# What lighting equipment was used in the 1980's for major events?



## strandcentury (Jun 17, 2011)

Now a days a large lighting rig for a major venue will usually consist of moving fixtures, LEDs, atmospherics, super advanced digital consoles, and sometimes conventionals.

I was watching some Depeche Mode concert footage from the 101 world tour from 1988.

I randomly started thinking, what type of equipment must they have used?

The rig looked like a combination of intellabeam scanners, strobes, and various par cans, I did not notice any moving heads.

I understand that Vari-Lite was just starting to make history with their VL1/2/3 fixtures and in general at this period in time the control systems for entertainment lighting were becoming digital and moving away from analog.

What type of fixtures were common for this time period? both moving and conventional.

What type of control console may have been used? were there separate proprietary consoles for moving lights / intellabeams and 2scene or memory boards for the conventional fixtures? or were things centralized onto one console like it is nowadays. I am suspecting that DMX did not quite find its way into the market yet 

If there was more than one console, was it common to have two or more board ops / programmers?

I don't know if this is off-topic, or what to classify this post as. But if anyone has any experience or knowledge that would enable them to answer my questions and if some of you were involved in the industry back then, if you wish even provide some details on what it was like back then to be and LD, op, programmer, or rigger. 

Thanks!


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## mstaylor (Jun 17, 2011)

Lot and lots of Pars, some ACLs and eventually movers. First there were moving mirror fixtures(intellebeams and others) then Varilite and Morpheus. Leprecon was a huge board. TTI and LMI were leaders in dimmers. Anything the moved had it's own board. If you had Varalites or Morpheous lights you hired a board and tech to run it. Everything was a rental, you couldn't buy them. 
Many tours were just huge Par rigs with audience abuse and ACLs. Then they used truss spots. I know I ran my fair share of truss spots. House spots in arenas were super troupers or gladiators.


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## SteveB (Jun 17, 2011)

Prior to ML's the typical touring desks I saw were Avo Diamond types and Celco Golds. Big heavy mothers. 

They would typically have 60 to 90 faders in a two scene config, with 20-30 preset faders, and with a Rola-Cue, you could roll the plastic wheel to swap to different pages of looks. 

Leprecon had the LP2000 as well, similar concept.


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## shiben (Jun 17, 2011)

mstaylor said:


> Many tours were just huge Par rigs with audience abuse and ACLs.


 
I would say a fair number of current tours are just giant piles of moving lights and audience abuse too... Who was it, Was reading about them a couple years ago, that in their design concept for the LD they said they needed to be able to see the audience well for like 60% of the show... Quite a few shows I have seen basically take a pile of MLs, hang them behind the band, and point them at the audience with various colors, sometimes a gobo, and some different movements for most of the show, Not exactly creative and a pain to watch. I hate it when the LD for a concert has lights in my eyes so much I end up watching the mosh pit instead of the band I paid 30+ bucks to WATCH in a concert... I want to watch people fighting I watch the news on mute and listen to whatever band that might be...


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## DuckJordan (Jun 17, 2011)

shiben said:


> I would say a fair number of current tours are just giant piles of moving lights and audience abuse too... Who was it, Was reading about them a couple years ago, that in their design concept for the LD they said they needed to be able to see the audience well for like 60% of the show... Quite a few shows I have seen basically take a pile of MLs, hang them behind the band, and point them at the audience with various colors, sometimes a gobo, and some different movements for most of the show, Not exactly creative and a pain to watch. I hate it when the LD for a concert has lights in my eyes so much I end up watching the mosh pit instead of the band I paid 30+ bucks to WATCH in a concert... I want to watch people fighting I watch the news on mute and listen to whatever band that might be...


 

Very seldom do i see this, most of the time when there are lights being projected into an audience is to give the audience a more sensual feel. Granted if they are just moving across the audience randomly or no gobo/color then that's a different story. I'm actually designing a show right now for a theatrical performance where the use of "audience" blinders is used. Its for some explosions, but its the same concept.


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## shiben (Jun 17, 2011)

DuckJordan said:


> Very seldom do i see this, most of the time when there are lights being projected into an audience is to give the audience a more sensual feel. Granted if they are just moving across the audience randomly or no gobo/color then that's a different story. I'm actually designing a show right now for a theatrical performance where the use of "audience" blinders is used. Its for some explosions, but its the same concept.


 
I suspect we may be going to different kinds of concerts, a significant number of the ones I go to have a truss full of NC PARs pointed towards the pit section of the venue, a crap load of strobes and 9lites pointed in the same direction, and a lot of MLs that generally trace a large bit of the audience with various colors (I dont care how dark your blue is, a 700W Arc source is still bright) and flash on and off, etc. I dont know how much sensuality you really can achieve when a significant bit of the floor is taken up by a couple hundred larger gentlemen using eachother as billiards balls and heavy bags...


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## Footer (Jun 17, 2011)

shiben said:


> I suspect we may be going to different kinds of concerts, a significant number of the ones I go to have a truss full of NC PARs pointed towards the pit section of the venue, a crap load of strobes and 9lites pointed in the same direction, and a lot of MLs that generally trace a large bit of the audience with various colors (I dont care how dark your blue is, a 700W Arc source is still bright) and flash on and off, etc. I dont know how much sensuality you really can achieve when a significant bit of the floor is taken up by a couple hundred larger gentlemen using eachother as billiards balls and heavy bags...


 
Those shows are usually attended by the types that are on concert enhancing vitamins. In other words, if you are not mezmorized by the lights, you probably are not getting the _full_ experience. There is a reason the Creative Stage Lighting who lights most of the jam bands out there owns every bright light imaginable.


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## shiben (Jun 17, 2011)

Footer said:


> Those shows are usually attended by the types that are on concert enhancing vitamins. In other words, if you are not mezmorized by the lights, you probably are not getting the _full_ experience. There is a reason the Creative Stage Lighting who lights most of the jam bands out there owns every bright light imaginable.


 
I dont know, I get the idea that most of the point is to make people angry, and thus able to fight longer... And Im 22 years old, I dont need concert enhancing vitamins, I can take the liquid form... I just dont like the idea of going to a show, waiting in line to get to the front row, and having my eyeballs blistered out so I cant even see the dude I came to see scream out his songs do so. I dont mind some strobes and whatnot, just please dont make me sit through 2+ hours of strobes in my eyes... A stage has a pretty big opening, and we do have MLs now, you dont need to settle for them all pointed at me... Maybe I just got into liking the wrong kind of music.


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## DuckJordan (Jun 17, 2011)

shiben said:


> I dont know, I get the idea that most of the point is to make people angry, and thus able to fight longer... And Im 22 years old, I dont need concert enhancing vitamins, I can take the liquid form... I just dont like the idea of going to a show, waiting in line to get to the front row, and having my eyeballs blistered out so I cant even see the dude I came to see scream out his songs do so. I dont mind some strobes and whatnot, just please dont make me sit through 2+ hours of strobes in my eyes... A stage has a pretty big opening, and we do have MLs now, you dont need to settle for them all pointed at me... Maybe I just got into liking the wrong kind of music.


 

WAIT WAIT WAIT... You go to the front row to see the band? 

*uses old mechanic voice* Well, There's your problem right there!

You also have to remember when a touring group goes out most of the "focus" of the lighting is put that set of pars up their and aim them towards (insert general target here). Its fast dirty and easy, but it also doesn't do well for the first half of the crowd when watching the show. I went to a Disturbed concert not too long ago and they had maybe 20 movers and a ton of pars. Of course they lent towards the pyro side leaning towards propane jets.

And I was probably 30' from the stage and I could see the wash effect from the pars and some mover effects still hitting the audience when it wasn't the intention.


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## avkid (Jun 17, 2011)

Footer said:


> Those shows are usually attended by the types that are on concert enhancing vitamins. In other words, if you are not mezmorized by the lights, you probably are not getting the _full_ experience. There is a reason the Creative Stage Lighting who lights most of the jam bands out there owns every bright light imaginable.


 Exactly, Umphrey's McGee blew my mind a few weeks ago.
Mac 250's, Mac III's, and JB Lighting A7's 



(Excuse my Blackberry camera)


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## shiben (Jun 17, 2011)

DuckJordan said:


> WAIT WAIT WAIT... You go to the front row to see the band?


 
Yeah. First 20-50' DS of the stage is taken up by a giant mosh pit, and the rest is full of people using the pretext of a concert to drink overpriced beers in excess. Plus, you never get anything if you sit in the balcony, if your in the front you can sometimes get guitar picks and other stuff like that.


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## strandcentury (Jun 18, 2011)

shiben said:


> I would say a fair number of current tours are just giant piles of moving lights and audience abuse too... Who was it, Was reading about them a couple years ago, that in their design concept for the LD they said they needed to be able to see the audience well for like 60% of the show... Quite a few shows I have seen basically take a pile of MLs, hang them behind the band, and point them at the audience with various colors, sometimes a gobo, and some different movements for most of the show, Not exactly creative and a pain to watch. I hate it when the LD for a concert has lights in my eyes so much I end up watching the mosh pit instead of the band I paid 30+ bucks to WATCH in a concert... I want to watch people fighting I watch the news on mute and listen to whatever band that might be...



So true! Although I did see Arcade Fire here in vancouver... Their LD (Susanne Sasic) did a really good job. 24 VLX wash fixtures and a crapload of blinders and atomic strobes. Controlled off Series 1 grandMA Consoles. The setup was quite good on the audience. They were putting more of an emphasis on video. I think many shows are doing that. Quote "the last thing we want is just a moving light show."


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## mstaylor (Jun 18, 2011)

The problem I have is you can still do a pretty nice show with conventionals. I agree that MLs can really enhance a show, it's just that many current LDs use them badly. I have seen all ML rigs that are used to basically to simulate a PAR rig but still using some mover tricks.


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## shiben (Jun 18, 2011)

mstaylor said:


> The problem I have is you can still do a pretty nice show with conventionals. I agree that MLs can really enhance a show, it's just that many current LDs use them badly. I have seen all ML rigs that are used to basically to simulate a PAR rig but still using some mover tricks.


 
I had to laugh at one concert I went to a little while ago, the LD has a front truss and back truss, all MLs. Parks them all in one configuration for the first song, during the little chat it switches to the 4 S4s in the rig, and then the MLs move to another position, then they park there, and they get flashed like PARs that get refocused. Was actually kind of funny.


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## BillESC (Jun 28, 2011)

When I toured, 1973 to 1986, all our rigs were pars with ACL's and a few lekos.


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## mstaylor (Jun 29, 2011)

Climbed and focused many of those same type rigs. Of course they were stacking sound then too.


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## mrb (Jun 29, 2011)

ahh the days of QM-90 and 37 pin socapex cable for your analog control. Then intellabeams came along and and you'd wire the console up to the analog input on your ibeam LED controller(s) to get more presets.....oh and the noise the generators would make when the LD would push the 'all full on' button on a 500K par can rig....

want to see how it was done in the 80s? check youtube for some old def leppard and poison videos...


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## techieman33 (Jun 29, 2011)

shiben said:


> I had to laugh at one concert I went to a little while ago, the LD has a front truss and back truss, all MLs. Parks them all in one configuration for the first song, during the little chat it switches to the 4 S4s in the rig, and then the MLs move to another position, then they park there, and they get flashed like PARs that get refocused. Was actually kind of funny.


 
Sounds a lot like the brad paisley rig, tons of brand new vl3500's and didn't do squat with them. It was all about the video wall.


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## DuckJordan (Jun 30, 2011)

techieman33 said:


> Sounds a lot like the brad paisley rig, tons of brand new vl3500's and didn't do squat with them. It was all about the video wall.


 
Hey don't talk too bad about that video wall.. It came out of SD


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## techieman33 (Jun 30, 2011)

DuckJordan said:


> Hey don't talk too bad about that video wall.. It came out of SD


 
The video wall was cool, I just would have liked to see the rest of the rig used more. Maybe being a festival had something to do with it though.


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## DuckJordan (Jun 30, 2011)

techieman33 said:


> The video wall was cool, I just would have liked to see the rest of the rig used more. Maybe being a festival had something to do with it though.


 
Actually Lights and sound america has an article about it. The Designer wanted the Screen to be a big feature of the set because of the ability to use it to "back light" as well as project live video to the large attendance. But this is pulling towards off topic... (maybe a new thread about LED video screens is in order...)


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## Esoteric (Jun 30, 2011)

I am so glad I went to school at a place where they taught us to properly use moving lights (in all environments). Of course I have no problem pointing lights at the audience, but I know when to do it and when to not.


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