Editor's note: With MAGFest happening right in our backyard, we sent our resident lighting designer, Gabby, to the event to capture some media and share her experience. Enjoy!
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Super MAGFest (short for Music and Gaming Festival) is exactly that – a music and gaming festival located in Maryland’s National Harbor just outside of Washington, D.C. It’s a nonstop four-day festival filled with live music, retro arcade games, tabletop games, cosplay, panels, and more. This was my first time attending the festival, and first time shooting a show. What you may not know is X-Laser’s history with MAGFest.
For many years, our friend Krztov ran lasers for many of the live shows, and this year he was back doing the same. He took DeLorean Overdrive’s rave set to new heights with his four Skywriter HPX M-5s that had the crowd hyped. During that set, my sister and her boyfriend were in the crowd, and she texted me, “Lasers are sick af.” I agreed, as I saw Krztov work his magic while I snapped photos from the front of house.
There were more than just Krztov’s Skywriters doing the work however. SONUS brought six Skywriter HPX M-5s as well as part of the whole staging package they brought for the weekend. SONUS was running both the main stage and the B-Stage for the festival. I managed to shoot a few of the other sets, and those M-5s were the perfect lasers for that venue.
I did enjoy seeing the difference in laser programming between Krztov and the SONUS team. The DeLorean Overdrive set was more of a classic rave, with tight, fast-moving beams, while the Red Vox set, which was more of a rock band, had these lovely wide-spread beams with a bit of a liquid sky effect. I always love seeing the range that lasers have. They truly can do it all, from chill or slow songs, to fast rave sets. Seeing the lasers being run directly from a lighting console is huge for me too. The SONUS programmers, Cole and Brittany, were busking each set on grandMAs. If I wasn’t standing behind them taking photos, I wouldn’t have known they were even busking.
While this was my first time shooting a show, I had a very easy experience. The SONUS crew set my assistant and I up in their backstage office and showed us around where we were allowed to shoot from. However, I knew the best view of the lasers was going to come from the front of house, so my assistant and I posted up there. I got some pretty good still shots, and my assistant took some short videos to really show the lasers in action.
Overall, I had an awesome time hanging out with the crew and enjoying the music while also getting super sick photos of the lasers. MAGFest is an amazing convention and I only got a glimpse of it. Huge thanks to the SONUS team for giving us the ability to come out and shoot with them!
See below for YouTube videos of our lasers in action, courtesy of MAGFest:
Red Vox (coming soon!)
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