As the tenth series of Dancing on Ice makes its way back to our screens, Rotolight, the award-winning British LED lighting manufacturer, has announced it has supplied its Anova PRO 2 location and studio lights to help create a dramatic new look for the production. The lights, 30 in total, were provided in five custom-designed rigs for the filming of the TV idents, glamour and profile shots. The unique rigs each featured six lights mounted in a large ringlight configuration.
David Sutton, VT director who has worked on the likes of I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here, The X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing, needed a different, unique look for the shots to herald the show’s return.
“We wanted something new, fresh and original for the relaunch of Dancing on Ice, something that was visually different and interesting. What we were looking for was obviously the performance and functionality of the lights, but I also wanted to incorporate them into the actual shot to make it unique,” says Sutton.
Chris Yacoubian (The Voice UK and Strictly Come Dancing), director of photography for the glamour and profile shots for the show sought out the Rotolight team. “I saw the Anova PRO 2 clustered together and that just sparked my creativity. The lights are powerful, portable and beautiful in terms of their colour rendition and skin tones. They are a fantastic tool and deliver and perform perfectly. I’m thrilled with the result,” he says.
The Rotolight Anova PRO 2 is a pioneering continuous light and High Speed Sync (HSS) flash for creative image-makers — one of the brightest LEDs ever launched in its class. The light includes a customisable suite of Rotolight’s award winning CineSFX™ (Fire, Lightning, TV, Gunshot, Paparazzi, etc) which eliminates the need for expensive, time consuming legacy ‘flicker-box’ workflows. The LED provides the best power to consumption ratio in the industry, with a mere 72W consumption. The light also delivers outstanding colour reproduction (CRI>96, TLCI 91) eliminating the need for expensive post production — something that was important for Yacoubian and Sutton during the shoot.
“The newly launched Rotolight Anova PRO 2s have performed amazingly well. In a studio literally made of ice, we constantly pushed them to their limits and they haven’t let us down. They are a seriously versatile tool for your kit. Apart from the great functionality, the lights are really energy efficient, which was vital for us as we were running so many at the same time. They are also safe and generate no heat that we had to worry about, while drawing hardly any power — unlike traditional lighting,” Yacoubian says.
The custom-designed hex rings were controlled via a lighting desk and five-pin DMX connection, that also enabled operators to use the built-in CineSFX™ suite of effects, such as flash and pulse lights for added drama.
“The lights are amazing. You can create a number of effects, like firelight or paparazzi, which we used on set, and quickly switch between them and the continuous light with just a flick of a button, or go from soft tungsten to punchy daylight in a heartbeat,” says Yacoubian.
The Anova PRO 2s are sold separately, and Rotolight will be offering the unique hex ring mounting system as part of its product portfolio later in the year.
“Everyone is really pleased with the end result. The Anova PRO 2s have been absolutely amazing. They look stunning and have the ability to flash, pulse and change. They gave us that edge over other TV shows, and provided the cherry on the cake for the glamour shots. I really love them,” concludes Sutton.
