Good Friday and Easter Sunday are typically some of the most celebrated days in the Christian calendar, making it only fitting that the services be as stunning as possible. To that end, Knoxville, Tennessee-based Bandit Lites aided lighting designer Ed White and production manager Ian Cattle of Black and White Live Ltd. in creating two stellar services for Atlanta's Passion City Church.
“My aim with this event is to support the atmosphere, and what is going on musically, without overpowering or distracting people,” White explains of his lighting design. “There are moments that need to be like a rock show, with huge dramatic cues and changes; but then also times for a lot of restraint, and subtle changes to enhance what is happening on stage and in the crowd.”
For one of the more dramatic aspects of the show, a large 25-foot cross was placed as the centerpiece of the rig, whereas in the past years it was typically offstage. Built out of Bandit 5x5 blinders, with 950 individually controlled lamps that were mapped within the GrandMa2 Lite console for various patterns and effects, the cross moved from behind the LED screen up into the rig where it was revealed halfway through the night.
“The matrix product is great and its rigging was perfect for building the cross shape,” White says of the Bandit 5x5. “With the amount of blinders we had on the rig also, this made for some huge tungsten looks, which also looked great in the daylight on the Sunday (service).”
Additionally, the lighting design, which integrated video and lighting so song lyrics and videos were not obstructed during the services, consisted of a staggered wall of angled trusses from upstage to downstage, with a geometric array of 38 Vari-Lite VL3000 Spots, 28 Kupo 2Lite blinders, and 28 GRN Par 3-36 as truss toners.
“Unusually for me,” explains White, “All of the wash light was on the floor: 10 Vari-Lite VL3500 Wash with clear lens in an upstage row for rear wash and silhouette looks, and a further eight down the sides of stage, for cross wash, and ACL type beam fans in Varibrite mode.”
The front truss contained 17 MAC 2000 Wash fixtures and 8Lites, with DF50 hazers and F100 foggers covering the atmosphere.
One challenge of the event came in the form that the rig had to be suitable for two different shows: the Friday night service in the dark, and the Sunday morning service in broad daylight.
“A truss-heavy, geometric design was chosen for its ability to create the big looks I needed in darkness, but also to fill the space and provide ‘eye candy' for the daylight show where beam looks would be lost,” says White.
Ultimately, the Bandit team, made up of Dave Butzler, Jason Workman and Ty Veneziano, worked together to provide two brilliant services attended by more than 12,000 people. And while some may look at a production of this scale simply as another job, Bandit Lites and those involved made sure to create a singular experience for everyone involved in the services, from those on stage to those in the audience.
Bandit Lites is a 40-year-old lighting rental and installation firm with offices in Knoxville and Nashville, Tennessee, San Francisco, London, Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Lights on the Passion City Project :
Designed and Operated by: Ed White
Supplied by: Bandit Lites
Production Management:
Supplied by: Black and White Live Ltd
Production Manager: Ian Cattle
Sound:
Supplied by: Spectrum Audio Inc. (Nashville)
LED:
Supplied by: I-Mag Video (Nashville)
Projection:
Supplied by: VER (Atlanta)
Risers:
Supplied by: house and Staging Dimensions (Atlanta)
Local Crew:
Supplied by: Crew One (Atlanta)
Venue:
Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre at Encore Park, Alpharetta GA
