Custom Club Lighting Effect Sales and Installation by Hollywood DJ
Club lighting, designed, installed and programmed.
Hollywood DJ designs, supplies and installs club lighting systems for nightclubs, bars, lounges, event centers and private venues. We have been doing it out of our Los Angeles warehouse since 1992, and our downtown showroom holds the largest permanent Chauvet DJ lighting display in the country, so you can stand in a dark room and watch a fixture run before you spend a dollar on it.
One company for the fixtures, the rig and the programming.
Hollywood DJ sells and installs complete lighting systems for commercial venues. A typical project covers the dance floor and stage fixtures, the truss or mounting hardware, DMX control and cabling, on-site installation, and custom programming of the looks and cues your staff will actually use night to night. Most venue systems land between $5,000 and $40,000 depending on room size and how much movement you want.
We are a stocking dealer, not a broker. The fixtures ship from our own Los Angeles warehouse, which is why we can quote a system, show it to you running, and install it without waiting on a distributor. Systems ship nationwide. Installation is Southern California.
Built for rooms that have to fill up.
The gear list changes a lot between a 60-seat cocktail bar and a 900-capacity club. The process does not.
Nightclubs
Dance floor movers, beams, blinders and haze, programmed to build across the night instead of running one look until close.
Bars & lounges
Color washes, back bar and architectural accents, plus a small effects package for the nights the room turns into a club.
Event centers & halls
Uplighting, gobo projection for logos and monograms, and dance floor effects that reset quickly between bookings.
Restaurants & private venues
Dinner service warmth that transitions to something louder after 10pm, on one controller a manager can run.
What does club lighting actually cost?
Nobody publishes this, so here it is. These are the ranges real projects land in, based on what we sell. Every number below is equipment plus install, and every one of them moves with your ceiling height, your electrical, and how much you want the room to move.
| Room | Typical system | Equipment range | What it gets you |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Small bar or lounge under 100 capacity |
Color wash package plus a couple of effect fixtures on a controller | $1,500 to $5,000 | The room has a look and can change color. Enough movement for a busy Friday, not a full club rig. |
|
Bar with a dance floor 100 to 250 capacity |
Four to eight moving heads, wash, haze, DMX control | $5,000 to $12,000 | A real dance floor. Beams and gobos overhead, programmed looks, one controller behind the bar. |
|
Nightclub 250 to 600 capacity |
Full overhead rig on truss, movers, beams, blinders, laser, hazer | $12,000 to $40,000 | A designed room. Multiple zones, cues that build through the night, effects the crowd reacts to. |
|
Large club or multi-room 600+ capacity |
Zoned rig, heavier fixtures, professional control desk, rigged truss | $40,000 and up | Production-grade. Built to be run by a lighting operator, not a wall panel. |
Ranges are for planning, not a quote. Live pricing is on the product pages: see lighting packages for pre-built systems, which currently run roughly $3,800 to $11,000, or moving head lights where individual fixtures run about $240 to $1,930. Electrical work, rigging engineering and permits are quoted separately when a room needs them.
What lights are used in nightclubs?
Six fixture types do almost all the work in a club. Most rooms use four of them. Here is what each one is actually for.
| Fixture | Also called | What it does | Shop |
|---|---|---|---|
| Moving head spot | Mover, intelligent light, scanner | Sharp, defined beam that pans and tilts. Projects gobo patterns onto floors and walls. The workhorse of a club rig. | Moving heads |
| Moving head wash | Wash mover | Soft, wide flood of color that fills a zone rather than cutting a beam. Used to color the whole room at once. | Wash movers |
| LED par / uplight | Par can, uplight, color wash | Static color on walls, corners, bars and architecture. Cheapest way to make a room look designed. | Uplights |
| Strobe / blinder | Strobe, audience blinder | Hard white flash on the drop. Used sparingly, it is the single biggest crowd reaction in the room. | Strobes |
| Laser | Club laser, laser projector | Tight aerial beams and fans. Needs haze to be visible and needs to be aimed above head height. | Lasers |
| Hazer or fogger | Haze machine, fog machine | Not a light. It is what makes beams and lasers visible in the air. Without it, an expensive rig looks like nothing. | Haze & fog |
Also common: gobo projectors for logos and monograms, cold spark machines for bottle service and entrances, box truss to hang it all from, and a lighting controller to run it. We stock Chauvet DJ and ADJ deepest, and the Chauvet ILS range is what we reach for when a venue wants fixtures that sync without a programmer on payroll.
Beam, spot or wash. What is the difference?
Three words that get used interchangeably and should not be. Pick the wrong one and the room looks wrong no matter how much you spent.
Beam
A narrow, parallel column of light, often only a few degrees wide. It stays the same width all the way across the room.
Use it for aerial effects over the dance floor. Beams are what people photograph. They need haze in the air or you will not see them at all.
Spot
A wider, focusable cone with a hard edge. Carries gobo patterns, so it can project shapes, textures and logos onto surfaces.
Use it for patterns on the floor and walls, and for actually lighting a DJ booth or stage. The most versatile single fixture in a club.
Wash
A broad, soft flood with no defined edge. Covers a large area in even color and blends with the fixtures next to it.
Use it for coloring the whole room or a zone of it. Washes set the mood. Beams and spots create the moments on top of that.
Most club rigs use all three: washes to color the room, spots for patterns and coverage, beams for the peaks. A hybrid fixture does two or three jobs in one head and costs less than buying them separately, which is usually where we start on a tight budget.
Bringing the club home.
More clients want the same thing in a private space, and the engineering is the same, just smaller. We have turned basements into private nightclubs, lit pool areas as resort-style party zones, and built home theaters that switch from movie night to dance floor from a phone.
Game rooms that change color with your team. Home gyms with lighting that actually pushes you. Garage setups that hold their own against downtown rooms. Same fixtures, same control, no commercial permit process.
From first call to a programmed room.
We look at the room
Square footage, ceiling height, where the power is, where the dance floor actually is versus where you think it is, and what the room has to do on a slow Tuesday as well as a sold-out Saturday.
You see the fixtures running
Come to the downtown showroom and we will put the fixtures we are proposing in a dark room and run them. This is the step that stops people buying the wrong light, and almost nobody else in Los Angeles can do it.
Written system quote
Itemized, so you can see every fixture, the truss and rigging, control, cable and labor as separate lines. Approve the whole thing or cut it into phases.
Install
We work around your hours, not ours. Hanging, rigging, DMX runs and power. We coordinate with your electrician, or bring one, where a room needs new circuits.
Programming and handoff
Custom looks and cues built for your room, mapped to something your staff can run without a lighting degree. We train whoever is pushing the buttons, and we pick up the phone afterward.
Thirty-three years of LA rooms.
Hollywood DJ has been family owned and operating out of the same city since 1992. We sell the gear, we stock the gear, and we install it, which means one number to call when something goes dark on a Saturday night.
- The country's largest permanent Chauvet DJ display
- Stocking dealer, not a drop-shipper
- Design, supply, install and programming in one place
- Phased builds when the budget needs it
- Rent fixtures first and apply the fee to the purchase
- 4.7 stars across 1,059+ Google reviews
Club lighting, answered.
How much does it cost to light a nightclub?
Most nightclub lighting systems land between $12,000 and $40,000 for equipment and installation. A bar with a small dance floor is usually $5,000 to $12,000, and a lounge that just needs color and a couple of effects can be done for $1,500 to $5,000. Rooms over 600 capacity generally start at $40,000.
What moves the number most is ceiling height, whether you need truss and rigging, and how many moving fixtures you want. Electrical work and permits are quoted separately.
What lights are used in nightclubs?
Six types cover almost every club: moving head spots for patterns and coverage, moving head washes for room color, LED pars or uplights for walls and architecture, strobes and blinders for peak moments, lasers for aerial effects, and a hazer to make the beams visible in the air.
Most rooms use four of the six. The hazer is the one people leave out and then wonder why the rig looks flat.
What are club lights called?
The moving fixtures are called moving heads, movers or intelligent lighting. The static color fixtures are LED pars or uplights. Together with strobes, lasers and haze they make up what the industry calls an intelligent lighting rig, all run over a control protocol called DMX.
What is the difference between a beam, a spot and a wash?
A beam is a narrow column of light that stays the same width across the room, used for aerial effects. A spot is a wider focusable cone with a hard edge that can project gobo patterns. A wash is a soft, wide flood with no edge, used to color a whole area.
Washes set the mood, spots create the patterns, beams create the peaks. Hybrid fixtures do two or three of these jobs in one head.
Do I need DMX, and can my staff actually run it?
Yes, any system with more than a few fixtures should be on DMX, and yes. We program the looks and cues in advance and map them to simple controls, so running the room at night is pushing a button or moving a fader, not programming.
If you want something even simpler, the Chauvet ILS range lets fixtures sync to each other without a console at all, which suits a bar with no dedicated lighting person.
Do you install, or do I need my own contractor?
We install. Hanging, rigging, DMX runs, control and programming are ours. Where a room needs new electrical circuits, structural rigging sign-off or a permit, we coordinate with a licensed electrician and the relevant inspector, either yours or one we bring in.
Where do you install club lighting, and can I buy the gear without the install?
Installation is Southern California, centered on Los Angeles and Orange County. Equipment ships anywhere in the United States.
Plenty of customers outside the area buy the designed system from us and have a local crew hang it. We will still spec the room and tell your installer exactly what goes where.
Can I see the lights before I commit?
Yes, and you should. Our downtown showroom holds the largest permanent Chauvet DJ lighting display in the country. We put the proposed fixtures in a dark room and run them, so you are choosing from what a light actually does rather than from a spec sheet.
Bring your own DMX controller if you want. We can patch it.
Can I phase a club lighting project across budgets?
Yes, and most venues should. We design the finished rig first, then build it in stages so the truss, power and control are sized for where you are going instead of where you are starting. Adding eight fixtures in year two to a rig that was planned for them costs far less than rewiring.
Can I rent club lighting before buying it?
Yes. We rent the same fixtures we sell, and the rental fee credits toward the purchase price of that item if you decide to keep it. For a venue trying a look for one event before committing to a permanent install, that is a paid test drive. See DJ equipment rental.
How long does a club lighting install take?
A small bar package is usually one day. A full club rig is typically two to five days on site, depending on rigging and whether electrical work is in scope. We schedule around your opening hours, so most of the work happens while you are closed.
What about service after the club lighting install?
Call us. We are ten minutes from downtown, we stock the fixtures we sold you, and we hold the programming file for your room, so a swap or a re-program does not start from scratch.
Downtown Los Angeles, and the rooms around it.
Showroom & warehouse
Hollywood DJ
934 E 11th St
Los Angeles, CA 90021
Fashion District, ten minutes east of Downtown
Hours & phone
800-700-4542
Monday through Saturday, 10 AM to 5 PM
Closed Sunday
Walk in and see the lighting display any time we are open
Install coverage
Los Angeles, Hollywood, West Hollywood, Downtown, Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, Culver City, Pasadena, Burbank, Glendale, Long Beach, the San Fernando Valley, Orange County and the Inland Empire. Equipment ships nationwide.
Tell us about the room.
Send the details and we will come back with a direction and a budget. If it is easier to talk it through, call 800-700-4542.