Imperial College
Summer Ball 2003
Technical Review

The technical lighting and sound equipment for this years Summer Ball was specified [UPDATE: I have been corrected - actually the equipment was initially specified by the Summer Ball Committee and members of DramSoc], supplied and setup by Smyle Productions. In the past it has been done by ICU DramSoc* - a union society who normally does tech for union events, however this was changed this year for political reasons (i.e. the Union President doesn't like DramSoc, and the Ent's manager has some historical links with Smyle, and was therefore very keen to use them).

The quote from Smyle was very competitive. So competitive in fact the many think they are not making much money on this event, and the aim was to get a major event onto their books, so they can expand their operation.

This review has been written by Gary Ewer with the aim of being as unbiased as possible. I went to the event (well gate crashed the event to be precise) with the aim of writing this, and did not participate as a "punter". I did however try to get the opinions of punters at the event and see what they thought.

Here follow a list of the venues, and what had been done in each venue:

Great Hall - R&B

Ground support truss across the back of stage with 4 Golden Scans and 4 Mac heads (2000's perhaps??). Truss arch style thing in front of that, mainly to look pretty, with 2 Mac 300's or something on it. Then two small arches covered in material each side with a video projector behind (this looked very funky!). They had a tech back stage mixing the video.

On the floor of the stage they had 6 Mac 300's/250's.

In the middle of the main truss they had a laser. I didn't see it in operation, however I'm told it looked very cool (although it didn't do very much).

It's a shame Smyle didn't use the points in the roof, and hang some lights above the dance floor. Obviously they didn't have the skills or equipment to do this.

The PA wasn't great (badly set up) although it did the job I think.

LX operator was using a Pearl and was situated by the rake. Some people commented that the operator didn't seem to be doing much and was just making the lights move, rather than move in time with the music.

JCR - Drum and Bass

A stage with decks at the back, and then an area for some guy to prance around on. T-Bars either side of the stage with 4 Mac 250/300 on each. On each side of the room they had another T-bar with another 4 macs on each. Operated by some Avolites desk and a bored looking operator.

Lots of PA stacks - some in front of the stage, and more at the edge of the room. Again it didn't sound good.

Cables (Sound, LX and control) were zip tied to the roof.

Ante Room

Seemed a bit empty - had an Arcade style racing game in the corner, some kind of bar and then the College bar in the corner. Illuminated by one green uplighter!

MDH - Cheese

Ground support truss with 8 Martin 918's, 2 Mac 300's and a few other little things on it.

Mackie sound system (plug in power and signal type).... ooh dear... distortion and general nastiness.

Queens Lawn - Chill out marquee

Stage in the corner with a bar in other corner and tables in the other 2 corners. Very old looking PA - never heard Chicane's Saltwater with so many weird sounds added (again PA was bad). Marquee was illuminated by the standard fluorescent lights. There was some draping which apparently was supposed to give it the theme of "water".

Didn't see the big band playing, however the DJ after was good - playing propellerheads, chicane and other good stuff ;-)

Queens Lawn - Queens Tower

Illuminated by a number of Citycolours. They had a Ferrari Formula 1 car (as the Ball was sponsored by Shell of course) hung of the first balcony - this looked _very_ funky!

Conclusions

It looked cool. People I spoke to seemed to be enjoying themselves. There were lots of people milling around by the Queens Tower, in the foyer etc. The Great Hall and JCR seemed a bit empty, although it wasn't too bad. MDH was full, but didn't feel packed. All the tables in the marquee were occupied when I was in there at about 2am.

As for Smyle - they had lots of lx equipment (lots of it hired from Stage Electrics) in the rooms, however the programming didn't seem great (but I doubt the punters noticed this - there were pretty coloured lights, and they were moving around). The Great Hall did look very impressive however, with the beams shooting out across everyone's head off the stage.

The sound however was not very impressive. All the PA systems looked like they'd seen better days, and non of them felt "loud". They just sounded distorted and struggling.

QT was very cool, however how could it not, with a red Ferrari hung off it?

* DramSoc are always keen to find new and interesting events to do, so if you are arranging tech for a ball or other event, please get in contact with them, and I'm sure they can do you a very good deal!