Robe for Petar Grašo

	Petar Grašo performing at the Zagreb Arena. Photo: LumiLas LLC

Croatian pop singer Petar Grašo completed a trio of sold out high-profile arena shows -- at the Spaladium Arena in Split, the Roman Arena in Pula, and finishing up at Zagreb Arena -- with lighting, video, and scenography designed by Sven Kucinic.

Kucinic uses Robe as his go-to moving lights whenever possible, for which 24 BMFL Spots, 24 LEDWash 600+s, and 24 MMX WashBeams were supplied for two of these three shows -- in Spilt and Zagreb -- together with sound, video, trussing, and staging, by ELDRA.

The production supplier for the second show was the IVAS Group, and the Robe kit included 20 Pointes, 28 LEDWash 600s, 16 BMFL Spots, and 20 CYCFX 8s.

Kucinic, one of the top Croatian lighting designers working with a raft of music clients both regionally and internationally has collaborated with Petar Grašo for the last two years. He was given complete creative freedom in coming up with a lighting concept for these gigs.

Grašo himself proposed the video concept and the content was created by Dragan Ðokic and operated live by VJ Olgierd Kamienski, with Kucinic supervising for the overall color schemes and aesthetics.

The video was simple, straightforward, and in some cases humorous, and bearing all these in mind, Kucinic's goal was to ensure the lighting rig was as clean as possible, a look he achieved by arranging the trusses in a stylishly defined arrow shapes.

He also wanted to leave enough space for the mid-air effects to stand out without cluttering the overall shape and structural integrity of the trussing shape.

The Zagreb show was also recorded for a DVD, so lighting needed to be balanced and lit for this as well as calculated to give the live audience all the dynamics and spectacle they were expecting.

BMFL Spots were the primary hard-edged fixtures and work-horses of the show, positioned on four arrow-shaped trusses in "power groups."

The LEDWash 600s were rigged alongside the BMFLs as rear lighting and also were ideally positioned to be used as effects fixtures. He thinks the individual LED ring macros -- from the original LEDWash -- again proved to be "amazing eye-candy" and ideal for pop environments. He also comments that they produce a highly effective strobing effect.

These had literally arrived at ELDRA's warehouse from the Robe factory in Czech Republic the day before the Zagreb show! "CEO Igor Dražic pulled out all the stops to make sure they made it onto the gig," says Kucinic, well impressed with the service and dedication from one of the top Croatian rental specialists.

The MMX WashBeams have been a favorite of Kucinic's ever since the luminaire was launched, and they are almost a default on his lighting plots when available. They were crucial to giving him the flexibility of balancing between a live pop show and a recording environment. He likes the accurate CMY mixing and the zoom which allow for fine-tuning online or even during the show itself.

The BMFL Spots needed the have all the impact when in a mid-range zoom to still punch through 60 beam lights and a 100sqm 4mm pitch video screen, and the BMFLs "excelled" at the task recalled Kucinic. "This and the fast and precise zoom and the focus tracking are invaluable for quick and effective programming."

The only other lights on the rig were strobes and blinders. Kucinic had originally specified Robe Pointes for the beam lights ... but they are in such incredible high demand across Croatia and the Balkan regions ... that none were available for the Zagreb gig!

In the middle of the show, Petar Grašo made a surprise appearance on a B-stage out in the audience ... for which he was lit with three lasers.

The biggest creative challenge was to get the max out of the lighting configuration as there was effectively no set on the stage ... the architecture was provided by the trussing and the lighting rig had to step up to being the visual centrepiece of the show.

On the technical side, Kucinic was kept busy and on his toes multi-tasking between programming and running lighting and overseeing video content and creating the best options for video recording ... without the time for any camera rehearsals.

He programmed and ran lighting himself with assistance from his LumiLas team mate Juraj Stipetic who, together with Robert Kirša, took care of the lasers.

The lighting crew of Josip Kneževic, Domagoj Pribanic, and Zvonimir Borovac worked hard and long hours to make sure the 18,000 Petar Grašo fans packing into the arena had a fantastic night.