CHAUVET Professional PXL Curve 1 Set the Mood at Zomerhit, Belgian Music Festival

	The lighting design needed flexibility to reflect the stage personas and music styles of the wide range of artists who appeared on stage, while still projecting a single unified look

Zomerhit, the annual Belgian summer musical festival produced by the Finnish broadcast network VRT, featured lighting and set design by Michiel Milbou and his team at Never Fear Shadows.

Set on a half-disk stage, evoking images of a summer sun, the design's warm, welcoming look embodied the season's spirit. "For Zomerhit, the lighting needed to support the summer identity of the show from the very first glance," Milbou says. "Because this was a televised summer music program, I wanted the design to feel warm, open, festive, and instantly recognizable, both for the live audience and on camera.

"A central part of that vision was to create a strong visual element at the back of the stage that suggested a setting sun," he continues. "That image immediately connected with the atmosphere of summer and gave the show a clear visual signature. From there, the lighting had to do more than just illuminate the artists -- it also had to help shape the stage picture, add depth for television, and give every performance its own energy and character."

The lighting design needed flexibility to reflect the stage personas and music styles of the wide range of artists who appeared on stage, while still projecting a single unified look. It also had to look good on camera.

"A look can feel powerful in the venue, but it also has to read clearly and attractively from different camera angles," Milbou notes. "We were constantly looking for ways to create bold stage images without losing clarity or making the picture feel too busy."

Helping Milbou and the Never Fear Shadows team achieve these goals was a collection of 122 CHAUVET Professional COLORado PXL Curve 1 arrayable batten fixtures, which, like his entire rig, were supplied by Splendit. Positioned on the large half-disc structure at the back of the stage, the compact quad color fixtures played a wide variety of roles during Zoomerhit.

"They were much more than just lighting fixtures -- they became a scenic and graphic element within the overall stage design," Milbou says. "This helped us solve an important visual challenge: creating a strong and iconic backdrop that was recognizable at all times, while still being flexible enough to evolve throughout the show.

"The 'sun' shape gave us a clear visual anchor, but because the PXL Curve 1 is so versatile, that same structure could constantly change in color, intensity, and movement to suit each performance," Milbou continues. "This meant that the backdrop was never static -- depending on the song, it could feel warm and atmospheric, bold and energetic, or highly dynamic, while always preserving the core visual identity of the set. What I liked most about the PXL Curve 1 was that it helped us combine lighting and scenography in one gesture. They gave us the freedom to keep changing that image throughout the program. For a music television show, that combination is extremely valuable."

Milbou's designe also featured six COLORado Q15 battens, 33 Rogue Outcast 1 BeamWashes, six Color STRIKE Ms, two onAir Panel 1 IP units, and four Amhaze atmospheric effects.

"What I especially appreciated is that the design felt both iconic and flexible," Milbou says. "The overall image remained clear and coherent, but we were still able to create enough variation for the different artists and songs. For television, that balance is extremely important, and I think the PXL Curve 1 played a significant role in achieving it."