OH BOY It's Robe for Hecht posted: 09/12/2019
Swiss pop-rock band Hecht - well-known for their energized live shows, slick dance moves, foot-tapping tunes, general zaniness and eye-catching post-concert videos - thrilled 13,000 fans at Zurich's Hallenstadion in an energy-fuelled visual and sonic extravaganza which included zip-lining keyboardists, crowd surfing, inflatable pink flamingos and several tons of confetti!
They are a band who know how to entertain!
Show and lighting designer Roger Staub was asked to create a BIG, vibrant and memorable show to end their current touring cycle riding high on their chart-topping third studio album Oh Boy and assisting him to make a massive impact were 98 x Robe MegaPointes and 60 x Pointes!
Roger, who is based in LA and Zurich, first met the band three years ago at the Swiss Music Awards. They asked him to produce this ground-breaking show for which he worked very closely with the artists themselves to ensure plenty of visual drama and craziness were combined with 3 hours of musical fun!
Roger is also a video content creator and his elegant design combined the media of lighting and video perfectly, proportionately putting the band right at the centre of the action on a large (18 x 8 metre) semi-transparent LED screen.
Visually, Roger wanted to create simple and powerful statements and a clean performance space. To keep focus on the band, he proposed the central upstage screen instead of standard left and right IMAGs as one of his starting points.
The concert was also shot for a DVD / documentary film with 15 cameras in total, 11 of which were available for a lively IMAG mix which was cut by John Allen of Live Image.
The screen position ensured that all eyes stayed centre stage, glued to the imaginative collage of multi-angled IMAG images. A vital part of the aesthetic was that the lighting looks worked harmoniously to create a sumptuous bigger picture' combined with the camera mix.
The presence of the screen also required really bright lightsources to punch through, so Roger immediately thought of Pointes and MegaPointes as ideal tools.
For practical as well as stylistic reasons in designing a large one-off, he wanted to refine the number of fixture types on the rig, which was pared down to four, carefully picked for maximum versatility to keep the looks varied and fresh from start to finish of a truly incendiary performance.
In addition to the Pointes and MegaPointes there was a matrix of 84 LED battens around and behind the LED screen, and a scattering of strobes.
He relied on the full multi-functionality of the MegaPointes in particular to provide his beam, spot and wash effects. Roger had used MegaPointes before, but primarily in festival scenarios, so this was the first show with them as the main fixture.
Seventy-two MegaPointes were used around and below the screen, rigged on a series of trusses hung below one another, with 20 x Pointes behind the LED screen, blasting through.
Ten MegaPointes circled the edges of the B-Stage at the end of an 18-metre runway from the stage that got the band right in among their fans, with another six for side lights shooting across the downstage edge of the main stage. The remaining 10 were on the front truss for front light, keys and specials.
Forty Pointes were positioned around the arena on a perimeter truss for lighting the audience along with some LED spheres and LED battens.
The strobes were on the deck behind the backline, and the stage, runway and B-stage were all outlined in LED. The B stage also had a low-resolution video floor.
The concept of reducing the fixture types also speeded up programming whilst they did have some pre-vis time, the on-site lighting programming window of four hours was the only chance to see how things really looked and worked in situ, and in that time, the building blocks had to be fine-tuned and plenty still needed creating!
I wanted to concentrate on the overall looks and in making big, bold lighting statements, explained Roger who knew that the band would be animated and buzzing with energy, moving constantly between stages. This was why he needed front / key lights that also looked great as rear lighting when they were on the B-stage, and that could create curtains of effects.
MegaPointes were absolutely THE right fixtures for getting all that energy offstage and out there and around the room. They easily had the intensity to reach all the way down to the back of the arena and beyond.
MegaPointes proved themselves in every way to be the universal' lighting fixture to ensure this show looked fantastic live and on camera.
I wanted to embrace all the fans with the lighting and pull them into the performance, and this was precisely the effect we achieved with all those beams, he enthused.
The MegaPointe's hot spot control and beam-shaper were gifts in assisting the stark and contrasty IMAG shots they wanted, but so the cameras didn't look washed out.
Roger also loves the prism effects, plus the general brightness. Even with a prism and in darker colours, they were still able to produce amazing backdrops behind the band.
Once the setlist was finalised in the run up to the gig, he thought about colours for each song. The music goes from classic pop to soft rock to banging EDM, so the goal was to get away from traditional blue and red books and go for some more off-beat and adventurous elements of the colour spectrum.
Lots of yellows, pinks, purples and magentas used judiciously and thoughtfully made a refreshing change.
When he did choose a red, the colour palettes were defined to give neon shades - circa 1980's Miami vibes - rather than legacy shades.
Roger used plenty of white, which is a personal favourite, mixing the subtleties of different texturing, tonality and colour temperatures - strikin
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
OH BOY It's Robe for Hecht posted: 09/12/2019 
