St Paul’s Cathedral is a venue that is steeped in tradition, even when it comes to lighting, the traditional Par 64 has always been the fixture of choice for lighting designers. However, for the Queen’s Jubilee Thanksgiving Service, Lighting Director and BAFTA Award winner, David Bishop stepped away from tradition, opting for an all-new LED lighting rig, with the new Martin MAC Aura PXL taking the leading role as the main lighting fixture.
“For the Queen’s Jubilee, it was important to maintain the traditional feel and the natural look, yet I wanted to increase the flexibility and efficiency of the lighting rig,” Bishop explained. “The new Martin MAC Aura PXL was ideal. The high lumen output, colour rendering, and zoom range is exceptional for such a compact fixture and perfect for this application. It allowed me to have much greater control of the colour temperatures, while the remote controllable fixtures meant our focus session was far quicker because we didn’t have to communicate each par fixture to multiple electricians at height. We could also continue to perfect our focus during camera rehearsals without disturbing the production.”
Gaffer, Mark Newell added: “Installing any type of lighting rig at St Paul’s Cathedral is challenging – the building was simply not designed with us in mind back in 1675. Access to the triforium level – where the majority of lighting for events and broadcast is installed – is via a tiny window, just half a metre wide. All the equipment must be winched up the outside of the building, then manoeuvred manually around the Cathedral’s small alleyways. Because the Martin MAC Aura PXL is compact and weighs just 16kg, we could access most areas without too much trouble. Using an all-LED rig also reduced cables and power requirements of this previously power-hungry rig.”
Limelite’s investment into the MAC Aura PXL has proved very popular for numerous events, sub hires and broadcast productions. “The MAC Aura PXL has been a fantastic addition to our hire stock,” said Matthew Mountier, Limelite co-director. “Being a compact, yet versatile moving light is very appealing for many of the gaffers and LDs that we hire to. They offer a huge range of effects, which makes them the perfect unit for a diverse range of events. Since arriving at our warehouse, they have been on back-to-back hire, so they were definitely worth the investment.”
Martin Professional is exclusively distributed in the UK by Sound Technology.
www.soundtech.co.uk/professional-lighting/martin/
