When Queen and Adam Lambert were planning their 2017-2018 tour – taking in the
USA, Europe and Oceania, set designers Stufish wanted to showcase the band in a
new and immersive way, and Rob Sinclair was asked to design the lighting.
“I’d seen what Dark Art Creative had done before, and was blown away by the
creativity and precision of the lighting,’ said Sinclair. “I knew that Oli Metcalfe was the
owner and responsible for lighting the shows and, as I’d known him for decades,
contacted him and asked him how he’d done it. He pointed me in the direction of
BlackTrax.’
BlackTrax is the only solution available that can reliably deliver state of the art
tracking on an enormous scale. BlackTrax is a vision-based system that connects to a
range of third-party applications, such as robotic lights, media servers, and any other
device that uses the RTTrPM open protocol, capturing and passing positional 3D
(X,Y,Z) and 6D rotation (yaw, pitch, roll) data to them. This delivers unprecedented
accuracy and repeatability.
Sinclair used Clay Paky Scenius Uncio and controlled them with BlackTrax, with all
seven band members being tracked.
“Follow spots offer very few options and can give variable results which, when you’re
trying to deliver specific effects, can be enormously frustrating,’ Sinclair continued. “I
knew there must be a better way of controlling some fairly complex lighting that could
give me the repeatability which is a key element of any high-profile show.’
“Not only did BlackTrax give us that consistent repeatability, but it also gave us the
ability to create and deliver numerous effects and behaviours that would just not have
been possible without it,’ he added. “We were able to design the whole rig around its
capabilities. The support we got from Oli at Dark Art Creative, as well as Sam
Augustus (BTE on tour), was second to none, and the BlackTrax system has
performed flawlessly throughout the tour.’
“It was a pleasure to work for Rob on this production. He has plenty of fresh ideas on
how to use the system and really knows how to use the Zone Control feature offered
by BlackTrax,’ added Oli Metcalfe of Dark Art Creative.
Stufish based the stage shape – 21m wide by 34m long – for the tour on Brian May’s
iconic custom-made guitar. It is, according to the company, the most technically
advanced show it has created for Queen + Adam Lambert. The main feature is the
eight-ton red chrome, oval-shaped “halo’ kinetic lighting rig above the stage and which
allows for spectacular and dynamic lighting effects. It is 15m wide, 9m deep and 1.2m
high, and has 94 moving lights embedded within a series of mirrored boxes.
