Ravenhill, president of GLP US Inc., tells that GLP products have been getting to see the world a lot lately. LD Steve Comer used Impression Spot Ones on Jackson Browne’s recent tour, and Bare Naked Ladies, CSN and Melissa Etheridge used them on their recent tours too. Other GLP lights were used by LD Butch Allen for NKOTBSB (New Kids on the Block and Backstreet Boys) and Marc Janowitz for My Morning Jacket. Blake Shelton, Nickelback and Sugarland are other tours relying on GLP gear.
The impression X4, which incorporates 19 quad color RGBW LEDs, has been getting out, too. LD Tom Kenny used them to light the futuristic set for the MTV Video Music Awards, which expanded from the 7,100-seat Nokia Theatre to the neighboring 20,000-capacity Staples Center in Los Angeles last September; that show featured performances by Green Day, Taylor Swift, Pink, One Direction and Alicia Keys, among others.
Different from the First Day
Ravenhill grew up in the U.K., and got bitten by the theatre bug early on. He then found himself in Denmark working for Martin Professional in the 1990s, then again in the 2000s, leaving as vice president in 2008. “That’s when I got a taste for automated lighting,” he says.
In April of 2009, Ravenhill joined GLP. Although the brand had been available in the U.S., Ravenhill spearheaded the opening of its first North American office, in Sun Valley, CA, shortly after joining the company, which felt it was important to “put our destiny in our hands.” While GLP had grown to be successful and well-known in Europe, it had been lagging behind in North America, a region that GLP deemed strategically important in terms of the numbers of designers and consultants. “Having a presence here is a huge advantage,” Ravenhill says.
The company’s impression line of LED products were already in the marketplace, having nabbed industry honors with its launch at LDI in 2007. “That was a turning point in LED market,” Ravenhill notes, saying it offered “the right features at the right price. I saw it making a positive impact on the market immediately.”
GLP Light Products GmbH, founded in 1994 by Udo Künzler, set “the benchmark” for moving LED light fixtures, Ravenhill says. Building a “solid base” in Europe from a home base in southwestern Germany, GLP merged with Cairos technologies AG in 2006, GLP merged with Cairos Technologies AG, and today, GLP functions as a subsidiary of that entertainment software group.
Ravenhill notes that one of their first products was the Patend Light 700, “basically like a scanner that would spin continuously and move in ways like nothing else. So from the first day, GLP was set on trying different things, and the company grew from there.”
Ravenhill acknowledges that the entertainment lighting business is competitive, with plenty of better-known players in the market, but adds that lighting designers have proven themselves to be receptive to GLP. “Like any professional in any field, they can get set in their ways, but once they have a flavor of what a GLP product is, once they see it does everything they want it to do — small, light, bright, whatever they are looking for, they are open to a conversation. They like to do shoot outs with GLP lights, and I’d like to think we’ve built a reputation for making quality products, and that goes a long way as well. Then once they try it out on a show, they see how flexible it is and that it is a viable fixture.”
An Exciting Time
Ravenhill says all of the R&D is out of the office in Germany, which is filled with high tech tools including 3D printers capable of making molds of prototypes. “There are some cool toys over there,” he says. But he adds that the biggest tool is decidedly old school: good old-fashioned feedback. “That is, by far, the biggest part of the process — getting feedback from the professionals who are using the product. And not just the designers, but also the operators and rental companies. Also, delivering what they want is as important as delivering it in the package they want. We want to make the light for the designer of course; but it must be a package that is realistic for today’s budgets and must work well for the people who install it.”
GLP keeps up a constant dialog, and one of Ravenhill’s roles is to get ideas gleaned from those constant conversations back to Germany. He quickly learned that the same unit for the European market isn’t necessarily perfect for North America, and vice-versa. “For instance, in North America, the fixtures have to spend much more time in a truck traveling much greater distances between shows, whereas in Europe, that’s not a concern, because you’re in another country in just a few hours,” he explains. “There are some differences to how and what is used for television over there, too.”
Customer service is a major focus at GLP. “The majority of people in the company have worked on the other end of the phone, and so we know how we have to respond to ensure that things are taken care of quickly and accurately. We go out of our way to make sure that the company doesn’t get wrapped up in red tape and routines that slow things down, because that just doesn’t help anybody.”
In addition to the Spot One and the X4, at LDI 2012, GLP showed off a prototype of the X4S, which is a smaller version of the X4. “Another new product is the Volkslicht Spot, which is a smaller version of the Spot One,” he says. “Both are slated to be on the market in early 2013.
“It’s an exciting time for us,” Ravenhill adds. “We are very privileged to be doing the work we’re doing for the people we’re doing it for.”
A Busy 2012
Looking back, 2012 proved to be an eventful year for Mark Ravenhill and GLP:
My Morning Jacket Tour:
LD Marc Janowitz chose 50 impression X4s for the rig’s soft, swooped hanging positions between truss elements.
Jackson Browne Tour:
LD Steve Comer chose GLP impression Spot Ones for their light weight, small size, hard-edged beam and LED light sources.
MTV Video Music Awards:
LD Tom Kenny specified GLP impression X4s to help light Florian Wieder’s angular set featuring Green Day, Rihanna, Taylor Swift, Pink, Alicia Keys, Lil Wayne, Frank Ocean and One Direction.
Smashing Pumpkins Tour:
LD Lawrence Upton specified 20 GLP Volks-
licht Zoom LEDs supplied by Epic Production Technologies and Neg Earth for the Pumpkins’
return to the international stage.
