Elation ACL 360 Bar creates futuristic lighting atmosphere on New Politics tour

The tour of the Danish group New Politics through the United States has included in its lighting design units of the new LED bar with continuous rotation ACL 360 Bar and Lumina Strip by Elation Professional, brand that sells in Spain visualsvisuals.

Alex Specht, of the company Spechtrum Lighting, is the lighting designer of the 'Wilderness Politics' tour with which this Danish rock band has toured different cities in the United States during the last months of 2015. This specialist began working with the group New Politics after they supported another band, Panic! at the disco, with whom he also collaborated.

“There was a good connection with the people from New Politics from the first moment. “They had liked my lighting designs that they had seen before and were interested in a collaboration”, explica Woodpecker.

The ACL system 360 Bar is part of the new range of products with continuous rotation in Pan and Tilt ACL 360 of Elation Professional, which also includes the ACL 360 Matrix, el ACL 360 Roller and the new ACL 360i, all of them present in the Spanish market through visualsvisuals, company responsible for distribution, sale and support of the systems of this lighting systems manufacturer.

Regarding the choice of this fixture for the lighting design on this tour, Specht points out that “I wanted to differentiate the show from New Politics and highlight the more electro-pop aspect of their music.”. I have used truss totems from 2 m high positioned above the ground at the back of the stage. Each of them had 3x ACL mounted 360 Bar y 1x Lumina Strip”.

Specifically, ACL units 360 Bar “have been installed so that they form a continuous line of LEDs when programmed in a vertical position. “This design has given me the possibility of programming different geometric shapes to have a great variety of scenes.”, points out this specialist.

ACL 360 Bar facilitates spectacular visual effects thanks to its continuous rotation in Pan and Tilt, high speed of movement and a design with seven 4° aperture lenses, collimator type (for a 31° combined beam) 15-watt RGBW each (for a total of 105-watts) and individual control over each LED.

“The creative possibilities of individual control over each pixel or pixel-mapping, and the wide variety of resources in terms of positioning the bars have been the aspects that I have looked for with the inclusion of the ACL 360 Bar in this lighting design - continues Specht -. The continuous rotation in Pan and Tilt is a very good resource. I haven't used it too much in the design and so it has become a special effect when it appears at certain moments in the concerts.".

One of the advantages of ACL 360 Bar is its small size and weight (57x 25 cm. y 10 Kg.). As Specht highlights, “the truss structures in a totem position on which the different ACL units have been placed 360 Bar and Lumina Strip had a wheel system installed on their bases that has allowed us to greatly speed up assembly and disassembly., thanks to the lightness of the ACL 360 “Bar installed on each totem”.

The lighting material for this tour has been provided by the company Burst Sound & Lighting Systems (based in Detroit), which has more than two hundred ACL units in its inventory 360 Bar that made their debut at the Electric Zoo electronic music festival in New York 2015.

“I was working as a lighting programmer at Electric Zoo and I found the installation with two hundred ACL units very interesting. 360 Bar -adds this specialist-. For the New Politics tour I was very interested and, next to the warm white Lumina Strips Led bars, I have managed to create a great contrast between the possibilities of colors and movements of the ACL 360 “Bar and Lumina Strip strobe effects to enhance the silhouettes of the band members with back lighting”.

In addition to the different possibilities and resources that add attractiveness to any lighting design and installation., This expert highlights that “Elation ACL 360 Bar has allowed me to be bolder with this design for New Politics and add new aspects to those based on Spot moving heads, Wash y Beam. Although I have also created more traditional scenes, los ACL 360 Bar have helped me get an atmosphere, let's say, more futuristic for certain moments of the show and I will use this effect again in designs for other bands”.