Rainbow's End Sound & Lighting
Rainbow's End is a well-known New Zealand theme park, covering 9.3 hectares in Manukau, Auckland, New Zealand. It features over 20 rides and attractions, and a popular entertainment stage. The stage is used for all manner of events both day and night, including magic shows, jugglers, dancers, DJ’s and bands. The daytime performances relied on a basic sound system that struggled with music and the evening shows were run by in-house operators or hired contractors working with the end customer. Various sound and lighting systems were hired from different companies. Industry standard “pro” type equipment was used to cope with the heavy use and for easy and consistent operation.
“Bookings were increasing and the costs of hiring and labour to bring in the sound and lighting gear were no longer making financial sense. We decided we wanted an easy to manage permanent sound and lighting system,” explains Danny Berg, Entertainment Manager. Danny went to a number of different companies, “Edwards were by far the most professional, spending the most time with us and even bringing in the management team for a site visit. They understood our vision and came back to us with a number of designs from budget to top of the range.” Danny considered one of Edwards’ main strengths to be the proposal itself, “I’m not an AV expert and Edwards’ described the solution in layman’s terms, and answered all my questions – and there were lots!”
Edwards understood the theme park’s need to find a permanently installed sound and lighting system that would save money and provide a more consistent quality experience for the guests and performers alike. Edwards put forward the new DAS Audio ‘Event Line Array’ as the speaker system of choice. The price / performance ratio made sense, providing the desired power and high quality sound at an affordable cost. Plus Rainbow’s End would benefit from DAS’ renowned reliability and backup service. This was supplemented by lighting controlled by Sunlite software.
“Once the speakers arrived from Spain, the Edwards’ team did the installation within a week.” And much to Danny’s relief, “There were no surprises. I’d been dreading that we would suddenly need this or that, but there were no hidden costs.”
The system has been up and running since July, and even though Rainbow’s End have always used pro equipment, Danny says there has been a remarkable change to how the stage looks and sounds, “Plus there is the peace of mind of the warranty and Edwards’ back up. We paid a fixed fee but David, the Edwards’ project manager, has been back numerous times to check how we are doing and Shae, the technician has given us heaps of training.”
Danny concludes, “I’m so thankful to Edwards. Their customer service has been faultless.” And Edwards will be back again soon, now the Rainbow’s End engineers have given the go ahead to hang the speakers. The sound is going to get even better…
The Gear: Audio 12 x DAS Event 208A line array modules 1 x DAS DSP-2060 digital audio processor 1 x DAS Vantec-215A Dual 15” Active speaker 1 x Soundcraft SIE1 digital audio mixing console Shure microphones |  |
The Gear: Lighting 14 x Chauvet Colourdash Q18 LED spots 6 x Chauvet Rogue-1 Moving Heads 2 x Chauvet Strike-882 LED strobes 1 x Antari M-8 pro stage fogger 1 x Sunlite Suite lighting control software |  |
