Lights and other new stuff for gigs

[Danny1969]

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Just got some more lights, 8 of the moving mirror scanner type and a compact DMX controller. The scanners are really good, here's a couple of phone pictures when we were testing them last night in a garage :





Only problem is each one is 250 watts and there's 8 of em. Plus we already have 4 Parkhands at 500 watts each and two 1KW spots. So if every lamp was on at the same time we would be drawing 6KW's which is possibly a bit much : )

Also got a new smoke machine that takes ice cubes to help keep the smoke on the floor ... ohh and a silk flame effect which looks more like a large tongue dancing than a flame : )

In terms of audio we have gradually been upgrading all our mics. Almost all the old Shure SM's have been replaced now. For vocals we have tried loads of different models and the best mics for the job seem to be Sennheiser EW165's, huge improvement over the old SM58's. For guitar cabs we got some more Sennheisers, E906 models. They look a bit strange but sound great on guitars and have much better spill rejection than the old 57's. They also work really well on the snare.

Still need recommendations for tom mics that don't pick up half the kit as well as the tom it's 1 inch away from and overheads that sound less trashy than AKG C1000's. Has anyone used the Rode NT4 stereo mic as an overhead ?

[Sporky_McGuffin]

Danny - have you used any LED lights for stage work? I've seen some more recently in the right sort of format but I'd be a bit dubious about the brightness.

[Danny1969]

I've haven't seen LED lights in use yet, the low current looks appealing but like you say they probably won't be bright enough. Maybe we should buy one and just test it out. Some cars have LED lights now don't they, so the technology must be getting close..

[Sporky_McGuffin]

Aye - but only at the back, or as side-lights. They get very bright to look at, but don't really project much of a beam. I have an LED torch; it's great for close-up work but no use past about 15 feet or so.