Grande Fête Lilloise du Cirque: Big Looks under the Big Top
- yvonnebolharnorden
- 5 days ago
- 3 min read
From October 26 to December 1, 2024, the Grande Fête Lilloise du Cirque returned to Lille, France, bringing two hours of nonstop thrills, laughter, and wonder. To support his vision, lighting designer Jean-Marie Lemaire deployed a zactrack SMART system.
The Grande Fête Lilloise du Cirque is a family-friendly spectacle featuring world-class performers from across the globe, delivering audiences an unforgettable experience. Also called “Cirque de Lille”, this annual circus festival attracts approximately 100,000 to 150,000 spectators each year to the city of Lille.
Lighting Designer Jean-Marie Lemaire Brings 3D Tracking to Lille’s Circus Stage
The Cirque de Lille takes place in the Champ de Mars area, typically under a large big top tent. The show features acrobats, clowns, jugglers, and more—requiring an innovative lighting design to support their performances.
At the 2024 edition of the festival, they had a technical ace up their sleeve: zactrack SMART. In an interview Jean-Marie Lemaire, a seasoned lighting designer now part of Stienne Productions, speaks about his work at the festival, and his experience using zactrack SMART for the first time. The system was supplied by Axente.
It starts with the right people at the right place
Jean-Marie started using zactrack after Eric, director of Stienne Productions, introduced him to the system. He had previously heard about the success of the system in Disney shows and was excited to try it himself. Tracking objects “in the round,” as required by the classic concentric shape and layout of a Big Top circus tent, can be daunting—and that was exactly the challenge posed here.
The renowned Cirque de Lille show features high-energy acts, including dogs and horses, with performers moving dynamically through the audience and on stage, sometimes at great speeds and in unpredictable patterns. To meet this demand, the team deployed a zactrack SMART system with 11 Anchors, ensuring extensive 3D coverage of the space with minimal tracking errors. Luminex hardware was used to handle accurate and smooth data transmission.
Challenge Accepted: zactrack SMART Takes on the Big Top Circus
The primary goal was for each lighting fixture to function as a potential key light for performers, regardless of where they moved in the tent. Fast-moving objects and varying movements required the system to handle 3D tracking in real time. By integrating zactrack SMART with an MA3 Light console, this capability was put at Jean-Marie’s fingertips. With 50 fixtures operating on the zactrack system and a total of 120 lights in the rig, Jean-Marie had precise, responsive control over a complex and dynamic lighting environment.
By using Ayrton Rivales, which boast a 360° pan/tilt movement range, they successfully adapted to the performers’ unpredictable patterns, avoiding the notorious “flip” issue that usually occurs with standard moving lights. The MA3 software allowed them to create and activate dedicated zactrack presets, making the system highly intuitive and adaptable.
Zactrack Does It Better: Letting Art, Design, and Vision Take Center Stage
zactrack’s automation created a smoother, more immersive experience by allowing Jean-Marie to focus on the artistry of lighting design without the distractions of manual follow-spot adjustments. Using the zactrack app on his tablet, he was able to monitor each tag’s status, a feature that proved invaluable when performers occasionally forgot to wear their tags, enabling quick corrections.
The Audience Experience and Artist Reactions
For the performers and audience alike, zactrack added a new level of connection. “It keeps the focus directly on the artists,” Jean-Marie shared. The clowns, particularly impressed, found the automated lights “magical,” especially since the system operated seamlessly and allowed them to fully engage with the audience anytime and anywhere. For the technical team, being able to work with a system that minimised manual interventions during each act was a game-changer.
More to come
Jean-Marie is excited about zactrack’s potential integration with audio, which could open even more creative possibilities for productions like Cirque de Lille and many others. He continues to explore new ways to combine zactrack with Stienne Productions’ D&B audio sound systems, aiming to bring synchronised sound and tracking to the next level.
