The National Theatre’s River Stage Festival brought a dazzling array of acts to London’s Southbank with on-the-fly lighting by Chief Lighting Designer Huw Llewellyn on an Avolites Arena.
Avolites supplied the National Theatre with a full lighting control solution, which in addition to the Arena consists of a Tiger Touch II (TTII) and Fader Wing.
“The Arena is built for festivals and theatres and we’re pretty much both during River Stage, so it’s an obvious choice,” said Llewellyn. “There are so many shows and most have little to no tech time at all. The Arena is perfect for busking with lots of faders, a great FX engine and a great interface for live, on-the-fly control. With the drama on stage, it’s often seat-of-your-pants stuff!”
The Signify Entertainment Lighting rig consists of Philips Vari-Lite VL6000s on a scissor lift behind the stage, Philips Showline SL LEDSPOT 300, Philips Showline SL Beam 300FX and Philips Showline SL HYDRUS 350.
Both the Avolites Arena and the TTII are loaded with the enhanced Titan V11 OS. “There are so many new features to play with,” said Llewellyn. “The new colour swatches, for instance, are great. And with seamless Multi User compatibility, our operators using Arena or the TTII can have anything, anywhere.”