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The Faroe Islands - The musical Fame was recently shown on the Faroe Islands. In the Nordic House the audience could follow the actors on their ride through triumph, heartache and romance. Programmer and operator was Gardar Hall of LimeLite, who used one grandMA full-size and three MA Digital Dimmer racks for the show. Turpin N. Djurhus was the lighting designer. The Nordic House is a multi purpose venue where all sorts of events from classical to rock concerts take place.

Hall talks about his preference for the grandma, saying: "I believe that the grandMA range of consoles are the best you can get on this planet. Nothing else comes close." As a sidenote he mentioned that aproximately 48,000 people are living on the Faroes, but already three grandMA consoles were

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UK - For Stage Electrics this year it will be business as usual in-between Christmas and New Year, by centralising their national operation.

Although the doors will be shut in Stage Electrics' Birmingham, Cambridge, Exeter, Plymouth and Tyneside branches, their London and Bristol branches will be open as the companies 'Central Customer Service Team'. As customers call their local branch, calls will be diverted to the central team.

Stage Electrics have also arranged for customers to collect hire orders required over Christmas and New Year before Christmas with no extra charge on the rental.

Linda Moore, head of sales and marketing for Stage Electrics says: "Last year we scaled down and branches were open with a minimum number of staff. This approach worked well but this festive season to ensure our customers continue to receive the best possible service we have decided t

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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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UK - PRG Europe, a supplier of lighting and projections solutions to the entertainment and events industries, has confirmed its purchase of one of the many units which make up the former MG Rover Motor Works at Longbridge in Birmingham.

David Keighley, managing director of PRG Europe, says: "We have been based in Birmingham for over 20 years, and the lease on our current warehouse expires at the end of 2007. The new unit is ideal, as it allows us to take the time to refurbish in exactly the way we want it. The site will also enable us to expand the range of services which we are able to offer clients."

PRG Europe is part of Production Resources Group Inc, an international company which in addition to lighting also provides services in the audio, video and scenery sectors. As well as its Birmingham head office facility, PRG Europe has warehouses in Greenford, Middlese

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UK - For several years, newer CD players have expanded the length of continuous playback time without interruption by adding the ability to play compressed digital audio files off CD data discs. One CD data disc could provide as much as 20 hours when playing back low bit rate MP3 files.

Denon Professional's new 1RU DN-C640 takes this idea a step further. The DN-C640 can play back MP3 and WMA files from CD data discs, but it is also capable of decoding broadcast standard MP2 and uncompressed digital PCM (WAV) files of those same discs.

It also has the ability to read any of the above from any data DVD. This not only expands the 20-hour playback time to almost six days (continuously), but also allows those users who demand uncompressed audio quality the ability to play back full 44.1kHz PCM recordings without being limited to the 80-minute CD-R.

The DN-C640 can decode a host o

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Malta - Large format projections specialists E//T//C UK returned to Malta to project onto the dramatic Fort St. Angelo in Valetta Harbour, for the opening ceremony of a Thomas Cook conference.

Working for the DRP who were the main show producers, the Malta Tourist Authority and the Malta Fairs & Convention Centre (MFCC) the event was staged for two sets of Thomas Cook delegates. It marks E//T//C UK's return to the island after their highly acclaimed work for the Welcome Europe celebrations in 2004 that saw 10 new member states including Malta join the EU.

E//T//C UK projected 500 metres across Valletta Harbour onto the Fort from the projector position located at the Old Customs House.

They used eight 6kW PIGI projectors with double rotating scrollers, all overlaid to optimise the image brightness, complete with special Barco 125 cm lenses. The image was divided into t

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UK - When a church in Dartford, Kent wanted to precisely light the background around two Christ figures, it seemed a very difficult problem to surmount.

When the newly-built St Edmund's Church in Temple Hill, Dartford was planned, a bold statement was wanted. So instead of the conventional crucifix, the church commissioned Japanese artist Tomoya Yamaguchi to paint two giant Christ figures - one in a crucifixion scene, the other depicting Christ as risen - on large scale white cross backgrounds.

Lighting for the feature was designed by Peter Moore of local company PM Lighting Services, in collaboration with lighting designer John Roffey. They planned to light the crosses at night, giving them a very different ambience to how they appear by day. However, the crosses were to be lit in blue, whereas the figures and their halos needed to be lit in white.

"We did experiment w

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UK - The Institute of Sound and Communications Engineers will be holding its annual exhibition on Tuesday, 27 February 2007 at the Park Inn Hotel, Watford.

More than 20 specialist suppliers to the sound industry have already signed up including; Ampetronic, Duran Audio UK, ADS Worldwide, Allen & Heath, Audio-Technica, Baldwin Boxall Communications, BC Technology, Brähler ICS UK, Canford Audio, Clockaudio, Communication Technology, Fuzion plc, Ikon AVS, Institute of Acoustics, Peavey Electronics, Rackz, RK Sound Engineering, R W Salt, Sennheiser UK, Shuttlesound, SigNET (AC), TOA and Yamaha-Kemble.

Running alongside the exhibition is a full programme of expert speakers covering the following wide range of topics: Sound engineering in churches (Malcolm Cunnings - Cunnings Recording Associates); Training the next generation (Dr Philip Duncan of the University of Salford); Fittin

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UK - Leicestershire based Hawthorns has announced that it has more than doubled its revenue from permanent installations to more than £1 million, over the last 12 months.

In addition to large church and theatre installations, Hawthorns have been successful in securing contracts for the Government initiative of City Academies. Having already done the installations of lighting, sound and other theatre equipment at Lambeth and Northampton Academies, it has just completed the Marlow Academy and is currently working at the Reading and Paddington Academies. They are due to start a further three Academies in the New Year. Tony Blair announced last week that the government is to double its initiative to 400 Academies by the end of the decade.

Tracey Hughes, a consultant to one of the key suppliers on the Academy build programme says: "We have worked with Hawthorns on two Ac

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UK - The International Association of Lighting Designers (IALD) has now confirmed its line-up of speakers for their conference, The IALD presents: Sustainable Lighting Design Education in association with RIBA, which takes place on February 12-13 at the Business Design Centre during The ARC Show.

Leading lighting designers from around the world will take part in the conference as well as architects from the Royal Institute of British Architects.

To book your place at any of these sessions please visit the website address below, and click on 'Register Now'. The conference is charged at £20 per session, plus VAT, allowing delegates to hand pick the sessions of interest. Refreshments courtesy of IALD can then be enjoyed at their coffee lounge area within the main exhibition.

The ARC show will open late on Monday 12 February with drinks served within the exhibition

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Slovakia - Robe moving lights took centre stage for a special edition of Velky Hrac, (The Big Player) one of Slovakia's top rated TV programmers, with lighting supplied by Q-99. The programme saw six contestants including a Slovak celebrity taking part in the nail-biting general knowledge quiz.

Lighting designer was Martin Kubanka, one of the country's highest profile TV lighting designer and also LD for the last four series' of the popular programme for the independent TV channel JOJ.

Velky Hrac (known as PokerFace in the UK where it was created and presented by Ant & Dec) is based on the bluffing aspect of poker games and was recorded at Koliba Studios in Bratislava with a live audience. The series is licenced by UK-based Freemantle.

Kubanka explains that the terms of the licence contained certain lighting references which had to be followed. He took t

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Germany - Modular in structure, the new DMXPWM/RGB DMX decoder from VLM GmbH offers over 500 addressable channels and can control up to 99 operating devices for LEDs.

With the new DMXPWM/RGB DMX decoder, VLM has expanded its range of DMX-controlled RGB solutions. No longer limited to 3-digit addresses like its predecessors but freely addressable, the new decoder is capable of controlling up to 99 operating devices using up to 511 addressable channels, the previous limit having been 93. This opens the door to a wide range of uses, covering virtually all DMX-controlled RGB applications.

The DMXPWM/RGB converts signals based on the DMX 512/2000 protocol into PWM (pulse width modulation) signals that can be interpreted and processed by VLM's own DLDC(C)/RGB/SLX colour control system, which was designed for use by all professional lighting designers and is especially suitable for t

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USA - Two grandMA consoles and two grandMA lights are used in the production Love, a co-production of Cirque du Soleil and Apple Corps Ltd. celebrating the musical legacy of The Beatles. Lighting designer Yves Aucoin, assisted by Karl Gaudreau and Robert Brassard, employed an extensive number of moving lights and LEDs to light the stage, with lifts going up and down, and foggers to camouflage the lifts.

Love features HD video projections with 100-foot digital, moving images and a panoramic surround sound system. The grandMA's control an array of equipment for the show, including 28 Green Hippo Hippotizer media servers which permit eight different layers of HD images on a curved, translucent screen, a lighting rig featuring more than 200 Vari*Lite spots and washes, 200 Color Kinetics LED fixtures and 22 MDG foggers.

During the production period, Aucoin assisted by

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Germany - Klotz Digital's Vadis router family has undergone a re-design. Recently the new Vadis 212 router was unveiled and Klotz Digital now introduces the new design and functionality of its bigger sibling the Vadis 888. Like the Vadis 212, the new Vadis 888 comes with an enhanced front panel display to provide more information, and a fan-less power supply unit (PSU) for absolute silent operation. An optional hot-swappable redundant PSU is available providing outstanding reliability and allowing maintenance operations while the frame is in operation.

Klotz Digital's hot swap technology applies to all essential components of the frame, such as Vadis cards and the synchronisation module. As with the forerunner model, the PSUs are installed at the front of the Vadis 888 for serviceability. The new Vadis frame is also available as Vadis 884 version, additionally equipped with a vi

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UK - When Peterborough Community Church was designing its multi-million pound, brand new purpose-built home in 2004, a key requirement was a large backdrop that would look impressive and help to bring the large congregation closer to senior pastor Dave Smith as he delivers his sermons.

The new church's main auditorium can accommodate 1800 worshippers and includes state of the art audio visual facilities. Hawthorn Theatrical was the contractor chosen to fulfil the staging and visual requirements, which included the task of sourcing a video screen that had to measure a vast 10m high by 16m wide.

"We needed to provide a backdrop to all that goes on during our services and other events," says the church's Pete Charlton. Having seen blended projection in other church venues - Charlton took the decision to take advantage of the latest projection technology and, together wi

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UK - Wireless Microphone specialist Trantec has announced that Mark Parkhouse has joined its team as sales and marketing executive.

Having gained experience working for another well known MI / Pro Audio distributor Parkhouse's role is to continue building Trantec's market share in the UK. This will involve selling directly and advancing the expanding sales network throughout the country.

He will concentrate on both Trantec's recently launched MI range and its internationally acclaimed professional range, including the S6000 series.

Parkhouse says: "This is a strategic career move for me and offers an opportunity to expand my skills-sets working for such a leading RF manufacturer with a brand that is synonymous with design, innovation and quality. I'm looking forward to building the distributor network throughout the UK and to channelling my experience of the MI market t

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The Netherlands - As the Midas XL8 live performance system rolls out across the globe, the emphasis is now on training sound engineers to become as familiar with this system as they are with their much-loved Midas analogue desks.

Midas Consoles Holland has just completed a training session for the country's engineers at its premises. "The majority of Holland's top engineers - more then 100 - attended this six hour training session, where they not only learned what the XL8 is all about but learned for themselves that digital has indeed gone Midas," says MCD MD Axel Nagtegaal, who issued certificates to all who completed the training.

(Chris Henry)

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Europe - Lighting designer Leggy (Jonathan Armstrong) used a Kinesys motion control system to great effect for the recent Basement Jaxx tour. It was the first time he's used Kinesys and he enthused, "I love it," adding that he will use the system again at the first opportunity.

He designed four upstage/downstage 'claw' trusses as the key architectural elements of the lighting rig, and these moved constantly during the show into different positions, adding depth and dynamics to the overhead stage rig.

Each claw truss - two at 40ft long and two at 38ft - was suspended by five motors - two static Lodestar hoists downstage and three Kinesys vari-speed Liftkets on the upstage hinges, which moved them in and out via a Kinesys Vector control system.

Hung on the claws was the majority of Legg's lighting rig - including five High End Studio Command 1200 fixtures, four X-Spo

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Austria - Vienna's newest musical production Rebecca recently opened to critical acclaim at the Raimund Theater, featuring the story of Daphne du Maurier's famous 1938 novel. Staged by Vereinigte Bühne Wien (VBW), the musical is directed by Francesca Zambellow. Sound design is by Hendrik Maassen, whose musical credits include a long-term association with Phantom of the Opera. The heart of the show's sound system is the VBW Raimund Theater's resident Cadac J-Type Live Production Console, in conjunction with two Cadac D16 Digital Mix Matrices.

Rebecca is a technically very sophisticated show, combining video projection, surround sound and a dramatic lighting design. Sound designer Hendrik Maassen says:"The show's design is extremely challenging, particularly in the way that it combines the video, sound and lighting elements - this makes it a lot of fun

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Europe - The 89,600-ton MSC Musica is a new design of ship for MSC Cruises and can carry 2,550 passengers with a crew of 1,000. It was introduced in 2006, and will be followed by two sister ships in 2007. Musica is scheduled to sail on European cruises out of Venice.

MSC's Italian style is emphasised throughout the new ship's design, cuisine and service. Onboard highlights include a three-deck waterfall in the central foyer with a piano 'suspended' by means of a transparent crystal floor above a pool of water; a 13,000sq.ft spa/beauty facility offering aerobics, yoga, aromatherapy, thalassotherapy, chromotherapeutic hydro-massage and a purifying Turkish bath; a 7,000sq.ft casino; two restaurants, a Sushi Bar, an a la carte restaurant and a pizza/grill; a Cigar Room, Wine Tasting Bar and Coffee Bar, as well as a 46-foot-long bar in the casino and a Well-being and Fitness Centre B

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UK - Entec Lighting is supplying all equipment and crew to Renegade Productions and LD Nick Gray for an installation at the Entice corporate event venue in Canary Wharf.

The three-roomed tented venue - with a capacity up to 3000 - is being run by catering and hospitality specialists Dish. It's hosting a series of parties and events throughout the run up to the festive season, aimed at attracting locally based Canary Wharf companies keen on capitalising on the convenience of having corporate festivities on their doorstep.

Renegade is supplying the creative lighting design by Gray, plus co-ordinating supply of all the technical infrastructure and hardware including lighting, sound, video, staging, set and power. Sculptivate are looking after all the set, scenic and dressing elements, with a design by Andy Cobb.

When it came to sourcing the lighting gear, Renegade came to Entec

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