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The Activity, TAG and Elation team up for Ultra Music Festival
Patrick Dierson and the team at The Activity were again called on to handle production and lighting design for the Main Stage at the Ultra Music Festival in Miami and this year delivered a visual presentation with the help of Elation Professional IP-rated lighting and Netron data distribution devices. The Activity collaborated closely with Ultra’s Creative Director Richard Milstein, as well as TAG (Technical Arts Group), the primary lighting and video vendor for the Main Stage.
Ultra’s flagship festival in Miami is one of the world’s largest electronic music celebrations. This year’s event, at Bayfront Park, ran from March 24-26 and featured a lineup that included Martin Garrix, Eric Prydz, Carl Cox, Rezz, Swedish House Mafia, Alesso, and many more. The Activity has been involved with the festival for over ten years. For this year’s event, Richard Milstein came up with an overall production design for the Main Stage.
As part of the pre-production process, The Activity traditionally operates in conjunction with Ultra’s creative designer, Technical Producer Ray Steinman, the event production team, and chosen vendors to bring Milstein’s vision to an engineered reality. This year, Milstein’s concept included a massive amount of production elements placed throughout the space to complete a visual balance.
The look was primarily hexagonal in nature with undulating curves flanking the stage. Dierson says it was not just about lighting and video. The concept incorporated a plethora of pyrotechnic effects across the length of the downstage edge as well as the roof, cryo jets, water features that incorporated flame dancing atop fountains, and full fireworks displays every evening.
Elation fixtures played a large role in the design and according to Dierson most of the units were chosen not just for their expected performance but also their IP65 ratings. Active within the rig were 92 Proteus Hybrid moving heads, 27 Pixel Bar 60 IP, 48 Paladin Panel flood and effect lights, and 294 SixBar 1000 IP, all IP65-rated luminaires. TAG turned to thirty Netron EN12 nodes from Obsidian Control Systems to drive the Main Stage.
The Proteus Hybrid moving heads served as workhorse units that were completely exposed on the sides of the stage. They were spread across four separate layers of truss and video. The linear SixBar 1000s provided the bulk of the LED strip lighting, lining both layers of Proteus trusses on the external sides of the stage, as well as a densely populated “hex” or “arrow” pattern directly above the center of the stage.
For the interior of the stage, Dierson sought a “bright bucket of intense light” to outline the vertical hex video wall, as well as two flanking areas of truss downstage left and right. Paladin Panels were chosen, which were so intensely bright that they had to be limited to 20% of their output for the majority of the event. The Pixel Bar 60 IPs were chosen to enhance the symbol of every Ultra Music Festival stage - its iconic “U” truss configuration mounted at the top center of the structure. Complemented with LED video panels, the Pixel Bar 60s helped to outline the truss structure and maintain the pixelated visual all the way to the top extent of the stage.
Working on this project alongside Richard Milstein, Ray Steinman and Patrick Dierson were TAG Project Managers Kevin Mignone and John Gonzalez, TAG Lighting Crew Chief Russell Felton, TAG FOH Technician John Flanagan, TAG Video Crew Chief Mike Wurtz, and the TAG Crew comprising Michael Hale, Lowell Hawley, Abraham Carrillo, Geoff Ford, Justin Volpe, Ed Amico, Albert Chipperson, Jonathan Gue, and Amilcar Fernandez.
Grant Davis was the Video Director, Laser Director and SFX Director were Jeff Cornell and Lusi Torres, respectively, both from JDFX. Neil Rosenstock (Audio Lead) and Justin Gauthier/Premier Global Productions (Rigging & Automation) were also involved.
(Photos: Rutger Geerling - rudgr.com)
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