Behind the Scenes at Glücksgefühle Festival 2024

Sold-Out KNEECAP Tour – Made with Depence

Incomparable Show Design: Defqon.1 made with Depence

POOLgroup GmbH, a leading event technology and production company based in Germany, recently brought its expertise to the Glücksgefühle Festival at the iconic Hockenheimring. Known for its comprehensive event technology services, POOLgroup took on the challenging task of creating a captivating closing show, combining lights, lasers, pyrotechnics and video elements to create an unforgettable spectacle. This year, POOLgroup used Depence to take the festival's production quality to a whole new level, creating an immersive experience that left audiences in awe.

Headquartered in Emsdetten, Germany, POOLgroup is a leader in event technology and production for a variety of markets. The company's portfolio ranges from major festivals to television productions, making it a trusted partner for events of all sizes. Their comprehensive services include technical planning, project management and the operation of state-of-the-art event technology such as lighting, sound, video and rigging.

Held annually at the Hockenheimring, the Glücksgefühle Festival combines music, culture and entertainment in a breathtaking setting. Thousands of visitors gather to enjoy live music, DJ performances and elaborate light shows. Set against the backdrop of a motorsport venue, the festival offers a unique platform for spectacular stage setups, with ample space to execute an elaborate show design.

POOLgroup seized the opportunity to push the creative boundaries at Glücksgefühle, using the festival's expansive setting to deliver an extraordinary show that combined music with immersive visual storytelling. The Euphoria Stage, which hosted a number of high-profile pop acts throughout the event, was transformed with a bespoke design featuring large LED displays, inventive lighting setups and multiple towers to create layers of visual depth. A total of 320m² of LED surface and just over 900 fixtures were used.

Central to POOLgroup's work on the Closing Show was Syncronorm's Depence software, which served as a vital tool for integrating lighting, lasers, video and pyrotechnics into a cohesive, synchronized performance. The software's real-time visualisation and programming capabilities allowed POOLgroup's operators to meticulously plan every aspect of the show before it went live, ensuring flawless coordination and optimal creative output.

Using Depence, the POOLgroup team programmed individual elements in advance, creating a seamless blend of light, laser and pyrotechnic effects that contributed to the powerful emotional impact of the show. POOLgroup’s operators praised the software for its realistic renderings, which allowed them to visualize how every element would come together, making it possible to fine-tune the show’s timing and design before going on-site. The team expressed pride in their work on the Glücksgefühle festival, emphasizing the thrill of delivering a grand finale for festival-goers. As a highly innovative and creative endeavor, the event demanded the full technical and artistic expertise of the team. Working on this scale underlined POOLgroup's commitment to quality and innovation, pushing the boundaries of live event production.

Reflecting on their experience with Depence, POOLgroup was impressed by the software's user-friendly interface and the seamlessness it brought to their creative process. Any minor issues encountered were quickly resolved by Syncronorm's dedicated support team, whose commitment to improving Depence ensures that it remains a reliable, first-class tool for live event production.

POOLgroup highly recommends Depence as a solution for anyone in event production looking to unify and visualise complex elements within a single, intuitive platform. With Depence, they were able to create an exceptional show for Glücksgefühle that left a lasting impression on both the audience and the industry.

Conor Biddle, lighting designer and programmer specializes in festival stages and advance, recently used Syncronorm’s multimedia show design and visualization software Depence on hip-hop trio KNEECAP’s sold-out Irish and UK tour. While his very own previz and design studio is located in Kildare, Ireland, he is specialized on pre-rendering shows for prospective clients and of course accompanying them on tour. Always on hand: the Depence software system.

“I’ve been incredibly impressed with Depence […]. I’m always relieved when I see Depence in the festival previz suite—it really makes the process smoother.”

Conor Biddle began using Depence at festival previz suites and was very impressed with its capabilities. Last year, he covered a colleague's show that had been timecoded using Depence and was amazed at how few changes were needed when transferring to real-world values. Following this experience, Biddle switched from another program and has been using Depence since.

Recently, Biddle was working on KNEECAP's sold-out Irish and UK tour. KNEECAP, the Northern Irish trio known for their distinctive fusion of punk and hip-hop, were set to embark on their tour, featuring an impressive lighting and production setup. With a reputation for thought-provoking lyrics and engaging performances, KNEECAP combines powerful social commentary with infectious beats. The tour showcased their latest songs alongside fan favorites, all enhanced by dynamic visuals and immersive stage design that elevates the live experience. The main design brief was to create an atmospheric show with strong, homogenized looks that follow the music tightly to enhance each musical quirk. The design aimed for a strong minimalist industrial look, incorporating shadow play and a heavy smoky atmosphere. Most of the sources are out of sightlines, and the design primarily uses soft wash and strobe sources with no beam fixtures.

Depence was utilized from the very start to create static and video renders of the initial design to send to the artist. The realistic render engine was invaluable in providing the artists with an accurate idea of their show. Once all the design elements were finalized, Depence was crucial for the programming. Using NDI, Biddle could live program the visuals as well, using Resolume. He programmed in his studio and used screen capture to send full sessions to the visual artist and the rest of the team. They would make notes, then reprogram and re-render. With the entire show being timecoded, using Depence meant they knew exactly how the show would look, resulting in minimal tweaking at the venue. This was fantastic, considering there are over 13,000 timecode events for the lighting alone. The show was designed with touring in mind, featuring ACME Pixeline as the main fixture. Perfectly visualized in Depence, the Pixeline resembled compact, powerful and durable enough to withstand the intensity of a KNEECAP stage.

The assurance of knowing that all off-site programming would closely relate to real-world values, along with realistic and flattering renders to convey the design ideas to the client, was a significant benefit. This show is one of the most complex and tightly synced Biddle has been involved in, using over 5,000 recipes, 3,000 cues, and 13,000 timecode events. The accuracy and quick frame rate capabilities of Depence allowed for tight synchronization with any track in both lighting and visuals. The confidence of knowing all the time spent in the studio was invaluable.

“This was a strong, minimalist design that followed the tracks and visuals with precise detail—achieved only because the band and management trusted us to spend two weeks buried in the previz studio. The result is a show that integrates cutting-edge technology for a tight, cohesive experience. It wouldn’t have been possible without Depence […].”

The Defqon.1 festival was held from June 27th to June 30th in Biddinghuizen, Netherlands and celebrated its 20th anniversary with a spectacular lineup, unforgettable performances and most of all, a show that simply left you speechless in all regards. Syncronorm are extremely proud to have been involved in this massive Q-Dance production, as lighting design company Happy Technology once again relied on our Depence show design software for a superlative mega-production that went beyond scope.

Under the motto ‘Power of the Tribe’, the concept of this year's Defqon.1 festival was designed entirely around coming together and celebrating past editions. For this reason, the main stage, also known as the RED stage, was realized with a special concept that took design elements from past festival concepts and integrated them into a new design to match the character of this year's anniversary show. The dutch lighting design and show entertainment professionals from Happy Technology around major lighting designer Robbert Vernooy were also responsible for the show design of the RED stage, along with more than 10 other stages, and presented a closing ceremony that was second to none. With over 70,000 daily visitors from 52 countries, it is a festival of superlatives, and the visually stunning shows do it justice just perfectly.

The shows of all stages around the six different areas are timecode-based and were created in advance using Syncronorm’s Depence multimedia show design and visualization software. The software thereby was a huge advantage in presenting the show designs to the respective clients well beforehand, which made the rehearsing time much shorter than usual. While pre-programming for about a month’s time before the event, programming at the location was basically done in about three hours, including programming lasers, SFX and pyro as well within the Depence file. That also includes working with video content as well in Depence in regards of the other stages at the festival.

 

Credits:

Jonas Schmidt: Creative Director Q-dance

Tamiel van Draanen en Dennis van Harten: Set Design Q-dance

Robbert-Jan Vernooij: Lighting Designer / programmer RED

Thijs Brouwers: Lighting Programmer Blue

Fabian Fisniku Lighting programmer Black

Pascal Parent Lighting Programmer UV

Micky Dordtrechter: Lighting Programmer Theatre

Carly Eijlander: lighting programmer Holland Casino

Keylight programmer Red : Joost Wijgers Light-H-Art

Niels Kieboom: Depence Master

Jari van Leerdam: Technical Producer Backbone international bv

Teun Schilders & Joost van Straten: Technical producer Q-dance

Jenno Roelofs: Technical Producer Backbone international bv

Stan van Winden: CAD Master 

Lennart Lindhout: Project manager Lighting and Rigging Production people

Kevin van Setten: System Tech lighting Production People

Jeroen Winnubst: Laser Designer 

Robin van der Linde: Creative Producer Q-dance

Joshua Dutrieux: Audio Composer Aepic platform

Lucas Gerritzen: Pyro Designer Pyro 4

Depence powers the WorldSkills Lyon 2024 Closing Ceremony

“Full of Life” | NATURE ONE 2024 made with Depence

Pol’and’Rock Festival 2024 | Pre-programmed with Depence

The WorldSkills 2024 event, held from September 10-15 in Lyon, showcased the finest young talents across a variety of skills, with over 1,400 competitors participating. The series is a global competition that showcases the talents of young professionals across a wide range of vocational trades. Held every two years, it brings together participants from over 70 countries to compete in disciplines such as engineering, construction, and digital arts, aiming to promote excellence in vocational training and inspire future generations to pursue careers in these crucial industries. Beyond the remarkable achievements of these young professionals, the event itself became a showcase of technical innovation and visual artistry, with Syncronorm’s Depence software playing a key role in creating the stunning visual displays that accompanied the competitions.

One of the outstanding teams responsible for this spectacle was Concept K from France. Their responsibilities included the stage design as well as lighting and laser programming for the show. By utilizing three Depence R3 licenses, Concept K were able to deliver a meticulously pre-programmed visual experience that combined lighting, lasers, and special effects. Depence’s powerful visualization capabilities allowed the team to visualize and fine-tune the entire production well in advance, ensuring a seamless and perfectly synchronized live performance.

The preparation for the event involved a year of research and development, plots, meetings and brainstorming. That was followed by a month of intensive pre-programming at Concept K’s Creative Studio in Paris. Thanks to Depence’s integration with timecode tools such as Timecore and ADREM, the team was able to synchronize complex lighting sequences with music and live performances with precision well beforehand. The show was set up in under a week, with only one rehearsal needed before the live event—a testament to the efficiency and accuracy of Depence’s simulation and programming capabilities. By using Depence, the team was able to streamline their workflow, reducing the need for multiple rehearsals and long setup times on-site. The ability to pre-visualize the entire show in 3D meant that the team could test and refine creative concepts in advance, ensuring a smooth and efficient build-up to the live event, optimizing and streamlining the overall workflow perfectly.

Throughout the event, Depence was used to control an impressive array of lighting and laser equipment, including 72 Robe iForte LTX units, 150 Robe MegaPointes, and 12 high-powered laser systems from Laser System Europe. This complex setup was flawlessly coordinated, delivering a vibrant and immersive visual experience for both the competitors and the 250,000 visitors in attendance.

Syncronorm is thrilled to have contributed to the success of the WorldSkills Lyon 2024 Closing Ceremony by providing our leading show simulation software, Depence. We are proud to see Depence continually used to enhance the world’s most prestigious events, offering both creative freedom and technical precision to production teams on a global stage.

Since the 1990s, the NATURE ONE Festival has been a staple event at the legendary Pydna missile base in Kastellaun. Next year, the festival will celebrate its 30th anniversary. From EDM to trance and harder techno genres, the festival offers an immersive experience with powerful bass resonating through the various stages. Thanks to Syncronorm Depence, every step of the creative process – from conceptualization to pre-visualization to execution – was streamlined, ensuring that the intricate lighting and video elements were optimized for the festival. Depence allowed the GERDON design team to push the boundaries of what’s possible, bringing an unforgettable audiovisual experience to life.

This year, lighting designer Marek Papke from GERDON design, alongside technical service provider schoko pro, crafted the remarkable main stage concept for NATURE ONE. Key to this achievement was the use of Syncronorm’s Depence software, which allowed the team to pre-visualize and optimize every lighting and video element well before the event. Depence enabled the designers to see exactly how their creations will look in real-world settings. This capability was crucial in ensuring that the lighting rig, which extended not only over the main stage but directly above the audience, was perfectly positioned to provide a seamless, 360-degree visual experience.

Papke explains that the festival organizer, I-Motion, wanted the Open-Air Floor to feel like a true club environment. To achieve this, the lighting and video design didn’t just focus on the main stage but also included a lighting rig directly over the audience, creating an immersive overhead visual experience. Pre-visualization through Depence played a pivotal role in bringing this to life, allowing the GERDON design team to simulate the complex lighting setups and optimize the effects from various perspectives, ensuring flawless execution of the production. In recent years, the central stage at NATURE ONE has also featured a pyramid-shaped truss construction, originally designed for circus tents but re-engineered for the festival’s needs. This structure, enhanced with lighting and video elements, is a centrepiece of the festival experience. Depence allowed the team to adjust early on, avoiding last-minute changes and streamlining the setup process on-site. The design aimed to incorporate a strong architectural theme, with clean, structured elements like Layher scaffolding angled at 45 degrees to create a skyscraper-like appearance. GERDON design also developed custom video content for the festival's three large LED walls (6x6 meters each), blending visuals with lighting fixtures and construction.

The lighting setup relied on powerful equipment like the outdoor-ready Cameo OTOS H5 Hybrid Spot-Beamlight, which shaped the lighting on the main stage and pyramid structure. SGM Q-8 strobes and floodlights enhanced the lighting along the stage’s outlines, floor, and the pyramid’s center. The team also employed Cameo ZENIT P130 LSD fixtures to bathe the truss structure in color, while lightweight Martin Aura XIP fixtures added dynamic lighting and effects from above. 160 SGM LT-200 tubes accentuated the architectural elements of both the stage and the pyramid. Using Depence, the lighting design team was able to simulate these fixtures accordingly as pre-programming the entire light and video show in Depence was essential, especially given that many festival attendees view the performances not just from in front of the stage but from various angles, including from nearby bunker hills.

The lighting show was executed using MA Lighting grandMA3 consoles, but the programming still relied on the MA2 platform. According to Papke, their long-standing experience with NATURE ONE allows the team to operate the show efficiently, which also benefits the tight-knit GERDON design crew. The festival is handled with passion and expertise by the team, which includes long-time collaborators like Annika Hinzmann and Florian Grimm on show operations, and Max Schmalenberger, Artur Kechter, and Lennard Jason Thurner on visuals. Felix Heilemann and Marek Papke took charge of show calling, project management, and lighting design.

 

Source: EventElevator

Green Beam Design from Poland have already proven that they know how to realize some of the most spectacular show productions of the country. To achieve their goals, they have been relying on Syncronorm’s multimedia show design & visualization software Depence for quite some time, which enables the team to pre-visualize and plan even the most extensive productions. So, what belongs together comes together, and Green Beam Design, with the help of Depence, realized one of its most ambitious projects in terms of lighting design. They are particularly proud to be part of one of the most important music events in Poland: Pol’and’Rock Festival 2024.

Under the motto “Love, Friendship and Music”, the festival has been held annually in western Poland since 1995 (although under another name), with the highest number of visitors being a staggering 750,000 people. The team at Green Beam used the latest version of the Depence system to make the lighting design unique for this already bombastic project. The unforgettable atmosphere of the festival, which took place in Kostrzyn nad Odra, attracted and captivated several hundred thousand fans and truly left its mark.

“A key element of this project was the use of the advanced Depence visualization tool from Syncronorm. Thanks to it, we were able to precisely plan and prepare every aspect of the stage lighting, which was crucial for creating dynamic and coherent visual effects that emphasized the energy of the festival.”

Green Beam thereby used two Depence licenses in the pre-programming phase, which allowed them to perfectly reproduce the intended lighting effects, as well as to perfectly synchronize the show with the music and atmosphere of the festival. The lighting was done by designer Jacek Chojczak, who once again proved the quality of his shows. In turn, Tomasz Szwelicki was responsible for the pre-programming as he also implemented all artistic assumptions of the project with maximum precision. In implementing the lighting, Green Beam used a wide range of equipment, which allowed them to achieve impressive visual effects. In total, the team used 35,758 parameters in the project, which were controlled by using multiple GrandMA3 consoles.

“The precision and technological advancement provided by Depence allowed us to perfectly match each lighting element, which created an unforgettable live show. Pol'and'Rock Festival 2024 was another milestone in our work for us [...]. Thanks to advanced technological solutions from Syncronorm and our passion for creating unique visual experiences, we were able to provide the audience with unforgettable impressions.”

The key fixtures used at Pol’and’Rock Festival 2024 read as follows:

24 pcs. ROBE iForte
56 pcs. ROBE Forte
152 pcs. CLAY PAKY Sharpy
32 pcs. AYRTON Cobra
16 pcs. ROBE iBolt
16 pcs. ROBE Robin iBolt
48 pcs. CHAUVET Maverick Storm 2 Beam Wash
92 pcs. ACME Pixel Line IP
60 pcs. ROBE 800 Led Wash
96 pcs. MARTIN MAC One
107 pcs. PROLIGHTS SunBlast 3000 FC
48 pcs. GLP JDC-1
16 pcs. GLP JDC-2 IP
48 pcs. GLP Impression X4 Bar 20
192 pcs. ELATION Fuze Par Z60 IP
106 pcs. CLF Ares
80 pcs. THOMAS Pixel Par 90
48 pcs. SHOWTEC Sunstripe DMX Active
398 pcs. PAR 64
144 pcs. THOMAS 4-Lite Blinder
16 pcs. THOMAS 8-Lite Blinder
1 pc. VARI-LITE VL 6000 Beam

More information about the festival can be found on the organizer's website: https://polandrockfestival.pl/ 

Pictures by Green Beam and Black Studio.

Eurovision Song Contest 2024 in Malmö | Pre-programmed with Depence

Royallaser | Depence R3 Showcase

Qlimax 2023 Pre-Programming | Happy Technology use Depence

Following Swedish top act Loreen's victory at the Eurovision Song Contest 2023 in Liverpool, UK, this year's sixty-eighth ESC was held in Malmö, Sweden, once again captivating millions of viewers to their screens. The Syncronorm team is once again honored to have been able to make a decisive contribution to the production of this outshining event through the support of our Multimedia Show Design and Previz Software Depence, which was used to help designing the shows of all 37 participating countries. The team thereby relied on 5 Depence machines during preproduction as well as 2 systems on location.

Under the motto “United by Music” this year's ESC took place from 7th to 11th May in the Arena Malmö, which, with a maximum capacity for 10.000 people for this event, offered an exceptional opportunity to experience the phenomenal acts up close. As every year, an ingenious and fresh stage concept was designed, which this year was arranged in a kind of cross construction on which the various delegations could perform in four different directions. As another central design element, five video cubes were installed above the stage, which were used on a massive scale, as were a total of 2168 moving lights, led bars and strobes in total. The stage design was developed by none other than Florian Wieder, who placed particular emphasis on enabling interaction with the audience. The contest was not intended to look like a conventional tv production, but to create the atmosphere of a concert, in which respect the venue provided a clear advantage. Lighting Designer Fredrik Stormby of Green Wall Designs, based in Stockholm, thereby made the other decisive contributions to the show concept. All under the technical lead of Senior Technical Director and Eurovision Guru Ola Melzig, they did a remarkable job in growing the event into something truly special. The cross-shaped stage for example, consisted of a video floor with an area of 186 square meters. This was complemented by a 340 square meter video wall in front of which the acts could deliver their performances. This video surface was also able to be divided in the middle. The stunning amount of LED in this show was a total of 1000 square meters. Together with Stormby, Wieder developed a design with a strong emphasis on kinetic movement that radiated an incredible dynamic, using 3500 meters of truss. To that an absolutely crushing amount of 199 C1 hoists, which were also visualized in Depence, was used to create the kinetics. The arena had to support an equipment weight of 210 tons.

The lighting design of this year's ESC was primarily intended to reflect the identity of the city of Malmö, i.e. modernity and urbanity. This principle was combined with a representation of the Northern Lights, as they can often be seen in the sky in Scandinavia, which graphic designer Sidney Lim endeavored to achieve. Things became experimental when Stormby and the lighting design team used so-called infield pods. These were side elements that operated between the audience and the stage, but also surrounded the entire set from behind. The flexible lighting level formed in this way was equipped with wash lights. As the audience was to be more involved in this year's ESC, the stage design had to be adapted accordingly. For this purpose, the arena was illuminated with audience lighting, which created a beautiful ambient effect throughout the building. Only the key light was a challenge due to the very spacious and dynamic stage, especially because of the many mechanical movement possibilities. A follow-me system was used for this, which was operated by eight operators.

A particularly well-equipped FOH was needed to handle this massive show. A total of 19 MA3 consoles were used, with which 663 DMX universes were managed. The team around Melzig, Stormby, Ishai Mika (Lead Programmer FX Light), Isak Gabre, Dom Adams (Lead Programmer Keylight), Leo Stenbeck and Linus Pansell were thereby able to rely on first-class support for the Depence Previz system from Syncronorm GmbH, who provided fast and effective fixture and tech support to ensure that all elements of the show were seamlessly integrated in the pre-production phase. Syncronorm also helped to optimize the project file to simulate this massive stage in real-time. The Depence software system was used extensively to gain a time advantage, as programming 37 shows in the given time would not have been logistically possible, giving the team a distinct advantage throughout the pre-production period.

 

•  Ishai Mika (LX Director / Lead Programmer for FX)

•  Dom Adams (LX Director / Lead Programmer for Key and White Light)

•  Isak Gabre (LX Programmer)

•  Linus Pansell (LX Programmer)

•  Leo Stenbeck (LX Programmer)

 

Collaborating Designers:

•  Mike Smith (Associate Lighting Designer)

•  Michael Straun (Associate Lighting Designer)

•  Louisa Smurthwaite (Assistant Lighting Designer / Viewing Room Coordinator)

 

Additional Support:

•  Per Hörding (Follow Spot Caller)

Creating a stunning experience at a hardstyle/hardcore/rawstyle festival requires not only creative vision, but also the right tools to bring that vision to life. For laser show designer Lukas Lange from Royallaser, Syncronrom's Depence was the crucial tool to help him create a stunning opening show for such a festival.

The project started with a rough stage sketch from Bocatec Sales & Rent (www.bocatec.de) as a starting point. Lukas used Depence to program the lasers with Pangolin Beyond, using Depence as a real-time visualization and allowing him to seamlessly synchronize light, video and lasers.

After the event, the show was further refined by developing the stage in D3 and using the new pyro effects in D3.1 to give the show that extra something. With Depence as the central tool, the show video was optimized and can now be used for future promotional purposes.

The flexibility of Depence allowed the show to be customized according to the laser show designer's vision, adapting the existing moving heads and pyro effects to his needs. While the focus was on the lasers, Depence also allowed for the control of other lighting elements such as moving lights and blinders that were synchronized with Pangolin Beyond.

 

Lukas Lange was particularly impressed by the ease with which he could program pyro effects and integrate them into the show. Depence also offered great possibilities for video mapping, allowing him to seamlessly insert video content into the scenery.

For the final video, each camera position was rendered in Depence and then edited in Final Cut Pro to create a stunning 4k 60FPS video. The workflow was efficient and allowed him to showcase his work quickly and professionally.

The benefits of Depence 3.1 over previous versions were evident in this project. The ambient light setting added a more authentic atmosphere to the visualization, while the indoor fireworks provided many opportunities to make the show look even more spectacular.

 

"The advantage that Depence gives me as a laser show designer is an all-in-one solution to perfectly stage my content." // Lukas Lange, 2024

 

For laser show designers like Lukas Lange, Depence is not just a tool, but an indispensable partner in turning creative visions into stunning reality.

 

The following equipment was used at the real event (excerpt):

  • Explo GX2
  • Explo Powerflame
  • Explo X2 Waveflamer
  • Explo X2 RX 30K
  • MagicFx Stadium Shot 2
  • Lightsky Aquabeam
  • Q7 LED
  • MDG ME 2
  • Smartstage 51 8x6 Trailer Bühne
  • Lightcraft Shot Fog
  • 25W Kvant Laser 20x
  • Hog 4

 

A special thanks to Lasershow.no for their great support in creating this visualization.

Last year, Happy Technology, a young extremely well experienced dynamic company from the Netherlands, that specializes in lighting and show design, used Syncronorm’s Depence multimedia show design software to create the astonishing shows for the 2023 edition of Qlimax, one of the biggest indoor hardstyle music festivals in the world.

The Qlimax Festival 2023, known as one of the most spectacular indoor hardstyle events to this date, took place on 18 November in Arnhem, the Netherlands. Themed "Enter the Void", the festival offered a unique mix of laser and light effects paired with magical electronic sounds that created an almost mystical atmosphere. Visitors were treated to a night of intense musical performances from top acts such as Deepack, Blademasterz, Showtek and TNT, as well as first-time appearances from Hard Driver, Warface and Deadly Guns. Returning acts Devin Wild and Vertile were also part of the line-up, as well as the premiere of new live act 'The Enlightenment' by B-Front x Phuture Noize. As the voice of this ritual, Villain led the night and contributed to the unforgettable experience, where around 27.000 people attended.

At the centre of the design process was the young yet highly experienced company Happy Technology, which handled the pre-programming for the festival by using our Multimedia Show Design & Visualization Software Depence. The team around Robbert-Jan Vernooij relied above all on the realism of the visualisation and the particularly strong performance in live mode, while using lighting consoles from the grandMA brand. The lighting design was intended to tell a story that played with the contrast between light and darkness. To this end, an imaginary narrative figure was devised to guide the audience through the evening and set the visual guidelines. The "illusionist" was to lead the audience into the so-called "void", where the boundaries between reality and fantasy become blurred and a unique collective show experience takes place.

 

Credits

Jonas Schmidt: Creative Director Q-dance

Daan Jansen: Show Creator Q-dance

Tamiel van Draanen en Dennis van Harten: Set Design Q-dance

Robbert-Jan Vernooij: Lighting Designer 

Thijs Brouwers: Lighting Programmer

Micky Dordtrechter: Lighting Programmer

Niels Kieboom: Depence Master

Jari van Leerdam: Technical Producer

Teun Schilders & Joost van Straten: Technical producer Q-dance

Jenno Roelofs: Technical Producer

Stan van Winden: CAD Master

Lennart Lindhout: Project manager Lighting and Rigging

Kevin van Setten: System Tech lighting 

Kevin Walenciak: VJ 250K

Chris Hoogwerf : VJ 250K

Jeroen Winnubst: Laser Designer 

Robin van der Linde: Creative Producer Q-dance

Joshua Dutrieux: Audio Composer Aepic platform

Lucas Gerritsen: Pyro Designer Pyro 4

Fairground Festival 2023 | Pre-production w/ Depence R3

Hans Zimmer Live | Pre-visualized with Depence

Special Olympics World Games Berlin 2023

As in their numerous previous show projects, the interdisciplinary motion design and show development studio visualprime relies on the latest version of Syncronorm's multimedia show design and visualization software Depence R3. The studio, which specializes in live entertainment, draws on a wide range of skills, and combines event technology and classic design disciplines to offer customized solutions for its clients. Depence R3 helps the four-person crew to implement and realize their concepts for the event, show, trade fair and television sectors. Founded in 2000 as a pure motion design studio, the areas of lighting, video, media technology, specialist planning, event IT and, of course, operating and preprogramming have been added over the years.

“The design process for lighting, video, laser and stage design is generally carried out with Depence R3, as we have a closed workflow from design to preprogramming and can also deliver impressive preview renderings.” – Uwe Schröder, visualprime

To realize their vision at last year's Fairground Festival in Hanover, visualprime once again relied on the Depence software system, specifically version R3. In the first year, the studio was responsible for lighting and video operating as well as FOH at system level, while in the second edition taking place in 2023, they were also responsible for the design processes of the lighting, laser and video design of the three floors as well as for the technical advancing of the guest operators. The client here was the organizer himself, as he, like the team at visualprime, appreciates the direct contact, the "short official channels" and, above all, the all-round support they have provided. The same applies to communication with the technical service provider.

While working with Depence, visualprime particularly appreciate the extensive possibilities for displaying light, video, and laser. Flexible working without being tied to a fixed workplace also made production much easier as the general technical service provider was located in the Czech Republic, the organizer in Hanover and the team at visualprime in their design studio in Cologne.

“Of course, it is an immense advantage for us to be able to use screenshots and video renderings from Depence R3 to very quickly turn ideas into images that the customer can understand and to respond to customer requests. At the same time, we can also clarify many technical aspects with the technical service provider in advance, which significantly simplifies the preprogramming process.”

After the final design decision with the customer, visualprime were able to go straight into pre-programming, while the specialist planning was carried out by the technical service provider in close coordination. Preprogramming in the studio enabled the team to save an immense amount of time on site in Hanover and also made things much easier for the guest operators at the festival, as extensive technical advancing with patch and show files, video mappings and show files for the laser system could be provided. At the festival itself, Depence R3 was also available together with a lighting console to offer guest operators the possibility of extensive and stress-free pre-programming if the programming slots in the sound check were not sufficient. This option was also gladly used.

 

(c) pictures on location by Maximilian Steinke, renderings by visualprime

After a planning phase that began in 2019 and countless postponements due to the pandemic, John Featherstone, and his team at Lightswitch were finally able to get started with the realization of the Hans Zimmer Live Tour 2022/2023 after a long period of preparation. To realize the cinematic approach of the show, scenic designer Derek McLane and projection designer Peter Nigrini were also brought on board.

The aspiration to create a visual journey for the audience shaped the production, as did the distinctive artistic aesthetic of Hans Zimmer himself, who is able to send the listener on a unique musical journey. As Hans Zimmer's music spans several internationally acclaimed films and numerous different genres, the lighting design also had to be conceived in such a way that it could reflect all these facets in different ways. The range extends from the Asian sounds of a movie like The Last Samurai to the menacing music of The Dark Knight and beyond.

In order to reflect the flow of the themes in the music, Featherstone relies primarily on cues in the design of the show that are fluid and musical, and not too mechanical. Nevertheless, there are moving trusses and architectural elements on the stage. His preferred fixture to realize most of the looks was the Robe MegaPointe, which can also cover the beams typical for rock shows between strongly fanned light. The architecture of the rig was designed so that Zimmer is located in the downstage center while the band and orchestra are placed on risers behind him. The architecture of the rig was designed so that Zimmer is located in the downstage center while the band and orchestra are placed on risers behind him. The stage is also illuminated with plenty of sidelights on both sides with the help of the MegaPointes. The color scheme of the shows reflects the flexibility of the lighting design itself, with everything from pastel looks to razor-sharp saturated hues.

The show itself starts with the title track to the movie Dune, which is also reflected in the light show. The band is cloaked in striking desert tones while the Oscar-winning soundtrack is played. The second score that can be heard is the one from Gladiator. Here Zimmer pays attention to the fact that there are no strong female leads in the film, which is why the idea was to let the music take on this role. The lighting design here also takes the approach of elevating the mood from soft to extremely bombastic. The music from The Dark Knight, on the other hand, is more like a study of order and chaos and everything in between, almost comparable to the eternal battle of good and evil. This plunge from order into (mental) chaos is largely supported by the lighting design, which virtually attacks the audience with wild beams and red blasts from Robe Tetras. As far as the overall color scheme of the tour is concerned, great attention was ultimately paid to the respective storylines of the films for which the music was written.

Along a super great team, Featherstone was especially proud to work together with his daughter Hailey, who acted as tour lighting director. Chris Herman served as programmer on grandMA3, while the pre-programming in Berlin was done by using the Depence multimedia show design & visualization software system. However, Featherstone also points out that the entire project has been highly collaborative. Influences in the design are blurred and the lines in the production overlapped. This can also be seen in the arrangement of light and video content, as the two design elements merge seamlessly. The team's way of working, as well as that of Hans Zimmer himself, is reflected in the entire project process and in the design.

 

Credits

  • Technical Direction: Tobias Busskamp, Thomas Schmitt
  • Lighting Design: John Featherstone
  • Lighting Director: Hailey Featherstone
  • Lighting Programmer: Chris Herman
  • Scenic Design: Derek McLane
  • Media Design: Peter Nigrini

Lighting Crew

Jens Modigell- crew chief

Sascha Laue- systems and networ

Marvin Jürgens- robo spots and systems

Kevin Schulze-Borgmühl- dimmers

Ludwig Sigel- kabel 1

Christoph Konermann- kabel 2

Mona Rapp- kabel 3

Peter Hermanns- kabel 4

CyberHoists: Tobias Frey, Boris HölscherIngo, Ingo Koenzen, Florian Renisch

 

Pictures by Lindsay Cave

History was made. For the first time ever, the Special Olympics World Games took place in Berlin, Germany from June 17 to 25, 2023. The opening show ceremony of the games was thereby designed by none other than the team around Flo Erdmann, who relied on Syncronorm's multimedia show design software Depence R3 to create and visualize this fabulous show. With over 7000 athletes in 26 different sports, this major sporting event focuses on the mentally and multiply handicapped to give them visibility and promote inclusion. The massive opening ceremony also served to strengthen public perception and create a media focus for these very important topics.

The collective phase7 performing.arts under the artistic direction of Sven Sören Beyer was responsible for the creative concept of the opening ceremony as well as its planning and implementation in cooperation with mediapool Veranstaltungsgesellschaft on behalf of the Local Organization Committee Berlin. POOL Group GmbH was responsible for the technical implementation. Flo Erdmann created the lighting design, Raphael Grebenstein acted as lighting director and showlight operator, alongside Johannis Laugwitz as keylight operator as well as Ole Güllich as overhead lighting technician and Younes Rellmann (von|BERG) as gaffer.

The team made extensive use of Depence R3, which was already used during the pitch phase for the creation of the renderings and in the follow-up to the pre-programming in the Solingen studio and finally on site in the Berlin Olympia Stadium. Since there was no full access to the system at first, on-site was initially programmed in Depence and adjustments were successively made to the live system. The location of the headlight systems was done in Vectorworks whereas the setup was imported via MVR into Depence R3. “The clear advantage and the necessity lie in the preparation, which takes place in a relaxed and focused environment. The production time on site did not allow us to implement the programming phase exclusively on the live system, which is why we had to rely on the software solution”, Erdmann says. The implementation of the stadium lighting and the number of fixed devices in the stadium was a challenge for the software, which was solved nonetheless thanks to the excellent Syncronorm support. The stadium's house system was natively incorporated into the GrandMA3 system, and the roof lighting was controlled from both the console and the media server. Parameter expansion was also inevitable in this project and was implemented thanks to Syncronorm. In this way, it was possible to access all local parameters without interfering with the house system, and these could also be programmed in advance, which saved a great deal of time on site. Thanks to the integration of the VizKey in Depence, many network processors could be dispensed with.

The requirement for the lighting design was to illuminate a 360° playable set consisting of the public area, infield, and center stage. In addition, the existing in-house lighting system had to be natively integrated into the lighting programming.  540 moving lights (incl. X5 Bar IP) and approx. 180 LED spotlights were used. The setup was controlled via 4 x GrandMA 3 Fullsize. The roof lighting of the house was additionally controlled by a Pixera media server via pixel mapping. The whole setup was pre-programmed with Depnece R3 at the company von|BERG GmbH in Solingen and visualized in advance. The special feature for Depence R3 was clearly the necessary performance with a total fixture count of over 3500 fixtures (stadium lighting included).

“The performance of Depence R3 once again proved the enormous visual and also technical advantage in the field of visualization software. We were once again able to rely on the excellent support and thank Syncronorm for the great cooperation. A project of this magnitude shows how important it is to be able to rely on your technical partners. Depence R3 offers lighting designers the possibility to focus on the creative work and keeps you stressless with their intuitive software.” – Flo Erdmann, 2023

Depence R3 | 3000+ fixtures visualized at ESC 2023

Superbowl LVII | Earlybird use Depence

Nature One | Gerdon Design using Depence

Since over 65 years the Eurovision Song Contest has been resembling a truly superlative event and even to date regularly breaks records with its extravagant shows and performances, reaching up to 180 million viewers worldwide every year. Following this tradition, the 2023 edition of the ESC, which was held between the 9th and 13th of May in Liverpool, UK, on behalf of the Ukraine presented 37 countries and their special delegations, performing breathtaking musical performances accompanied by a one-of-a-kind lighting show.

With the BBC as client, this year's Eurovision lighting design was done by none other than the team around Tim Routledge, winner of multiple TPi Awards, who relied on Syncronorm's multimedia show design and visualization software Depence R3 for the pre-programming of the entire project. Together with his team including associates James Scott, Morgan Evans, Alex Mildenhall, Mark Nicholson, and Tom Young, who were responsible for different aspects of the pre-programming and Depence project, Routledge created over 37 shows, including intros and interlude performances in an amazingly short time.

The preprogramming took place at Neg Earth Lights in London, where the team around Routledge has built a Depence machine especially for this demanding project, running the latest release of the software namely Depence 3.1. In this way the team could rely on the newest features and performance boosts, some of which were developed simultaneously to the ongoing project to make the ESC pre-programming possible. In addition to the Depence visualization the team utilized three GrandMA consoles for the programming process, which were connected via VizKey technology to Depence to enable a flawless, fast, and stable workflow.

For this year, a visualization teaser was created for the first time for the ESC, which was also broadcast by the BBC. Responsible for this Depence visualization was Morgan Evans. The teaser should already give an impression about the design of the stage and the general mood in advance. Thereby, not only generic fixtures were considered but the entire rig, e.g., all kinetic and moving elements, extras like LED tape or prop extras of all delegations. Depence R3 has made the visualization of some special features possible, which cannot be found in any other visualizer. For example, some shows of different delegations required the so-called Star Filter effect on the cameras, which could also be implemented in Depence to create the most realistic image of the different scenes. During pre-programming, over 3000 fixtures with tens of thousands of individual LEDs on more than 300 DMX universes were used, which were also placed in Depence, and which could be visualized without any problem at all. The team also worked very closely with Syncronorm to keep all fixture characteristics and profiles as close to the real devices as possible to ensure the most accurate pre-production.

Read the full story of Syncronorm's involvement with even more information in the latest issue of TPi magazine here.

Once again, design support services studio Earlybird relied on Depence, the powerful and realistic show design and visualization software from Syncronorm, to help bring to life the lighting design for this year's Superbowl LVII half time show featuring pop legend Rihanna. We once again had the opportunity to talk to the team at Earlybird- Eric Marchwinski and Nick Coauette answered our questions and described their work with Depence in regards of this unique project.

The lighting for this year's Superbowl was designed by Al Gurdon and was based on one thing above all else and that was functionality. This was mainly due to the number and combination of fixtures used, which was composed of the following:

  • 146 Vari-lite VL3600 Profile
  • 72 Robe Robin 1200
  • 35 Vari-lite VL2600
  • 325 GLP X4
  • 76 TMB Solaris Flare
  • 3 MA Lighting grandMA3 Full Size
  • 1 MA Lighting grandMA3 Lite
  • 6 Strong Gladiator IV
  • 6 Britebox Flame LT3000
  • 6 PRG Best Boy Ground Control Long Throw
  • 4 MDG The One
  • 8 Reel EFX Diffusion DF-50
  • 8 Reel EFX Fans
  • 2 zactrack PRO servers
  • 4,200 PixMob Nova
  • 12 PixMob IR Transmitters
  • 7 PixMob Kore Receiver

"When approaching a previz project, especially one of this scale, we always look towards Depence as our preferred previz software. The flexibility, fidelity, and efficiency offered by the program helps us to create previz projects that are useful tools in both the design and programming process. For this Super Bowl Half Time Show, we utilized DMX motors to simulate the moving platforms, and NDI video input to replicate the under-platform lighting that was provided by PixMob. Depence's toolset allowed us to begin rehearsals with all of our homework complete while simultaneously allowing us to create a full animation of the show that we were able to share with the rest of the creative team." // Nick Coauette, Earlybird 2023

The physical layout of the fixtures on the halftime show can definitely be described as "straight forward”, due to a unique environment with many complex factors to how and where fixtures can be hung. Once the design was finalized, Earlybird took an approach that focused primarily on how to best utilize the fixtures effectively given the hang and very large area to light. Huge straight trusses finally complement the design, which is also meant to maintain its charisma from afar. The distances in the stadium are a challenge especially for a light show, which the team mastered with bravura.

The demand on their own work was to have an almost perfectly running show for the first rehearsal. Since there are only 3 nights of rehearsal with all cameras, cast, and scenery; being prepared for these small windows was vital to the success of the lighting team on the show. For Earlybird, Depence was a powerful tool in helping assess the approach for lighting the scenery and cast, while learning how to best work around the huge distances within the stadium. Artistically Depence could help with the assessment of the design ideas, becoming both a design and programming tool throughout the process.

Line of sight was another incredibly important part of the show. The team had to be aware of the background throughout the performance as the camera direction was very specifically changing which direction the story was being told in. The DMX camera feature in Depence helped the team replicate the camera storyboard therefore allowing key light and the background composition to be allocated based on the direction of each shot. Depence was also used to simulate the various platform automation positions in the show. These were programmed in Depence with the help of simulated motors and adapted to the sequence, giving the programming team the complete picture at all times.

Although they had almost no time to spend with the real set, the lighting team were perfectly prepared for the show thanks to the help of Depence and the incomparable realism of the visualization.

Designer: Al Gurdon
Lighting Director: Ben Green
Lighting Director: Harry Forster
Lighting Director/Programmer: Eric Marchwinski (Earlybird)
Lighting Director/Programmer: Mark Humphrey
Pre-viz/Depence Tech: Nick Coauette (Earlybird)
Vendor: PRG

GERDON DESIGN are a team of designers, technical experts and creatives who have made it their business to design impressive stages and to complete shows with light, content and special effects. The design of the OpenAirFloor of NATURE ONE has been in their hands for many years. Very special requirements apply there. In contrast to other festivals, NatureOne relies on an impressive "floor concept", which means that instead of a large Layher wall covered with decoration, the focus is primarily on a structure above the floor and the spectators.

The design work at GERDON is still classically done in tools like Cinema4D and Vectorworks, but it gets specifically interesting when the first design drafts can be loaded into Depence, and the team can control their design from a GrandMA console for the first time. The MVR workflow is especially helpful here, so that as little time as possible is spent translating between the different software "worlds." So, positions, rotations, fixture types and patches come right along, and the system is ready to play right away. Depence greatly helps the team at GERDON look at the design in real time from different angles. This way they can get a good idea of possible lighting positions already in the design process. Also, the content connection on the different LED surfaces via NDI helps a lot to control the viewing angle and arrangement of the different screens.

“Compared to productions without Depence in preparation, the very fast availability of fixtures is definitely an advantage for us. We had 100 Ayrton Cobras in use, which were just new at the time of pre-programming. Depence visualized these in great detail; this of course saves a lot of work on site. I think the Depence software is on the right track not only to be a visualization software, but also as an intermediate tool to bring the process from initial design drafts to production implementation and on-site support closer together and simplify it significantly.” // Marek Papke (Gerdon Design)

https://gerdon.tv/de/

 

Live Pictures of show content by Julian Huke

Behind the scenes pictures by Gerdon Design

Junior ESC 2022 | Designed with Depence

Light Art Studios preprogramming “Wetten, dass..?”

Moon Man’s Landing Festival visualized w/ Depence

The lighting design of last year's Junior Eurovision Song Contest, which took place in December in Armenia was realized by independent LD and programmer Raphaël Demonthy, all with the help of Syncronorm’s Depence software system.

Demonthy, who was entrusted with the conception and realization of the lighting design for the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2022, is otherwise active in the fields of TV, automotive, special events, live and musical design. This time he relied on Syncronorm's show design and visualization software Depence to express his creative ideas and visual output. His connection to the ESC reaches way back to 2017 and 2018, when he had the opportunity to work as Lighting Director for the big brother of this event, held in Portugal at the time. In addition, Demonthy has provided lighting design support to several delegations at the ESC.

The Junior ESC is basically a smaller version of the worldwide known and popular music format, in which various artists compete against each other, and at the end of which the audience of the participating countries votes to determine the winner. However, in terms of effort and staging, the JESC does not have to hide from its larger variant. Broadcasters such as the BBC also broadcast the show to the 16 participating countries, while the show reached over 33 million viewers.

For the 2022 edition of the show, Demonthy can call on a great creative team that brought a lot of experience to the production. Chris Moylan, light designer and light operator took over the complete show light programming for this job. Matthias Schöffmann programmed the media servers. Matthias Hagel programmed the key light and follow spots, he was also at the ESC 2011 in Düsseldorf. Tobias Heydthausen was there as lighting design assistant and during the rehearsals as contact person for the delegations. Nick Charalampidis, also a veteran in the ESC business, was server engineer. Christian Glatthor and Matthias Held were responsible for the Follow-Me System.

To make his workflow for the production of the JESC as optimal as possible, Demonthy turned to Syncronorm’s Depence visualizer for preproduction. First, he drew his designs in Vectorworks to take the venue's technical specifications into account. This drawing was then imported into Depence using MVR export, and it was already here that the first benefits of pre-production visualization became clear to him, as he was able to check whether all the angles and positions created were suitable for the lighting.

“In the next step, I immediately use this file to create renderings. And there I have to say for me that Depence is in my opinion, for fast realistic renderings exactly the right tool, where I can create live quickly and effectively my light images and it is not far from the real world, but I have often had that customers have asked me whether it is now real or yet rendered.” - Raphaël Demonthy, 2022

The set design of the JESC was mostly shaped by the video-ready LED tubes, which frame the stage above and below. Demonthy tried to enhance the stage itself by using the lighting design to let it appear much bigger than it was. For this effect he tried to fill the gaps of the stage with lighting. This means that the traverses in the stage area, which are arranged in a circular manner to follow the shape of the stage, can offer the possibility for individual looks for every participating country. In this way, totally different looks for each show could be achieved, while the stage is staying the same. 8 of the traverses can also be brought into different positions and angles due to C1 motors to achieve different looks. To that the team also relied on additional C1 light pods, which were equipped with ClayPaky Axcor 600 profiles.

The main LED wall is framed by Tambora Battens, because Demonthy was meaning to give this part of the wall special attention in terms of visually strengthen the outer lines of the video content design. Left and right to the stage, spot and wash lines were placed to achieve the desired effect of widening the stage to give it more presence and radiance. Both catwalks which are leading from the stage to the green room, where each candidate is resting in between shows, are framed by Mythos 2 as well as Mini-Bs.

“Since I had already created the file for the renderings, it was obvious that we also do the complete pre-programming with Depence. But with the size of the system, we are talking about a lighting system of over 1,200 fixtures + C1 + LED tubes etc., we were not quite sure if the performance is sufficient and we have to say we would not have expected it, but the performance in terms of fluidity, which affects extreme timings as well as the much better real representation of light properties of the fixtures and the effect on objects is a lot better in Depence than with another popular visualizer from Canada.” – Demonthy

Full Equipment List of the Junior Eurovision Song Contest 2022:

78x CP Scenius Spot

70x CP Scenius Unico

60x CP Axcor Profile 600

36x CP Shotlight wash

72x CP Arolla MP

22x CP Arolla HP

92x Lightsky F230

80x CP Mythos 2

85x CP Beye K25

80x CP Beye K20

22x FineArt 1537 Led Wash

42x CP K10 Wash

60x FineArt 1519 Pixie

200x Mini-B’s

94x CP Tambora Batten

94x CP Tambora Linear

40x PR lighting Bar

30x M1500 Led Par

6x MDG

6x Fan

As programming days on location are becoming more and more short, Demonthy praises the possibilities of Depence in terms of preprogramming at the Prefocus studio in Berlin beforehand. He also states that the real-life parameters of fixtures are a huge help while doing so, as much more knowledge about every lighting fixture out there is needed while using visualizers from other companies. With Depence, he is able to work as close to reality as possible due to the real-time lighting behavior of the fixtures. For Demonthy, the combination of different components such as NDI or C1 and the nonetheless stable and high frame rate is also a big win.

“The bottom line is that it was really fun to design the lighting with Depence and we are very confident that it will bring us even further forward for future projects.”

 

(c) pictures on location by Optikalusion

The famous entertainment show "Wetten, dass...?", which attracts an audience of millions in German-speaking countries, celebrated a furious new TV experience in November 2022. Syncronorm's multimedia & show design software Depence was used for pre-production in this budget-rich project.

Light Art Studios, a young five-headed preprogramming studio, newly established in Hamburg, Germany were responsible for this year’s creative part of lighting design at the venerable German entertainment show “Wetten, dass..?”. The show around cult presenter Thomas Gottschalk attracts an audience of millions every year and is structured around bets to be won by various participants. In addition, world-famous show acts also perform and heat up the audience between the bets.

The studio, in which the preprogramming for these shows took place, includes two fixed lighting desk workstations and an optional additional workstation as well as a dedicated 3D workstation. The team is primarily active in the areas of TV, concert, touring, theater, musicals, trade shows, advertising and corporate. A special feature of the new studio in Hamburg is also that it is open to other designers and operators.

As for the show act itself, no other than famous music acts such as Robbie Williams, Tate McRae, the Moulin Rouge musical show and famous German singer-songwriter Herbert Grönemeyer were entertaining the audience in between the candidates and their bets. Light Art Studios worked very closely with the lighting designers of the various acts, to ensure a fabulous show experience for the live audience as well as everyone in front of their TVs. Lucas Hoyer, employee at the studio, thereby did the work on the Depence file while preprogramming. Raphael Grebenstein was responsible for the lighting direction and operation for all four show acts. The main client for the production was the German TV channel ZDF, on which the program was also broadcast. ZDF also provided the responsible Director of Photography Volker Schmidt and Tom Stockinger as well as the operators for deco light and white light. The decorative light was set up on site by ZDF as well.

“Depence is an integral part of our workflow, both to quickly present results to clients in the form of renderings, to check feasibility in set designs, and to pre-program productions and save time and money on location.” – Raphael Grebenstein, 2022

In their workflow, Light Art Studios first worked with Vectorworks to draw the plans for the show concept, this also included addressing the lights on stage. The set design was then mostly created in Cinema4D, which was then edited and polished again in Depence. The same applies to the LED wall and UV mapping. In Depence, all the threads then came together, and the various project elements were merged thanks to the extensive import functions of the software. This was followed by an adjustment of the respective textures. In the Depence project, different layers have now been created to manage the shows of the four acts. The camera movements were then carried out via DMX camera.

“Since we now have 3D CAD plans available in 90% of cases anyway, the import into Depence is done quickly and so results can be achieved quickly even on the road without a lighting desk. Fast support is also another PLUS.”

 

The project itself relied on the following equipment:

170x Martin Mac Encore

160x Elation Smarty Hybrid

61x Martin Mac Quantum

51x Robe Robin 800 LED

JB Lighting Sparx18

5x Robe Forte Followspot

3x Robe Forte

19x GLP S350

58x GLP JDC-1

180x Expolite Tourled42

12x GLP creativ light1

 48x Varilite VL5 LED

 06x GrandMA3 light

 12x GrandMA3 PU

 13x GrandMA3 8port Node

 2x GrandMA3 4port Node

 

Live-Picture Credit: ZDF / Sascha Baumann

For the first annual Moon Man’s Landing Festival 2022 in Cleveland Ohio, creative firm Raw Cereal relied on Syncronorm’s multimedia show design software Depence as a necessary part of production. The festival was curated by artist Kid Cudi, in whose performances Depence has been used as a visualization and design tool for some time now.

“Pre-visualizing a performance is a common workflow for any of our projects” says Anders Rahm, a longstanding member of the Cudi visual team and EP/CD of the project and Partner at Raw Cereal. “On many occasions, we’ve been able to show Scott/Cudi what his performance will look like to the audience and make notes or comments from the comfortable location of a rehearsal studio. Our pre-visualization phase with Depence allows us to plan each show before it loads-in and show any of our clients the lighting, video, special effects, and more, all programmed beforehand.”

Lighting Designer and Programmer of the project, Austin Schneider also uses Depence anywhere he can, and comments on the high frame rates on his portable machine. “On a plane or backstage at a festival, having Depence in my pocket gives me confidence that my programming is ready for the live show and my presets will match what is onstage. Programming brings out the details in the music, and Depence brings out the details in the production that I can see up close on a screen down to the pixel, which is very necessary with today’s multi-instance and pixelated fixtures.”

Alongside the Raw Cereal team, laser operator and programmer Macy Rupp with StrictlyFX used Depence to pre-program the lasers for this performance as well, making it a cohesive workspace for the best show possible.

“The workflow is too simple”, says Jacob VanVlymen, Associate Designer and Technical Director on the project. “We were able to move from Vectorworks to Depence using MVR during the design process, showing us what we needed to see and even test ideas. There are no hoops to jump through and it works, our creativity has no limits when using Depence.”

“We will continue to use Depence as our pre-vis tool, and we look forward to seeing the software become the best it can be, allowing us to provide our clients with the best shows we can come up with, much thanks to Depence for the great product.” Cort Lawrence, EP/CD and Partner at Raw Cereal.

 

Creative Direction:

  • Raw Cereal
  • Anders Rahm
  • Cort Lawrence

Screens Director:

  • Raw Cereal
  • Eric May
  • Grant Draper

Show Design:

  • Raw Cereal
  • Austin Schneider
  • Jacob VanVlymen

Laser Programming:

  • Macy Rupp

 

picture copyright by alivecoverage

Depence Visualization | Bavaria Sounds 2022

Laser Studio UA | Depence delivers endless possibilities

Scorpions | Rock Believer World Tour visualized w/ Depence

The Bavaria Sounds 2022 festival starring amazing international artists such as Andreas Gabalier, Helene Fischer and Robbie Williams was one of Europe’s biggest open-air events of the year, located on the compound of the Messe München in Munich, Germany. Syncronorm are elated that our show design and visualization software Depence was in use to create this massive event, where ~325.000 tickets were being sold.

The three shows took place on three consecutive weekends. The team, that dealt with the lighting and video side for these special shows consisted of light and video designer Roland Greil, associate designer Troy Eckerman, studio associate and LX programmer Michael Kuehbandner, LX programmer Klaus Kubesch, video programmers Leo Hermann and Tom Levin as well as video director Haegar De. The previsualization suite, running the Depence software system, was built by THE X4 COLLECTIVE under the directive of Markus Neubauer.

“For me and the whole team Depence was a great support in the realization of the three shows in Munich. Without such a Previz set up, we would not have been able to cope with the workload and deliver such detailed shows. Especially the detail accuracy of the system and the realistic reproduction are impressive and made our work easier.” – Roland Greil, Light & Video Designer

As the creation of the Depence visualization was a key element in preparing the actual shows, performance of the files was given some very special attention, while nonetheless keeping the visualization of the stage, musicians, live crowd as well as the whole architecture around as detailed as possible. This gave the show design team the best possible outcome to get going with their ideas. To display the different stage setups of the artists, layers were applied within the Depence project, and all fixtures were multi-patched within the lighting desk. The previz suit itself along with all technical requirements was built within a climatized container in the backstage area of the stage. A wide 50” screen along with four 21” screens were placed for each working space and a DMX camera was used to program various virtual viewpoints as well as fly overs via GrandMA console. Possible video streams from the local Disguise Server were transformed from HDMI signal into NDI and thus streamed into the Depence Server.

“The Depence mapping editor was a great help in dealing with the video surfaces. The outputs of the Disguise VX 4 server came into the system via HDMI->NDI converters and could thus be mapped to the video surfaces without any problems. The resulting latencies were pleasantly low. By consistently optimizing all of the 3D objects in our model, the overall performance was equally pleasing given the scale of the project!” – Markus Neubauer, THE X4 COLLECTIVE

Since it was critical for the modeling of the Depence project to be as accurate as possible, actual 3D models of the architecture were first created in and exported from Vectorworks, then optimized in Cinema 4D to get the best result resource-wise and finally imported to Depence. The stage itself was over 130 meters in width, 65 meters deep and 20 meters high and placed on an open-air area with around 100.000 square meters. The mapping of the massive LED walls used for the concerts was also done directly in Depence, all with the help of the integrated mapping editor. To that, one special facet of the visualization was the realistic and functioning display of the semi-transparent LED wall in the center of the design as well as the mapping of the Neonflex LEDs all along the edges of the stage and it’s back. The patching of the project was done in Vectorworks as well and then was easily imported via MVR file into Depence.

“As a Studio Associate, i am in charge of translating Roland's design ideas into technical planning documents from the very beginning and it was especially important to me to have a pre-programming that is as close to reality as possible and at the same time performant enough to represent this enormously large stage and terrain. Due to the close cooperation with Markus Neubauer and our common experiences from many previous Depence projects, we succeeded again this time.” – Michael Kuehbandner

Equipment used:

  • 479x Movinglights
  • 429x intelligent Lights
  • 164x 8 light Blinder
  • 18x MDG ATME
  • 18x LOOK ORCA
  • 5x GrandMA 3 Full Size im 2er Mode
  • 8x GrandMA2 NPUs
  • 40960 MA Parameter available, around 32000 used Parameters

www.x4.design

Bavaria Sounds LX & Video Creative Crew:

Tom Levin Schwenzle | Video Programmer & Design Assistant

Haegar Deutsch | IMAG Director

Michael Kuehbandner | Studio Associate & LX Programmer

Roland Greil | Lighting and Video Designer

Bianca Mastroianni | FollowMe

Troy Eckerman | Associate Designer

Leo Herrmann | Video Programmer

Klaus Kubesch | LX Programmer

 

Stating that a modern event isn’t complete without the integration of projections and multimedia technologies, Laser Studio from Kyiv, Ukraine, are counting on Syncronorm’s multimedia show design & visualization software system Depence, to plan & realize their various projects, ranging from product presentations to inauguration ceremonies or simply fictional show experiments.

We have talked to Yevhenii Poriadyn, main man behind the studio, who gave us some interesting insights at three totally different design approaches the designers have created within the last couple of months and even back to mid Covid pandemic.

At first, we have Laser Studio creating a show for the presentation of the latest Toyota Land Cruiser 300 model, which had to be done mid pandemic with full respect for the safety of the audience. The event agency which had worked for Toyota came to Laser Studio because they proposed to do a virtual 360° presentation, which then was realized with the help of Depence. The flexibility in creating textures and materials in Depence, was a huge help to the realization of the project, as the car was modelled in a most realistic 3D model and then presented in an exact 3D copy of the Kyiv metro room. Set designer Sandro Koridze created a fantastic virtual light show, which accompanied the presentation most phenomenal. The show was programmed via lighting desk in the studio and then streamed via DMX. The project then was rendered in stunning 4K 360° video quality.

The second project, Yevhenii told us about is the opening show for the all-new Bucha Shopping Center in the suburbs of Kyiv. The customer asked Laser Studio for a specialized multimedia show with a focus on maximum accuracy. For this reason, Laser Studio again relied on Depence and its powerful visualization capabilities. The modelling took place in Depence only, after receiving detailed drawings provided by the client. The shopping centre’s architecture was emphasized to build a fitting light show afterwards as centre for the stage performance. It was decided to mainly use high-power laser projections, all included 1:1 in the extensive Depence fixture library, simulating reality in a detailed and accurate way. Building the actual show was then coordinated very well due to the detailed Depence visualization and its compatibility to Pangolin Beyond. Therefore, all preparations of the laser content were as well done in Depence.

Finally, Yevhenii introduced us to a third project, done with Depence. The most recent show case depicts the opening celebration of a factory near the city of Kryvyi Rih. The show was given some extra with the implementation of a drone show, which was enhanced by laser effects from the ground. Depence perfectly fit for the task because of the complexity of the show as all features could be visualized in one. The location area is 60.000 square meters with the Kryvyi Rih National University as centre of the installation. The show consisted of 150 drones as well as four towers spread over 100 meters where 16 laser projections were integrated.

“Depence is a fantastic program that renders beautiful videos and images. This makes it possible for technical services to be prepared in advance.- Yevhenii Poriadyn, Laser Studio UA, 2022

www.laserstudio.kiev.ua

Who would think that a remote and solitary dark room located somewhere on the outskirts of Hamburg, Germany would turn into a fully equipped pre-programming studio with the sole purpose of preparing the Las Vegas residency of the German rock band Scorpions in April 2022?

After a two-year delay due to Covid-19, production designer Manfred Nikitser and Depence engineer Otto Schildknecht spent 12 hours per day working on getting everything up and running for the “Rock Believer” World Tour 2022/23. In their pop-up studio, everything revolved around a 68-inch flat screen that was mounted at the back of the room. On display was a Depence animation of the Scorpions playing on stage, vivid flames shooting left and right behind them, and a mass audience cheering them on. Manfred’s grandMA3 console was set up right in front of the screen, while half a dozen laptops and computers were organized into individual workspaces around. From behind, the buzzing sound of a massive server rack filled the silence. Usually, however, recordings of the Scorpions were heard all day long. Manfred explains that “our work here at pre-programming is targeted at connecting and creating the dynamic between all visual elements, which we will have in Vegas, on-site. We have set up the entire network here in the studio the way it will be in the venue, to make sure all components are speaking to each other and also to pre-program the show as efficiently as we can, before everything comes together.

The Scorpions’ residency took place at Zappos Theater at Planet Hollywood Las Vegas from 26 March to 16 April 2022. The show presents an entire new stage set, video content and lighting design. In addition, the Scorpions premiered brand new songs from their latest album “Rock Believer”. Not only was the album just released at the beginning of this year, but it also bears the title of the world tour that will take place right after the residency, continuing until 2023.

With new tunes mixed with the old classic hits, it was important for Manfred to get his new design ideas across to the band and the management as best as possible. Using Depence was the way to go since, according to Manfred, “it is always easy to talk about things but it’s much better if you can show them through a moving image. So, rendering all these ideas and showing the band a video with music, like ‘this is what I am talking about’ and not talking in theory but rather having something to show that is close to reality, was very important.”

This was especially the case with visualizing the beginning of the show since one major focus of the new production design was to deliver a strong opening. Manfred remembers that it “was something we looked into in detail very early. We pre-programmed an idea of how the show opening can be and presented that to the band. Thanks to Depence it was possible to show the opening in a dynamic way, by recording all the elements in the upfront and then rendering it afterwards. That gave us a level of quality that we didn’t have in the past.” Manfred adds that “we pushed it really to the limits of what is possible by involving special characters, by involving the built-in audience within Depence, also by involving kinetics, et cetera, to really show the dynamics within the production design and to give the band options for extras, such as lasers or other elements, pyro, all of that. This was not planned but just to show ‘ok, we could do this in this song and this in that song’.

Even beyond visualizing lighting looks and effects, Manfred emphasizes that “Depence was a huge asset throughout the entire process, not just for the production design process but also for the construction design phase.” While pre-programming had just started at the studio in Hamburg, the stage set, at this point, was already designed, built, and en route to Las Vegas.

On planning the stage set, Manfred explains that his goal was to create “a steel metal analogue look in a traditional rock’n’roll way.” To facilitate this creation process, he elaborates that “one of my personal key assets for this design, other than the easy workflow with the MVR export, was the usage of PBR materials. That gave me the option to look in detail into the haptics of the set design before even thinking about lighting,” adding that “once the set architecture and dimensions were planned and approved by our production management, we went through different PBR materials and did a lot of renderings.” The outcome is a spherical architecture, constructed out of metal grids that were specifically chosen, custom cut and colored for this set. Its arch structure serves as an optical rupture to the overall linear lighting and rig construction surrounding the stage. The pyramid- shaped drum riser that stands in front of the set is built with same material, completing the overall analogue characteristic of the stage set design.

With only a few days in the theater to rehearse and to prepare for opening night, the ability to visualize all the looks and ideas as precisely as possible has been key to creating and programming this show in advance. Regarding the overall development process, Manfred concludes that “Depence closes the gap within production designing phases because it is a software that finally involves all the elements that are used within entertainment.” As a last statement, he adds that “we are all very ambitious when it comes to presenting ideas and, finally, we have a tool that allows us to connect all the different technologies, such as lasers, lighting, video, all of that, in one software and render it in a quality where you stop and think ‘is this a photo or is this a rendering?’” Now, at last, the design is neither a photo nor a rendering. It has finally become a live experience to be enjoyed in Las Vegas.