Intelligent Lights

Intelligent, or moving lights, come in all shapes and sizes. From cheap disco lights to huge world concert touring instruments, the range of moving lights available on the market today is breathtaking. As the technology has gotten more widespread, the cost of these lights has come down considerably. Let’s take a look at some of the major types of moving lights.

 Moving Mirror Lights

Once upon a time, this was most of the market for moving lights. A light source way down in the body of the light shone on a mirror, which directed the image to your desired location on the stage. The limitations of movement of the mirror (usually 180 degrees side to side) were somewhat offset by the blinding speed of movement, but as moving head technology has advanced, these lights have become less prevalent in recent years.

The light pictured is the Roboscan Pro 918, from Martin. It’s a 575W moving mirror light that is very affordable, very bright, and comes packed with features. The lights make a good front light or catwalk light, because from a catwalk you’re very rarely going to be trying to light in 360 degrees. These instruments are also very often less expensive than a comparable wattage moving head light.
Moving Head Wash Lights

It all kinda started with the MAC. One of the first widely available moving head lights, the MAC gave lighting designers the ability to put a big bright blast of color anywhere they wanted, with a full range of side to side motion and 3/4 of a circle of front to back motion, the field that one MAC could cover was groundbreaking. Plenty of imitators followed suit, and the moving head revolution was joined.

Pictured is the newest shining star in the MAC range, the MAC 700 Wash. Using a 700W short-arc lamp, the MAC 700 provides an incredibly bright wash light with a wide focus range and full color mixing, all in a light that can run off 120V power!

 Moving Head Spot Lights

It stands to reason that as soon as it became possible to project a sharp image and patterns in a moving head fixture, that would become the benchmark. The Studio Spot and Mac 600 were early frontrunners in this field, with the ability to project multiple patterns and effects and put them absolutely anywhere. These lights are now the keystone of any moving light rig, as most moving lights manufactured today are hard-edged moving head units.

The unit pictured above is the Martin MAC250 Entour, the mac-daddy (pun intended) of the smaller moving lights. This little puppy has a pile of patterns, a couple of color wheels, and fantastic optics. I’ve used them to great effect in smallish 500-seat sanctuaries all the way up to overstage in a 2200-seat theatre. I was very impressed with the output and flexibility of this little guys.