The Fire Experience Units: Suffolk Fire Service.
This is one of two units made for Suffolk's "Crucial Crew" demonstrations in conjunction with Jim Laws Lighting. Built in a closed trailer, this seemingly innocent kitchen is full of hazards: Ironing that catches fire, a chip pan going up in flames, a washing machine that emits smoke, a pile of 13A adaptors that gets very hot and glows red before the inevitable shower of sparks. Through a comedy routine devised and choreographed by Illuminati with the aid of the Fire Service in Ipswich, thousands of children have been made very awareof the dangers of fire. The effect used eight smoke machines, a roll of fax paper (that was for the iron scorch effect), many metres of tubing and a comprehensive lighting and sound control (Prometheus 6) |
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This is the other one...
In this unit children are led into this beroom scene, where they spot a variety of hazards such as a frayed bedroom lamp, cigarette burning in an ashtray etc.. As they watch, smoke is seen to come from under a closed door and a raging (fake) fire is detected beyond. One of the children is encouraged to call the fire brigade on a closed line, and they are shown how to avoid smoke and what not to do!. Soon the Brigade arrive and the chilkdren are resued by a real live fireman with breathing aparatus.
Illuminati designed and made the entire effect, which has been used in events throughout the County.
PS these photos are really bad quality - sorry! but we'd sooner make 'em than worry about the photo! |
The Firefly:
The worlds FIRST Fibre Optic lamp that changes colour. This was designed patented and manufactured by Illuminati from our factory in Brightlingsea.
Illuminati were the FIRST to show Fibre Optics in the form of Fireflies and as a starcloth at the ABTT trade show in Riverside Studios. We were the FIRST to show them at LDI through GAM and the FIRST to install them as a chandelier in a British Hotel. This was all in 1982
We are very proud of these. Because we were babes in arms when it came to injection moulding tool design, when the complex three part tool blew up, we couldnt afford a new one, and anyway we wanted to do something else.... |
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THE INDUSTRY QUIZ;
STUDIO SET AND CONCEPT DESIGN BY DORIAN KELLY OF ILLUMINATI FOR A NON-BROADCAST PILOT FOR NEW SERIES FOR CHANNEL 4 (1995). The series was never made. |
| One of our beautiful fibre optic or LED starcloths, based on ancient Japanese designs |
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Illuminati never uses off-the-shelf christmas lightsfor public displays. If you want an effect designed specifically for your town, and cross-street decorations made to fit the character, colour and tone of the environment into which it will go, then look no further than illuminati.
We work with several Christmas designers to create unusual effects for department stores and offices which have been seen Europe-wide. We use fibre opics, electroluminescence, large scale projection,(still,animated or video), fluorecent tubes, neon, cold cathode, LED's, strobes, Ultra Violet, tungsten and discharge sources andtheatrical lighting techniques with extensive use of shadow masks or goboes. We have built centrepeices up to 30' high and containing hundreds if not thousands of light sources. Our work is always more than you expect and usually more than you pay for!
SOME INNOVATIONS
Prometheus Ropelight
Illuminati were among he first to use LED ropelight inasmuch as we had some especially made for us by drawing a string of individually resistored red Led's through a length of polypropelene tubing, powered by our own special controller/PSU the Illuminati PROMETHEUS-1?(TM). Unfortunately we do not have any photographs as we were far too busy working to think about actually recording it,, but it was used as a Christmas feature, and on stage, notably for Dame Edna Evarage's giant 'spectacles' drop at Drury Lane Theatre and on tour, and outdoors on a variety of building elevations. Unlike modern LED strings, which are wired in series-parallel and very prone to temparature variations, the Prometheus had no failures in use. However we never got round to making more.
Prometheus-4: Cascadable chaser cards
Illuminati designed and made a set of 30mm square PC cards containing low voltage incandescent lamp, firing circuit and a timer with an input socket and a flying lead. These could be cascaded simply by plugging together and connecting to a Prometheus-4 controller, and could be made to chase at any speed, it being set by the Prometheus-4 controller which simply sent a "go" signal to the first card. The circuit lit up the first lamp, waited a preset time and passed the go signal onto the next card. in the meantime the controller sent a second go signal etc. The result was a simple chase which could go on indefinitely until the signal hit the last card in the series. If the controller sent six pulses in a row, then paused for six pulses, sent six more and so on, the result was a chase of ‘packets’ of light.
These were made originally for “Charlie Girl” at the Victoria Palace, London, where they formed the “rocket stick trails” for a vast artificial firework display described here.
The chasing strobes variant
This was a variation of the above, where the low voltage lamps were replaced by miniature strobe tubes and a more complex firing system. These too formed part of the fireworks display described here