VL4000 Spots Show Their Power and Versatility at Oak Creek Assembly of God

	A Little Boy's Prayer. Photo: Josh Humpa, Oak Creek Assembly of God

In Oak Creek, Wisconsin, the Oak Creek Assembly of God recently produced the musical A Little Boy's Prayer. Set in a small town but with over 200 performers in the show, technical director Nate Turner needed to create a lighting design that could take the congregation somewhere they have never been before. To do this, he needed both multi-faceted and powerful automated fixtures, so he worked with Clearwing Productions who provided him with VL4000 Spot and VL3000 Spot luminaires from Phillips Vari-Lite.

"The VL3500 Spot had been my go-to light for the last couple of years, but when I found out Clearwing had the VL4000 Spots, I was very excited to use them on this show," began Turner. "I first saw the VL4000 Spot at a Clearwing demo and I was immediately impressed by the brightness, but when you add in the extra gobo wheel and the framing shutters, it makes it an extremely versatile fixture."

The company says the VL4000 Spot includes all the tools needed to create dynamic and useful lighting on any stage as every aspect of the luminaire has been designed with performance in mind. The 1,200W VL4000 Spot boasts 33,000 lumens as well as a quiet studio mode which outputs 25,000 lumens. Its high resolution optics ensure remarkable center-to-edge focusing and an unprecedented contrast ratio while a 5:1 zoom covers an amazing 9- to 47-degrees without sacrificing output or clarity.

Turner continued, "Our rig has two sections of catwalk over the house and then a pipe grid as well over the 40' x 90' stage. I placed the VL4000 Spots on the front catwalk for our downstage front light and then I placed the VL3000 Spots on the stage pipe grid for backlighting and aerial graphic eye-candy."

With a 1,200W short arc lamp, the VL3000 Spot luminaire features a 6:1 zoom optics, CYM color mixing, variable CTO color temperature correction, a six-position color wheel, three gobo/effects wheels, a beam size iris, and separate dimmer and ultra-fast strobe mechanisms.

"We try to keep our annual musical fresh so this year I used the VL4000 Spots for our front light to take advantage of their color and gobos to create beautiful textures," added Turner. "The brightness of the VL4000 Spot is perfect for deep, rich colors, plus they have such a great zoom I could paint our entire stage with both color and texture."

Along with the mechanical iris, the beam of the VL4000 Spot can be further modified via the precise four-blade shutter system, independent prism with divergence control, and the variable frost. The Infinity Color Mix System offers CYM color mixing along with variable CTO color temperature correction and dual five-position color wheels. The VL4000 Spot luminaire also features dual rotating gobo wheels with a remarkable new collection of optimized gobo patterns for both aerial and projected imagery, and its dual animation wheels provide dynamic motion effects such as the chromatically tuned Dichro*Fusion effect.

"I really like the brightness of the VL4000 Spot because it gave me great use of color and color temperature to match our conventional fixtures," concluded Turner. "The gobos are also a tremendous asset because all of the patterns are useful. They were quiet in the air, and for me, the framing shutters are a must-have. When you add it all up, the VL4000 Spot is an extremely attractive lighting tool."