Commercial category
Theatrical and Entertainment Lighting
Venues, worship spaces and ballrooms, where show control and building code have to agree.
Need theatrical and entertainment lighting priced, or just need to know if we can get it? Send the schedule or ask us a question. No charge for a takeoff.
Theatrical work sits oddly between two trades. The fixtures, dimming and control belong to the entertainment world and its own vocabulary. The house lighting, egress and emergency circuits belong squarely to the building code. On a real venue project both have to be right and they have to talk to each other.
South Florida has a steady flow of this work: performing arts spaces, houses of worship, hotel ballrooms, cruise terminals, broadcast and event venues, and school auditoriums.
What a venue package has to account for
- Control protocol first. DMX512 is the long-standing entertainment control protocol, with RDM adding bidirectional device discovery and configuration over the same wiring. Get the protocol, the universe count and the topology agreed before selecting fixtures, because it determines the data infrastructure as much as the gear.
- Dimming type has to match the load. Forward phase, reverse phase, 0-10V and DMX-driven drivers are not interchangeable, and mixing an LED source with the wrong dimming curve is the most common cause of flicker and drop-out complaints on a venue job.
- House lighting is code lighting. The audience chamber, lobbies, corridors and stairs carry egress and emergency obligations regardless of how the show lighting is controlled. Some of that has to come back on automatically at full output on loss of normal power, which constrains which fittings can be used and how they are wired.
- Architectural and theatrical control usually have to co-exist. A ballroom needs simple wall-station scenes for banquet staff and full console control for an event crew, without one locking out the other. That integration is a design decision, not a wiring afterthought.
- Rigging, weight and access. A fitting that is wonderful and unreachable is a maintenance problem for the next twenty years. Ask how it gets relamped, refocused and cleaned.
- Noise. In a performance space, fan noise and driver whine are specification criteria. A fitting that is silent in a warehouse is audible in a 300-seat house.
Lines we carry in this category
10 of the 637 manufacturers in our index make theatrical and entertainment fixtures. Each link opens that manufacturer’s page, with the South Florida representative, the territory and how to get it priced.
Not seeing the line you were specified? Search all 637 manufacturers or look up the rep for your territory. We quote lines beyond the ones listed here.
What to send us for a price
- The venue drawings, including section, because trim heights and throw distances drive fixture choice.
- What happens in the room: theatre, worship, banquet, broadcast, multipurpose.
- The control intent: console only, architectural stations only, or both.
- The consultant fixture schedule if there is one.
- Which circuits are emergency or essential.
Common questions
Do you supply theatrical fixtures and dimming?
Yes, as a supplier working from a consultant schedule or a manufacturer proposal. Send what you have and we will price it.
Can you handle a house of worship project?
It is one of the more common venue types we see. The combination of a performance-grade front-of-house system with straightforward controls for volunteers running services is a specific problem, and it is worth saying so at the quoting stage.
Do you do the lighting design for a theatre?
No. Venue lighting design is specialist consulting work and we do not pretend otherwise. We supply against the design, and where there is no consultant we can get manufacturer application support involved.
Can you match existing fixtures in an older venue?
Often, and where a fitting is long discontinued we can usually identify a current equivalent. Send photographs of the fitting and its label.
Related: Dimmers and lighting controls · Hotel and hospitality lighting · Restaurant and bar lighting · Emergency and exit lighting · All categories
Manufacturer lines we carry for theatrical and entertainment lighting
10 of our lines cover this category. Any of them can be priced from your fixture schedule.
Altman Lighting, Inc. · Desisti · Fresco Lighting · Griven USA · Pathway Connectivity Solutions · SGM Lighting · Tempo LLC · Tivoli · Traxon · Vari-Lite
Not seeing a line? The full manufacturer index has all 637, or just send us the schedule.
Ask us about theatrical and entertainment lighting
Not ready for a full quote? Ask the question. Whether we can get a particular item, what the lead time looks like, or whether there is something comparable we can ship you. We usually come back the same business day.
Or call (954) 456-1006, Monday to Friday, nine to five. If you have drawings or a fixture schedule to attach, use the quote form instead.