The Spectra Cyc
One of the company’s first and most popular LED fixtures was the Spectra Cyc, now called the Spectra Cyc 100. It is a 100W cyc wash fixture that uses red, green, blue and amber LEDs. Recently, Altman introduced a new fixture to the series, the Spectra Cyc 200. Think of the 200 version as two 100s joined together, with two arrays of Philips Luxeon Rebel LEDs.
The Spectra Cyc 200 builds on the technologies incorporated into the Spectra Cyc 100, including Altman’s LED blending lens and its reflector design. Similar to Altman’s tungsten-based cyc fixture, the Focusing Cyc, the Spectra Cyc series uses an asymmetrical reflector. The reflector is computer-designed for a smooth and even distribution of light.
Before the LEDs bounce off the reflector, the light passes through the specially-designed lens and filter. They help blend the separate LED sources and reduce the sometimes-annoying visibility of the separate RGBA light sources when the fixture is viewed directly. With the combined effects of the reflector design and the blending lens, no additional lens on the front of the fixture are required.
The Spectra Cyc 100 works best with fixtures placed apart on four foot centers. That allows for the soft and broad light to blend evenly between fixtures. With the new Spectra Cyc 200, fixtures are designed to be used on 10- to 12-foot centers to achieve the same balance and blending, at four feet off the cyc or wall being washed with light.
The Spectra Cyc 200 makes available both yoke and ground support hardware for specific applications. You could also use both at the same time for top and bottom coverage — but the company says that usable height of the output light has been measured at a about 35 feet, so those instances might be pretty rare. A fold-down handle is built into the top for easy transport.
Power, DMX and Control
The Spectra Cyc 200 features power pass-through, letting users daisy-chain multiple fixtures off one circuit using PowerCon connectors. Since the fixture consumes less than 300W, it is easy to power your entire ground row off a single 20-amp circuit. When you compare that to using multiple 3-cell 1000W fixtures, you can see how the energy savings can multiply. Each fixture features an on-board multi-voltage power supply that autosenses between 100V and 240V.
With spacing between fixtures growing from four to as much as 12 feet, other advantages become evident. Using just four fixtures, you could color-wash 48 linear feet of wall space with four daisy-chained fixtures, all using one 20 amp circuit.
The Altman Spectra Cyc 200 also features your typical DMX in and pass through with RDM built in. Users can set the fixture to standalone or DMX control by using the three push buttons on the rear of the fixture to configure the device. The Spectra Cyc series features a Master and Slave mode for synchronized control of multiple units without a controller.
For additional information about Altman Lighting’s Spectra Cyc 100 and 200, go to the
company’s website, www.altmanlighting.com.
