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Christmas at Vatican City with SGM

During the traditional Christmas celebrations that took place last December, three locations were set inside Vatican City and various products of Italian company SGM were chosen for the lighting rig.

Light contractor Sound D-Light srl performed the three installations and Pat Henry, lighting designer for the event, used a huge number of SGM fixtures: Genio Mobile, Palco 3, Ribalta, Pilot 2000, Pilot 3000, Synthesis Spot 700.

Pat Henry, supported by Luca Domenicucci and Paolo Marcuzzi of Sound D-Light srl as lighting operators, stated: "We lit the big Christmas tree inside Aula Paolo VI, the back of the same hall where the huge bronze statue the Resurrection is and the Christmas crib placed outside in St. Peter's Square.

“I essentially used Ribalta, Palco 3 and Genio fixtures to create the different white and colour hues - mainly violet and blue - both for the backgrounds and to give value to details; this task was performed simply by choosing the right interchangeable optics from time to time. We managed to obtain a good scenic result which brought out the bronze statue of the Resurrection tight behind the Pope. For this purpose, I used five Ribalta with 30° asymmetric lenses placed on the back as backlights, one Genio Mobile with 8° lens inside the sculpture itself, four Palco 3s with 25° lenses for cuts and to light the back, and two Ribaltas with elliptical lens and two with asymmetric lens for the details on Jesus. The effect was so great that I heard that the Vatican asked to make the installation permanent!

“As far as the big Christmas tree on the right side of the hall is concerned, I used four Ribaltas with 8° lenses aimed at the highest part of the branches and five Palco 3s with 25° lenses to light the low portion of the trunk. For the Christmas crib, placed in St. Peter's Square, I used Genio Mobile fixtures with 8° lenses both for "diffuse" illumination and for the details of the sculptures.

“Four Synthesis Spot 700 with gobos were used to light the background. The projectors were controlled by a SGM Pilot 3000 desk, to control the fixtures dedicated to the illumination of the sculpture, the tree and the crib..."

Aula Paolo VI, built with a large amount of reinforced concrete, is covered by a parabolic vault that concentrates the attention of the public towards the stage. The bronze sculpture of the Resurrection, the tree and the crib, offered by the Mexican delegation, are placed on the stage.

Other comments on the installation come from one of the engineers of Sound D-Light srl, Luca Domenicucci, who provided information on cabling and management of the locations. As far as the Christmas crib is concerned, Luca says: "All the cabling passed under the crib stage; in such events a clean stage and a flawless installation are paramount. We chose Pilot 2000s because, in case of voltage drop, it restarts without the need of a direct intervention. We had no guarantees of a continuous technical assistance, so it was rather important to have every unit set in automatic mode."

Luca continues: "Both signal and current cabling were placed on the ground. A DMX line served the bronze sculpture, another line served the background (behind the crib),vthe Christmas crib and the Christmas tree.

“In this case, the system was turned on and off by Vatican staff members. As far as the programming of the Pilot 3000 is concerned, it followed these guidelines: a cue list for the sculpture (three colour changes); a cue list for the Christmas tree (no chromatic changes); a cue list for the background (no position or colour changes); a cue list for the Christmas tree (four colour changes, one cue makes also use of Palco 3 and Ribalta fixtures).

“In order to obtain very "smooth" changes, crossfade times between cuelists were very long.”

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Christmas at Vatican City with SGM

1st February 2008

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