Theater De Storm, the Netherlands, Opts for Robe Gear Theater De Storm in Winterswijk, the Netherlands, has been a client of Martijn Klein Gebbink of Frontline Audio & Vision for 20 years. Last year, he delivered a package of 124 Robe lighting products, including 12 ESPRITE moving lights fitted with the HCF (High Colour Fidelity) LED engine, 80 T11 Profiles, 12 TX1 PosiProfiles, and 20 T15 Fresnels. The theatre has three halls, two used for theatre and concert productions and one for parties. The main hall seats 609 and the smaller one 219. The venue stages a host of different shows, averaging six or seven a week, necessitating quick turnarounds. The new lights were part of a major LED upgrade and followed a shootout conducted earlier by Martijn, which resulted in Robe being the chosen brand. "We needed to replace the old profiles, PCs, and Fresnels," explains head technician Sander Wilderink, who has been there for eight years and works alongside Jocelyn Waalderbos, both of them taking care of all things technical, including lighting. Important for Theater De Storm with these new luminaires was the zoom range and the output. The previous Profile zooms had covered a range of 17-43 degrees, which has now been expanded to 5-50 degrees with the T11 Profiles. They also scrutinized the color temperature and color-mixing systems. Something additional was required for illuminating bands and musical shows in the main hall, leading to the choice of ESPRITE HCFs, which also work extremely well as general back lighting, whatever the style of show onstage. The new set up has several advantages. The fixtures are extremely quick to focus and programme. Having a multi-spectral LED light source expands the adaptability of the luminaires and the colors, "which are intuitive to adjust and programme," Wilderink says. He adds that they also wanted luminaires utilizing the European style of focus methodology, with both plano-convex lenses mounted facing each other on one side of the fixture. Most incoming shows will typically bring their own production lighting rigs to use above the stage and will utilize the house bridge, tower and side lighting; they can hook in their own consoles via DMX or sACN. "We've had a fantastic reaction from all those who have come in and used the new lighting, including all the freelancers," Wilderink says. Gebbink also designed and installed a new power and data wiring infrastructure for the theatre. Now, wherever one plugs in a light, power and a DMX cable are available; the plan included installing LSC APS (Advanced Power System) power distribution. The installation was completed in four weeks, during which time Theater De Storm ran on an interim setup before the final switchover. 
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