#vari-lite

At my school there are going to be at least 7 people who are lighting design majors, not including the incoming freshman. And because of how many of us there are, considering that we are a small university, we felt the need to ask if we could take a trip to Texas next year.

For the Vari-lite certification tests.

So the Assistant ME, whom I love to death, said that he is definitely going to ask the school to sponsor it because there are enough of us to make a trip that is worth it. And he said that even if we can't get the school to send us, we can all just go together and cover the costs ourselves which I am totally willing to do.

It also helps that my boss and the Assistant ME are both certified and have the service manuals in their offices that are available for some light reading (HA PUN).

Beyond excited to take apart various fixtures all day in some hot Texas weather and get a pretty piece of paper with my name on it that's gonna be framed in the gel room amongst the 5 other VL certificates in there.

Vari-Light has always made me happy. Mostly because of my most favorite fixture ever, the VL1000. And now they do exactly what I would do if I were in charge, release even smaller fixtures, the unparalleled flexibility. The new VL440 spot fixture takes something none of us should have to live without, CMY, and throws it into a 400w arc fixture with 15-35° zoom and seven gobos. So wonderful!

Martin is doing some cool stuff too. They've effectively replaced their Mini MAC with 2 fixtures. A Smart MAC - 150w arc, 8 colors, 6 gobos and the new MAC 350 Entour - a Smart MAC with an LED light source. Also quite exciting, they've slapped some new lens configurations on the 2k and the 250 to better match the old High End Studio Beam. That leaves all of us in Musical Theatre out of the loop, since they only offer the TW1 as something remotely capable of subtlety.

Thankfully Vari-Lite has covered their bases, much the way Meyer Sound has a global concept and extends that to every sub-brand. Every Meyer speaker sounds the same, from the MM1 to the MILO line array which allows amazing creativity in spaces that require long throw, fills and surrounds. VL does much the same where we might have 8 VL3500's as long throws, some VL2500's from the balcony, gobs of VL1000's to replace SourceFour's and a handful of VL440's as boom replacements.