034 REPORT
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
Company: Martin Professional Location: Los Angeles, USA
Photo by Joel Zink
Two venues in the University of Southern California’s (USC) new student centre, the Ronald Tutor Campus Center, feature Martin Professional lighting installations: the Trojan Grand Ballroom and Tommy’s Place. Both installs, completed over the summer, are managed by USC’s Department of Performance Venues. The Trojan Grand Ballroom is a classic 1000-capacity multi-purpose venue with a proscenium stage used for a variety of events like formal dinners and receptions, student group performances, and guest musicians. Tommy’s Place, connected to the on-campus bar, is a 400-capacity entertainment venue with a stage for live performances. Both venues feature conventional and moving lights hung on straight truss over the stage and house, with power and rigging designed as flexible as pos- sible for future additions or changes. Brandon Operchuck, Director of Performance Venues (full-time staff member) and Steve Farquhar, Lighting Director of Performance Venues (student staff member) handled the system and lighting design and also took on the role of installation foremen. Both venues feature Martin lighting packages: MAC 350 Entour and MAC 301 Wash moving heads, Atomic 3000 strobes and Jem K1 Hazers, and Martin M1, Maxxyz Compact and MaxModules for lighting control. “We researched and demoed a lot of gear and the MAC 350 Entour was a pretty clear choice,” Brandon commented, adding that the fixture is the perfect size with the right feature set and price range for the two venues. “Plus, since its functional- ity was as good as lamp discharge fixtures, the LED source was the kicker. We have been unbelievably impressed with it. It performs great - optically, mechanically - next to other discharge fixtures two or three times the price. It has a great beam and output, perfect dimming, and good movement. And it takes so little power!” Brandon said that once they decided to go with the MAC 350 Entour, the MAC 301 followed. “Compared with similar LED wash fixtures, the MAC 301 is a leader and
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there isn’t much competition at that size,” he stated. “It’s a great rock ‘n’ roll light. It has great primary colors, strong output, a nice beam, quick movement, and the zoom is nice to have.” The switch to LED fixtures has given the Department of Performance Venues, and the University, several advantages. Less heat created means there are fewer issues, and in heavy-use environments like the Ballroom and Tommy’s Place there are fewer lamps to monitor and replace. “The low power consumption is green but practically allows us to run our entire mover rig on only a handful of 120V 20A circuits,” Brandon stated. The choice of lighting consoles came down to features vs price with many of the competitor consoles in the Martin price range lacking in terms of software features, an intuitive interface, and playback functionality. Brandon commented: “Frankly, for most of our uses, the extra features of the larger consoles just didn’t justify the price difference. Overall, the Martin consoles offer top-notch features at a lower price plus the promise of continued development - we like the trajectory of the consoles - was encouraging. Lastly, because we were looking for two different size consoles to be used by the same users, it was tempting to have the exact same software running on both; with other companies there were usually (at least) small differences.” Brandon chose the new M1 lighting console, Martin’s new ergonomic desk that provides fast and intuitive operation in a portable and affordable package, for the Trojan Grand Ballroom. “The M1 has amazing utility in a small package and consid- ering the price, it’s unmatched,” he stated. “The software is just as powerful as the Maxxyz Compact and it’s nice that it’s identical, which makes it easy to transition users as well as show data. It is an all-in-one package that we can take anywhere and have the power of a full lighting console.
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