A 70-metre-wide stage production featuring Robe lighting to celebrate Joker Out’s 10th anniversary

Joker Out celebrated their 10th anniversary with Karneval, an outdoor circus-themed show held at Kardeljeva ploščad in Ljubljana. The production combined live music, guest performers and an extensive visual production, with a lighting design that featured Robe's new GigaPointe fixtures for the first time in Slovenia.

Visual design agency Blackout, which has been working with Joker Out since 2021, was responsible for the lighting design for this landmark event. The lighting design team was led by Klemen Krajnc, while Crt Birsa took care of key lighting. For the occasion, they chose to work with a large rig of Robe moving lights.

This included a set of 32 brand-new Robe GigaPointes, which had just been delivered to rental company Event Lighting. The rig also featured 13 Robe FORTES, 6 iFORTE LTXs, 37 MegaPointes, 49 iSpiiderX wash beams and 14 Tetra2 moving LED battens.

The band chose a spherical-shaped stage and worked with set designer Maja Moravec to create various circus props, elaborate draping and other scenic elements designed to evoke the look of a Big Top, including the band risers on stage. The central arched stage was flanked by wings dressed to resemble circus tents, while the guest performers included aerialists and other circus acts.

Klemen incorporated the lighting fixtures into this stage configuration, positioning them overhead, around the sides of the structure and on eight independent scaffolding towers. Six of these were located behind the stage at graduated heights, all taller than the stage and its wings so they remained visible above them. These were complemented by the left and right PA towers, which framed the central section just in front of the stage.

The GigaPointes were positioned at deck level along the entire front edge of the 70-metre-wide, 2-metre-high stage, including the two wings and their returns at each end. All of them were placed on a ledge half a metre below stage level. They were used to create dramatic effects and project their narrow, piercing and bright beams across the venue, creating a powerful impact as part of the show's epic, wide visual aesthetic. Klemen, who was using GigaPointes for the first time, declared: "They are fantastic!"

In terms of programming, he noted that it is very practical to be able to exchange, swap or pair them parameter-for-parameter with MegaPointes, which will continue to be a favourite fixture for many professionals for some time. "This makes the transition from MegaPointes to GigaPointes very smooth and seamless," he confirmed.

Twenty-seven of the 37 MegaPointes were rigged on nine longitudinal trusses above the stage, running from upstage to downstage at different heights following the curvature of the roof arch. The other 10 were positioned upstage in a straight line. Klemen worked with these fixtures and the GigaPointes to create some of the show's most memorable lighting scenes.

Fourteen Robe Tetra2 LED battens were used to illuminate the scenic elements on the stage wings. They were rigged on the floor to provide optimal uplighting for the vertical sections of the set.

Twenty-seven iSpiiderXs were also rigged on the longitudinal trusses, three per truss. Another 18 were used for low side lighting across the spherical stage, nine on each side, running from front to back along the lower sections of the stage structure. Four iSpiiderXs were used as front key lighting for the static members of the band from two high cantilevered positions on the downstage sides of the stage structure: two for the drummer and one each for the keyboardist and backing vocalists on their respective risers.

During the show, these fixtures were under Crt's control. He also added further layers of key lighting using a combination of 6 iFORTE LTXs and 13 FORTES to illuminate the band members moving around the stage, as well as several guest performers.

The side key lighting on stage utilised four FORTES, two on each side, positioned on the outermost towers at stage left and right. From there, they projected towards the front of the stage, covering the performance areas in front of the wings, the central stage apron and the thrust/runway area. This involved a considerable throw distance, well suited to the power of the FORTES.

Eight FORTES were installed on the two delay towers positioned to the left and right of FOH, while the thirteenth FORTE was rigged in a mid-front position on the spherical stage to provide backlighting for performers as they moved along the central catwalk.

Above the FORTES on the delay towers were 6 iFORTE LTXs, three on each side, programmed to cover all the action on stage, the forestage, wings and runway. The 6 iFORTE LTXs were running on 5 RoboSpot systems, with the BaseStations positioned beneath the stage. Crt notes that, most of the time, he only needed to run the LTXs at 50% intensity for them to be effective both on camera and live.

Klemen's main task was to make the show look spectacular and celebratory while conveying the sense of scale and occasion that everyone expected. This is why he selected these Robe products, along with several other fixtures used for the show, for their flexibility and dynamics. Another factor was that Event Lighting, one of Slovenia's busiest rental companies, already had these fixtures in its inventory.

Excitement grew even further when everyone learned that the GigaPointes would arrive in time!

Klemen and Crt pre-visualised as much of the show as practical and, once on site, had two intensive days of programming with the full rig installed. However, the main challenge for this show was neither technical nor artistic: it was the weather. Ljubljana is situated in a wide, flat basin known as the Ljubljana Basin (Ljubljanska kotlina), surrounded by hills and mountains, which creates its own microclimate.

An extremely violent thunderstorm accompanied by torrential rain hit the area a couple of hours before Joker Out were due to take the stage, causing extensive flooding and requiring emergency adaptations across the site.

Some elements of the equipment were soaked and waterlogged, while several of the upstage backdrops were torn away by the strong winds and had to be reattached as securely as possible.

Fortunately, the coordinated efforts of the entire team made it possible to resolve the problems caused by the storm and ensure that the venue and production setup were safe. The show was ultimately able to go ahead, allowing 17,000 Joker Out fans to enjoy a large-scale production with a carefully crafted visual presentation.

Image credits: © Sasa Krajnc, Janez Strukelj and Miro Majcen