University of Pittsburgh Lantern Night

At this point in my career, this was probably the most high level and high stress event I’ve worked, yet the challenge was perfect me in my development as an artist. The MagicQ MQ50 lighting console was something I had never worked with before, so I spent a lot of time in prep learning the ropes.

Photos by Claire Emch

From there, I worked with the Fireside team to build out the lighting rigs; we had a mix lights including Chauvet Maverick Storm 4 Profiles, Storm 2s, and Rogue Outcast Washes. We used the storms (as our highest output fixtures) to light an entire face of the Cathedral of Learning building and the Chapel on Pitt’s Campus; at night during the event this created an amazing effect. The washes and other assorted fixtures were used as front and back light for the podium on the stage, however the most complex lighting element wasn’t even done yet.

I had the pleasure of working with the team at Crowdsync to use their custom bracelet wireless LED system, which has been used by artists like Kygo, organizing like iHeartradio, and in football stadiums across the US. We used these as the lanterns the entire audience of 3,000 plus persons would be holding during the show. I used their DMX node to control thousands of grouped LEDs for the biggest moment of the night; the passing of the lanterns from faculty to the first year students of the university.

This moment of the night required that all the lights I’ve mentioned transition from blue to gold. A simple thing in theory but took the work of myself and the entire Fireside team to pull off successfully. The night of the event had a few bumps in the road but with a little quick thinking and the support of the team around me we got it done. The entire crowd cheered and we knew we’d made these freshman’s college experience great. What a great night this was, and what a fabulous experience.

Paperwork by Liam Lyons IV