You can throw away the spec sheet for this fixture — or at least put it away until you’ve seen the video. Sure, it’s great to read the specs, especially for a brand new fixture like the High End Systems Showpix. But until you’ve seen the video at www.highend.com/showpix/videoqt.html , you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Of course, watching the video is only second best to seeing the product itself; the Showpix speaks for itself. It is a moving yoke fixture that looks an awful lot like the Showgun — same housing, same LEDs — except it has a lot more of them. Instead of a 2000-watt MSR lamp ringed by 36 3-watt RGB LEDs, it has an array of 127 3-watt LEDs without the MSR lamp.
Did I say it speaks for itself? It screams, really. Especially when all 127 LEDs pan into your face. I measured 46 footcandles at 16 feet in white with a Minolta T-10 Illuminance Meter, and considering the size of the field — 45º beam angle and 80º field angle; almost 27 feet in diameter at 16 feet throw distance — it’s a lot of light any way you measure it. High End’s official spec is 24,000 “RGB lumens.” This is their way of quantifying a discontinuous spectrum like RGB LEDs.
It’s a common issue in the industry; you can’t take a conventional handheld illuminance meter made for measuring incandescent or natural sunlight and expect it to yield an accurate reading for a narrow band source like LEDs. So High End devised a way of comparing the light output with a conventional automated light.
They measured the Showpix in seven different colors — white, red, blue, green, cyan, magenta, and yellow — and did the same with a Studio Color 575. Comparing the results, they found the ratio of light from the Showpix to the light from the Studio Color for each color. For example, the white light might be .5X, the red 3X, etc. Then they averaged them out and multiplied by the number of lumens in a Studio Color, which is 12,000.
But the crowning feature is the graphics capability. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then this low-res, high-brightness moving yoke digital luminaire speaks volumes. One-hundred and twenty-seven color-changing LED pixels arranged in a concentric circle array can paint quite an impressive picture, particularly when it’s aided by the on-board media server and pixel-mapping application software they call Echo. By dragging and dropping graphics — any graphics — into the application, it automatically performs an algorithm that maps animated graphics or still graphics into the LED array. The built-in visualizer allows you to view the results on the computer display. It can take a video clip of every day ordinary life and turn it into something extraordinary. Just by adjusting the sensitivity, some of the most innocuous video turns out to be very interesting.
You can load the content via a USB port or by DMX512 (using RDM-like protocol) into the on-board media server. It comes with 255 factory files and it holds up to 255 user files with up to 256 frames per file. The media server allows you to “scratch” via DMX, adjust the playback rate, rotate globally or by layer and use a number of crossfades and transitions. There is a lot more to the media server, including the ability to use standard “lenses” or masks that change the look and feel of the graphics coming from the fixture.
There are several DMX512 modes, from 451 channels in enhanced mode to 12 channels in big wash mode that allow you to tailor your rig to your needs. In standard mode it uses 70 DMX512 channels.
From a physical point of view, the fixture is identical to the Showgun except for the LEDs. By removing four screws on the snoot of the fixture you can access the LEDs. Each LED pie-shaped segment is held in place by three screws and they have a snap-on connector, so they are easily replaced. Even the drive boards for the LEDs have retained fasteners and the circuit boards snap into place.
The road to hell is paved with bad inventions. This is not one of them. The Showpix is a refreshing change in a sea of mediocre automated lights and LED wash fixtures. It can provide a big color changing wash or it can entertain with animated color-changing graphics. Or it can do both at the same time.
What it is: Homogeneous RGB color mixing wash fixture with animation and graphics capability
Who it’s for: Color wash and/or graphics playback
Pros: Very bright, very wide field, dynamic low-res graphics, modular, easy to service, built-in media server, versatile pixel-mapping application software
Cons: Very large, heavy
Retail Price: $16,500
