USA - Built in 1914, Chicago's Wrigley Field is one of Major League Baseball's legendary landmarks. Having long ago been designated one of the city's historical landmarks, improvements to the park are carefully evaluated and overseen, not only by the city's historical society, but by fans and the public. The installation of lighting in 1988 to allow for night games was preceded by several decades of controversy. And the field's original scoreboard, with per-inning and pitch scores changed by hand, has been untouched by progress (or pitches) since its construction in 1937.

Not surprisingly, the project to upgrade the park's audio system was also subject to the limitations of historic preservation. "Because of the park's landmark status, any proposed changes have to run through

UK Tarmled reports "an overwhelming response" at PLASA 07 to its 4x4 video tiles which are equipped with 3-in-1, 3-Watt, SMD-LEDs designed for indoor and outdoor use, and deliver quality video images, even in direct sunlight.

Their transparent (82 %), lightweight, modular, aluminum, grid structures can be assembled into various configurations, such as cylindrical shells or wavy surfaces.

Individual tiles are interconnected via daisy-chaining involving just a single cable that transmits both the necessary drive power and electronic control signals.

Tarmled 4x4 video tiles and their interconnections are fully IP65-compliant, thanks to their passive cooling system. They are self-contained units, incorporate all of the electronics need for their operation, measure just 418 mm x 418 mm, have a pixel pitch of 100 mm, and weigh just 13 kg (28.8 lb.) per sq.m. Video signal

UK - White Light - and the members of the White Light family of manufacturers that the company distributes in the UK, report "a hugely successful four days" at PLASA 07.

Leading the move into Earls Court 2, which the PLASA Show expanded back in to this year, White Light created more than just a conventional stand: a White Light Zone featuring White Light itself and ELC DMX Tools, LDDE, Look Solutions, LSC, Rainbow, Robert Juliat and Wireless Solutions.

Notable events in the Zone included the launch of the new Robert Juliat Victor 1800W MSR followspot presented by Francois Juliat, and the new Redback dimmer from LSC Lighting presented by LSC's Gary Pritchard. In addition ELC marked the milestone of supplying their 2007th FocusHand/Brain hand-held remote in the year 2007 by presenting the unit to the 2007th customer, Stuart Lodge of Wimbledon High School.

The unit's

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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

UK - When Rosco launched #313 Light Relief Yellow Supergel filter in 2003, the hope was that the colour would provide the Light Relief charity with a steady income from its sale for years to come.

Developed with the help of Rick Fisher, co-founder (along with the late Tony Gottelier) of the industry charity which supports lighting designers in difficult times, Light Relief Yellow is a vibrant colour, suitable for raising awareness of the charity.

Since committing to this programme, Rosco has presented Light Relief with an annual donation based on the sales of #313. At PLASA 07, Rosco's president Stan Miller presented Light Relief with a check for $3,172 bringing the total to date over $10,000.

"What has been remarkable about Rosco is the continuing nature of its support for this charity, which is there to provide practical assistance to those in the Lighting Industry wh

USA - Meyer Sound will have much to celebrate at this year's Audio Engineering Society (AES) Convention in New York City when CEO/president John Meyer is presented with the society's prestigious Silver Medal Award in recognition of his "outstanding achievements in the field of audio engineering" during Opening Ceremonies on 5 October.

The Silver Medal Award recognises the considerable impact Meyer's innovative loudspeaker designs have had on the industry, starting in the late 1960s with his Glyph loudspeaker and continuing through the 2006 release of the M'elodie ultracompact high-power curvilinear array loudspeaker. The Silver Medal Award has been presented to a long string of audio pioneers such as John Mullin, Robert Moog, Ray Dolby, and James A. (Andy) Moorer.

The award is not the first honor bestowed on Meyer by AES: in 1985 he was named a Fellow of the AES. Mey

UK - Blackout has completely overhauled its website for ease of navigation. The site has been given a fresh new look, with seven separate sections in addition to the homepage.

These sections include an up-to-date product listing, which includes information on Blackout's new Rigging Mast and Gabled Truss products; a list of the services provided, from sales and rental to temporary and permanent installations; a look at the people who make the company tick; and an in-depth image gallery showcasing some of Blackout's most recent projects. There is also a contacts page with full details of the company's London and Paris offices, and a recruitment page.

Steve Tuck, Blackout's managing director comments: "The old website was fine up to a point, but we wanted something that any potential customer would find easy to navigate, even if they were from outside the events industry.

USA - Following last week's announcement of an AES seminar on the subject of Digital Networking, hosted by Renkus-Heinz, the company has confirmed two further seminars.

The first is titled 'Iconyx Digitally Steerable Arrays: Technology, Applications, Innovations', from 2:45 PM to 4:15 PM on Sunday 7 October.

Secondly, Ahnert Feistel Media Group (AFMG) will conduct two seminars on 'Tools & Techniques for Measuring & Optimising Loudspeaker Systems', and will discuss actual applications of EASERA and the new EASERA SysTune software. The seminars will be held in Room 1E04 at the Javits Convention Center on Friday 5 October.

(Jim Evans)

UK - Freelance broadcast sound designer Oliver France, who originally designed the sound for Deal Or No Deal, has replaced the game show's inventory of 23 Audio-Technica Engineered Sound gooseneck contestant microphones, re-equipping the production with the newly re-engineered Engineered Sound Series models, featuring the UniGuard RFI protection circuitry.

The decision to deploy the new ES Series mics, was made to take advantage of the new RFI protection circuitry on set. "There are large numbers of the public to marshal on this show, and some of them do sneak in with their mobile phones switched on in silent mode," explains France, "The new RFI protected microphones provide us with a guarantee against that additional possibility of something else going wrong with a live studio audience. The RFI protection also guarantees against interference from other RF

UK - Delta Sound has a reputation for working on unusual projects and one Friday evening in mid-September heralded another atypical job, the UK premier of Alvin Curran's Maritime Rites, which required ingenuity and versatility from both equipment and engineers.

A DiGiCo D5 Live sat at the bankside Front of House position, with XTA digital signal processors controlling two hangs of VDosc loudspeakers. Nothing unusual there, but with a barge moored in the middle of the river Thames as the main stage, that was where convention ended and inventiveness took over.

Commissioned by Tate Modern, Maritime Rites is the first collaboration between Tate Modern and the London Symphony Orchestra and is part of UBS Openings: Live, a series of bi-monthly performance events at the gallery, which is a regular Delta Sound client, and marked a prelude to the start of the Thame

France - At this year's 60th anniversary of the Cannes Film Festival, Meyer Sound signed on as a sponsor of the Cannes Legend celebration, employing the new, self-powered UPJunior ultra-compact VariO loudspeaker to deliver audio to the esteemed guests and performers. Cannes Legend is an exclusive week-long spree of animation screenings, presentations, fashion shows, and soirees held in conjunction with the festival itself.

Paris-based Dispatch, France's largest audio rental house, supplied the audio equipment for Cannes Legend, including four UPJunior loudspeakers and four USW-1P compact subwoofers for a tented dance floor on the beach, six UPJunior cabinets on the terrace surrounding the tent, and four more UPJunior units at the hotel's seafront garden, where another tent hosted a series of smaller gatherings.

Versatility was of key importance in choosing the Meyer Sound syst

USA - Aviom's MH10f Fibre Merger Hub made its high-profile debut moving live broadcast audio at the recent MTV Video Music Awards in Las Vegas.

The Vegas hotel-nightclub that hosted the star-studded extravaganza has a sizeable complement of Aviom Pro64 Series products already installed, including a dozen 6416dio Digital I/O Modules as tie lines. The MH10f Merger Hub allowed MTV engineers and installer Audio Analysts to connect the venue's 12 6416dio modules via fibre to broadcast locations over long distances.

The MH10f Merger Hub is designed to merge and distribute A-Net data streams and provide a host of professional features to make audio networking with Pro64 Series products easy to set up and configure in multiple professional audio environments, says the company.

(Jim Evans)

USA - American Music & Sound confirms that Turbosound has joined the AM&S family of brands effective 1 October 2007.

"Turbosound produces the most innovative loudspeaker systems on the market," comments Lynn Martin, president of American Music & Sound. "We are honoured to have them on board, and we look forward to spearheading Turbosound's push into the American market."

"American Music & Sound is extremely well aligned to take Turbosound to the next level in the US," says Turbosound's new managing director, Simon Blackwood. "They have a number of complimentary product lines in their roster to leverage our brand and are in a perfect position to market our products through their existing channels."

"Also fantastic news for us," comments Blackwood, "is that Brad Stephens, who managed the Turbosound brand at our previous di

Belgium - Introduced at the PLASA Show in London in September, Goboland's innovative black steel gobos have received a positive response from the lighting industry. Each gobo is coated with a black, heat-resistant coating, which does not burn or peel off under extreme heat. The coating minimises internal reflection, producing a crisper image with no halo effect. Encouraged by initial tests and feedback, Goboland has a patent pending on the use of this material for gobo production.

"Lantern optics have improved considerably over the years," explains Goboland's exclusive consultant, Wyatt Enever, "but the basic nature of the gobo has remained the same - until now. Goboland is known for the work it does on glass gobos, now we are extending our development to our steel range as well."

Goboland gave some 'M' size black steel gobos to ETC to try out in the ETC So

USA - The Oregon Symphony starts its annual concert season in style at the end of each summer, celebrating popular classics in the heart of the community with outdoor performances staged in Portland's public parks.

Local company Horne Audio deployed Electro-Voice XLC loudspeaker systems for 30 August performances by the Portland Youth Philharmonic and the Oregon Symphony in Tom McCall Waterfront Park, which featured a programme of classical favourites ranging from Copland to Tchaikovsky.

Horne addressed the large bowl-shaped venue with 14 delay towers in 15 time zones, a surround sound system with a circumference of approximately 1000ft.

Spaced up to 75ft apart, the towers were configured to keep every member of the audience in a near-field zone, minimising environmental effects on sound quality. Most of the towers featured three XLC127DVX enclosures, with low-end support v

Sweden - Wireless Solution Sweden has announced the release of two new W-DMX Micro products: The BlackBox S-1 Micro Transmitter and the BlackBox R-512 Micro Lite Receiver.

"The Micro line was extended after seeing the incredible response to the R-512 Micro receiver released in 2006," says Niclas Arvidsson, international sales manager for Wireless Solution. "The unit has all the reliable functionality of the full sized W-DMX BlackBox units, but the compact size was appealing to a large number of end users."

The new Micro series builds upon the considerable successes of the full size BlackBox range. Thanks to advances in circuit miniaturisation, Wireless Solution has managed to fit the complete W-DMX system into a compact package with less than half the volume of the usual casing.

Even with the compact size, the S-1 Micro includes a full battery backup syst

UK - The industry reference source, The White Book celebrates its 25th edition with the launch of a new website at the Showman's Show, at the Newbury Showground this month.

With more than 37,000 listings across 470 categories, www.whitebook.co.uk provides the event industry with its first dedicated search engine, claims the publisher.

Group sales manager, Michelle Tayton, said: "The White Book's experience and reputation within events organisation is second to none. With such a strong brand it made sense to launch an on-line resource that supports the directory and provides instant and accurate results at the click of the mouse."

(Jim Evans)

UK - Remo Martufi has joined Tomcat UK in the role of channel development manager. Martufi comes to Tomcat from a well established entertainment background, working for some of the most well known companies within the industry, amongst which are Ampco-Flashlight & Blue Squares. In addition to leading the sales team, Remo will be responsible for Sales & Business Development in the European, Middle Eastern and African markets.

Paolo Dozzo, sales manager for the Vitec Staging Division - Tomcat UK's parent company, commented, "Remo is experienced in sales, marketing, customer support and communications, all of which have built him a lot of respect within the industry. We are pleased to have Remo on the Tomcat team."

(Jim Evans)

USA - Nexxus Lighting has announced that it has closed the previously announced merger of LED and fibre optic lighting manufacturer, Advanced Lighting Systems (ALS), with and into a wholly-owned subsidiary of Nexxus Lighting. The newly merged company, Advanced Lighting Systems, LLC, will continue to operate out of ALS' manufacturing facility in Sauk Centre, Minnesota.

In addition, Nexxus Lighting announced that the non-binding letter of intent it entered into with LightWild, LLC in Overland Park, Kansas has expired and will not be extended.

"We are very excited to have closed the merger transaction with ALS. We look forward to integrating ALS as a Nexxus Lighting company and executing our LED product development strategy for both the commercial and entertainment lighting markets," stated Mike Bauer, president & CEO of Nexxus Lighting.

"Our overall strategy for

Russia - NOUK Autograf based in Moscow, has just invested in two InnovaSON Pro FX Sy80 and Sy48 console packages featuring the new FM-8VB plug-in effects modules. The consoles were supplied by StudiTech, InnovaSON's Russian distributor.

According to StudiTech's Nikita Stepanov, Autograf is one of the most highly regarded rental production companies in the country. "They were the first rental company in Russia to invest in really top-class consoles from internationally recognised brands," he explained. "Everything they do is of the highest quality and it is important to them that they maintain those standards. Hence when it came to investing in a new digital console, they saw and tested absolutely everything that was available."

Autograf decided upon InnovaSON for a number of reasons. "First and foremost, they were extremely impressed by the flexibility

UK - Mojo Barriers' services have been enlisted for the current Police world tour. The company installs 300m of its aluminium Mojo Barriers at all European shows. The set-up is a classic front of stage barrier system with a secondary barrier in the shape of an arc, to segregate the audience and decrease loading on the front-of-stage barrier. The system was equipped with eight "line up" gates to safely control the flow of the crowd in and out of the secondary barrier.

Headed up by crew boss Jeroen Tap, Mojo Barriers also installed barriers around the mixing positions and delay towers in the crowd.

Mojo Barriers provided the band's aluminium Mojo Barriers for the shows in the US earlier this year and will continue to supply The Police with their product for the upcoming shows in the US, South America, Australia, New Zealand and Asia.

"Major tours like The Police

UK - Richard Martin Lighting has recently taken stock of the latest innovation from Martin Professional, the LC2140 Panel.

The LED based video screen has a semi-transparent design with easily connecting panels that allow for area coverage of up to 14m in height and no restrictions in width.

Each panel frame is 1m x 2m with LEDs laid inside an acrylic tube. The pixel pitch of the panel is 40mm which allows for excellent resolution and the design of the panel creates a seamless image, says the company.

(Jim Evans)

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