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FanFair Alliance - Artists including Arctic Monkeys, Iron Maiden, Ed Sheeran, Noel Gallagher and Little Mix have launched a new campaign against ticket touts. Dubbed the FanFair Alliance, it is calling on the government to take tougher action against websites which resell concert tickets. Launching the campaign, Arctic Monkeys' manager Ian McAndrew accused the sites of "rampant profiteering". He said the goal was to "make it easier for fans to buy tickets" at face value. "Fans' anger, their discontent, is what prompted me to do something about this," he told the BBC. "I hope the efforts of this campaign will put pressure on the government to do something."

The secondary ticketing market in the UK is thought to be worth more than £1bn a year. But the music industry is conce

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UK - The first products in Elation Professional's new DTW Series of variable white LED lights are now available. DTW Series fixtures are colour temperature adjustable and can emulate the 'Dim to Warm' look of conventional tungsten / halogen fixtures.

Optimized to give the finest in variable white light, available now are the DTW Par 300, DTW Par Z19 IP and DTW Bar 1000. All three fixtures feature full colour temperature range control from 2,700K - 6,500K plus independent Dim-to-Warm channel control from 1,800K -to 3,200K for accurate rendition of traditional tungsten halogen lamps. All DTW Series fixtures include extremely smooth dimming with variable dimming curve modes, strobe and chase effects included.

The DTW PAR 300 houses (16) 10W multi-chip CW / WW / Amber LEDs for a soft light that is easily adjustable from warm white tungsten to cool white. Beam angle is 23°

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UK - At this year's PLASA Show, igus will be demonstrating its innovative bearings, linear slides and cable management systems for the live entertainment technology industry. Returning to the heart of West London at Olympia the show, which runs from 18-20 September, is a significant date in the calendar for professionals working with pro audio, lighting, broadcast, AV, rigging and stage technologies.

On the igus stand (Stand C20) there will be two main demonstrations; the first is the drylin W curved rail system. These rails offer an innovative way of mounting sound and lighting rigs, or displays and control panels - anything that needs to be adjusted regularly. As the aluminium rails can be modified by precision bending, the profile of the curve can be tailored to customer requirements. The use of spherical tribopolymer bearings enables the guide rail system to be self-adjust

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Indochine X PixMob Fan Immersion

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's - 40 thousand LED pixels on a ceiling!!! Indochine's whirlwind tour transports fans to another level of the live experience - immersing them from floor to ceiling with PixMob's X4 wristbands, and an LED ceiling made entirely of its NOVA Minis! With the vision of Indochine's creative team, PixMob used its LED fan-technology to turn attendees and venues into an ocean of effects, and a starry sky of LED magic. Très très cool!

Read more about the Indochine tour in the latest issue of LSi

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Germany - For its Musikladen (music shop) event programme, Stuttgart's Club Zwoelfzehn now relies on stands from Gravity, an Adam Hall Group brand.

"Top equipment for our young music talents in the Club Zwoelfzehn is very important for us," says Kay Swoboda from the organiser Popb

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UK - Utopium lit up Grillstock Festival as it returned to Bristol Harbourside for a weekend of meat, music and mayhem, 2-3 July 2016.

This year's Grillstock Festival boasted performances from The Fratellis, The Stranglers and the Cuban Brothers as it welcomed over 14,000 BBQ-lovers to the two-day event. Complete with a King of the Grill barbeque showdown, two music stages and endless food vendors, Utopium was tasked with creating appropriate stage sets and lighting for the festival areas.

For the bar lighting, site lighting and stage lighting, Utopium supplied 20 Chauvet Q-Wash 419Z LEDs, 12 Martin MAC Quantum Profiles, 11 Chauvet Rogue RH1 Hybrids, 18 Chauvet Nexus 4 x 4 panels, nine 4 lite Molefays, six Selecon Arena 2Ks and 12 of Utopium's new SGM Q-7s. All lighting was controlled by an Avolites Arena controller. Utopium also supplied Antari HZ-500s to add extra ambienc

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UK - As part of a continuing programme of improving its inventory, PRG XL Video is upgrading its inventory of Barco projectors. This process offers greater flexibility of use across all the market sectors PRG XL serves. The upgrade sees HDX-W14 14K projectors transformed to HDX-W20 Flex units, and HDF-W26 26k projectors becoming HDF-W30 Flex units.

The stock of 14k projectors was purchased in early 2015, and the units were partly selected because they were upgradable. As the demand for higher brightness projection increases, work has begun on unlocking the units' Flex capabilities.

The upgrade process involves unlocking the units via a license key. This then enables the power to be increased to the lamp to achieve 18,000 lumens output. The second part of the upgrade process converts the projector to a Flex unit, which means it can be locked off to a specific light output l

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USA - New technologies that excel under controlled test conditions in a laboratory don't always meet expectations in real life. Every engineer knows that; so too do lighting designers. This thought passed briefly through the mind of Jonathan Lipsy recently when he completed a video production studio project at New York's D&C Digital, formerly the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle.

Lipsy, the manager of broadcast & lighting at Integrated Solutions Group, had specified the new Ovation E-910FC RGBA-Lime colour-mixing fixture from Chauvet Professional for the studio's lighting system. Having tested the fixture extensively, he was impressed with how its lime LEDs enhanced its colour-rendering capabilities. Still, since the technology was new, he had no experience using it in the field.

"All the pre-testing I did with the Ovation E-910FC showed me that it was going to work on this

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UK - Sheffield University's new £81m engineering teaching block, The Diamond Building, was opened at the end of last year, with building work completed on schedule by contractors Balfour Beatty. The six storey building, with its aluminium diamond shaped fa

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Canada - Les Feluettes (Lilies) made its world premiere at the Opera de Montreal recently playing to full houses during its four-night run. Lighting designer Martin Labrecque utilized seven Clay Paky Scenius Spots for the new production.

Les Feluettes, with a book by Michel Marc Bouchard and music by Kevin March, is a play within a play. It begins as a prison confessional and unfolds as a love story spanning 1912-1957, a time when same-gender relationships were conducted largely in secret.

The opera marked Labrecque's first use of Scenius Spots. He frequently deploys other Clay Paky fixtures using them on Cirque du Soleil productions and the Pan American Games' opening ceremonies last summer.

For Les Feluettes, Labrecque lit eight tableaux showing different locations and time periods in monochromatic palettes of amber or blue. The orchestra

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Germany - Loudspeaker systems manufacturer, d&b audiotechnik, has announced it has joined the AVnu Alliance, the industry consortium that fosters the adoption of AVB/TSN (Audio Video Bridging/Time Sensitive Networking) protocols and an open ecosystem of certified products.

According to d&b product manager Vicent Perales, the move is a logical step for the company. "d&b is known to be a supporter of open standards, such as OCA (Open Control Architecture, recently ratified by the Audio Engineering Society as AES70)," he commented. "Joining the AVnu Alliance and supporting AVB/TSN as open audio transport protocols is another good fit for us."

AVB/TSN is a set of open standards developed by the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), and represents an evolution of standard Ethernet to support production quality audio and video, and control data. AVB/TSN provi

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Europe - Dave Crump, CT's CEO Europe & Middle East, has announced the creation of a new CT department specialising in technical event infrastructure, led by Sid Lobb, CT's director of integrated networks.

Dave comments, "We have been developing the ideas for this new service for some time. We have started with a small and highly focussed team, but see this as a key growth area for the future. We're optimistic we'll see rapid expansion and broadening of the service offering in the future."

CT will now offer clients a bespoke technical solution that integrates and distributes video, audio, IT and comms signals over a reliable Fibre/IP network infrastructure.

Sid notes, "The new technology can massively increase the flexibility we offer in signal distribution architecture. We're moving away from the traditional point to point way of doing things where you lay a cable and

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USA - Twenty-four Robe BMFL WashBeams are highlighting the fans for US country star Kenny Chesney's current Spread the Love stadium tour, chosen by lighting designer Mike Swinford specifically to illuminate the audience.

Mike, who has been a lighting professional for over 30 years, has lit the successful chart topping singer-songwriter's shows since his first headline tour in 2001. In that time he's seen the whole visual concept for the live show evolve and change, with the main objective now being to create big impressive yet simple and straightforward looks, "It's more about the music than a load of lighting fluff or gags," he states.

The BMFL WashBeams were purchased by Morris Light & Sound of Nashville, which coordinates technical production for Chesney's annual tours.

They are positioned on empty seats around the side of the stadiums (not sold as they are at 90 de

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UK - The D&AD New Blood Festival kicked off in Shoreditch, London on 5 July with creative technical production expert Hawthorn on hand to deliver technical production for two of this year's events.

The festival provides a series of programmes for new creatives, offering them inspiration, learning and insight on how to best break into the industry.

The use of projection and projection mapping, a technique that uses specialist software to warp and blend projected images on to any surface including buildings and interior walls, is becoming increasingly popular at events due to its high visual impact and immersive experience. Proving that this technology can be used effectively in any type of event, no matter what the budget or setting, Hawthorn put their own creativity to the test, working on the D&AD New Blood Award ceremony and Adobe's muchly-anticipated fringe event, their

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Taiwan - Taiwan-based sound company Winly Production Services Int'l Corp. has taken delivery of an Adamson E-series PA, making them the first Taiwanese company to join the Adamson network. The announcement was made by David Dohrmann, technical director, Asia Pacific for Adamson.

"As one of the older sound companies in Taiwan, Winly has an exceptional reputation and the experience to grow the Adamson brand in the area," explains Dohrmann. "We are thrilled to have a company of their calibre working with our organization and see a very bright future with Winly."

Initially the rental company added 24 E12 line array modules and 16 E219 subwoofers, powered by Adamson E-Racks loaded with Lab.gruppen PLM20k44 amplifiers. After extensive testing they decided to expand their Adamson inventory further.

"They are adding E15, S10 and E119 cabinets which should delivered and in use

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Australia - The APIA Good Times Tour, starring legends Daryl Braithwaite, Kate Ceberano, Jon Stevens and John Paul Young, has recently completed its 16 date tour of duty, including a stop in the Perth Concert Hall. With Perth being one of the three 'orphaned' shows without toured production, tour lighting designer Rohan Thornton called local rental house Concert and Corporate Productions (CCP) to source a rig to supplement the house system.

When offered eight High End Systems SolaSpot Pro 1500s, he accepted, but when offered eight High End Systems Shapeshifter C1s, he wasn't so sure. "I'd heard of the Shapeshifters, but my first reaction was I thought they were a bit of a gimmick,' explains Rohan. "But Sean McKernan at CCP convinced me to give them a go. Well, I'm glad he did, because they're an awesome light and they've just gone to the top of my 'must hire' list."

"The a

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Japan - Powersoft has appointed pro audio specialists Audiobrains as the company's new Japanese distributor. After initial discussions with Audiobrains' sales and marketing representative, Shin Yamada, the deal was signed with CEO Fujii Shuzo and took effect from mid-June.

Audiobrains already has an A-list distribution portfolio, which includes Martin Audio, Symetrix and beyerdynamic, and they also enjoy dealer status for AVID consoles and d&b audiotechnik loudspeakers. The Powersoft acquisition completes an important part of the jigsaw.

"Powersoft fits comfortably into several professional sectors - both for touring and installation," says Yamada. "This is a great opportunity and we are delighted to be representing the brand."

Another key person in brokering the deal was Powersoft regional sales manager, Arthur Soh. "He opened door for us at Powersoft and talked at le

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South Africa - Johannesburg-based DWR Distribution has welcomed lighting designer Michael Broderick to its team, to be based at the company's branch office in Durban, his hometown.

"I love Durban. Quite surprisingly, Durban is a melting pot of creativity," says Michael. "It is home to a host of talented people and so many creative ideas are born here. Even though the city of Durban can't support the magic being created by its inhabitants, the magic continues to flow. We don't have the money or the resources that our sister cities like Johannesburg and Cape Town have so we have to make the magic less with technology and more with cunning and guile. On another level, I have lived here my entire life, it's the place I know, so it's also a part of who I am."

For a number of years, Nick Barnes has manned the DWR Durban branch alone, but now he is thrilled to have a colleague. F

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Korea - Located in the heart of Seoul, South Korea's Dongshin Presbyterian Church recently installed Allen & Heath's dLive digital mixing system as part of the Church's developing digital-based AV system.

Dongshin Church celebrated its 60th anniversary this year, and the building was named as a 'Seoul Legacy for the Future' by the city in 2014.

Comprising a S5000 Control Surface and a DM48 MixRack, the new system replaces the incumbent GL3800 analogue mixer.

"The relationship between A&H and Dongshin Church started with the GL3800, and we also installed a Qu-32 in the Education Centre last year. Migrating from analogue to digital is a big step but we knew we could trust A&H products," said Seongyeon Won, who is in charge of A/V system at the church.

"We did evaluate other brands for the main FOH console but dLive won hands down on product specifications, such as th

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USA - API reports that Mount Olive High School in Flanders, New Jersey, has purchased a Vision console for their forthcoming recording studio and audio production programme.

Mount Olive's new audio programme will add to the school's already outstanding curriculum, including a top notch television production programme, an award-winning robotics team, and a music programme touting a 60-piece orchestra.

Superintendent and music enthusiast Dr. Larrie Reynolds brought in consultants who were up to the challenge of creating a professional-level studio; record producer, engineer, and mixer Ron Saint Germain and record producer and recording engineer Tony Bongiovi have been hard at work on Mount Olive's studio since the fall of 2015.

Saint Germain collaborated with Trevor Campbell, who will head Mount Olive's audio production programme, to find the right console. After traveli

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USA - Anyone wanting to take a look inside Al's Beach Club, doesn't have to try too hard. That's because for all practical purposes, this new live music venue has no 'inside'. The only club in Fort Walden Beach, Florida, located directly on the city's famed Emerald Coast beach, Al's is almost all open air, with no walls or barriers separating it from its surroundings.

This breezy configuration makes for good times, but it also creates a challenging environment for a lighting system. Aside from contending with wind and sand, any fixtures installed at this club have to stand up to the rain. (Averaging 69 inches of precipitation a year, Fort Walden is the rainiest city in Florida.).

Sohail e. Najafi and his team at Najafi Design Group (Los Angeles, Las Vegas) were well aware of this challenge, which is why they designed the lighting rig at Al's around a collection of IP-rated

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Germany - Self-styled 'panic rocker' Udo Lindenberg is showing no sign of letting up. During his Keine Panik (No Panic) tour, the rocker celebrated his 70th birthday, but there was no sign of him quietening down; and that was a good thing for all his fans.

His stage incorporated Lara Croft Dancers, Go-Go girls, Jugglers, Acrobats, a UFO, a giant pink piano, a Russian empress, a houseboy, a children's choir, biopic clips , various movies and so on - plus a jam-packed set list with over 30 songs. The repertoire spans a wide range of classics such as Sonderzug nach Pankow, Mein Ding and Alles klar auf der Andrea Doria to more recent songs like Ich schw

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