Ellipsoidal: Never Going Away!

Classics are classics for a reason. They deliver a quality performance that stay until innovation sweeps into something new. Ellipsoidal fixtures are classic. They are needed in stage lighting to frame the stage.

Framing shutters and an adjustable iris allows you to create a sharp or soft circle of light on the part of the stage you need focused on. They allow you to differentiate from your main stage wash. Ellipsoidal fixtures are commonly used to project Gobos for logos and scenery. Though there are many smaller Gobo projectors that would serve better if that’s their only purpose.

So basically, ellipsoidal lights are needed to direct focus and illuminate certain parts of a stage.

Brightness: A general gauge of the brightness of fixtures is Wattage. Lumens are often not even provided as a measure. For example, the fixture videoed above is 200Watts which is incredibly bright for an LED ellipsoidal.

Color: Often LED ellipsoidal fixtures offer color LED engines. You can create thousands of vibrant colors with a simple RGB+W LED Engine while still creating a pleasant light. Some fixtures just focus on producing a Warm White and can be used with color gels for adding color.

Lenses: A good way of thinking lens sizes is smaller=smaller. So a smaller degree size will equal a smaller circle. Most ellipsoidal fixtures will give you two options, a zoomable lens, or the ability to swap lens tubes.

Pictured in the video above is the Springtree LED Color Ellipsoidal!

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Thanks for Reading!

*an annoying fact about writing about ellipsoidal fixtures is that adding an s at the end of ellipsoidal is grammatically incorrect. So instead of simply writing ellipsoidals, you have to add the already implied word fixtures or lights.

Written by Brandon Vaque– Who grew up around AV, being dragged to help at rental events for his parents AV company. Before the age of 18, he had been in over a hundred church installs as his dad attempted to instill in him a good work ethic. Then after college, he did what he swore he would never do and joined the family business. His passion has been to simplify the lighting process, to take the stress out of navigating between thousands of similar products and control options.