Anyone carry stage lighting?

[Tim2723]

Anybody here carry their own stage lighting setups? We've come across a couple of times when we wish we'd had a small, simple setup. Nothing for a big stage, just a couple of cans on a small truss overhead. Any suggestions for a small,portable set up for two guys?

[MikeEdgerton]

If you're carrying speakers with stands mount them on top of the speakers with bungee cords, and no, that's one thing I haven't needed to carry.

[fredfrank]

We had a gig one time where the booking agent said we'd need to bring lighting. This gig paid so well, we went ahead and bought some. I've only used 'em a couple of times since, but the first gig paid for them many times over. Also, if you are playing outside, they help keep you warm.

I wouldn't mount these cans on a speaker, unless you're playing for the Fireman's Ball. Oh, and don't plug these into the same circuit as you PA gear. Or anything else for that matter.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/navigation?N=100001&Ntk=All&Ntt=lighting&Nty=1

[MikeEdgerton]

I play a monthly set with the lights mounted on the speakers, they've been doing it for years.

[Mandodrummer]

We made 2 boxes and installed 3 plain old light sockets in each one. We use colored flood lights from the hardware store and get a good effect by pointing one box at the band and the other shining up towards the ceiling in back of the band. Been using them for 20 years with no problems.

[steve V. johnson]

Most of the places we play are lit, one way or another, already, but I've thought about lights...

One time for our city's "Arts Week" we were asked to play and to invite a couple other acts to a
new, big and nice room, not a performance room, but good for it, with an 18' ceiling. The Arts Week folks got some raised stage platforms and a guy who has a country show band called to offer lights. We accepted and he brought an electrician pal to inspect the power in this old building and set up a secure and adequate circuit for the lights... which was not as complicated as it seems, and he helped put our PA on a separate circuit, too.

The light rig was two T-stands with four lights each with colored gels and two boxes, one that had foot switches so that someone could change the lights from the stage, and the other that was a 'sequencer' (I think) that would change the lights in patterns that could be programmed.

The lights really added to the effect of the bands. The stage looked great. We didn't do very much of the programming stuff at all. One of the other bands had a friend there who knew how to do that stuff, and she made some gentle changes thru their sets and that was nice.

After that I started shopping for lights and pricing them. Before all the money went crazy, some
music/DJ/stage gear stores would offer packages that were similar to what I've described that were just a few hundred bucks. MusFriend had one rig once, in a clearance sale, with six lights, two stands and a controller for under $300. That was pretty attractive. After I learned a little more about the terminologies (I did theatrical lighting in another life, but a lot has changed since then), I shopped around some more and found that there were similar deals around, and it's the package deals that made the best sense dollar-wise. Getting the stuff separately added some significant cost.

It's good for the lights ("cans") to have, or to be able to be fitted with, gel racks so that you can use colored gels (plain white light often looks terrible), and there are different levels of the controller boxes, some that will do a zillion things. It seems that a controller is necessary, and it's nice to have some options even if you only have a few lights. The footswitch things vary in power nad options, too. Simple is good.

But I lost interest when I realized that we rarely use our whole PA, so ... we probably wouldn't really use the lights all that often... We looked at the possibility of renting them out when we werent' using them, but in my circles anyway, there didn't seem to be good demand, so I gave up on 'em.

I've only looked around at lights a few times in the last year, but the good pkg deals seemed harder to find. But I only made a casual inspection, so ... they could still be out there.

It depends on where you play. If you're getting good responses but are playing in dark corners,
yeah, it might do well for you to have 'em.

Iif you decide you want to light your performances, have some looks at places that sell DJ/lighting/stage gear and look for discounted pkg deals.

stv

[Steve G]

Funny, I just sold a stage lighting set last week on Craigslist that I had for 4 years in unopened boxes!!! It was from the same Musicians Friend clearance deal described above. We used to play a restaurant every weekend for over a year and the place had poor stage lighting (like none) so after many nights of construction light experimentation I broke down and bought a nice light system. The restaurant changed hands and cut the grass almost to the day the lights arrived. The need to supply my own lighting never came up again so far. But the need to sell them did.

[Tim2723]

Thanks for the ideas guys. I think I'll pick up one of the small four-can setups. We don't need special effects, but there are times when it's just too dark.

[steve V. johnson]

Before you buy, ask around your area to see if there are any rental firms that can provide 'em, which might or might not be more economically efficient than buying, OR, if there are any bands
that are inactive or willling to share/rent/sell their lights.

If the numbers are good maybe you can twist the venue into some $ for 'em...

fwiw,

stv

[EdSherry]

I echo what Sliabhstv says.

If the problem is that things are "dark" on stage, the cheapest solution would be a bunch of clamp-on style hardware store aluminum reflectors with some colored bulbs (e.g., red and blue), left on during the set.

Not as nice as a full set of PAR-64 cans on a lighting truss with gels and a multi-scene controller, but a lot less expensive.

Most "lighting systems" are set up for you to change lighting during your sets (e.g., what the lighting folks call multiple "scenes"). "Chase" capability seems popular with the disco/rap crowd, but I've never liked it for acoustic music.

If you don't have a budget for a lighting tech as well as a sound man (yeah, right), I'd recommend a footswitchable controller. Some of them allow you to jump directly from one "scene" (e.g., a mixture of red and blue lights) to another (all blue) to "blackout" without scrolling through different scenes.

I have an old MBT system that I bought a while back at a Guitar Center blowout sale that works well. I just bought a nice OnStage truss setup off the local Craig's List.

That said, I do NOT haul it around very often. Too much of a hassle.

[UnityGain]

I'm about to get some small lights to help light up our corner (its not exatly a stage) in a dark bar. All I'm going to do is get some small hardware store clamp lights with alu reflectors and a few higher power compact florecents and some colored plastic. Nice part about the compact florecents is that they draw very little power so they dont allways need their own circut and dont get hot so you dont need to use and sort of special lighting gel, just any type of colored plastic will work and wont melt. And you dont have to worry about buring whatever they are clamped to. They dont dim though, which can be an issue, but you can just get a few diffrerent wattage bulbs and go higher or lower wattage depending on the situation. If your just trying to avoid a dark stage I really cant think of any disadvantage. A little extra light goes a long way. Also, I've never encountered a modern compact florecent light that induces buzzing in sound systems, old bar neons on the other hand....