MIDI pilots lighting to new heights
In the world of nightclubs, there are certain ingredients that ensure immediate success — a booming sound system, a top-notch staff and an exclu-sive guest list. JET nightclub in The Mirage, one of the hottest nightclubs in Las Vegas, has added a fourth: a dramatic and exciting lighting system. Ever since JET opened in 2005, the club’s main room has boasted a lighting system designed by the team at John Lyons Systems.
Richard Worboys, vice president at the Los Angeles-based John Lyons Systems, says, “[The owners] wanted a very dynamic show. It’s been a while since there was a club that had a really exciting light show. It seems that venues were wandering away from that and were worrying more about the couches and the curtains.”
Neil Kull, JET lighting director, adds: “A lot of clubs will put a few lights and speakers in, and it’s more about the table and bottle service. At JET, they really sunk a lot into the whole visual approach of everything. When you walk into JET, the whole room comes lunging out at you, and you’re blown away.”
Solid As a Rock
In addition to the club’s architectural lighting touches, the initial lighting install included 16 Martin MAC 250 Kryptons, eight Martin MAC 550 Spots, 16 Martin Atomic 3000 strobes and 36 American DJ Accu Scan 250s. Kull says, “It’s a rock-solid rig. We’re pretty good at keeping the maintenance going. I have a crew that comes in every two months, and we clean everything inside and out to keep the fixtures looking crisp, keep the lighting effects vivid and the colors rich. The Martins are great workhorse fixtures that bounce around the room anyway you want. Just to make those a little bit better, I changed out some of the patterns they create and gave the club a little more of a custom look.”
According to Kull, the other half of the rig is almost entirely video hung by the ceiling over the main dance floor. There are 120 2-foot by 2-foot Traxon Technologies Tile 64PXL LED panels, which feature 64 pixels per panel. The panels are controlled by e:cue computer-based lighting con-trol. It runs on a CS-1 industrial rack-mounted server running Microsoft Windows XP.
In addition to adding some excitement to the room, the LED panels helped with a space issue that Lyons and Worboys found when surveying the room. A series of offices for The Mirage accounting staff had occupied the space that is now JET. The original plans called for a two-story club, but because of the space constraints, JET became a one-story club with a meager 13-foot ceiling. The challenge, says Worboys, “was trying to cre-ate a light show with the low ceiling. We didn’t have the space to shoot lights through conventionally, so we came up with a design using Traxon LED panels. It’s more graphic and more video-like than light beams shining through the air.”
The ceiling panels have also been used as a projector, thanks to a pair of Green Hippo Hippotizer media servers with video switching handled by a Kramer VP-8X8 matrix switcher. In addition, six High End Systems DL1 digital luminaires were installed to add a dynamic layer to the rig.
MIDI Puts ShowCad in Gear
The ShowCAD Artist show control software was also added to the system. “We’ve been constantly developing the software to control a room of that size,” Worboys reports. “Neil is one of the few people who uses that software, so it’s been great.”
Kull also appreciates the program’s flexibility. “Most of the other lighting control systems are basically consoles — essentially big boards with some faders and some buttons. What ShowCAD has over other boards is its MIDI interface,” Kull says. “That allows you to customize your con-sole a lot more than anything else. So, if you need more faders, if you need more buttons or whatever, you can plug in any old piece of MIDI gear. There are so many different instruments out there that can create MIDI, or you can create your own, so you can really go nuts with your interface.” Indeed, Kull has used an electric flute and a piano and is on the hunt for a MIDI guitar to use with ShowCAD at JET.
Although the initial lighting look turned heads all over town, a year after the room’s opening, the Light Group, who operates JET, decided it was time to refresh the club. “The light show was a talking point of the venue, and they also have a great guy who makes the show fantastic, so to them it was money put to good use,” Worboys reports.
Black Magic
In the club’s main room — there are three rooms — the team installed a number of RGB architectural fixtures in the ground and in the ceiling that added splashes of color beyond the dance floor. Also, 36 motorized projection screens were added to the venue’s ceiling. “Those were taken out of the original design for budgetary reasons,” Worboys reports. A standard white screen, along with black scrim material that both reflects and passes light and videos, are scattered around the room. “We have these in various six-foot, eight-foot and 10-foot widths with a DMX control, so we can bring them down in different places and heights to create shapes in the room. Then, all the lighting effects can make patterns on these screens.”
Kull reports that the motorized screens have been great early in the evening and early in the morning when people are about to head home. “It’s great to bring those down and add another dimension to the room,” he says. “It keeps the energy going, keeps the place looking like it’s alive and rocking out. People will stay, have another drink and watch like it’s a fireworks show. It’s great.”
One of the back rooms, Worboys adds, received both audio and video upgrades. To be fair, he says, “The back rooms had no design whatsoever. Everything was concentrated in the main room and that made sense, because the back room is more of a VIP area, so filling those rooms with all that technology would detract from the main room. The reason one of the rooms was upgraded was because that room ended up having more en-ergy than was originally anticipated.”
Kull is quick to point out that any successful night is the result of the work of the entire team at JET, from the wait staff to the DJ to the booker. At the same time, working with Worboys was exciting. “Richie is somebody I’d heard about for years before actually meeting him,” he says. “I’d seen examples of his work and his programming and thought we were both on the same page, so it was exciting to meet him and bounce ideas off of him.”
Of course, the proof of success in the nightclub business comes with a packed dance floor. Spin by JET any night and judge for yourself…. If you can get in, that is.
