Back at the Arena with a new team and then Meet the Artist – James Argyropoulos

All great changes are preceded by chaos. – Deepak Chopra

After a short break from an event I have lit 2 times a year for the past several years, it was nice to get back behind the console in the arena. I don’t light many events of this size and caliber throughout the year with my lighting company as most of my projects are in ballrooms, conference halls, hotels and venues with UNDER a 90′ ceiling height!. It was nice to get back in a space this big again “with the band” so to speak to create what turned out to be an amazing event.

I must say that this one was ALOT less stressful as I just went in as a lighting designer and programmer. Having not only done that, but also been a provider of all the lighting equipment, prep, and lead techs for the past few years, I eventually realized that perhaps I was wearing a few too many hats. I was nice to be able to just concentrate on the creative side of things (as well as juggling the many cameras I OVERPACKED to help document and time-lapse some of the art we all were able to share.

A special thanks to Jorge and the team at Paradigm for helping my design and vision come to life!

The shot above was taken behind the console I spent the last few days behind (hence the lack of posts for a while). Its a single raw file that in retrospect, I should have shot at a tighter aperture to get a little more depth of field. Still can’t get over the range of light I was able to pull out of the file though as those screens were screaming bring (technical term) while the lighting console was quite a few stops darker.

The shot below however was created from a few brackets I captured last night during the cleanup of the arena. I baked the collection a bit with photomatix to create an HDR that I really like! A few more of these soon so stay tuned.

Love what a little haze does to a few lighting fixtures!

It takes quite a team to pull of a project like this, especially when its a “one off” show that in scale rivals many touring shows out there. Artists of all types spent countless hours creating content, previsualising renderings, designing rigs, directing talent, and assembling the many facets of the show. With that being said, I’d like to share the art of one of them.

Meet the Artist – James Argyropoulos

James has been a part of the team for a couple of years now and does an amazing job capturing stills, video, and time-lapse clips from the magic we all create. Having created a few time-lapse projects myself, I know how much work these take to put together. Having lived a long 2 days of load in, it was pretty cool to see these up on youtube to relive the experience! Like I’ve said before, it takes a team!

He did a great post about the show over here.

Check it out and come back to watch his art in the videos below.

(I lent him a couple of my time-lapse clips I captured from the D800 to use. They are the moving ones and were captured with the Emotimo moving camera rig I have. More on that soon as well!)

Or click here for the video

Or click here for the video

Here are a few other places to find the art of James Argyropoulos

His Website

His Youtube Channel

As always, thanks for stopping by!