Parade of Light

The Adelaide Fringe festival is the largest such festival in the southern hemisphere spanning February and March annually. In 2018, the key attraction to kick off the festivities was the unveiling of a series of projection, light shows and laser activations. Simply known as the Parade of Light.

Novatech were fortunate to work with Adelaide based projection specialists, Illuminart, on the projection installation of the Institute Building of the State Library of South Australia as well as more traditional lighting of buildings on the southern side of North Terrace.

For the Institute Building, Novatech created and supplied two custom projection towers complete with ventilation, weatherproofing and security. Each tower was then weighted down with concreate ballast and secured in site for power distribution. Novatech’s new high-powered laser projectors (the Barco UDX-4k32) were installed into each tower and aligned as a single projection surface onto the Institute Building.

Illuminart then supplied the stunning custom content that told the story of Tangkuinyendi Yabarra, a story telling the cultural and spiritual practices from Kaurna family clan customs. A seven minute program repeated nightly over the 6 week period of the installation to acclaim from the public that wandered along the boulevard.

To compliment the other projected installations, Novatech supplied pods of lighting to project colour and movement onto the opposite side of North Terrace – mainly office buildings, shops and student accommodation. Utilising high powered LED wash lights, a canvas of colour was washed across the surface of the buildings and changed colour at pre-determined intervals. To this was added moving shapes and beams of light to create interest and contrast to the colour wash. These shapes were provided using Novatech’s brand new weatherproofed hybrid moving lights – the Elation Proteus Hybrid.

The Elation Proteus Hybrid allowed high powered beams of light to be displayed moving across the facades without expensive or cumbersome weather proofing such as plastic domes or covered in scaffold structures. The benefits were clear from reduced installation costs, structure hire costs and set up time. Novatech are the first in Australia to have such a light and were thrilled to debut it on such a high profile and long duration event.

The 2018 Parade of Light was a true success for the Adelaide Fringe with a clear increase in pedestrian traffic in the east end of Adelaide which followed onto the businesses within the area. It’s clear that activations using light and projection are popular with the general public and Novatech were proud to play their part in bringing this project to life.