Fire Fight Australia posted: 25/02/2020
Over 20 hugely talented artists including Queen Adam Lambert, Olivia Newton-John, John Farnham, Alice Cooper, Delta Goodrem, 5 Seconds of Summer, Tina Arena, Ronan Keating, Hill Top Hoods, Amy Shark, k. d. lang and many more entertained 75,000 music fans - and a worldwide TV audience - all helping Fire Fight Australia raise over A$10 Million for bushfire relief during an emotionally charged, high energy day of performance at Sydney's ANZ Stadium.
Throughout the day, the heroic and super-real efforts of people uniting and the dedicated commitment of the firefighting community were highlighted in the context of the massive fight to save lives, homes and land. The extraordinary spirit and resilience of Australians has shone through and continues with the many efforts and initiatives contributing to rebuilding after the fiercest and most destructive bushfires in Australian history.
The nightmare scenario has touched people worldwide and seen people galvanise in incredible generosity and support with donations of money, general supplies and services to the various organisations assisting the recovery effort. It's brought the need for urgent attention to climate change - once again - into sharp focus.
Presented by comedian Celeste Barber - who has herself raised over A$50 Million for the relief fund - this was arguably THE most significant gig in the world that weekend.
Dave Jackson, Jeff Pavey and a crew from Queensland and New South Wales-based rental specialists Creative Productions were extremely proud to provide the lighting which included nearly 130 Robe moving lights including BMFL Spots, Blades and WashBeams and Spiider LED wash beams.
Their many challenges included an exceptionally short planning period and get in time on site.
Queen Adam Lambert played the stadium the night before ... utilising the same roof but with their own production lighting rig, so that was completely stripped out before Dave, Jeff and their crew of 8 could start their build at 4 a.m. - to hand over for a show-start 8 hours later.
Creative Productions donated the entire lighting rig plus all the preparation expenses and crew wages for this landmark occasion after they were contacted by Colin Skals of promoters TEG DAINTY who organised the event for Fire Fight Australia.
It coincided with three major international tours that they already had in progress - Q AL, Alice Cooper and Michael Bubl - of which the latter was performing in Melbourne that same night, so a portion of this show was beamed live on to screen at the ANZ Stadium.
Dave's production design for the show had to provide great looking lighting for the 20 diverse artists on the bill - and the cameras once the decision was made with about 10 days to go that it would also be a live telecast beamed worldwide.
The only essential brief that they received on lighting was that there would be a large upstage LED screen plus left and right IMAGs so this plus the fact it was in a stadium and had to be available from rental stock during an already busy period Led to Dave's choice of Robe BMFLs as the main workhorse lights on the rig.
I needed something with serious punch, he commented, not just because it was a stadium show, but also for the daytime filming, which covered most of the artists.
Dave thinks that BMFLs are still the only moving light where colours are properly perceptible in daylight, especially the BMFL WashBeams.
The 32 x BMFL Blades were on the floor upstage, making a big, dramatic contrast to the overhead rig, with some on the four overhead trusses, The 36 x BMFL Spots and 36 x BMFL WashBeams were also rigged on the overhead trusses, making up the core of the stage and effects lighting.
The 30 x Spiiders - 15 a side hung on three ladders stage left and right - were added once the telecast was confirmed - picked for their great range of colours and CT whites and also for excellent pixel and ring-control back-of-camera' effects for the side shots. They worked brilliantly in these positions, confirms Dave.
Creative Productions owns over 300 Robe moving lights and has been investing steadily in the brand over the last two years.
In addition to the Robes, Dave used an array of LED battens, strobes, and 4 and 8-lite blinders, together with some additional waterproof beam lights for Q AL's B-stage.
All of these were controlled from a grandMA3 full size which was the main event house' console, with a grandMA2 full size for backup. A Hog 4 was provided for LDs preferring to work from that and a greandMA3 lite was available for any LDs who wanted to take advantage of pre-vis time during the day.
Throughout the day there were around five guest LDs including Queen Adam Lambert's lighting director Graham Feast (the LD is Rob Sinclair) and Scott Warner who is touring with Alice Cooper. Australian LD Brad Alcock from Melbourne ran lights for four bands - Tina Arena, Ronan Keating, Guy Sebastian and Delta Goodrem.
Dave and Pavey looked after all the visiting LDs and ran the lights for all those who didn't have an operator.
The average 15 - 20 minutes sets and quick changeovers were interspersed with video footage capturing some of the incredible efforts and initiatives that are part of the post-bushfire rebuilding programmes, with many stories of survival and heroism.
Celeste Barber yelled thanks repeatedly and with much passion throughout the night in particular to the thousands of volunteer firefighters around the country who battled to exhaustion and some to their deaths we can never, ever say THANK YOU enough, reverberated around the stadium time and time again in an emotive, intense evening that illustrated so much unity in the face of the crisis.
It was the third bushfire fundraising event that Creative Productions has donated its
Most recent headlines
23/12/2025
How guilas Cibae as Dominican Winter League Games Are Locally Produced for Glob...
23/12/2025
BitFire's Jim Akimchuk on Supplying Scalability and Customization in the Clo...
23/12/2025
CAMB.AI Enables European Athletics to Offer Multi-Language SupportPlan is to eventually offer translation into all languages spoken in EuropeBy Ken Kerschbaumer...
23/12/2025
Analysis: As sports media values trend negative, scarcity and quality are king By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Monday, December 22, 2025 - 14:08
Print ...
23/12/2025
ESPN, Disney, and NBA Return to the Animated Altcast Fray With Second Edition of...
23/12/2025
End the Year on a High Note and Donate to the Sports Broadcasting Fund Today! By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, December 23, 2025 - 12:25 pm
...
23/12/2025
The year is winding down, the weather outside is frightful, and it's the perfect time to escape into a story that warms the heart. For listeners looking for...
23/12/2025
A Zeus motor is hot fire tested at L3Harris' Camden, Arkansas, solid rocket ...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Lightware will exhibit several major product innovations at ISE 2026, including the new USB-C BOOSTER-V1, Google Meet. integration for various Taurus UCX models...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
23/12/2025
Taking the Stage at Carnegie Hall-On a Global Scale Boston Conservatory Orchestra students reflect on their epic concert marking the 80th session of the UN Gene...
23/12/2025
Experience the power of WO Automation for Radio's newest service, the System Effectiveness Review. Designed to help you achieve more, a System Effectiveness...
23/12/2025
23 Dec 2025
VEON's Beeline Kazakhstan and Rakuten Symphony Collaborate to A...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
How Steamy Can It Get? Single's Inferno' Season 5 Pre...
23/12/2025
Back to All News
33 Million Global Viewers on Netflix Watched Jake Paul vs. Ant...
23/12/2025
New technique lights up where drugs go in the body, cell by cell Scripps Research scientists developed a technique that maps drug binding in individual cells th...
22/12/2025
SVG New Sponsor Spotlight: Presidio's Neerav Shah on the Role of Its Captiva...
22/12/2025
Hitting the bullseye: Sky Sports readies itself for the biggest PDC World Darts ...
22/12/2025
Unique skillset: Bringing new directors to the world of darts at The Worlds with...
22/12/2025
Gravity Media prepares for a flight of fancy with the PDC World Darts Championsh...
22/12/2025
One hundred and eighty: Gravity Media on hitting the production bullseye at the ...
22/12/2025
The Famous Group's Jon Slusser on Fascinating Fans Through Immersive Content...
22/12/2025
ESPN's Meg Aronowitz on Continuing High-Quality Broadcasts of Collegiate Spo...
22/12/2025
ESPN Takes Data-Driven Storytelling to New Heights with MNF Playbook with Next ...
22/12/2025
For a decade, popular German podcast Fest & Flauschig has hosted an annual Chris...
22/12/2025
Paramount Scores Largest Share Increase Among Distributors as Paramount and CBS...
22/12/2025
New multi-year deal integrates Roku's data to fuel Nielsen's measurement suite
Roku gains access to Nielsen's streaming ratings, showing The Roku C...
22/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
22/12/2025
Berklee Wrapped 2025: Our Top News and Stories A look back at a year highlighted by faculty milestones, major film and television projects, Bob Dylan's ho...
22/12/2025
The works of Plato state that when humans have an experience, some level of change occurs in their brain, which is powered by memory - specifically long-term me...
22/12/2025
Partnership integrates complementary satellite data and AI analytics to enhance security, infrastructure, and environmental monitoring solutions for global cust...
22/12/2025
Workflows allow you to create a sequence of planned events which may be added to your template(s) or inserted directly into your sequential or background playli...
22/12/2025
Monday 22 December 2025
Sky extends PGA TOUR partnership until 2029, as Sky Spo...
22/12/2025
Back to All News
Global Anime Hits and New Releases Take Center Stage at Jump Festa 2026
Entertainment
22 December 2025
GlobalJapan
Link copied to clipboar...
22/12/2025
Siobh n McSweeney, Rory McIlroy, Elon Musk, Catherine Connolly, Jim Gavin, Ivan Yates and Traitor Paudie Moloney lead new characters for Callan Kicks the Year 2...
22/12/2025
Winner announced in the picturesque surroundings of Wicklow's Avondale Tower and Treetop Walk
Andrew Trimble wins the show in his first series as coach
Th...
22/12/2025
The 2025 winners have been announced today, Sunday 21 December, for Ireland's largest choral competition Choirs for Christmas hosted by RT lyric fm.
Ove...
21/12/2025
Back to All News
Legoshi and Haru's Story Reaches Its Finale: BEASTARS Fin...
21/12/2025
John Shortt named Young Sportsperson of the Year Kerry are the Team of the Year
...
20/12/2025
Atomos announced the immediate availability of a new firmware update for its Ninja TX GO and Ninja TX monitor-recorders, unlocking ProRes RAW recording from the...
20/12/2025
CJP Broadcast has completed the digitisation of the European Gymnastics tape archive, converting 328 tapes containing more than forty years of recorded material...
20/12/2025
Bitmovin, the leading provider of video streaming solutions, today announced the launch of the Stream Lab MCP Server, to give AI agents and large language model...
20/12/2025
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
Fire Fight Australia posted: 25/02/2020 
