mikienorth Posted January 4, 2009 Share Posted January 4, 2009 Of course, another thing to remember in that this remarkable piece of work both in lighting design / set / etc etc was all created and produced in the days before autoCAD, laptops, mobiles, moving lights, HOG2's and the like - so, its just remarkable what was achieved "back then" compared to whats available now. Which is probably one of the reasons it is so good. 20+ year old technology still performing mostly perfectly 8 times a week (Well from the front anyway...) Brilliant. And probably one of the reasons it relies so heavily on crew being 'on form' instead of having an automaton op... Don't get me wrong, I saw it in Manchester in the 90's as a schoolboy, and loved the whole show. It was just having a bad day back in 06 I reckon... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henny Posted January 5, 2009 Share Posted January 5, 2009 I saw it in NYC about 2 years ago and you could tell everyone had got far too complacnent , it was verry rough around the edges, eirly/late cues ect 20+ year old technology still performing mostly perfectly 8 times a week (Well from the front anyway...) Brilliant. it has been updated over the years , see below (taken from Strand e.News Spring 2006) It was a very different world technologically 18 years ago, when the show started. The console was a Strand Light Palette – Full Speed / Full Backup console that was built by Four Star specifically compacted to fit the booth at the Majestic and had a second floppy drive added. At that time, the show was stored on multiple floppies and they had to load a new floppy…not just at intermission but during the first act! There was a specific moment where they found time to load the second disk. There was even enough time to load again if the first load didn’t take. The production electrician, Bobby Joe Fehribach, says that at one time the show even had a 5 disk floppy changer. The original Light Palette had a capacity of 500 channels and 8 submasters with 50% over-range capability. How far we have come in the world of theatrical lighting control! In 1995, the show decided to upgrade components of the lighting system. This included upgrading their scrollers and their console but they didn’t change the dimmers or the interface. With the Light Palette being retired, they chose the Light Palette 90. Now they had a capacity of 1536 channels, 1536 dimmers, an average of 600 memories per show (no more multiple floppies!), 8 timed or manual playbacks, up to 128 simultaneous fades, DMX protocol, programmable macros, up to 999 effects, a notepad display for messages and reminders, function keys, full proportional dimmer patching with up to 64 user-definable dimmer names, remote monitor capability, up to 2 handheld remotes and an off-line editor. The interface from the console to the dimmers is a sample and hold card that converts AMX to 0 – 10 VDC. For dimmers there are 3 96 way Dilor 2.4kw racks, 1 “tall box” custom Strand CD80 rack and a smaller 8 x 12k dimmer rack. They use 3 universes of DMX which include wireless dimming and a non-dim relay rack.The electrician that has been on the show all these years is Alan Lampel. He says,“I appreciate how the language of the console is consistent with all LP consoles. It’s a simple machine with rock solid connections that I can service after 11 years of non-stop performance.”Many companies of the show have come and gone but both Broadway and the current road company are on LP90s. Another touring company ran 8 years on the LP90 while the San Francisco company ran on the Light Palette 2.By today’s standards the show is rather small with only 200 cues and 15 effects but that doesn’t stop it from being on top of Broadway with no end in sight.Here’s wishing them another 18 years! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lifeisacabaret Posted January 28, 2009 Share Posted January 28, 2009 "It is indeed false, and a pretty important part of 'Phantom'. The PA is concealed within it," The PA used to be totally concealed through almost the entire auditorium, however, that is very different since the sound re-design last year, and indeed the false prosc was acually moved downstage slightly to accomodate the new speakers, which are much, much larger than the old ones- and all the speakers in the auditorium- fills, delays and surrounds, are now almost completely visible too, whereas the previous systems were not. It sounds lovely though, but has a very different aural character to it now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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