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It takes a village to pull off a laser show. These are our villagers.

Our team: The Illuminauts

About our team: Mike Gould is the designer, fabricator, and guiding light of our efforts, but he depends on a bold and daring bunch of friends who help out with the electronics and video, publicize the events, and set up, fire up, tear down, and haul around the gear necessary for all this. Mike would like to thank them all ever so very much.

In Alphabetical Order:

Henry Birdseye
Henry is one of our newest Illuminauts. We met him through his use of the Radiator, which he uses with his analog synthesis music projects. Radiator creator Chris Short hooked him up with us via Photon Lexicon, an online laser forum. He assisted at FoolMoon 2021 in Ann Arbor, and DLECTRICITY 2021 in Detroit. He is also our resident video editor, working on our recent videos for our Detroit and Ypsilanti shows.

Tom Bray
Tom is our resident AV, web, and general theatrical technology expert. He provides production supervision and construction, and advises us on all manner of technical topics. By day he is a Converging Technologies Consultant at the University of Michigan. His video expertise can be seen in most of our videos, including the Four-Barreled Transmodulator, which he filmed assisted by his wife Jeri Hollister.

Salli Christenson
Salli is Illuminatus Lasers' promotions coordinator. A recently retired social worker, and Mike’s spouse of almost 3 decades, Salli will handle the majority of Illuminatus outreach, booking, and promotion. She has been a long-time coordinator of various Illuminatus events and parties.

Bradley Cross
Bradley has helped out on lot of our shows, starting with our 3-month stay at the Dow Museum of Science and Art in 2014.In this photo he is assisting setting up the first dry run of the screen framework used in Lasing Nang Talung, our show in Madison WI in 2018. He also ran the 6-Chan for the Lumiators at ypsiGLOW in Oct. 2021.

Draco Draco
AKA Chris Rockhey, Draco is a member of our crew who helps out with various laser and electronic-related issues, and is a member of our road crew. He also flies a drone and makes his own laser projectors.

Wayne Gillis
Wayne is Co-founder of our group, and is our Chief Engineering Officer. He builds our cables and controllers, and advises Mike on what is and is not possible in the laser realm. He is also our resident laser specialist and Laser Safety Officer.

Zita Gillis
Zita has many roles. Client Relations: helping to understand the objectives and challenges of each project and maintaining communications between the team and stakeholders. Fabricator: creating customized screens and projection surfaces. Aesthetician: optimizing the physical appearance of setups. Laser Operator: controlling effects during a performance. Operations Logistics: coordinating transportation, accommodations, and well-being of crew.

Ken Kozora
Ken is our resident composer; he composed the soundtrack for L is for Laser and The Quest for Mystic Fire Celtic Festival show. He provided the live soundtrack for Legend of Sleepy Howell in 2020, and his band provided the live soundtrack to FoolMoon 2021.

George Parisau George Pariseau
George is our shooter of video and creator of documentaries. He is the principal of Brainstream Creative, and shot the footage in our DLECTRICITY and (forthcoming) ypsiGLOW shows.

Tim Prosser
A member of our road crew, Tim has been helping out at shows for years now. He was with us at Art Prize in 2012, and many events subsequently. Tim and Mike were in the Martian Entropy Band back in the 70's, which usually featured Wayne running the lightshow. Tim continues to write and play music as the Mandolin Maniac.

Steve Rich
Steve is our consigliere and logistician. He helps with documentation,communication, positioning, lifting, climbing, music curating and driving the laser van.

Bill Witcher
Bill is our resident machinist, cranking out parts for Mike to assemble into projectors. He is also our fogger, maintainer of the secret sacred smoke sausages. Mike met him through Photon Lexicon, an online laser forum.

In Memoriam: John Langs
It's all his fault. He saw Mike demo some lasers at an Ignite talk, then visited Grand Rapids and saw the wall at the JW Marriott. He put them together, called Mike and got things going for Art Prize back in May of 2011. John passed away in 2017, and is greatly missed.