Rohan Thornton admits he only looked for a new lighting control platform when LSC Lighting stopped support for his beloved Clarity console, however, this turned out to be a blessing in disguise as it lead him to the MA3 platform.
“Once I got over being shitty about it, I needed to look for a replacement platform as I didn’t want to wake up one morning to find that the console wasn’t working,” he said.
Rohan embarked on a mission to try every lighting console with decent support in Australia eventually discovering the MA Lighting grandMA3 onPC command wing XT was a clear winner for him.
“A lot of programmers I respected, who weren’t big fans of MA1 or MA2, were singing the praises of MA3 so I knew I had to have a good look at it,” he added. “Brandon at Showtech spent a fair bit of time showing me the MA3 platform and I was intrigued. It’s quite revolutionary. It’s amazingly flexible to design your workflow around the way you want to do your show rather than the way the software forces you to go. I found MA1 and MA2 forced me to work in a way opposite to my muscle memory. The more I got into MA3, the more I realised just how good it is.”
Rohan discovered that he could use the MA3 how he normally operated the Clarity console with everything he wanted to do being possible. Of course, there was also a whole heap of new features that enhanced his experience.
“I transferred easily to the Phasers and MA3 has turbo-charged the encoder in combination with the executor which is a stroke of genius giving a level of flexibility to a console that I never thought was possible,” commented Rohan. “I haven’t used the visualiser yet and that’s something I want to learn more about. I’m a Vectorworks user so I expect the integration should be seamless.”
Rohan confesses that initially, he was cynical about the grandMA3 onPC command wing XT as he says the interface with a PC-based system with other brands is rather lame.
“However, MA Lighting produced another stroke of genius and with the grandMA3 onPC command wing XT you just don’t know the difference,” he remarked. “In fact, I prefer the grandMA3 onPC command wing XT because I’m a clumsy bugger and I keep putting my hand on the touchscreens of the MA3 light or full size – which you don’t have with the grandMA3 onPC command wing XT so I don’t keep accidentally turning my rig orange! I prefer to have the bigger screens too, which I can position where I require them, and I find it easier than with an MA3 light.”
Upon receiving his MA Lighting grandMA3 onPC command wing XT, Rohan used it for the Adelaide Carols saying he enjoyed the experience immensely. However, at one stage he lost control of everything and had a bit of a panic … until someone suggested he check the blind button to discover he had accidentally hit it!
“Switching to MA3 has been a very good experience,” concluded Rohan. “When designing the hardware and software, MA Lighting has listened to users and taken onboard their comments. They’ve thought carefully about the PC interface and the hardware around it … which is something no other manufacturer has done. Jumping from the onPC to a light or full size MA3 is seamless which is unique and a great feature.”
Pictured is Rohan picking up his new console from Keith Bradshaw in our Melbourne warehouse
