jolt Panel FX,” enthused Frisch, “as it allowed me to be so much more creative than a traditional strobe or blinder. For example, on one song, to highlight the kick I’d flash on the RGB LEDs and then have them fade to the center. And then on the snare hit I’d light up the white center LEDs and then have them fade out to the sides. That looked really effective. Having the ability to fade out those strobe hits in different ways helped to stop things getting stale throughout the concert. The other thing worth saying is that they are insanely bright! I didn’t use them for the first 15-20 minutes of the show, but then when I did they really added a new level of drama and became a key component of the rig for the rest of the concert. I honestly think the Jolt Panel FX is my favorite fixture at the moment!”
Frisch also made use of ADJ fixtures to illuminate Corbin and his band members. Six Encore Profile Pro Color LED-powered color mixing ellipsoidal fixtures were utilized for the show, with two hung from the rear truss, one positioned on the mid-stage truss, and three more mounted to an additional truss hanging above the crowd in front of the stage. The front three fixtures provided key light, serving as specials for the frontline band members, while the mid-stage unit provided a hair light for Easton and the remaining two fixtures were used to highlight other specific spots on stage.
“Again, I was really impressed with the Encore Profile Pro Color,” stated Frisch. “I was able to use the CTO channel to quickly select the color temperature I wanted for the key light and then the color mixing allowed me to easily match the colors with the rest of the fixtures on stage. They are super even and, when he stood in his spot, Easton was perfectly and evenly lit by just one fixture, which was bright enough to keep him clearly visible while the Focus Profiles were blowing everything else up behind him!”
The rig also utilised 20 of ADJ’s 18P HEX IP colour mixing LED par fixtures. Six units were rigged to each of the vertical trusses, to provide a side light colour wash to the stage, while the remaining eight were lined across the front of the stage to serve as footlights.
“The 18P HEX IP was another fixture that did exactly the job I needed it to do and did it perfectly,” explained Frisch. “As well as providing coloured side and front colour fill they served as footlights for the frontline band members. As I’ve said, in terms of brightness and coverage, the Encore Profile Pro Color was enough on its own.
However, in this case it was necessary to add in a second light source as Corbin performs in a hat. This meant that some of his face was obscured from the Encore Profile Pro Color doing key light. But it was easy to set the 18P HEX IP footlight to the same colour temperature to fill in from below. You couldn’t tell it was a different light; lit from the top and lit from the bottom he looked great.”
Finally, Frisch deployed four ADJ Encore Burst 200 LED-powered warm white blinder fixtures across the front truss. Powered by two 110W warm white (2700K) CREE COB LEDs and featuring a rugged metal housing, these fixtures are designed to deliver a classic halogen lamp blinder effect but using only a fraction of the power and offering the other benefits of modern LED light sources.
“Every time I use the Encore Burst 200, I’m reminded again just how bright they are!” enthused Frisch. “They have a super wide throw, so you don’t need to put up too many to cover the whole crowd. They don’t take up much of your truss line, but they do a fantastic job in their role. I also love that each cell can be controlled independently as I would sometimes have them trickle off following a blinder hit, to mimic what the Jolt Panels were doing. As a traditional audience blinder, which I think will always be called for, they do their job phenomenally well.”
Complementing each other perfectly, the 48 ADJ luminaires utilised by Frisch on this show, alongside the additional Elation Professional fixtures, made for an impressive and flexible rig. It allowed for a wide variety of looks to be created, which provided appropriate backdrops for both Corbin’s up-tempo hits as well as his softer and more reflective numbers, which were all enjoyed by the capacity crowd in attendance.