This past summer, community center and local theatre GC De Kroon in Bocholt, Belgium, invested in a new Elation LED lighting package just in time for the new theatre season. The new energy-efficient lighting upgrade includes both stage and house lighting fixtures, a dynamic state-of-the-art system that will serve the local performance community well into the future. 

Conventional to LED

The transition from conventional lighting to LED lighting was high on the city council’s agenda and Jasper Hendriks, technician at the theatre, was tasked with looking into the newest available technology. According to Jasper, the 400-capacity theatre had several good reasons for wanting to upgrade their lighting system. “One issue was with the conventional 1 kw and 2 kw lighting we had – there was simply no more spare parts for them,” he explains. “Another reason is the local dance schools and associations that use the venue for performances. They were asking for lighting that is more dynamic—a greater variety of colors, cold and warm white light, better side lighting—and we just had no flexibility with the conventional fixtures. They were also concerned with inefficiency of the old system and wanted a cleaner more green-friendly solution.”

On-site demo

In September 2021, Elation Key Account Manager for Benelux, Bert Schmeits, received a call from Jasper who had heard about the quality of the Elation Fuze Profile from another theatre in the area and wanted more information about it and other products. “The starting point was to save energy without compromising on light quality with focus on multifunctionality and ease of use,” Bert said of the initial talk. “After a preliminary discussion and an inventory of the venue’s wishes for the new system, we conducted an on-location demo with products that could replace the theatre’s conventional Fresnel spots and profile spots.”

Fuze Profile

Jasper used both his lux and decibel meter at the demo to measure objectively the lighting and acoustic level performance of each manufacturers’ product. He says they knew they wanted a moving profile fixture because of the flexibility and looked at several different brands. “We have a good relationship with our neighborhood venues and had heard about the Fuze Profile,” he confirmed. “When Bert demoed the fixture, we liked the RGBMA color source and there were other advantages as well like a high CRI and a nice framing system.” The Fuze Profile’s 5-color homogenized LED array not only ensures accurate color reproduction with a beautiful mixed white, it also provides color manipulation features like virtual color temperature and Magenta/Green adjustment plus CMY emulation.

KL Fresnel complement

Looking for a full-color LED Fresnel luminaire to complement the Fuze Profile, the choice fell to the KL Fresnel 8 FC, a high-output soft light with precise color reproduction and adjustable color temperature that houses the same RGBMA color source. Bert elaborates on the advantages, stating, “Because all of the products chosen for the install use a 5-color LED, they are able to produce a complete white spectrum with a high CRI and R9 value so that in addition to each color an extensive CCT channel of 2400K-8500K is available.” Jasper added, “I didn’t expect so much from the KL Fresnel 8 FC in terms of intensity but it actually outputs 18,000 total fixture lumens. We get all the colors plus cold white and warm white CTC just perfectly. It’s very convenient.”

House lighting

Bert says that Jasper also wanted to tackle the venue’s outdated house lighting system which consisted of 48 obsolete 350W light bulbs in the ceiling that gave off a lot of heat and ran off an old 1960’s-era dimmer. Jasper comments, “We needed at least 500 lux on the floor. Our first idea was to change the bulbs out with LED bulbs but the light output was too low. We tried different LED lights from various manufacturers and the Fuze Pendant’s light performance was the best. The color source compatibility with the other lights was a benefit as well and now we can match perfectly the house lighting with what happens on stage.”

Fuze Pendant / E-Fly

The Fuze Pendant is color temperature adjustable from 2,000-10,000K and houses a full spectrum 230W RGBWL array for washes of high CRI white light, subtle pastels or pure saturates. Silent with no fans, output is up to 11,000 lumens. At GC De Kroon they are controlled via DMX through Elation’s E-FLY™ wireless DMX Transceiver, which allows for quick setup, programming and instant control and saves having to run meters of DMX cable. “We did a test set up with the E-Fly on one side of the building and the lights on the other side and it even worked through the walls so we felt very confident in it,” Jasper said. “It works very well and is very smooth.” A simple self-made and programmed DMX controller is used by visiting groups as well as the cleaning crew to easily adjust intensity, color and CTC values.

The new lighting system is made up of 9 Fuze Profile™, 12 KL Fresnel 8 FC™ and 41 Fuze Pendant™ fixtures, along with a NETRON EN12™ node from Obsidian Control Systems. The first phase of the lighting install consisted of the Fuze Pendant house lights and was supplied by 8en of Overpelt of Belgium. The second phase comprised of KL Fresnel 8 FCs and Fuze Profiles and was supplied by De Naarstigheid of Merelbeke also from Belgium.

Bands, artists, traveling companies and local organizations will all benefit from the new LED lighting system and a number of local shows already have. “We really did a lot of research to find the best lighting solution for the venue and it came out great,” Jasper concludes. “The local community will benefit from this investment for years to come.”