Durban Tattoo

11 September 2012

Black Coffee supplied the predominantly Robe lighting rig for the Kwa-Zulu Natal Military Tattoo held at the Natal Mounted Rifles (N.M.R.) parade grounds in Durban from the 11 – 13th July 2012.

Based on the success of military tattoos worldwide and the popularity of the Durban Military Tattoo during the eighties, it was decided to revive the local tattoo in 2008. It is now known as the Kwa-Zulu Natal Military Tattoo and has been held annually since then. Themi Venturas Productions and the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) called on the services of Durban rental based company Black Coffee to cater for the lighting and audio visual. Black Coffee’s LD and Operator, Llewellyn Pieters, worked closely with 3 Elec Regiment, the army’s sound and lighting division from Pretoria.

“The brief was to light up a castle set and to make sure the parade ground was lit beautifully too,” said Llewellyn Pieters. The lighting, all controlled on an Avolites Tiger Touch, was rigged on 5 x 5m high scaffolding towers and on the castle wall. The 24 x Robin 600s lit the field area while 24 x Robin 100s were used to light up the castle wall set. Two Robe 1200s, two Robe 2500s and 12 x ClayPaky Sharpys did the gobo work on the field.”

“The lighting handled very well considering it was out in the open (the beach was just across the road, sea air etc..),” said Llewellyn. He says the Sharpys penetrated into the night sky during the pyro display and looked great.

It was a fantastic gig to work on and the only real challenge was making sure that the 64 moving heads were covered each evening and uncovered again in the afternoon. Better safe than sorry!