Robe lights up the Conference on the Future of Europe – CoFoE

Held in the European Parliament in Strasbourg, the Conference on the future of Europe (CoFoE) has had the technology of Robe to create a more dynamic light environment in the chamber.

The inaugural event of the Conference on the Future of Europe (CoFoE), initiative of the UE to reform their policies and institutions, recently held at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, has had the help of the producer Nimblerr and Dimi Theuwissen, lighting designer from Belgian creative studio ID2Q, to create a more dynamic camera look, by having an audience of less than 40 years as a preferred audience.

Theuwissen therefore decided to completely change the look and feel with a new approach., based on illuminating the architecture of the room in the background and, thus, bring your speakers into the foreground and camera shots.

To achieve this aesthetic, more than two hundred Robe mobile lights were installed., specifically the Spiiders models, Tetra2s y LedBeam 150s.

The CoFoE event was broadcast live, with three hundred participants (ministers, dignitaries, opinion leaders,…) via Zoom, whose presentations were also shown on seven large LED screens, strategically installed in a circle around those in the chamber.

Erasmus students from all EU member states were present in a live audience, maintaining social distance.

“As it is a live broadcast, The lighting had to be animated - recalls Theuwissen -. Plus all the basics, as a key light and for speakers' skin tones, It was important to make the building come into play and participate as an integral actor in the entire environment”.

Around the two elliptical planes of the perimeter wall of the hemicycle, 136 Robe Spiider Led light beams to indirectly highlight the different glass panels of the wall. Besides, Its subtle pan and tilt signals were used to change the lighting treatment on the walls and give depth to the image.

An arc of Led Par was also mounted on microphone stands, which were placed in exact positions along the top of the wall panels. The seven LED screens masked the rear area of ​​the chamber seats, but the illuminated perimeter wall was clearly visible in the back of the shots.

For the latter, Theuwissen opted for forty Robe LedBeam 150 in order to create an intimate atmosphere and fill the gaps of empty seats to maintain social distancing.

Las 42 Tetra2 mobile LED bars were installed at the vertical ends of the screens, each one strategically placed to coincide with the trajectories of the halls of the hemicycle, that had to be kept clear by fire regulations.

“I especially wanted the option to tilt these lights in those positions - says the lighting designer -, because they allowed me to create cool and spectacular lens flare effects, especially for the long shots that came from the crane camera”.

CoFoE lighting was programmed by Stijn Vanholzaets, experto en The Creative Factory (TCF), using a grandMA2 console MA Lighting, who worked closely with Xavier Nijssen, project manager for the European Parliament, and Dimi Theuwissen.