Poetry in motion

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The set for the Million's Poet show is based on Abu Dhabi's Al Hosn Palace. The various lighting effects on the stage and back-drop are created by 25,000 LEDs.

The strips of LEDs line window frames in the fort-shaped set with broader groupings of fixtures used to provide borders and other patterns on the studio floor.

Each fixture is connected to the lighting control desk, which sends a video feed enabling smooth, coherent moving patterns to course across the surface of the set.

"Because the lighting surface can be used in such a broken up shape, rather than just as a rectangular block, you generally feed it abstract shapes and animations. These can be as lively or mellow as you wish and in the colour of your choice. You can feed the larger surfaces an image, such as a photograph and it remains coherent," says Holbrough.

"When you start integrating LEDs into a set, the level of collaboration between the lighting designer and the set designer goes through a quantum leap. Previously, the set designer would create a set and you would view it as a 3D shape to be lit. Your lighting was there to mute or highlight that shape. Once you introduce LEDs, the set becomes a source of light in itself that is being controlled by the lighting control desk. That means you have to collaborate more deeply, and from a much earlier stage, with the set designers in terms of what the end product is going to do in conceptual terms. You also have to discuss the physical practicalities of how you are going to incorporate the lights into the stage."

Nancollas agrees wholeheartedly with this sentiment.

"The lighting director and the vision engineer sit next to one another in the studio for a reason; it's a symbiotic relationship now. There is no point in me turning the lights down on the set if he is going to have the cameras close their iris. We have to be in cahoots," he adds.

Prior to beginning work on a set, Holbrough and Nancollas work through a checklist provided by the show's production, of all the elements that will require a dedicated lighting design.

"We start with the Al Hosn Palace themed set, we give it a mood, that mood needs to be able to change. It has to suit the recitation part of the shows, then while the competitors are being critiqued, the mood has to change again and the focus must switch to the panel of judges. When the audience votes and the tension is mounting in the theatre, the lighting must alter to reflect that feel," explains Holbrough.

The choice on offer from LED-based installs also permits far greater flexibility than was previously available from traditional fixtures. One studio installation can be used for various purposes and provide greater versatility than a lighting rig based entirely on traditional bulb fixtures is able to supply.

"They are so cheap you can put a lot into a set and still afford redundancy. You can say, today we'll just use the ones on the outside of the set, next show we'll use a videowall then we'll use a video floor. Getting a ladder out in order to move lights around now seems prehistoric," says Nancollas.

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