Beyond previsualizes a laser beam path, a narrower problem

The picture

Beyond is laser-show design and control software made by Pangolin Laser Systems, which describes itself on its own product page as the world leader in laser show technology. That page describes Beyond as a turnkey solution controlling laser output from a PC, a lighting console, SMPTE timecode or MIDI, with more than twenty editors for building content, one a full 3D design tool, and separate integrations with external visualizers, including Depence modules, for showing content in a rendered environment. Pangolin's laser show safety page, also retrieved 16 September 2026, describes the Beam Attenuation Map, or BAM, as a patented standard safety feature built into all of Pangolin's software.

What the documents show

The safety page is specific about what BAM does: it lets an operator define safe zones within the projection area and reduce laser output, by an amount the operator sets, over anything in that zone judged sensitive, such as a reflective disco ball. That is a planning decision made before or during a show, distinct from the beam's visual look. The same page states a US federal requirement that projected beams sit at least three meters, or ten feet, above the highest point an audience can reach, with an exception only for a specially conducted, FDA-approved audience-scanning show. Neither page frames BAM or the 3D design editor as equivalent to a general stage-lighting previs suite; Beyond's own listing of Visualizer integrations as a separate feature, alongside named products such as Depence, shows Pangolin treating stage previs as something Beyond connects to rather than replaces.

What it is allowed to decide

On these sources, Beyond's safety-planning features can plausibly support decision class 6, a regulated artifact, for the narrow question of beam elevation and audience exposure, since the three-meter rule is a stated federal requirement the BAM zones help satisfy, not a creative judgment. It holds Dimensional authority for that purpose, since a safe zone is defined against real projection geometry, not an artistic approximation. It does not establish general Photometric authority for how a beam will look against ambient light or an audience's eyes; that is separate from whether the beam's placement meets the safety page's height and power rules.

The disclosure label

A disclosure for a Beyond-planned laser cue, dated 16 September 2026 and asserted by the laser operator responsible for the show, would read: this is a class 6 regulated-artifact plan for beam elevation and audience-exposure limits, built using Pangolin's Beam Attenuation Map; it holds Dimensional authority against the venue's real geometry; it does NOT HOLD a general Photometric authority describing how the beam will appear under show conditions.

• Are the safe zones defined in BAM checked against a survey of the actual venue, or an approximate model?
• Does this show fall under the audience-scanning exception, and if so, has the required variance been obtained?
• Is the 3D design editor's laser path being used for content creation, for safety planning, or both?

A laser show previs answers a physical-safety question a lighting previs usually does not: not just what the beam will look like, but where it may legally and physically go.