Swedish Theatre Saves with ETC Selador LED Lighting

When Gothenburg City Theatre in Sweden received funding from the regional government to spend on energy-saving measures, the first thing the technicians thought of replacing was their energy-hungry cyclorama lighting. With the help of Peter Wikström, project manager at One Two Sales in Gothenburg, the technicians opted for ETC's Selador Vivid-R LED fixtures, which, among other things, allowed the theatre to gain some 15' of stage depth. Previously, a large gap had to be kept between the luminaires and the cyc wall itself. The Selador fixture, which can be mounted on the last flying bar, allows a greater area of stage to be used.

The Vivid-R fixture combines Luxeon Rebel LEDs and high-efficiency lenses for a strong cutting beam of light and maximum color production. The Selador x7 Color System is optimized to create intense, vibrant colors across the entire spectrum.

Anders Johanssen, lighting manager at the theater, says: "I was looking for a light that could combine the old traditional halogen cyc with the possibilities of modern LEDs. It was important to be able to do long smooth fades and quick strobe fades. And, with our very large cyc wall, we didn't want to have fillers on the floor."

Wikström adds, "We looked around at competitor products, but Selador was by far the best for the job. It fulfilled the need for a smooth dimming curve, with no dip or flicker at the end. And the color-mixing on Selador is better than any other LED fixture. The theatre cyc wall is a 15m x 25m [49' x 82'] curved wall. The fixtures couldn't be too close to it; otherwise, the audience would be able to see the wall's texture. However, we still needed to get an even light across the entire area. We ended up using 20 special double yokes and cross-shooting the fixtures' beams so that they could all be focused from the same lighting truss."

Gothenburg City Theatre expects to cut expenses substantially with their new cyc lighting. "We calculated the amount of savings we could achieve from replacing the 48 1kW cyc lights with Selador," says Wilkström. "When full on, Selador luminaires use a little over 11.5kW, while the cyc lights they replace use 48kW. Per year, this could be a savings of around €21,000 [$30,000 USD] or almost €360,000 [$510,000 USD] over the 50,000-hour lifetime of the Selador fixtures." Efficiencies will also come from eliminating frequent replacement of lamps and filters.