Robe DL Series Adds Panache at Puy du Fou

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Award winning French theme park Puy du Fou located in the Vendée region of western France has invested in Robe’s DL series LED moving lights, with 8 x DL7Ss and 18 x DL4Ss, which are being utilized to light their innovative new show “Le Dernier Panache” an immersive fusion of theatre and cinema being staged in their new 19-million Euro Le Théâtre des Géants (Giants Theatre). Photos : courtesy Puy du Fou

This incredible entertainment venue is a massive space, and can accommodate a capacity audience of 2,400 who sit in the middle on a 360 degrees rotating platform. This turns as they follow the story travelling through a 33 minutes mixed media sequence which is a combination of live acting, digital scenery and projections.

Robe’s DL range was specified by Koert Vermeulen, LD and director of Brussels based lighting and visual design practice ACT lighting design, who created the lighting scheme working closely with the Puy du Fou creative team and Steven Barthelemy, technical manager for the Park’s two largest performance spaces, the Giants Theatre and the Grand Carrousel.

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Steven’s own objective was to have a lighting rig comprised entirely of LED lightsources, with the only ‘conventional’ bulbs being in the projectors.

LED made sense on multiple levels. They wanted to minimise maintenance and ongoing running costs – the show plays 7 times a day – and the lights are also rigged in hard to access positions. Embracing their Green Globe certification for carbon efficiency was also important.

Koert Vermeulen worked on the project for two years and commented, “The client knew exactly what they wanted when I came on-board and were very precise which helped enormously. We effectively had to light six different theatre spaces (due to the rotation) with a single lighting rig so this also informed the choice of ‘multi-purpose’ fixtures.”

This is another reason that moving lights made complete sense, especially with the amount of DL7S and DL4S cues in the show, it would be hard to imagine trying to do this with a conventional lighting rig!

He comments that with the excellent framing shutters (also utilized in Robe’s BMFL Blade), “Robe has created two excellent profile fixtures”.

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Due to the size and scale of the space and the intensity of the projections, they needed bright fixtures and the colour rendering was crucial to good flesh tones, as well as the colour range to add drama and impact explained Steven. Koert added that the two fixtures types are highly compatible and work in unison extremely well.

During the creative process, Koert looked at a wide range of LED products that fitted the criteria, which culminated in a comparative shoot-out at the venue. “The DL range was a winner in several areas,” he confirms, mentioning the excellent spot quality, great zoom range, theatrical grade dimming and fast, accurate framing shutters as well as “a beautiful quality of light”, all making it perfect for the application.

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The latest generation of DL4S Profiles benefit from a new LED light engine boosting the brightness by 30% and the DL7S Profile has its 7-colour LED module to cover the full spectrum required by the most demanding designers and scenarios.

Puy du Fou purchased the fixtures from Robe Lighting France and have been impressed with the excellent technical support and attention which they have now experienced first-hand.