The Polish Song Festival in Opole has different opinions. Some like it, others don't. We, however, do not look at such events according to tastes. We are only interested in the technical side.
Responsible for the design and implementation was Marcin Michna who managed to ask a few questions and get some information for industry nerds. And there is no shortage of such here... No offense of course. Seeing such an amount of Acme Tornado reminded me of the meme "Tornado Guy" well, and I had to....
Now that we've had a laugh, it's time for some practical information interspersed with questions for Martin. Let's start with what teddy bears like best, which is a whole list of equipment. The Opole amphitheater included the following lighting equipment:
| Device name | Quantity |
|---|---|
| ACME Mana Hybrid | 90 |
| ACME Super Nova | 2 |
| Robe iForte FS | 8 |
| Robe iForte LTX FS | 4 |
| Robe iForte | 47 |
| Chauvet Rogue Outcast 1 BeamWash | 22 |
| Chauvet Maverick Storm 2 BeamWash | 72 |
| Chauvet Maverick Storm 3 BeamWash | 61 |
| Martin Mac ONE | 110 |
| ACME Tornado TB5 IP | 182 |
| Showtec Active Sunstrip | 84 |
| CLF Ares | 96 |
| ROXX Cluster B2 FC | 182 |
| RJ Dalis 862 | 23 |
| Astera Titan | 120 |
| Astera AX 5 | 40 |
| Robe RoboSpot | 12 |
| AKB Neon PRO 60LED 14W | 713mb |
| AKB 24v PRO SMD5050 120LED 28W RGBW tape | 600mb |
| MDG ATMe + fans | 8 |
Why so much ACME?
StageUpdate: The festival got the unofficial name Acme Opole Festival. Why so much Acme? Tornado in particular.
Marcin: Briefly - Tornado is a trendy lamp at the moment, which fit well with the aesthetics of my idea. Moving on. Originally, Robe Mega Pointe were to be used as spot/beam lights, but ATM suggested using ACME Man. I used them during New Year's Eve in Chorzow and in my opinion they are a very good replacement for Mega Pointe. Plus, they are IP65 and I could have the same lamp hung from the ceiling and placed on the ground.
Multimedia and electricity.
The festival is not only lighting but also multimedia provided by Aram which looked as follows (equipment + control):
| Device name | Quantity |
|---|---|
| Outdoor P3 LED Screen Black Face 0.5m x 0.5m | 1145 |
| Outdoor P3 LED Screen Transparent 1m x 0.5m | 973 |
| Outdoor P5 LED Floor Black Face 0.5m x 0.5m | 687 |
| Outdoor P5 LED Screen Black Face 0.5m x 0.5m | 160 |
| Barco MiStrip | 128 |
| Barco UDX 4k40 | 2 |
| Barco TLD+ 4.42 7.46:1 WQ/4KUHD | 2 |
| Implementation | |
| GrandMA3 full-size | 2 |
| Disguise vx4 Display Port | 4 |
| Server with Resolume | 1 |
| Specifications: NVidia RTX5090, Intel I9-14gen, 64GB Ram, Blackmagic Design DeckLink 8K Pro G2, 2x Ethernet 1GbE | |
| Barco e2 gen2 | 2 |
| Specification: 14x 4k Input, HDI SDI Input, 7x 4k Output, 6x HD SDI Output. | |
| HD SDI 16×16 matrix | 1 |
| DisplayPort/HDMI 8×8 matrix | 1 |
| 10GbE ethernet switch | 1 |
| 1GbE ethernet switch | 1 |
As we can quickly and easily count... All the modules used were 984.5m2. We also did not help to omit a fact that, not knowing why, always interests you.
StageUpdate: Stage current consumption ?
Marcin: All of the technology was powered by gensets that ADEX supplied. The total was 3.5 MVA.
For those who don't know and count everything in watts, if the power factor, which for standard electrical installations is 0.85, then a 3.5 MVA genset can produce almost 3 MW (or 3million watts). - Most likely there was also a lot of backup, but overall a lot of power!
Any breakdowns?
With so much equipment, it is known that inanimate things like to play tricks. And this time it was not without the proverbial "fuck-ups".
StageUpdate: any failures during implementation ? Of course you don't have to answer but as we are a strikte technical portal I'm curious to know if at least one Tornado has malfunctioned.
Marcin: We had a major sACN network failure moments before we went on the air on the first day. We started the festival with a large part of the equipment installed under the roof not working. Anyway, all the equipment installed under the roof was controlled via sACN and connected via Ethernet cables. ATM technicians showed mega professionalism and quickly fixed the failure.
Attentive viewers could see the work of technicians during the first minutes of the Debuts. I have to worry you, but there was not a single failure of ACME devices. During the entire festival, I think 2 devices were replaced - one Mac One and one Maveric 3.
Can I light up my team?
I had the opportunity to be at the festival with the team, and I asked Marcin a question to clarify once and for all to all those who were very surprised at the information that I would not be shining. Well, television productions are governed by their own laws.
StageUpdate: As I had the opportunity to be at the festival with the Poparzeni team, I know that we could have an insight into what will fly on the screens. When it comes to lighting, can the bands also have an influence?
Marcin: On productions for which I am responsible, I do not allow team implementers to foh-a. Any contact between the team and me occurs after the director has approved such an idea.
The band, managers and others do not have direct access to us. If the team has a specific idea for its performance and communicates it early enough then I try to implement it. At the same time taking into account all aspects of the entire television production.
For example, Paula during the Premiere really wanted me to turn off all the lights at the end of her performance. If it had been dark, we might have tried to do that. However, her performance took place when we still had a lot of daylight exposure.
Lighting control and design.
Something has to move it eventually, and so the whole implementation and pre-programming was driven by GrandMA3 (soft 3) and Disguise D3 media servers. The exact list of hardware looks like this :
| Device name | Quantity |
|---|---|
| MA Lighting gma3 full-size | 5 |
| MA Lighting grandMA3 viz-key | 1 |
| Wysiwyg 2025 Perform | 1 |
As if anyone else was curious, I'm throwing you a spread of bars, for complete nerds - like me, as I pulled this information.
| Device name | Quantity |
|---|---|
| 4m truss tower + base | 7 |
| 8m truss + winches | 1 |
| 1.5m 50mm pipe black | 6 |
| 2.5m 50mm pipe black | 10 |
| 3.5m 50mm pipe black | 170 |
| (fixed 30cm below the available suspension points of the canopy structure) | |
| Wahlberg Winch 50 | 1 |
Finally, credits, that is, for the whole realization, in addition to Marcin Michna, were responsible: Robert Iwański (light), Marcin Szczakiel (light), Tomasz Stępnik (light), Łukasz Wesołek (multimedia), Maciej Kiełb (multimedia). There were 12 people behind RoboSpots, whose names we were unable to pull out. But we respect and bow low.
Big thanks to Marcin for the interview and all the complementary information! And to you, how did you like this year's Opole - be sure to leave your mark in the comments or our socials!
