Australia’s biggest specialist lighting company, Chameleon Touring Systems, have invested in a fleet of Solaris Flares from TMB, the amazingly powerful and flexible RGBW LED fixture that can wash, blind and strobe all at the same time. With around 1000 watts of LED generating more than 30,000 lumens of output at a 1200Hz refresh rate, lighting designers are loving the practical capabilities and creative possibilities that the Flare gives them.
“We first started looking at the Flares when we saw them on a couple of specs,” says Tony Davies, owner of Chameleon, “and a lot of the lighting designers we regularly work with were also expressing interest.” Chameleon were impressed with the Flare’s specs and unique capabilities, and invested heavily; a move that has more than paid off, as the company are poised to expand their Flare inventory further.
“They’re working hard,” reports Tony. “They’re going out on all sorts of shows, in both small quantities and huge numbers. They’re being used in worship, broadcast, international touring and venues. We find a lot of the Australian LDs we work with that are specifying the Flares cross-over into a lot of different industry sectors. The feedback we’ve been getting on the Solaris Flares is that they’re brighter than everything else, the LDs love them, and they’re specifying and booking them out again.”
It’s not just the raw power that excites designers. The Flare uses 96 CREE RGBW LEDs which can be divided into 2, 3, 4, 6, or 12 pixels for pixel-mapping effects. They can be used alone, or multiple units can be synchronised to create large-scale colour-changing strobe effects, including the ability to wash in one colour while strobing in another. Operation can be a simple or as in depth as necessary, with three or four channel DMX control modes, and a mighty 56 channel mode for full mapability. The high refresh rate ensures they’re totally compatible with broadcast applications.
Backing up Chameleon’s investment are Australian TMB distributor Lexair Entertainment. Priding themselves on service, Lexair are always on-hand to provide technical support at the critical times when companies need it most. “Lexair are awesome,” confirms Tony. “They are always great – they care and they get it. They look after us; if I ever need something extra at short notice, I get it. They’re really good to deal with, and the thing is, they don’t just look after us like this because we’re big, they look after all of their clients the same way.”
