As fans eagerly await the release date of a new album, Radiohead has begun debuting some of its new material on a European and North American tour. The tour also marks the debut outing for Martin's Mac 700 Wash.
Andi Watson, who helped beta-test the Mac 2000 Wash on a number of Radiohead's European shows in 2002, and subsequently used the luminaire on the band's Hail to the Thief tour, has real-world tested the Mac 700 Wash on this latest Radiohead tour. "I am incredibly impressed with the Mac 700 Wash," he says. "They are very complementary units to the existing 2K range. For their size the power consumption is quite low, the colours are wonderful and also the reliability of the units is fantastic. They have also been wonderful to program. We were the first to tour with the Mac 2K Wash and to be asked again with the Mac 700 Wash is just great. Our lead technician, Ed Jackson, who does a very thorough job of looking after the fixtures on the tour, has had to do very little to them."
Watson has the 700 Wash units located on the floor and uses them to uplight cycs and side light the band. "For that the intensity is absolutely perfect," he says. Lights are positioned at varying heights - in the overhead rig, on drop poles and on the floor - to create different layers of light. Other Mac units in the rig are Mac 2000 Performances, Mac 2000 Washes and Mac 250 Washes along with Atomic strobes.
"There are times when you don't necessarily need that complete punch of a 2K," says Watson. "Both the 2K Wash and 700 Wash serve their purpose but I found that the 700 Wash work even better with the Performances because the 2K Washes can sometimes outperform the profiles power wise, especially if you have a gobo with the animation wheel and you're cutting the light intensity down."
The lighting concept for the show was born out of conversations that Watson had with the band and incorporates video and the CCTV system they have developed over the years. "We didn't want to do it in a conventional side screen kind of way," says Watson. "We wanted to integrate the video even more than on the last tour so we brought the video onto the stage. The concept was to create a space in which the stage would appear a different shape and look differently from every angle. I wanted to create these perspective screens so we use 10 trapezoidal screens on stage which are angled and perspective twisted. It is almost a cubist way of looking at it."
The screens are actually three-dimensional set pieces which were fabricated by Specialz of the UK with all softgoods by Blackout of the UK. Inside each screen are arrayed Color Kinetics iFlex SLX.
Ten cameras are used live during the show with video fed to the screens through Catalyst which allows Watson to then play with aspect ratios and distort the images. "Everything is live and nothing has been made in advance," he says. "We have no pre-recorded content other than textures and graphical shapes. It is very spontaneous and we get some very beautiful effects." All the video and LEDs are controlled with a combination of Catalyst and PixelMAD systems. Video equipment supply is by XL Video and Scenographic Ltd.
Watson projects colour effects from the Mac 700, 2000 and 250 Washes onto the screens as well. "I point the Mac 250 Washes at the screens, one per screen, and then project a black and white image on the screen so what you end up with is a colorized, dual toned effect. It's a great look. I also project the 2K Washes onto the screens which is a more shadow and light effect that makes the screens look three-dimensional by creating
