The first time I performed with a follow spot, I felt like a rock star.
It was a corporate event in Vienna — a large ballroom, maybe three hundred people, a proper stage with wings and a curtain and the kind of production budget that corporate Austria occasionally decides to throw at an evening gala. The event company had brought in real theatrical lighting, including a follow spot operated by someone in the back of the room.
When I walked on stage, the houselights dimmed and a warm pool of light found me. Just me. Everything else faded. The audience became invisible — I could hear them but not see them, which was actually helpful because three hundred faces can be intimidating. And the light was doing something I had never experienced before: it was making me feel important. Not in an ego sense. In a theatrical sense. The light was telling the audience, without words, that this person on stage matters. Pay attention. Something is about to happen.
The show was one of the best I had done at that point. And I knew, even while performing, that the lighting was responsible for at least part of it. The follow spot had created a visual frame that elevated everything I did. Every gesture was sharper because it was lit against darkness. Every moment of stillness was more dramatic because I was a figure of light in a dark room. The audience was focused, reactive, engaged — partly because the lighting had stripped away every visual distraction and given them exactly one thing to look at.
I walked off that stage thinking: I need a follow spot at every show.
It took about three more performances with follow spots to learn that it is not that simple.
The Salzburg Incident
A few months later, I was performing at an event in Salzburg. Different venue, different production company, different follow spot operator. The setup looked similar on paper — ballroom, stage, theatrical lighting, spot.
But from the moment I walked on stage, something was wrong. The light was tight. Very tight. A hard-edged circle maybe three feet in diameter, and I was expected to stand perfectly still inside it. Every time I took a step to the side — which I do constantly, because movement is part of how I perform — the light followed a beat too late, leaving me half in shadow while the bright circle sat where I had been a moment ago. Then it would catch up with a visible jerk, overshoot slightly, and settle.
The effect was the opposite of everything I had experienced in Vienna. Instead of feeling like the light was supporting me, it felt like it was chasing me. Like I was a prisoner trying to escape a searchlight. The audience could see the disconnect — the spot was always slightly behind me, slightly off, and that visible lag communicated something subconscious but unmistakable: this is not under control.
It got worse when I brought a volunteer on stage. The spot stayed on me, leaving the volunteer in near-darkness. When the volunteer spoke, the audience could hear her but could barely see her face. The spot operator tried to widen the beam, but overcorrected, and suddenly we were both in a flat wash of light that destroyed the intimacy the spot had initially created.
I spent the entire performance fighting the light instead of working with it. And the audience could feel the struggle, even if they could not have articulated what was wrong. The show was fine. It was professional. But it was not the transcendent experience I had in Vienna, and the primary difference was not my performance or my material. It was the follow spot.
What Makes the Difference
After accumulating enough follow spot experiences, I started to understand the variables that separate a gift from a curse.
Dan Harlan addresses this directly in his Tarbell Lesson 83 lecture. The first principle: the spot should have a soft edge, not a hard edge. A soft-edged spot creates a gentle pool of light that falls off gradually at the periphery. You can step a foot outside the center and still be well-lit. A hard-edged spot creates a visible circle with a sharp boundary. Step outside it and you are immediately in shadow. The audience can see the circle on the floor, and it looks exactly like what it is — a mechanical device pointing at you.
Soft edge is forgiving. Hard edge is punishing.
The second principle: size matters enormously. Harlan’s guidance is that the spot should cover you from feet to full arm spread, with room to step around the edges. That is significantly larger than what most operators default to. An inexperienced operator makes the spot tight, which turns every natural movement into a crisis. You cannot gesture widely. You cannot take a step. You are frozen in place by a circle of light. A larger spot gives you freedom to move, gesture, and address different sections of the audience. The light accommodates your performance rather than restricting it.
The Color Nobody Talks About
Here is something that surprised me when I first encountered it: the color of the follow spot matters as much as its size and edge quality.
The default assumption is white light. A bright white spot. And white light is fine, technically. It illuminates you. People can see you. Job done.
But there is a better option, and Harlan names it specifically: bastard amber. It is a gel color that looks pinkish-yellow — warmer than white, but not obviously tinted. The visual effect is subtle but significant. Bastard amber makes skin tones look warmer, more vibrant, more alive. It works across all skin tones. It flatters universally. Under bastard amber, you look healthier, more energetic, more present. Under plain white, you look slightly washed out, slightly pale, slightly flat.
The difference is not dramatic enough that an audience would say “that performer’s lighting color is beautiful.” It is subtle enough that they simply think “that performer looks great.” They attribute the visual impression to you rather than to the light, which is exactly what good lighting should do — be invisible as a technical element while shaping the audience’s perception at a subconscious level.
I started asking for bastard amber specifically at venues that had follow spots. The response ranged from “of course, that is standard” at professional theatres to “what is bastard amber?” at corporate event venues. When the gel was not available, I learned that a very light pink or a warm straw color achieves something similar. The key is moving away from pure white toward warmth without going so far that the color becomes noticeable as a color choice.
Communicating with the Operator
The single biggest variable in whether a follow spot helps or hurts your show is the person operating it. Not the equipment. Not the venue. The human being whose hands are on the controls.
A skilled operator is an invisible partner. They anticipate your movements, lead you slightly rather than following you, and widen the spot when you bring someone on stage without being asked. An unskilled operator is a liability — jerking the spot to catch up with your movements, forgetting to widen for volunteers, tightening the spot for “effect” at exactly the wrong moment.
Here is what I have learned about communicating with operators, from trial and painful error:
Talk to them before the show. Not through the event coordinator. Not through the production manager. Directly. Face to face if possible. On the phone if not. The conversation takes five minutes and covers three things.
First, I describe my movement pattern. I move. I walk to the sides of the stage. I sometimes step forward off the apron. I will bring a volunteer on stage. The spot needs to be large enough and soft enough to accommodate all of this without me feeling trapped.
Second, I ask about their experience. Not in a testing way — in a genuine, curious way. Have they followed a performer before? A speaker? A comedian? What is their default approach? This tells me what to expect and whether I need to adjust my own movement to compensate.
Third, I ask them to feel the show rather than mechanically track me. This sounds vague, but experienced operators understand immediately. It means: if I pause for a dramatic moment, do not adjust the light. If I take a slow step to the right, follow slowly. If I move quickly, follow quickly. Match the energy. The light should breathe with the performance.
When There Is No Follow Spot
Most venues I perform at do not have follow spots. Corporate events in Austrian hotels, conference breakout rooms, private functions in restaurants — these spaces have overhead lighting and that is it. And I have learned that the absence of a follow spot is actually preferable to a bad follow spot. Well-managed houselights, dimmed to a moderate level with perhaps a few overhead spots aimed at the performance area, can create a perfectly good atmosphere. It is not as dramatic as a proper theatrical setup, but it is consistent, predictable, and under control.
My rule of thumb: if I cannot speak to the operator directly and I am not confident in their experience, I would rather perform under well-set houselights than under a follow spot that might turn into a searchlight. The ceiling on the experience is lower, but the floor is much higher.
The Temperature Trick
One small practical detail that Harlan mentions, and that I have found genuinely useful: when you are in a well-focused spot, you can feel where the center of the light is by temperature. The center of the beam is warmer. Not dramatically warmer, especially with LED spots, but noticeably warmer if you are paying attention.
This means you can navigate within the spot without looking at the floor to check your position. You feel the warmth on your face and shoulders, and when the warmth is even and centered, you know you are in the sweet spot. When the warmth shifts to one side of your face, you know you have drifted off-center.
It is a subtle thing, and it took me several shows to learn to trust it. But it makes a difference, especially in situations where you cannot see the spot boundary because the edge is soft and the floor is dark. You develop an instinct for where the light is without ever looking for it, and that instinct frees you to focus entirely on the audience rather than worrying about your position.
The Gift Version
When a follow spot works — when the operator is skilled, the edge is soft, the size is right, the color is warm, and the communication has been clear — it is one of the most powerful tools available to a performer. It isolates you visually, making you the only thing worth looking at. It eliminates distractions. It creates automatic contrast and drama. And it gives you a sense of presence that genuinely affects how you carry yourself. You stand taller in a follow spot. You gesture more deliberately. The light changes you as much as it changes the audience’s perception of you.
The curse version is everything I described in Salzburg: tight, hard-edged, poorly operated, constantly fighting you. The curse version makes you look like a prisoner. The gift version makes you look like a star.
The difference between them is not the equipment. It is the communication that happens before the show starts.