ansi lumen
the standard measure of projector light output; large-venue mapping projectors run 20,000-50,000+ ansi lumens.
art-net
dmx over ethernet — how big rigs move hundreds of universes on one network.
audience scanning
sweeping laser beams directly over the crowd — the most striking and most dangerous laser effect, done only with measured irradiance and trained operators.
audio-reactive visuals
visuals driven by live analysis of the music — beat detection, frequency bands and amplitude mapped to visual parameters.
beam / spot / wash
the three moving-head families: beam cuts a hard shaft through haze, spot projects gobos in focus, wash paints soft colour over areas.
blinder
an audience-facing fixture fired in bursts to white out the crowd on musical hits.
busking
operating a show live without timecode — improvising cues to the music in real time; the skill that separates operators from playback.
cue stack
the ordered list of programmed looks a console steps through during a show.
dmx512
the 1986-vintage control protocol that still runs most lighting rigs — 512 channels per universe over a single cable.
drone light show
a synchronised fleet of led drones flying formations — the emerging fireworks replacement, flown from a single ground station.
edge blending
overlapping the edges of adjacent projectors and cross-fading them so several machines read as one seamless image.
fixture
any individual lighting instrument in the rig — from a single par to a 50,000-lumen moving head.
followspot
an operated spotlight that tracks a performer — increasingly a remote-controlled fixture driven by camera or sensor tracking.
generative visuals
content computed live by algorithm rather than played from rendered files — every frame unique, parameters performable.
genlock
locking multiple video devices to one sync pulse so outputs don't tear or drift — mandatory on large multi-server led walls.
gobo
a stencil or glass slide inside a spot fixture that shapes the beam into a pattern.
haze
the fine atmospheric suspension that makes light beams visible — without it a beam show is invisible; denser fog is a different, short-lived effect.
hologauze
a near-invisible metallised scrim that catches projection — the trick behind most 'hologram' moments on stage.
ilda
the international laser display association — the trade body whose standards and safety courses define professional laser practice (also lends its name to the classic laser control signal).
imag
image magnification — the live camera feed of the performer on the big screens, often treated through real-time effects.
kinetic lighting
fixtures or objects flown on motorised winches that move during the show — light as choreography.
laser safety
the discipline around show lasers: trained operators, beam-path control, measured exposure, and in some countries a formal variance or permit per show.
led processor
the box that takes the media server's video signal and drives the led panels — scaling, colour and refresh live here.
led wall
a video surface built from tiled led panels — brighter than projection, daylight-capable, and now the default festival backdrop.
moving head
a motorised fixture that pans and tilts — the animated workhorse of every festival rig, in spot, beam and wash flavours.
ndi
video over ordinary ethernet — how live camera feeds and generative sources move between machines without sdi infrastructure.
nit
a unit of brightness for emissive displays (candela per square metre); outdoor led walls run in the thousands of nits.
pixel mapping
treating fixtures or led strips as pixels of one big image, so video content plays across the physical rig.
pixel pitch
the distance in millimetres between led pixels — smaller pitch means finer detail and a closer acceptable viewing distance, at higher cost.
point cloud
a 3d scan represented as millions of points — lidar-scanned architecture and venues increasingly drive mapping and content design.
previz
previsualization — programming and reviewing the show in a 3d simulation before the rig exists; saves days of on-site time.
projection mapping
projecting content warped to fit a real object or architecture so the surface itself appears to move — the software splits, masks and pre-distorts the image per surface.
rgb laser projector
a projector whose light source is discrete red, green and blue lasers — wider colour, more brightness and no lamp swaps; the current large-venue standard.
rigging
the trusses, motors and hardware everything hangs from — the discipline that keeps tonnes of gear safely overhead.
sacn
the newer standards-body cousin of art-net (streaming acn, e1.31) — dmx over ip with multicast built in.
shader
a small program run per-pixel on the gpu — the raw material of generative visuals.
show control
the layer that coordinates all departments — one system firing lighting, video, sfx and audio cues from a shared timeline or logic.
spout / syphon
gpu texture sharing between applications on one machine (spout on windows, syphon on mac) — how touchdesigner feeds resolume without a cable.
timecode
a clock signal (usually smpte ltc) that locks lights, video, lasers and pyro to the music — the backbone of every synchronised festival show.
virtual production
shooting or performing against real-time rendered backgrounds on led volumes — film-world tech now flowing back into live staging.
vj
the performer mixing visuals live to music — clips, generative layers and effects played as an instrument rather than a fixed timeline.
warping
pre-distorting an image so it lands geometrically correct on a non-flat or off-axis surface.
xr stage
an led-volume stage where camera tracking extends the rendered world beyond the physical screens in real time.