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HSL Takes no Monsters at Rockness

HSL supplied lighting production and crew to the Main and Clash Tent stages at the 2008 Rockness Festival, staged on the shores of Scotland's famous Loch Ness.

It was the second year running that HSL has worked on the event, produced by Loudsound Events and production managed by Lee Charteris. HSL's crew chief Ian Stevens headed a strong team of Steven Abbiss (LD Main stage), Davey Sherwin (LD Clash stage), Rob Starksfield, Rick "Avo" Butler and Andy "Paris" Hilton. The production lighting design for both stages was created by HSL's Mike Oates, who also project managed.

The Main stage was a Serious Structures Solar Roof below which HSL sub-hung four trusses for lighting. This was headlined by Fatboy Slim on the Saturday and Razorlight on Sunday. All the moving lights on this stage were Robe ColorWash 700 and 1200E ATs and ColorSpot 700 and 1200E ATs, chosen for their brightness and reliability in outdoor environments.

The back and mid trusses both featured six ColorSpot 1200s and six ColorWash 1200 fixtures plus four Martin Professional Atomic strobes. The front truss had eight ColorSpot 1200E ATs, six ColorWash 1200E ATs, six ETC Source Four profiles, and either side were double hung runs of trussing rigged with a total of six Robe ColorWash and six ColorSpot 700E ATs.

For Fatboy Slim's set, for which Abbiss also operated, he added 16 JTE PixelLines to the mix which were positioned vertically upstage. Abbiss controlled all lights using an Avolites Diamond 4 console - his desk of choice for large shows and for festival set ups where he also had to light several other bands throughout the event. Fatboy bought in his own video visuals and five lasers for his show, and HSL supplied copious amounts of smoke and haze and three Robert Juliat Cyrano followspots for this stage.

An additional ‘advanced' truss was rigged to contain Razorlight's illuminated sign that bordered the stage for their performance, with its upstage side rigged with two bars of six PARs, specified by their LD Max Conwell. He operated their show with his own grandMA console and an additional floor based lighting package.

Main stage sound was supplied by SSE and video hardware by PSL, and the FOH tower offered commanding views over the Loch behind the stage which were enjoyed by everyone.

The popular Clash tent was headlined by The View (LD Brian Mandeville) on Saturday and Underworld (LD Haydn Cruickshank) on Sunday. HSL installed a 12 x 9 metre JTE spiggoted ground support system, which was both a challenge and a balancing act because of the uneven ground. The ground support also incorporated PA wings allowing audio suppliers Project Audio to hang their arrays.

On the box were 12 Robe ColorSpot and 12 ColorWash 700E ATs for moving lights. Six Source Fours graced the front run of trussing for key lighting, along with eight 4-lite Moles for the audience illumination and eight Atomics for strobe-tastic moments. The other generics were three bars of 6 PARs and four bars of ACLs, six short nosed PAR cans for the floor, and - naturally - smoke and haze.

The two headline acts had extra ‘house' floor lights available in the form of four ColorSpot and four ColorWash 700E ATs and four sets of 2-lite Moles. Sherwin controlled all this using a WholeHog 3 console and a USB Wing, and they also had an Avo Pearl Expert in residence. The latter was used by Brian Mandeville for The View, along with extensive floor lights that he brought in and utilised in addition to the ‘house' rig. Underworld used the already available floor extras, and augmented them with 32 i-Pix Satellites of their own.

The event went extremely smoothly for HSL. Ian Stevens comments: "Everything on site was highly organised which helped us all work quickly and efficiently, and we also had good weather which was great."

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HSL Takes no Monsters at Rockness

23rd June 2008

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