The smallest pair in the Jands Vista lighting and media control range won the award for ‘Best Moving Light Console – Small Format’ at the 2011 WFX expo in Dallas, Texas, USA.

The portable and compact Vista M1 and Vista S1 shared the spotlight, together with the second generation of software for the range – Vista v2 – which was launched earlier in the year.

The Awards are an integral element of the high profile annual WFX show, and are designed to honor the most innovative products available. The winners are selected by a panel of industry experts.

This is not the first time that the Jands Vista family has received one of the prestigious awards from WFX, in the past being honored not only with ‘Best Automated Lighting Controller’ but also ‘Best Overall Lighting Product’.

The 2011 WFX Award was collected on behalf of Jands by VP of sales and marketing at North American distributor A.C. Lighting Inc, Fred Mikeska. On accepting the award Fred commented “The team at Jands is really in tune with the market, they listen carefully to all of the input and feedback they receive from our extensive list of users. The Vista range is a great example of a company listening closely to its user base, then delivering a product that meets their needs. Vista v2 gives users of all levels the tools to deliver great looking events quickly and easily without having to resort to hours of complicated programming. A.C. Lighting Inc. is honored to receive the WFX Award on behalf of Jands.”

The Jands Vista control system has been enthusiastically adopted by many users, where its combination of simple, fast and flexible access with the power of controlling fine detail has made it a winner with users looking to deliver great looking shows quickly and efficiently.

Vista v2 was designed from the ground up to allow all levels of user to get the most from whatever mix of technology they have available, whether dimmers, moving lights, LED or media.

Vista continues to make a big impact worldwide with recent tours and shows including Third Day, Sara Bareilles, Adele, Pulp, The ‘Year of the Forest’ WWF Fund, Vienne Jazz Festival and Finland’s European Capital of Culture Opening Ceremony.

Lighting designer and long-time Jands Vista advocate, Rob Sinclair specified a Vista S1 console with two M1 wings to run lighting for Grammy Award-winning UK singer-songwriter Adele’s recent 2011 international tour.

The system ran Jands’ next generation Vista v2 software, and on some sections of the tour operating duties were taken on by John Barker while Rob fulfilled other design commitments on his busy schedule – including tours by Peter Gabriel and Goldfrapp also utilising Vista systems.

Rob’s classy, innovative design for Adele was sculpted using entirely white light, a bold aesthetic move which has won considerable acclaim. None of the moving lights were seen to move, there was minimal flashing, and was a real case of subtlety and suggestion to augment Adele’s powerful performance and natural stage presence.
There was a distinctive back wall of 96 cone-shaped lampshades each illuminated from behind with a 60 Watt incandescent household light bulb – all individually dimmed. These had been dipped in a special rubber solution treatment to make them break-resistant.

The Matrix facilities on the Vista S1 – one of the many tools added with the Vista v2 upgrade – made mapping and programming this unique arrangement of lights extremely easy.

The lighting rig echoed the simplicity of the show’s concept. Rigged across three overhead trusses were seven Robe ColorSpot 2500E AT moving lights and 20 ETC Source Four profiles, and on the deck were 16 Martin Professional MAC 2K Washes, all supplied by Neg Earth Lights.

Commenting on the Vista v2 software, Rob says, “I really like it. It is very solid and a marked step forward from V1. It feels almost as if the console directly connects my brain to the lights”.

In addition to Rob’s Vista systems being used on Adele, Pulp, Peter Gabriel and Goldfrapp tours throughout 2011, one has also just gone out on Will Young’s latest UK tour, operated by Jason Hynde.

The next generation Vista v2 software was designed from the ground up to allow all levels of user get the most from whatever mix of technology they have available, whether dimmers, moving lights, LED, or media. Available in a wide range of hardware Vista v2 offers both the simplicity to work fast, with the power to control the finest details, so everyone can focus on creating a great looking show rather than on programming a desk.

Jands Europe’s Neil Vann commented, “Rob’s designs are always interesting, fantastic looking and very precise. Vista v2 offers the perfect balance to get the detailed control he demands, with the simplicity to get the most from the tight timeframes that today’s productions have to work to. If you haven’t taken a look at Vista v2 for yourself yet, take the chance to see just how much you could be getting from your time……”

Gallery

Photo courtesy of Rob Sinclair - click to open

Adele’s recent concert at the Royal Albert Hall was filmed for an upcoming DVD and LD Rob Sinclair laid in some extra control for the night. Pictured from left to right:

>> Vista T4, running all audience lighting
>> M1 running group masters as inhibits for the film lighting
>> M1 attached to the T4 putting keylights within easy reach
>> Rob’s own S1 and 2 M1s to run the regular show lighting

Following her sold out tour in April and the success of her second album ’21′ Adele is currently playing more shows across the UK.

She has now become the first solo female to score eleven consecutive weeks at the top of the UK album chart, as well as being the first female artist to have two records and two singles in the UK top five at one time.

The renowned Gypsy Kings – credited with helping to bring the distinct sound and style of Rumba Catalana pop music to worldwide audiences – have just finished their latest US tour, with lighting designer Michael Sharon using his own Jands Vista I3 console for control.

Michael, based on the U.S. West Coast, is an independent lighting designer with a wide variety of clients. In addition to four years of designing for the Gypsy Kings, he has also designed a wide range of corporate shows for many different clients.

He first used a Jands Vista, on this occasion a T2, when he originally started working for the Gypsy Kings. This was provided by the lighting contractor at the time, PSI Production Services in Denver. He completely “fell in love” with the console and decided to purchase his own Vista I3 from Jands US distributor A.C. Lighting Inc. so that he never had to go back to using another type of console. He has not looked back since!

To cope with the everyday demands of touring, Vista’s powerful generic fixture model provides quick, straightforward and accurate fixture swapping to adapt Michael’s show to fit whatever type of lights he is faced with. This proves a perfect solution when the tour picks up local production, as opposed to using their own lighting rig, and ensures that he always has his show running on his console of choice.

The last Gypsy Kings tour lasted nearly four weeks, and they generally do about three 4-week US tours a year. Originating from France with a Spanish Romani heritage, they sing in a unique Spanish/French ‘Calo’ argot and are hugely popular among world music fans. The venues on the last tour were a mix of sheds and theatres, with capacities of around 3,000.

A typical local lighting rig, on which Michael would run his show from his Vista I3, would contain around 120 PARs and between 10 and 25 moving lights of different types. This would often be supplemented by a “specials package”. At the iconic Radio City in New York, he used Chroma-Q™ Color Force™ 72 RGBA LED battens to highlight some soft goods hired in for the show, and again at the Filene Centre in Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts, Washington DC, to up-light custom scenic columns.

“I love the way a single fixture can illuminate a 30 foot high surface, with a great color range and still have plenty of punch…” he comments on the Chroma-Q Color Force fixtures, a brand also distributed by A.C Lighting Inc. “..and the Vista really lets me get the most from them.”

As well as offering him a fantastic console for touring, he comments that for corporate events and other shows where time is short, the Vista’s next generation timeline is “Fantastic”, which he expands saying, “When working on complex timelines, I can use the timeline, to easily see and make precise adjustments to individual parameters.”

While great for tightly cued shows, Michael also finds the console ultimately buskable with the ability to configure the interface to the user’s exact requirements. He loves being able to have instant access to everything. “For busking, I have more options than just calling up presets on the fly. Using Extracts, I can trigger complex movements, effects, and routines which make for a visually richer show.”

Coming from a theatre background, he comments that the visuality of the Vista interface is amazing for making the most of his time “You can see graphic representations of elements like gobos in the different lights rather than just looking at a load of numbers – it’s so much easier to work offline.”

Michael is hugely impressed with the backup and service he receives from Jands US distributor, A.C. Lighting Inc. He concludes, “Overall, AC Lighting’s technical support is absolutely brilliant.”

Michael’s Vista is already lined up for the 2011 Oracle OpenWorld conference at the Moscone Convention Centre in San Francisco, highlighting the Oracle Racing team – winners of the 2010 America’s Cup World Series Regatta in Valencia, Spain. He will be making the most of the Vista’s flexibility by using a laptop running the Vista software to control a trade show booth in one part of the convention, while his I3 will be running the lighting rig for a press conference and presentation area in another.

The next generation Vista v2 software was designed from the ground up to allow all levels of user get the most from whatever mix of technology they have available, whether dimmers, moving lights, LED, or media. Available in a wide range of hardware Vista v2 offers both the simplicity to work fast, with the power to control the finest details, so everyone can focus on creating a great looking show rather than on programming a desk.

Fred Mikeska, VP of sales and marketing at AC Lighting Inc comments “Michael is just one example of a designer who took a look at the Jands Vista, and has never looked back. The Vista, and the next generation Vista v2 software, really does offer the perfect balance between the power to control your show accurately, with the simplicity to work fast. If you haven’t seen Vista v2 yet, you really should take a look and see what you are missing out on……”

Vivid Sydney is a festival of light, music and ideas that includes large-scale light installations and projections through to music performances and the holding of conferences and seminars on ideas and creativity. First held in 2009, Vivid Sydney has become Sydney’s major winter festival which lights up different parts of the city after 6pm, including the Sydney Opera House, Circular Quay and The Rocks.

From light “graffiti” on the Museum of Contemporary Art to live fire shows, more than 200,000 visitors experienced the festival this year.

One of the most popular of the light sculptures that were part of the Festival was Immersion designed by Martin Bevz and Kathryn Clifton. Consisting of LED tubes in a semi-circle, the sculpture invited the viewer to ‘play’ with them by reflecting their movement through the installation via a live video relay of still and dynamic images. The tubes are pixel mapped to form what is essentially a very low-res 18 x 2m video screen.

Martin used the Jands Vista M1 to control the Catalyst media server for a number of reasons including its size.

“Not requiring a full sized console to fit in a 12RU rack for three weeks – three very wet weeks – was a major plus!” he said. “Also, having physical faders allowed for easy programming and playback testing. The Jands Vista M1 works on a Mac alongside the Catalyst software and that reduces hardware requirements. I really like the visual timeline based playback and the easy to use date/time events so an operator was not required to power up and down each day.”

Martin further commented that the Vista was rock solid throughout the duration of the festival and consequently it’s the console that he would always prefer for any semi permanent installations.

“It’s visual, easy to use and Jands have a great support network,” he added. “As a final touch to the installation we programmed a start up sequence featuring a countdown timer and static which slotted in with the rest of the programming. It’s important to be able to work visually with media servers as they are inherently visual instruments – you need to be able to ‘see’ what the desk is telling the server in order to enable seamless crossfades and visual effects.”

Unfortunately Martin does not have any photographs of the rack as his phone didn’t survive the rain as well as the Vista did!

Geelong-based Total Events provided lighting, staging, transport, rigging and AV requirements for the festival across six venues. 2011 was the 35th year of Port Fairy Folk Festival and Total Events managing director Scott Parker has provided various levels of production to the event for over fifteen years.

Lighting consisting of approximately one hundred LED fixtures, fifty moving head fixtures and a hundred dimmer channels plus operators, was supplied for four of the venues which were all controlled by Jands Vista with combinations of I3, S3, S1 and M1 consoles.

“Having the same control platform across all venues meant easy transitions for relief operators who had to fill in on all four venues,” commented Scott. “It also meant easy file management for creating and distributing show files and backups. Use of Vista meant controlling the different types and brands of fixtures was simple.”

According to Scott, all systems performed flawlessly over the seven days onsite, with temperatures and conditions fluctuating significantly, as often happens in seaside towns.

“We’ve been a long time user of Vista and when it came to a choice of console to put into every venue, there was no discussion to be held,” stated Scott. “Operators that were new to Vista had no issues becoming comfortable within a few hours of programming, resulting in lightshows that were always fitting to the diverse range of music presented at the festival.”

All dimming was Jands, using HP and the new HPC ‘Air Gap’ dimmers running in both dimmer and 240v distribution modes for the moving lights.

“The HPC dimmers are new to our hire stock but will soon be the only dimmer and 240v distribution we stock due to their versatility,” added Scott.

Indiana based Grace Community Church has invested in a range of Vista lighting control solutions as part of a multi-million dollar expansion of its worship facilities. Models purchased include the full-size Vista T2, the portable Vista S1 and the playback-only Vista M1 consoles. This is to expand the church’s capacity to three weekend worship auditoriums, to accommodate as many as 6,000 churchgoers on a typical weekend.

The Church relies on a team of over 100 volunteers to assist the paid production staff during services, which can run simultaneously in up to three auditoriums. Senior Director of Production, Daryl Cripe, therefore felt it was essential to invest in a lighting console that the inexperienced volunteers could easily understand.

He commented: “For our Church’s philosophy, I had equal desire for functionality and ease of use in our choice of lighting console. Instead of being like a typical theater or concert, where a single person is responsible for all lighting, we are passionate about allowing volunteers, all of whom have no previous lighting experience, to be trained on and operate our theatrical lighting system. As such, yes, we need a lot of features and stability, yet we also need a console that is visual, easy to train on.”

Daryl and his production team utilized or tested various consoles, yet nothing they tried in their opinion compared to the Vista in terms of ease of use. He commented:

“From our volunteer’s perspective, the Vista is VISUAL. They can look at a screen and see what they are doing. It feels very familiar to navigate, so they can use their existing computer knowledge. We can configure the Vista screen to look like our lighting layout in the room. The ease of creating groups, presets, cues etc. is all so simple. In addition, patching fixtures in Vista is incredibly simple. I recently showed the Technical Director at another Church our T2 console and when I showed him how to patch an automated fixture, his mouth dropped open!”

Whereas most traditional full-scale lighting desks rely on number-crunching to program shows, the Vista utilizes a graphic based interface. As a result, users can work visually and get on with designing better shows, rather than getting distracted by the actual programming process itself. It makes programming extremely fast and getting to grips with the console a relatively short learning curve.

The lighting console’s ease of use would mean absolutely nothing if it wasn’t up to the job of controlling the state-of-the-art lighting system in the Church’s main auditorium; the centrepiece of their expansion program. Featuring a large 80ft by 40ft stage and seating in a 270° configuration, the Church uses high production values to emphasize the themes of its services via an eclectic mix of music, drama and video. The venue’s extensive lighting rig includes over 850 LED, moving and conventional fixtures controlled using six universes of DMX and over 2,700 DMX channels.

Daryl was looking to bring his creative vision for the services to life using the rig’s many cutting-edge LED fixtures; to literally paint the whole room with light. A full-size Linux-based Vista T2 console provides seamless automation of the auditorium’s lighting rig and blackout window shutters. LED fixtures provide color changing wall uplighting either side of the stage area, while a mixture of moving lights, PARs, ParNels and conventional fixtures provide theatrical performance lighting for music and drama during the services.

In addition, smaller 1,100-seater and 400-seater auditoriums are controlled using the Vista S1 and M1 PC based consoles. The two control surfaces are designed to be used with either a Windows PC or native Mac laptop and DMX channel dongle package, providing portable and affordable Vista solutions.

The ability for volunteers to be able to switch easily between consoles in all three auditoriums was another key factor in Daryl’s decision to choose the Vista. All models share exactly the same visual interface and controls, making a transition between models seamless.

Daryl commented: “Frankly, I cannot overstate how important this consistency is. Going back to the reality of utilizing volunteers, of DESIRING to use volunteers, the ability for those volunteers trained on the T2 to walk into a room with Vista PC and S1 / M1 and sit down and get to work creating… that is extremely valuable! In addition, if someone was trained on Vista PC, it’s not difficult for them to then utilize the T2. Also, we have had volunteers take Vista PC home, to experiment with it on their own. Again, it’s a great value to our philosophy and a great opportunity for our volunteers!”

Another labour-saving feature of the Vista, its innovative timeline editing function, is proving invaluable to helping the volunteers understand how to program a show. The timeline gives users the complete picture of their lighting events, making it easy to make sense of complex changes and put the finishing touches to their show.

The Vista’s intuitive interface is proving popular with leading US houses of worship. When launched, the product was voted ‘Best Automated Lighting Controller’ and ‘Best Overall Lighting Product’ by an expert panel of judges at the 2006 WFX Show New Product Awards in Dallas, due to its suitability to the industry’s unique production environment.

Grace Community Church Senior Director of Production, Daryl Cripe, commented: “While a few ‘big name consoles’ often get most noticed in the touring world, the reality is that nothing I have seen compares to the combination of functionality and ease of use that the Vista series provides. We still need a robust console based on our lighting rig, but it is critical that it is easily trainable to volunteers. These consoles allow us to push our creativity and ultimately, our volunteers have the joy of combining creativity and support of our services. We want them to be spending their time having fun programming, not trying to figure out some complex function on the console itself. ANY church that desires to use theatrical lighting and wants to provide volunteers the opportunities to create should be examining this series of consoles. We love our Vistas.”

Feature photo – the Grace Community Church lighting team. Courtesy of ©Kris Rinas

Finnish professional systems integrator, Electrosonic Lightinen Oy Ab, has supplied Jands Vistas to the Levi Summit venue in Lapland. Multi-purpose facilities, hi-tech equipment and an auditorium large enough to stage world-class performances and major product launches make the Levi Summit a first class venue for diverse events.

When tasked with providing the best lighting control system available for the main auditorium, Electrosonic specified a Jands Vista T4 as the main console and Vista PC with M1 playback hardware as a secondary console. The Vistas can be remotely controlled via the building’s AMX system, enabling seamless automation of the auditorium’s lighting and AV systems. A rack of Jands FPX units, which were specified due to their high quality, reliability, and excellent price, provides the lighting rig’s dimming.

Distributor A.C. Entertainment Technologies Ltd. (formerly known as A.C. Lighting Ltd.), has supplied a Jands Vista to The Grand in Clitheroe, UK. The former cinema has been completely revamped as a multi-million pound live music venue, studio and AV installation with the ability to record performances in HD audio and video.

With the venue used for many different events, each with their own technical requirements, A.C. Entertainment Technologies Ltd. was contracted by audio installation specialist Wigwam to provide a system featuring lighting, rigging, and a substantial electrical and network infrastructure, which offered the venue total flexibility. Central to the system is a Jands Vista T2 console, which controls various LED, moving light and conventional fixtures.

Norwegian lighting company, Live Technic, has supplied a Jands Vista I3 to PA Compagniet AS, main production equipment contractor for the new Spot nightclub in Kristiansand, Norway. One of the country’s most technically advanced and sophisticated nightclubs, Spot features two levels split into numerous ‘mood’ zones, each with its own live stage.

Live Technic specified the Vista due to its stability, fast programming and flexibility for the club’s hectic environment. The user-friendly visual interface meant Spot’s inexperienced lighting operators, the house DJs, were instantly comfortable with the console. A Vista I3 controls the main dancefloor and adjacent stage lighting, including a pair of Robe’s new DigitalSpot 3000 DT, the first combined digital moving light projector and LED-based wash light.

Featuring an intuitive visual interface, innovative timeline editing function and generic fixture model, the Vista is both fast and simple to use. The console’s graphic-based interface will be immediately familiar to anyone who’s ever used a modern computer application, whilst the introduction of programming via a ‘timeline’ gives you the complete picture and total control of your lighting events. The generic fixture model allows you to treat all fixtures in the same way and takes the hassle out of changing fixtures, adapting automatically if you have to run the same show with a different rig.

The Vista M1 – a console in your back pocket.

The Vista M1 is an ultra-compact and extremely cost-effective playback-only Vista control surface. The M1 is ideal for situations where you can do your programming in advance on your PC, but you still want hardware to control the playback of your show.

Designed to be used with a laptop, the M1 gives you all the playback benefits of a Vista show in a compact and portable package that’s perfect for trade show booths, hotels, clubs or any venue where space is tight.

With five playbacks including faders and flash buttons, plus a rotary master fader, the M1 is a complete and portable Vista playback module. When you want to travel light but you don’t want to compromise your show, the M1 is the ideal live playback solution.

M1 Product page

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Excerpt
With Heartland’s track record of “changing things up,” the auditorium’s lighting configuration both reflects and enables their innovative style. A favorite among Heartland’s technical team is Jands’ Vista lighting console platform. According to Hayes, a huge advantage is the console’s operating environment, designed around a timeline concept as found in a video editing system, making it more volunteer friendly. “The ability to cross train volunteers to all three levels of lighting boards (a different model of the Vista console is installed in each of HCC’s three venues) sold us on Jands