ACME Supernova Road Test
Written by Kurtis Hammer, published in CX Magazine.
The ACME SUPERNOVA is a large, robust, very powerful, full featured moving head luminaire. It features a big 1,800 Watt LED engine that produces bright light and vibrant colours with an impressive output of 65,000 lumens.
ACME have been hitting the market with some really interesting and high-quality fixtures recently, including the SUPERNOVA. They are a lighting brand to keep an eye on, as they are not just coming out with your typical offerings.
Construction
This is a big unit, at nearly 53kg, and on par with other fixtures in its class. Dimensions are: width 465mm, depth 365mm, and height 830mm. It is IP66 rated, making it a true outdoor fixture. It can be hung on a truss or placed on the ground just like any other light. Movement is smooth, with a reasonable range of motion at 540° Pan and 270° Tilt. It’s a well-constructed light. It is robust, and it definitely looks like it has an IP66 rating and will survive the elements.
Optics, Colour and Brightness
The main selling point for this light is the sheer power and brightness of the light engine. The ACME SUPERNOVA is powered by a massive 1,800 Watt LED engine with a colour temperature of 6,700K. It outputs 65,000 lumens. It’s a very, very punchy light.
It features linear CMY colour mixing with two colour wheels as well as Linear CTO colour correction, ranging from 2,700K up to its native 6,700K. It produces a solid array of bright, crisp colours from a single source LED that is the same colour from when it leaves the light all the way out to the end of the beam.
It has a very impressive 12:1 zoom ratio, with a solid zoom range from 4°- 48°. To achieve a zoom range that large it takes a bit more than a longer zoom motor. It really speaks to how impressive the optical quality of the light is.
It has a large frontal lens diameter of 225mm, or nearly nine inches. It casts a good healthy beam. It works well as a beam and zoomed out as a wash. Naturally, you do lose some intensity as you zoom out, but it is still very bright. Same for when using darker colours. But with 65,000 lumens, you probably wouldn’t be too worried.
I was surprised to read how high the CRI is for what is effectively a big outdoor light. It is a nice touch that shows quality and attention to detail. It has a CRI of 90 with the CRI filter dropped in. This would make it suitable for TV and other high-end applications such as lighting an outdoor art installation.
Applications and Features
Although the main selling point is the size and power of the light engine, it also has a solid and quite refined feature set. The features, and the quality of the features definitely surpassed my expectations.
The SUPERNOVA features two rotating gobo wheels. It has both projection and aerial gobos on deck as well as an animation wheel for effects. It has a four-shutter framing module in which a single shutter can give a blackout. It has a four-facet linear prism, and two independent frost filters to soften and spread the beam.
Pan has a range of 540° and the tilt has a range of 270°. Both of those figures are pretty respectable given that it is about standard for a mid to large moving light. To be honest, I thought the range of motion would have been compromised in delivering a moving light this heavy.
Although you could use the SUPERNOVA indoors in a venue or as part of a production house’s kit, it would be best suited for an outdoor installation, like Vivid for example, or in a stadium show. You could use it for a large number of applications.
You can use it outside for its beam, or you can project it at something and use it to light something up. It does both really well.
Control and Programming
Control and programming is much like any other fixture out there. It can be controlled using 5-pin DMX or Cat5 cable. Protocols include your standard DMX512, RDM, Art-Net and sACN.
The ACME SUPERNOVA has four DMX modes: 23 channel, 32 channel, 34 channel, and 43 channel. It has a reasonably low DMX footprint, which would theoretically make it easier to program as there are fewer parameters to worry about.
The unit can also be manually controlled via the onboard control panel which features four buttons and an LCD display. The onboard control has the same look and feel of most of the other ACME products I’ve used. Familiarity is a great thing when it comes to trying to manually test, control, or address a fixture.
Verdict
My initial thoughts were that I was going to be dealing with a big, powerful, brawny light first and foremost, and everything else was going to come in a distant second. What I got was a surprisingly refined light, with a quality, well finessed feature set. Make no mistake though – the powerful 1,800W light engine is still the main selling feature.
If you are in the market for a large outdoor fixture in the 65,000 lumen range, for a gig or an installation, make sure you check out the ACME Supernova. It’s a fantastic light.
