French lighting designer David Seligmann-Forest of Paris based Lite4Life chose ten
Robe DL4S LED profiles to be right at the heart of his lighting rig for MasterChef
Algeria, which was recorded in a new purpose-built studio and former envelope
factory in El Hamis, a suburb of the bustling, vibrant capital of Algiers.

Seligmann-Forest was working as both LD and Director of Photography for
broadcaster the Allegorie Group who produced 8 episodes of the series plus the
finale, which was a huge hit with the public. He is one of France’s leading TV
lighting specialists and has also worked on the French version of the series, which a
few years back gave him the initial opportunity to use the first generation of Robe’s
then DLS units.

He has been a fan of Robe for some time and is a bit of a pioneer when it comes to
introducing LED lighting into French TV. A couple of years back, he was the first to
utilize Robe’s LEDWash 600 fixtures on a variety of shows.

The DL4Ss – purchased by the Allegorie Group – were installed in the roof of the
studio for the duration of the MasterChef Algeria recording period and also chosen
for their shuttering capabilities.

He used the DL4Ss for key lighting the contestants, the presenters and the judges
wherever they were on the set.

His favourite colour temperature is 4200K, which came from the days when they
were using older discharge lamp moving lights which didn’t have the facility to vary
colour temperatures. They would frequently be working on programmes staged both
indoors and outdoors or that contained mixed lighting, for example daylight might
be flooding in through windows, so using 4200-4300K was a way of straddling
daylight and artificial light temperatures … and maintaining a nice balance for
whatever action was taking place on camera.

Today, with the most modern LED lights, it’s possible to take a different approach,
but the 4200 CT technique has stuck with Seligmann-Forest.

He worked on the MasterChef Algeria show with lighting programmer Edward “Ted’
Hall.

Just after the MasterChef series was recorded, the DL4S profiles were used for a
conference for the African Forum of Investment and Business at the new CICA
(Centre International de Conferences Algiers), a brand new 6000 capacity
conference venue which is part of a new 270,000 square metre international
conference development, currently the largest in north Africa.

Here Seligmann-Forest’s crew made use of the DL4S’s ability to run over sACN
protocol and work as an sACN node to help connect other lights into the network via
Ethernet. This reduced the consumption of DMX lines which were limited and needed
to be deployed elsewhere on the rig and run lights that didn’t have control
alternatives. “It’s an extremely useful function:’ comments Seligmann-Forest.

He has also used Robe’s DL7S LED Profile on the French TV show “Retour en Terre
Inconnue’. Supplied by Impact Evenment, this is another fixture he really likes for
its smooth and subtle colour mixing and intends to incorporate more into future
designs.