Volt Lites LD/Programmer Energized by Fresh Looks
On behalf of PLSN, I recently had the opportunity to sit down with LD and programmer Matt Shimamoto while he was working on the ACM Fan Jam. This was no easy task to schedule. He has been working seemingly non-stop ever since I first met him during tapings for Q’Viva, the TV reality series that culminated in a live stage show in Las Vegas in 2012.
PLSN: Tell us about some of your recent projects.
Matt Shimamoto: Here at the ACM Awards, I’m the lighting director for the TV side, working with visiting LDs, interpreting their existing shows for television. After this, I head off to L.A. to do a studio concert shoot with Jason Derulo, and then on to Roxanna to shoot a concert in an old renovated cathedral in downtown L.A. (wearing the design and director hats for both).
What would you say are your favorite types of lighting projects to work on ?
I like anything that has a lot of dynamics to it. As primarily the lighting programmer, I don’t always get the option to choose the artist I want to work with, but I listen for and try to find parts of an artist’s songs that I can break down and figure out where their head is at, and how to bring that out into a visual statement. Some of the stuff that surprised me, working in the rap world a lot, more rappers have decided to incorporate a live band, which is huge. If it was just a DJ and the rapper onstage, I would probably shoot myself! But having a live band on stage and being able to interact with the guitarist or the drummer, you can do some of the rock ‘n’ roll elements that can be more theatrical versus just flash and trash stuff. That’s a lot of fun. I’ve also been fortunate to work with a few people that do more pop music type artists, and it’s been fun to explore that realm because we can go a little more bold and crazy and explore some colors that I wouldn’t necessarily put into a rap show.
Can you give us a few names?
Nikki Minaj, who bridges that rap world a little bit. But she definitely wanted (the color) pink because she’s very much a pop music artist. Recently I was fortunate to work with Roy Bennett on a Katy Perry show at the Hollywood Bowl, and then I programmed video for Lady Gaga’s Monster Ball tour in 2009 with Willie Williams and Ethan Weber. That was cool to see how a pop artist could go into a darker and more dimensional direction, especially coming off of the typical “pop star” type of look. And then last year I got to work with the rock band Phoenix, with Tobias Rylander who is the lighting designer and production designer.
Do you get to choose your console, and if so, what console would that be?
For the last five or six years, I’ve stayed in the MA family; I haven’t ventured out past that and it’s kept me very much employed. I really like the development, and I like the support. I like the user interface; it conforms to the way I think. I’ve stuck with grandMA and I don’t really touch any other consoles anymore.
Do you have favorite lighting fixtures?
Some of my favorite lighting fixtures still have to be the VL3000 spot and VL3500 washes. Currently out there I think the MagicPanel 602 has a lot of potential in what it can do; we just roughly scratched the surface on it this summer and this fall (on Electric Zoo). I would like to see it being used more in less “showy” or less obvious ways then the typical “in your face” ways. I mean, we’ve already seen that it can spin and do all those types of things, but what else can it do? I think that’s what good products can do; you can use it one way, but then you can start breaking it down and figuring out how to put it into little nooks and crannies and making it into something else that make people ask “what was that light?” Then when you say it was a MagicPanel, they react “you’ve got to be kidding me, I had no idea it could do that.” But, even though there are a lot of new tools out there right now, I don’t think as a designer and a programmer that I need to be influenced by what’s latest and greatest. Instead, I need to be influenced on what I know it can do, and how I can push it to the next level just like I push myself to reach higher levels. I have to continue to see what’s already out there because I like to spec products that I know are accessible world-wide, like the VL3000. Fixtures like these are easier to find now, and I know what they can do. The Sharpy is another fixture that’s become very popular, and I love it, but we’ve also explored it a couple of times, asking “what else can we do with it.” We used the original Sharpy (Profile/Spot) as side light on a taping of Q’ Viva. Jon Goldstein, the LD for the show, added large banks of them on side torms, stage right and stage left, and we used them to wash the stage with a prism and a frost; we also threw in a Congo on either side and it punched like nothing I’d ever seen. We were able to get some really cool deep Congo coming from either side and then hitting it with amber backlight or with something cool in the front. And we were able to break up the stage with this really big strong punch look out of something like 12-14 Sharpys per side. It was one of those things where we knew obviously that the Sharpy could go out and do all the really cool sharp beams in the air looks, but we said “let’s just try this and let’s swing them around.” Even though we had other fixtures doing that purpose already, we decided to take those fixtures out and focus them out in the house in order to do something different for a look. By taking the other lights that were not originally intended for that we were able to cheat our way into another look that was kind of cool. Those are happy fun accidents, and you try to set yourself up for a little bit of experimenting per show at the very least.
How did you get started in lighting and programming?
I started learning about lighting when I was young, when, back in the fourth grade, I was introduced to strobe lights, and from there I just continued on. Later, I researched a bunch of lighting companies in my hometown of Fresno, CA, and eventually met Ben Holley, the owner of Lighting Resources. He could have kicked me out of his office; I was dropped off by my parents many times to just go hang out and see what else he had in there! But he kept me around, and I worked for him for many years until I eventually moved out and went to college in L.A. at Cal Arts. While there I met a lot of great people, and eventually contacted the Alumni Association because every year they have people that come in and look at your work and see what you’ve done and what you want to do. I was introduced by one of the teachers there, Dan Boland, who is the Emmy Award winning Lighting Director on The Voice, but at the time he was between projects. The teacher that introduced us said “this guy right here wants to do rock and roll type of productions. He does not want to go into theatre, not that he doesn’t like it, but this is his passion.” So we linked up and I started helping him out on any show I could and I definitely expressed my eagerness as well as my trepidation of going into that world of “this is where the big boys play” and “am I ready for this” so he slowly gave me opportunities in small doses. Every single time was like jumping into the deep end, but you learn how to swim and you build up a little bit, and you go again and again until eventually you are well on your own and you feel more confident in taking on shows outside of his world as well. He introduced me to a bunch of different people, and for that I owe him a lot; he’s the one who really pushed me into the right direction. He’s a mentor, no doubt.
Do you program and go on the road with the show or do you primarily program the show, then hand over the reins to someone else to take on the road?
Previously it was program and go out on the road, and I ‘ve done that for a while. But while that is fun, with my current business (Shimamoto owns Volt Lites, a lighting rental company in L.A.) right now we have driven right into rental and design and a lot of programming, so my direction now is just to go out to program shows, get them up and running, and make sure everyone has what they need. Either I’m designing it or programming it or both, and supplying equipment now as well. But the show is usually handed off to other people that would like to take a show out for the next year and see the world, and be able to grow with it. What we start with, I don’t expect any show to stay exactly where we left it because that means that the artist has maybe “checked out” and it would have to be pretty boring for them. So it’s got to be exciting for them to add another song or maybe another note or maybe they changed a part of the song to electronic and now it’s kind of cool to have it that way. Like back in November 2013 when I went to check up on Drake and Guy Pavelo, the lighting designer for Drake, who I helped with programming for the show even though he’s a proficient programmer as well. I got to see a huge jump from where we were when I left it after the first show in Pittsburgh to where it is was after about a month later. It had evolved, and it’s cool to see things evolve and get more polished, and fine tuned.
Earlier this year you worked on a few large festivals (iHeart Radio, Electric Zoo). Working with an unfamiliar rig for a one-off can be very challenging. How do you deal with those challenges?
Festivals can be difficult now, because there are a ton of them, and they are all kind of back-to-back. I mean, once you get on the festival circuit it’s pretty much non-stop. And part of the job of the onsite designers at these festivals is to make it larger and grander than last year’s festival, and more unique. And it’s competitive, and everyone is trying to show off a little bit more, so as a lighting director or designer going into a festival, you have to get really creative, and you have to know how to break your rig down that you had on your touring show and break it down pretty quickly and adapt it to something that may be bigger or smaller. That leads back to doing your homework and putting in a lot of time organizing yourself. It’s important to make sure that all of your ducks are in a row so that when you get to a festival you can slice your rig in half and know exactly which fixtures are going to be needed to get that effect; that is so important on your touring show. And then I’ve also been on the other end of it while working as Associate LD with Jon Goldstein on Electric Zoo, where we’re coming up with the overall visual element of the show but inviting numerous artists to come in and play on each one of these stages. Taking some of the knowledge that I’ve had as the guy coming in to somebody else’s world, we tried to make it as comfortable as possible by asking and encouraging the designers to submit their designs, so we can see what’s in their packages. Once we get that information, then can break down all the fixture types and categorize them and then try to find happy mediums and pair them up with certain fixtures. There’s a little give and , though, because we can’t hang every single artist’s lighting rig up there, but we at least give them their floor package, whatever it is, even if we have to find random fixtures that are 2000 miles away to get those fixtures. That way there is little bit of home onstage and they at least have part of their show there that’s unique from the artist before. We also know the guys don’t have a lot of time to get their rigs dialed in; they’re coming in at odd hours of the day or night, so we have set up a pre-viz suite for them to go in and at least make sure that their patch and the general fixture layouts and positions are playing right, or at least close. This also allows them a way to actually see what it’s going to look like, and then when they are in front of the rig, they can use that time more for updating and fine-tuning versus broad strokes of flipping lights, patching, and doing things that are mundane and time consuming when it’s on a large scale.
How important to the programmer do you think pre-viz is now?
From a programmer’s standpoint, it’s about making sure that you have all your palettes and presets built ahead of time. With Pre-Viz, I can sit there and look at everything and break it down and update palettes. I’ve got a show file that I pretty much use for everything, and I just go back and update or replace certain elements of it. But I can program full songs knowing how things interact, knowing that certain Pre-Viz programs can mislead you a little bit in terms of what a fixture could look like, so being able to know that when you go to a certain color with that light you aren’t going to get as much punch out of it (in real life) because of whatever limitations that it has. So be honest and realistic with yourself and ask yourself like “can that fixture really do that?” or “am I really going to get that type of look?” or “if I use that type of super-fine breakup gobo over top of a lot of wash onstage, are we going to see it? Will it read? Am I wasting my time?” I mean you can start programming, and you can make a really good looking 3D visualizer show by itself, but it doesn’t always translate to the stage. When that happens it usually means spending time going back and re-updating things like gobos onsite. So pre-viz helps you a lot, but at the same time you have to make sure that you don’t get too lost in that world. Since I came to understand this, it’s been easier for me to be more real on what it can and can’t do. And from a design standpoint, you can do proof of concept right then and there using Pre Viz. You can see if this is actually going to give you the look of the design choice you are trying to get, you can see how it’s going to play. And now, pre-viz developers incorporate a lot more elements into it like automation, and you can program this whole show, export a video, and send it to multiple parties, including the client, or to the automation guys with notes like “these are ideas for positions I am looking at using, this is the speed I’m looking for on this song, is this possible and can we do it?” That way, maybe they can get a jump start on their work ahead of time so that when we get together, it’s exciting and we get to see everything that we’ve all been working on individually and how it starts coming together.
I bet you know a lot of manufacturers personally, and I’m sure they value your feedback tremendously.
Yeah, I’m pretty vocal and now that we’ve started our rental division, so that’s become even more important. I look at things differently now — I look at things under a magnifying glass even more than I did before. I’m looking at things like what can the fixture do visually — can it give me the look that I want; and can it hold up over time; is this going to be a one trick pony; is it going to last two summers before it’s just going to be gone. I’m pretty vocal about where I want to see products go, and I give off ideas, and see if they can run with that, if they can go to their team and see what they can do. I never look at it as a complaint but more as an expectation for the future. So when we buy gear, I want to make sure that it has full support from the manufacturer and that they won’t ignore our feedback. There is nothing better than having someone say, “We listen to you; here’s a solution for you, and we think everyone else is going to like it too.”
Tell us more about your company, Volt Lites. How big is the company and what is your primary focus of the company?
The start of Volt was a foundation for growth in numerous areas. I wanted to explore design within a branded name, because just me by myself as “Matt Shimamoto Lighting Design,” well, I wanted to see it grow as a brand further than that. My love for design transcends from the stage to how things are packaged. I like marketing, I like doing system design stuff, integration, new product stuff, basically anything that has to do with specialized knick knacks and products. I love stuff like that. I’m a huge road case nut. I have a beautiful designed road case where everything has a place, and it eliminates errors and questions from anyone who has never used those type of products.. it shows them “that goes right there” because it is labeled… it has a home and it looks like it has a custom fit for that. Being a designer, I expect a level of quality coming from a rental shop, so we want to put out great products. If we put out a great looking product, then it’s going to show; I don’t have to go out there and tell you that it’s a good product, it should speak for itself. So we’re building off of that philosophy, and the three years we have been in business have been great. We strive to give every show the highest level of prep so that every show has the same level of quality.
Where do you see yourself in five years, 10 years?
I think in the next five years we’ll be continuing on this path. Hopefully, too, it will have opened the door for us to do even more projects and bring more people in, and work with manufacturers, and collaborate with other designers. We want to expand on our inventory, and we want to expand on what we can do in terms of custom solutions. We also want to explore more of the designer/programmer roles. We want to be able to pair the right people with the right shows. It’s kind of “boutique-like” in that way, but we’re happy with that. And while I’m not against the idea of having multiple offices in multiple locations, for now I’m very happy with one office in one location in the Southern California market. The most important things to me are our relationships with our clients.
Any additional thoughts?
I think the next wave of programmers, designers and directors, will be people from other visual design type fields who can come up with something that’s more “out of the box.” Someone that maybe just came out of an arts school who is an incredible artist in his own right in his own way may be able to come up with a solution that we all may think “that’s crazy! How could you think about doing it that way because…” and they reply, “ well yeah, but that’s why it’s cool, because it was not meant for that.” And his idea may seem completely crazy, but when the house lights go out and you turn it on and you say “wow, I would never have gone that far out there because I’ve always been afraid.” I just think that there’s going to be huge collaboration between seasoned lighting directors, designers, programmers and people coming from other design fields with different perspectives within even the next five years.
We already are seeing this happening more and more with the integration of video and LEDs into scenic elements.
Right, we are very close. We push ourselves into video world now, where we’re getting into animation. We’ve gotten very close to the guys that are making movies for companies like Pixar, for instance. That world has gotten very close so people have now started to come into our world from the Pixar world, than us going into theirs, because you know, I don’t know how to do anything in animation like that but I think that as we push up into technology we have reached into different industries in entertainment that you are going to see more overlap between the worlds more and more and it’s going to be pretty wild. But that’s only going to make everyone push and work harder to produce something that’s new and fresh.
More details on Matt Shimamoto and Volt Lites can be found at voltlites.com.
