LC Series™ for Schaufuss Ballet’s “Michael – I’m Bad”

The Peter Schaufuss Ballet, based in Holstebro, Denmark is one of Scandinavia’s premiere ballet companies, a top-class touring troupe that was established in 1997 by renowned ballet dancer, choreographer and director Peter Schaufuss. The company tours nationally and internationally with new productions staged every year.

For their latest production, “Michael – I’m Bad,” a dance biography set to the original music of Michael Jackson that highlights the notable moments in the singer’s life, lighting and video designer Bo Kudsk Kristensen had the opportunity to incorporate a video element into the show and chose as the canopy a back wall of Martin LC Series™ LED panels.

Video dimension
Bo, Technical Manager and Chief of Lighting at Schaufuss who has handled lighting design for the Ballet since 2005, traditionally had a large conventional lighting rig at his disposal. But in 2007 he added a Martin automated lighting package consisting of MAC 2000 Performance™ and MAC 2000 Wash™ fixtures. He welcomed the opportunity to couple the LC Series panels with the moving heads and looked forward to the challenge of “getting to know the new dimension of video” he says.

“For ‘Bad’ we were looking for more of a living set and thought about projectors,” Bo explains, “but then Martin came out with these great LED panels, which are very bright and easy to work with.”

LC advantage
The LC Series is a semi-transparent, modular system of LED panels, perfect for displaying video and images. It closely integrates light, video and design, a feature exemplified perfectly in “Bad.” It is extremely bright as a video source and with a 40 mm pixel pitch, offers excellent resolution without compromising on its light weight and transparency.

“The LC panels are very light weight which makes them easy to rig, but if that’s not possible in the small theatres that we play in, they can stand on the floor,” Bo says.

LC panels can be stacked or hung several units high and as wide as necessary. With standard Prolyte CCS6 conical truss connectors, linking the lightweight units together is simple and strong. With no external power supplies or drivers, each unit comes with everything it needs built in, which reduces logistical costs and set-up time.

Synergy
“Another reason why we chose the LC panels was because we already work with Martin lights,” Bo states, alluding to the Ballet’s relationship with Martin Scandinavia as well as the complementary nature of the Martin gear. The Martin LC Series panels, like the rest of the Schaufuss Ballet’s Martin gear, were supplied locally by Martin Scandinavia.

For “Bad,” twenty-four LC 1140 panels (1 m x 1 m) are positioned along a back wall and run custom graphics from a Martin Maxedia PRO media server, including graphical elements the Ballet made themselves.
Bo acknowledges the staff of the Peter Schaufuss Ballet as well as the dancers “who work so hard so that we can play with our great gear,” he concludes.

“Michael – I’m Bad” is described as a musical for the whole family, a moving display of dance, music, and light. It continues to play in theatres across the country.

Lighting equipment:
24 x Martin LC Series 1140
1 x Martin Maxedia PRO
17 x Martin MAC 2000 Performance
16 x Martin MAC 2000 Wash