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Skans!


robocow

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What happened to skans? There is such a poor representation of them now. I still love the instant movement and tracking.

 

Why didn't they develop as much as moving heads?

 

For example. I love miniscan HPEs but they're getting harder to hire.

 

Sorry just a but of naval gazing - anyone else feel the same?

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Purely as a tech and not as a designer I'd hate to work with Scans - the mirror is such a fragile thing to have on the front. I can't imagine touring with them as you'd get at least one smash every venue. VL3500's however can be chucked into the case by a gallow etc and remain relatively unscathed after 30 dates.

 

If you want to see some Golden Scans in use though check out 'Later with Jools Holland'

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If you want to feed your craving for scans, then how about one of these beasts? Huge, and massively over-engineered when compared to 'modern' scanners.

 

I used to have a set of 6 NAT1200s, but mine were the models with CYM colour mixing, 2 gobo wheels, effects wheel, motorised zoom and focus, etc. They also had a separate ballast, which meant they took up a lot of hanging space. They also weighed in at 75kg each, including the ballast!! The mirror was almost the size of a dinner plate, and its movement was unbelievably smooth thanks to the gear reduction on both pan and tilt. The movement was easily as good as any moving head, and light years ahead of most scanners. In the end they were far too large for our venue, so I sold them for not much money.

 

I think Clay Paky are stretching things a bit when they say their new scanner 'creates an absolutely original swirling effect'. Clearly they've forgotten about the Coemar TX360.

:)
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If you want to feed your craving for scans, then how about one of these beasts? Huge, and massively over-engineered when compared to 'modern' scanners.

 

I have a set of four of those gathering dust, bought them from the same liquidation auction as that guy. Like him, I haven't found the time to do anything productive with them. Nobody is buying, I'll be stunned if his listing ends with a sale.

 

It'll be interesting to see if the new Clay Paky unit reignites interest in scans, it's probably long enough for their popularity to come round again...

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I have a couple of CP Silverados sat in storage at the theatre that seldom get used at all because they have different lenses on them :(

I did try to find replacement lenses so they could be matched a couple of years back but I can't remember what happened with those enquiries - they were possibly too expensive to bother with maybe...

 

 

 

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I can't remember what happened with those enquiries - they were possibly too expensive to bother with maybe...

 

LightingMirrorMan was exhibiting at Pro/BPM the other week, and unless I'm very much mistaken there were a couple of lenses sitting on his stand. Might be worth a call.

 

The other guy I've come across is this fella who often seems to have older CP gear around, some of which he breaks for spares.

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Scans basically became a niche product when moving heads dropped in price to the level where you could have a head for the price of a scan, and heads were generally considered to be sexier, plus typically heads could point anywhere in 3/4 of the space around it (360 degree pan with 270 degree tilt) whereas most scans could only cover 1/4 of the space (180 degree pan with 90 degree tilt movement).

 

And most modern lighting design doesn't seem to require the speed of scans and even the rave scene has learnt to live with slower movements.

 

I've still got about 16 Martin Roboscan Pro518s and a couple of other scans, and I love them for what they are, but they just don't get used as I don't need the speed and have smaller, lighter, brighter lights with better features that do the job better. Still love scans though...

 

Not heard of the CP Spheriscan until this thread. I wait to be proved wrong, but it still looks like a very niche product to me!

 

I still fancy having a set of GS HPEs but really can't justify it, and finding ones that hadn't done 8000 hours and toasted their rear ends would be a challenge...

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Not heard of the CP Spheriscan until this thread. I wait to be proved wrong, but it still looks like a very niche product to me!

 

A fuzzlight for the 21st century perhaps...

 

I still fancy having a set of GS HPEs but really can't justify it, and finding ones that hadn't done 8000 hours and toasted their rear ends would be a challenge...

 

Yeah, it's the combination of weight and potential reliability issues that puts me off. Plus there is zero chance of a GS going out on a dry hire to an end user these days.

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Indeed, I did buy a set of 4 a few years ago just because I'd always wanted some GS HPEs, but they were in much worse condition than I'd been led to believe. Bit awkward lifting them onto my work bench on my own! And they needed far too many replacement parts to make it worth spending the time on.

 

Just remembered that I've got 4 old Abstract scans that do actually get used a couple of times a year for basic disco jobs as they can be run master/slave, and another 12 Roboscans that get used with proper control, um, occasionally!

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