As New Yorkers celebrated the arrival of 2016, several thousand EDM fans rocked out at Big Week NYC, a series of concerts produced by RPM Presents and staged at Pier 94 and Pier 36 in the city’s famous waterfront area.
Performances by international artists like Rudimental, Nicky Romero, Knife Party, Future, Travis Scott, local heroes Chainsmokers, and young Dutch rising star Oliver Heldens were illuminated by Robe fixtures selected by Kevin Mignone, owner of New York-based KM Productions.
Mignone, searching for a new look to the lighting and a change from the moving light brand that had been used in the past, decided Big Week NYC was an ideal chance to give Robe’s BMFL Spots and Pointes a center stage position for all the action.
He credited Lighting Designer Michael Gionfriddo for the high-energy display featuring Robe BMFL Spots and Pointes that accompanied the live music.
Pier 94 has a capacity of approximately 10,000 and the 48 BMFL Spots were the “anchor” fixture of the production lighting rig. They were positioned on five house trusses running down the 200-foot length of the venue with four BMFL Spots per truss, and another three over-stage trusses were each rigged with six units.
Another six BMFLs were on the deck behind the DJ booth. Apart from the intense brightness of the BMFLs, Mignone loved the zoom, the iris and the super-quick and smooth colour mixing.
One of the challenges was filling the large space with atmosphere and getting as many different looks out of a relatively expedient number of lights. The other was the ever-present parameter of a tight programming schedule. Mignone was delighted with the results. “The BMFL Spots absolutely carried the lightshows every night,” he said.
KM Productions owns 36 Pointes and these were deployed on the rig at Pier 36, which has a capacity around 6000.
They were dotted across a series of trusses flown over the stage, down the room and in the wings areas of the venue. “Again, we needed something that would cut right across the space, fill the air and create plenty of variation without needing tons of fixtures,” he explained.
KM Productions was brought on board by Jarrod Khoury of RPM Presents and has been fortunate to collaborate on many of RPM’s biggest events over the years.
In 2015, the RPM team produced over 200 events in and around New York City, including Pier of Fear – at Pier 94 – and the Electric Daisy Carnival (EDC) New York.
KM Productions first started investing in Robe products in 2014, “We love every Robe product we’ve added to the inventory” stated Mignone, “and look forward to purchasing many more as we grow and expand our inventory.”