robe 600 led wash

[inthe128]

These units popped up a couple of times at festivals last year and recently I managed to spend 4 hours with 4 units at my leisure and I have to say I was impressed. The colour possibilities seem very good to me and I would be happy at this stage to replace the TW1s I have for front and the Mac 700 wash on the back with these items. There seems almost total pluses to this, less truck space, less power, good rental prices.

 

I am interested to hear any views on anyone who has used them in anger, these will be used in a touring situation, so reliability on the road and anything to be wary of. The folk I have talked to so far seem to agree on it being a cracking fixture, so any minus points. Happy to hear the good and the bad.

 

Andy

[LampTramp]

Hi Andy

I was hired as one of the production lx for the SECC Christmas panto at the Clyde Auditorium 2011/2012.

The lighting design was by Nick Richings. What was interesting was that it was a full LED rig and I like you wanted to see how the units compared up against a generic rig.

The units that he used were as follows

Robin 600 wash 6

Robin 600 wide wash 3

Robin LED 600 wash 24

I-Pix Sat 23

Robin 600 p'file 18

Mac III 6

Robin Spot 12

JTE Pix Line 20

Then he used the FOH bridge with S4 and on stage ladder with S4 units.

All the equipment was supplied by HSL pre addressed and looms pre made. So not really alot of work to be done at the venue.

Control was on GrandMA dimming and power through Avo Arc...

When it came to the focus etc I was very surprised by the 'punch' of the LED units.

The colour quality etc was very good, as it was a panto super rich/camp colours were the order of the day.Also a lot of gauze work was in the show and the LED was very good on the gauze and backcloths, and being so close to them too.

The best part of it was the fact that there is almost no heat!! At one point in the run the on stage heaters were turned on!

As far as I know only the one 600 LED wash was changed out in the tech, but HSL had sent spare units.

That might be something to keep in mind if touring to have a limited spare stock if one of the 'movers' has a brain fart!

I was very impressed by the LED rig and the first time I had worked on a 98% LED to 2% generic rig.

And as you say the production electric bill was cut by almost 2/3rds!!!

I'd say give them a go!!

Regards

Brian

[inthe128]

I know Nick very well, nice chap.

 

The brain fart I am interested in and have heard it can get itself into some madness. My main worry is that is something that happens during a gig or something that is more likely to happen at power up. As I look at the gig sheet I see we play an outdoor stage in Koln where we need to handball the lamps onto the stage structure, so another plus for the Robe's. Last time we played this place it was with TW1s and a rope http://www.blue-room.org.uk/public/style_emoticons/default/sad.gif

[JDLX]

Yep they are superb units, Robe's best selling product ever I believe. If they were to knock a grand off the list price, I can honestly see these units replacing generics in mainstream theatres and other venues. I had one on demo at work when they first came out, and tried it on a bar next to a 1K Fresnel. With the virtual colour well selected to a tungsten setting (3200k I think) I could barely tell the difference between them. I haven't yet used the 1200 LED Wash in anger but I imagine this to be even more impressive.

[inthe128]

I have to agree with the colour, I had a guy stand in the light for 30 minutes and kept cleaning my glasses, I truly was amazed at what you could use this for. The units I got time to play with did have a bad spill on tight zoom and the quantity of the beam edges a small concern, but over all mighty impressed, I think perhaps the best thing I have seen for a long while. It makes the advantages of LED acceptable to the likes of me as an old 'un.

[LampTramp]

Andy

The brain fart wasn't to do with power up, if I remember, I think it was a problem with the pan when going 'left'!!

But then again this could happen with any 'mover' at anytime really.

If you know Nick, give him a call as it was his request for a full LED rig for that show, so knowing his pedigree in the game, he must have the confidence to spec those units for his shows..

He's going more LED for other shows he's doing and they are touring too...

Brian

[EmmaThompson]

The colour on them is amazing - I specced them for a tour because of their colour temp matching. Using them with both movers and generics they work so well, and the colour mixing is so punchy - even the 300 washes are great. The zoom range is really good as well, the only downside I had would they wouldn't move quite as fast as other smaller LED fixtures, but in terms of output they more than made up for it. The rings are good for effects too.

In terms of reliability, they had 22 days of abuse, and though HSL had sent a spare, I didn't once need to get it out. Another plus point is the battery - means you can address them, check modes etc without even powering them up.

[cedd]

Yurp, we had a set for a show last year and were also very impressed with them. The main issue we had oddly was the lack of fan noise on them. We had an all LED rig for the first time ever and I think we'd got so used to the fan noise from 20 odd 575's that when it suddenly became nearly silent. things like hazers and smoke suddenly caused a problem that they'd never been before. Our sound engineer loved it though!

 

We had an issue with them not dimming out fully, I seem to recall that they always got stuck at a very dim glow, just enough to see on the stage. They were a pretty new feature back then and the LD blamed the personality. I'm not 100% sure if it wasn't the nut on the desk though..... :-)

 

Get them in the right mode though. They're capable of doing an awful lot but if you want simple RGB, you can really tie yourself in knots. They've got individual control of each LED ring in some profiles.

 

 

[niclights]

We had an issue with them not dimming out fully, I seem to recall that they always got stuck at a very dim glow, just enough to see on the stage. They were a pretty new feature back then and the LD blamed the personality. I'm not 100% sure if it wasn't the nut on the desk though..... :-)

The LD was probably correct, certainly if it was a 'Classic' Avo Pearl. The problem is in dealing with 16bit dimmers where the LSB gets stuck on at 100% (effectively 1% total output). However, there are workarounds which have since been implemented.

 

I can only echo what everyone else has said. Superb units. Excellent output and colour. Also hired from HSL and no problems whatsoever. I've never bothered with the separate rings/effects but no doubt this only increases their potential.

[Young Johnstone]

We haven't seen ours for months! There always out on tour somewhere!

They are incredibly good though! Like all the points that have been made previously.

[cedd]

The LD was probably correct, certainly if it was a 'Classic' Avo Pearl. The problem is in dealing with 16bit dimmers where the LSB gets stuck on at 100% (effectively 1% total output). However, there are workarounds which have since been implemented.

It was indeed an old Pearl 2004, so it seems pretty likely to have been that then. Though it wouldn't have been the first time if it had have been a PICNIC issue.... :-)

[inthe128]

Many thanks for the feedback: Last year I was on one of those club tours of Europe with whatever was there is what you get. They had them in Basel on the front truss, along with some fresnels. I thought I would use them for a bit of colour, red, blue, the normal, in the end never used the fresnels, these covered cold and warm tones so well, the full range of what I needed.

 

The act I am going to use these on are a band of advancing yearshttp://www.blue-room.org.uk/public/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif so the TW1's were great for a range of colour that did not make the fellas look too dead and I really think these small units could do an even better job and we could use the space in the truck as well, seems a win, win.

[Tom Baldwin]

Being as they don't have an amber emitter, what are they like at yellows and oranges? Does the white emitter really make them that much better than a plain RGB LED fixture for these sort of difficult colours?

[inthe128]

Being as they don't have an amber emitter, what are they like at yellows and oranges? Does the white emitter really make them that much better than a plain RGB LED fixture for these sort of difficult colours?

 

I spent my time with the colour in the couple of hours I had with them as I really need to get a lot out of them. The ambers and yellows were remarkable in my opinion, considering its an RGB+W unit. I really had no problem getting great colours from Rock and Roll saturated to a very wide range of hues, pastels. Colour seems its ace.....

[Joe Bleasdale]

6 came into my venue last night for a gig, they were bright, fast, great colours and provided dynamic effects. Personally, the "rings" tricks and effects do nothing for me and if it's eye candy your looking for I prefer the Mac Aura, it's smaller and not as bright but serves a different purpose. Wash wise though the 600 is great. Don't know whether it could replace a generic rig though. Even when I use a very LED heavy rig, I still keep generics in there as they look better for skin tones and any camera work.

 

Thanks.