Singapore National Day is always an important cultural event for the people of Singapore. Held annually on August 9th, this year was same impressive as others. What is unique about this event was the location. Over 5,000 performers formed a mass tableau on a floating platform that was 120m wide by 83m deep, a grandstand holding over 30,000 spectators sits by it's side. Between the grandstand and the floating platform was one of the straightaway's for the inaugural 2008 Singapore F1. Lighting design was created again this second year by Paul Collison who controlled the show via 2 x grandMA full-size, 2 x grandMA ultra-light and 16 x MA NSPs.

This year saw the introduction of grandMA video as a major part of the scenic landscape. 1,800 square metres of custom made LED netting framed the back of the stage. Four grandMA media servers controlled the screen. "The influence this had on the view was amazing," said Collison, "I've always liked playing with video and lighting however I've never had the chance to work with it on such a massive screen and have total creative freedom to entwine it into the scenic landscape. Playing between the lighting fixtures and the screens is a lot of fun. On such a big scale as this, you need to be careful to not take over the whole stage."

One session handled almost 16,000 parameters. The lighting rig included hundreds of Vari*Lite, DTS and Martin moving lights as the backbone of the lighting system with over one kilometre of Multi Mode Optic fibre connecting four data distribution points on the platform.

Lighting Production was done by Showtec Group Singapore. Addam Crawford was lighting project manager, Stuart Anderson lighting design assistant.