to manufacture automated lighting products for the architectural lighting market, selling it off to Electronic Theatre Controls four years later. A smaller backup console was also launched, called the Mini-Artisan. This was followed by the VL4, a more compact and brighter version of the V元, and two upgrades of the original VL2: the VL2B and the VL2C.
#BROADWAY LITES DEMO SERIES#
The Series 200 system launched in 1987, featuring the Artisan Control Console and two new luminaires: the VL2-a direct descendant of the VL1-and the V元, based on the VL-Zero. and struck distribution deals to introduce the product into international markets. The company subsequently incorporated as Vari-Lite Inc. Showco used the capital to develop the control console, power distribution, and digital data transmission equipment required to implement the system. Genesis, already a regular Showco client, immediately invested $1 million in the new technology, although a working model, later known as the VL1, would not be available until the band embarked on its Abacab tour. Showco representatives demonstrated the prototype-known today as the VL-Zero-to members of the British band Genesis, having programmed it to enact two simple cues. An initial prototype of a fully automated lighting system, featuring a General Electric Marc 350 projector, was built in twelve weeks. The company exploited this discovery by constructing a fixture equipped with two motors to move the light. In 1980, Showco engineer Jim Bornhorst discovered that twisting dichroic filters alters the frequencies of light filtered, resulting in an apparent color change. īy the end of the 1970s, Showco's lighting equipment was becoming outdated, and the company could not afford to replace it. The company quickly grew, both in size and reputation, and added lighting equipment to its inventory in 1972. The company initially operated two sound systems and two trucks from Maxson's garage. In March 1970, Calmes and Brutsché, together with sound engineer Jack Maxson, incorporated Showco, with the intention of supplying sound systems to regional rock concerts. They built a sound system for their shows that attracted the attention of other acts, who asked to rent it from them. The origins of Vari-Lite date to the late 1960s, when college friends Jack Calmes and Rusty Brutsché played together in a Texas-based blues band.
#BROADWAY LITES DEMO CODE#
The code for the demo is in the Decoder folder, to build it run the make.py python script. The current version of Broadway was built with emscripten 1.35.12 Google's JavaScript closure compiler and further optimized by hand to use WebGL. The demo is Android's H.264 decoder compiled with Emscripten to JavaScript, then further optimized with The top left player runs on the main thread, the remaining players run in background worker threads. You can start the video by clicking on each player.
#BROADWAY LITES DEMO DOWNLOAD#
The video player first needs to download the entire video before it can start playing, thus appearing to be a bit slow at first, so have patience.