UK - The new partnership between Powersoft and Traction Sound chose the perfect showcase for previewing the potential synergy on offer by harnessing these two brands, when this year's Bestival kicked off on the Isle of Wight.

The Italian amplification manufacturer supplied six of their flagship K10 switch-mode amplifiers to drive both the powerhouse Hidden Disco tent and more sublime, soothing grooves of the Ambient Forest, bringing the best out of Traction Sound's passive soft dome loudspeaker technology.

Powersoft provided 72kW of muscle in just 6RU spaces (12kW per amp).

It was Traction Sound's Jonny Goodwillie's friendship with festival owner Rob Da Bank that delivered the opportunity for both brands to showcase the products and what is one of the most high profile events

South Africa - Gearhouse South Africa have invested in new lighting equipment comprising of 150 moving head fixtures and two new consoles.

The purchase was made in order for Gearhouse to fulfil their upcoming workload. As they have an initiative of going green, they opted for LED fixtures.

Gearhouse new purchase comprised of: 54x Robin Pointes; 36 x Robin 600 RGBW; 24 x Robin DLX RGBW LED Profile; 24 x Robin DLF RGBW Fresnel; 12 x Robin DLS RGBW LED Profile Framing Shutters; two grandMA 2 full size; two grandMA 2 NPU 8 out, and 32 x Philips SL Nitro 510.

(Jim Evans)

UK - As part of its drive to provide the best possible service to architects and lighting designers, Black Light has appointed Martin Dean to head up its Project Estimation team. Dean, who has previously worked at the company in Installations, brings his extensive practical experience and creative expertise to this new role.

"I have done a wide range of lighting design and installation work with big name clients such as Sage, Gateshead and the Arsenal Football shop in the Brent Cross Shopping Centre, London," he says. "I therefore have a proven appreciation for how projects come together and am fully aware of the challenges that clients can face. This means that I can give a more informed and more accurate assessment of project costs."

Black Light has moved Dean into his new position as part of a push to strengthen the support it gives to architects and lig

featured content

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

USA - Continuing its mission to present the professional audio community with a comprehensive knowledge platform, the 135th Audio Engineering Society Convention (Thursday, 17 October, through Sunday, 20 October, 2013, at the Javits Center in New York City) this year will again feature an increasingly popular event focused on pro audio products. T

he Product Design Track (taking place all four days of the convention), assembled and moderated by Dan Foley, director of European sales for Audio Precision, will focus broadly on product design, with an emphasis on system-performance measurement. New for this year is a special presentation on the importance of properly branding and marketing new professional audio products. Presented by noted industrial designer Adrian Weidmann, The Power of the Brand will define the meaning of branding and explore its power and importance for t

Germany - Amptown System Company (ASC) has taken on a dedicated dealership for Munich based fibre network specialists Optocore and BroaMan. The new partnership, which was confirmed at IBC 2013 in Amsterdam this month, will see ASC representing both brands in the system integration and live sectors, such as musicals and theatre.

Headquartered in Hamburg, ASC's ability to provide integrated solutions for media technologies draws on a rich company heritage within the group. Founded in 1973 by Peter Matthes and Ulrich (Uli) Müller as a music store for instruments and large scale sound reinforcement it was this passion for music and technology that sowed the seeds for the birth of ASC in 1990, which soon saw them working on major world famous musicals.

The two men, along with Leif Witte, have subsequently developed ASC into an experienced media engineering system house, which will

China - For the band's first-ever performances in China, Metallica delivered two packed shows at Shanghai's Mercedes-Benz Arena. A Meyer Sound Leo linear large-scale sound reinforcement system was deployed by Ling Hua ProSLV.

"I was immediately struck by the linearity of the Leo system, even when it was pushed to very high levels," says Freddy Kot, chief engineer for Ling Hua ProSLV. "Even with sustained readings of over 112 dB at FOH, there was no distortion. And of course, the audience was just ecstatic with what they heard."

The system configuration for the show was handled by 'Big Mick' Hughes, Metallica's long-time FOH engineer, with assistance from consultant 'dB Dave' Dennison. The core flown LEO system comprised main front-hangs of 18-each Leo-M line array loudspeakers, 32 1100-LFC low-frequency control elements deployed in dual steerable arrays, an

UK - Lighting Designer Tom Sutherland - one of the UK's emerging talents - utilised 60 Robe LEDBeam 100s to great effect on the 2013 X-Factor Auditions which were staged at London's Wembley Arena.

Around 250 hopefuls gave it their all in front of the judges - each was allowed up to about 10 minutes of potential fame - in four very intense days during which they were ruthlessly culled to 100! These then progressed to the next stage - boot camp - of selecting the 12 finalists for the 2013 edition of the popular reality TV series.

His lighting rig was based on several curved trusses at different levels. The concept was to create one very dynamic lighting look which had to look fabulous - and appear different but complimentary - from multiple camera angles.

It was the first time he'd used Robe's LEDBeam 100s on this scale and also the first time in an arena.

They were p

The Netherlands - HHB Communications is reporting the biggest year yet for broadcast audio at IBC after record-breaking attendance and significant product debuts created heavy footfall on its stand in Hall 8.

IBC has announced that over 52,000 attendees from 150 countries visited this year, making it a second record-breaking year for the show. These high attendance numbers combined with exclusive product launches made it an extremely vibrant event for HHB, says the UK-based company.

As an Avid Elite reseller, HHB is sharing the news of the new S6 control surface, which combines ICON and System 5 families in a new modular design. The S6 system offers the option of choosing a pre-configured S6 M10 or S6 M40, or with the S6 M40, customise the system even further with different channel control combinations. High precision editing and mixing control allows the user to quickly acces

UK - Projection and digital art specialist Ross Ashton collaborated with Russian artist Maria Rud to present Dark Matter a dynamic 'AniMotion' live performance painting projected in giant format on to the Institute of Astronomy library in Cambridge. The event embraced painting, music and projection mapping It was the world-wide launch of this concept, complete with live music from flautist David Heath, vocalist Fay Fife and DJ / producer Dolphin Boy (Andy Levy).

The one-off event also coincided with the launch of the 2014 e-Luminate Festival in Cambridge - which in February will celebrate the fusion of lighting and technology to show the city literally 'in a different light' - with a fundamental emphasis on eco-sustainability.

Ashton was approached by Rud, who had heard about his work and wanted to take AniMotion to a different level.

Ashton immediately saw the potent

Italy - LumenRadio reports that DTS fixtures will now be available with LumenRadio's OEM modules. For over 30 years, DTS has manufactured professional lighting for entertainment, as well as products for architectural applications. Based outside Rimini in Italy, the company's philosophy is to develop and manufacture products with the highest reliability, excellence, and quality - all in-house.

Select models of the extensive product portfolio will now be available for immediate shipment with integrated CRMX OEM RDM modules.

"LumenRadio's CRMX technology provides wireless RDM which gives our products a unique feature. The benefits of being able to monitor your wireless set-up through the SuperNova software it's a great concept and very interesting," says Andre Gabrielli, chief technician at DTS.

"We had a growing number of customers asking for DTS fixtures with L

UK - At PLASA London 2013, Harting (Stand B50) is featuring its rugged connectivity solutions for a wide range of audio-visual multimedia installation applications, along with RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) systems for asset management in the theatre and touring environment.

A major new product is Han-Eco Outdoor: a new addition to Hartings's Han-Eco connector family specifically designed for outdoor applications. The Han-Eco Outdoor connector housing is based on robust high-performance plastic material, which gives the added benefit of light weight to the customer. Further weather-resistant features are provided by the specially designed housing profile and the use of flange gaskets in fluorine rubber (FPM).

The Han-Eco connector family is specifically designed for applications that do not require the full range of product features offered by the Harting Han B series o

France - An essential French military complex for more than 400 years, the famous Fort Saint Jean has recently undertaken a massive renovation to return the legendary monument to its former glory. Located at the entrance of the Vieux Port of Marseille, Fort Saint Jean dates back to the 17th century and maintained a strong military role for the country.

Now integrated into the museograhic entity of MuCEM, a museum of Europe and the Mediterranean, the structure and landscape offers visitors numerous Mediterranean style gardens to visit. In order to continue the experience after nightfall, lighting design company, L'Agence Lumière, designed and installed a Martin lighting rig to brighten the symbolic monument.

Based on the intricate landscape design, the main challenge was transforming Fort Saint Jean into a new living space and night time walk area in Marseille. The lighting de

Sweden - Wireless Solution Sweden AB recently held open days with sales and technical training on 27-28 August. Guests from 11 countries including distributors and partners attended the event. The event was a success with plenty of networking including social activities, giving guests a chance to meet others from the industry.

Three training session were held for each group of technical and sales staff including service & support, project planning, RDM & Ethernet over wireless, product planning for the future and sales training.

The open days also included a factory visit, with a demonstration of the complete automated SMT line, QC Control with X-Ray Machine as well as the production line of the final products.

The event finished with an on-site visit to the W-DMX installation in the amusement park LIseberg where five DMX Universes control 24 W-DMX receivers on Sweden's larg

UK - From Thursday 19 September, a derelict Southwark building will play host to an interactive light sculpture by artists Marcus Lyall and Mark Logue.

The public will be invited to have a cathartic yell or scream inside the building. Each scream will generate an instant light composition that illuminates the entire building.

The unique quality of each scream will create the colour and movement of the light composition through a unique computer program which will analyse the sounds in real-time.

The installation will be visible to thousands of passers-by on Borough High Street between 5pm and 10pm each night.

House Of Pain is a centrepiece in the 2013 Merge Festival, an arts festival in the Bankside area of London.

(Jim Evans)

UK - inspHire will be exhibiting leading equipment hire software solutions to the events industry on stand 50, demonstrating innovative software applications and new products and features such as inspHire Mobile Android and interactive Dashboard technology.

inspHire Mobile Android provides inspHire users with the ability to access key, up-to-the minute business data out on site and execute changes on the move. Users will be able to complete a delivery, exchange or collection with signature capture and instantly store this back into inspHire as well as take photos at On-Hire, Off-Hire and push jobs and instructions to drivers and fitters on the move. Through efficient mobile access, inspHire users will be able to control data anywhere, minimising downtime and improving bottom line.

A range of key features for the event hire industry will be demonstrated throughout both days of

USA - Bruno Mars is riding high off the success of his sold-out Moonshine Jungle outing. Sporting a diverse set-list with a mix of eclectic covers, radio hits, originals (many from his latest outing, Unorthodox Jukebox CD), the tour recently made Rolling Stone magazine's list of "50 greatest live acts right now."

The Clair Global tour is outfitted with dual DiGiCo SD7s at FOH and monitor world, both running redundant Waves SoundGrid servers. Each desk has two SD racks for individual control of preamps and are connected completely via digital Optocore fibre cable-a big change from the 2011 tour.

FOH engineer Derek Brener sends MADI lines direct from FOH to the record rig, handled by Charles Moniz, who records 96 channels to a Pro Tools rig seamlessly without the need for an expensive audio router for archival purposes.

(Jim Evans)

UK - Four years after initial product launch, Christie MicroTiles continue to captivate audiences with high resolution, high brightness displays that bring digital content to life in rich, vivid colours. Now Christie has taken another step forward in near seamless video walls by offering a new screen option for its multiple award-winning technology: the Christie MicroTiles S310 screen.

Featuring the same optical performance and construction as the S300, the Christie MicroTiles S310 screen is slightly larger and features 0.7-millimetre seams (compared to 1.3-millimetre seams for the S300). The S310 operating temperature range is 5 degrees Celsius (41 degrees Fahrenheit) to 35 degrees Celsius (95 degrees Fahrenheit). Just like the S300 screen option, the Christie MicroTiles S310 screen delivers excellent contrast with deeper blacks and image uniformity in even the most demanding i

UK - Allen & Heath has launched GLD Editor, a free, computer-based control suite offering all of the key facilities of the GLD digital mixer with capability to display multiple information panels simultaneously. Available for PC and Mac, GLD Editor has the advantage of a GUI simulation of the mixer surface, offering users an onscreen representation that reflects the physical surface.

Similar to the popular iLive Editor software, the program enables users to easily configure show settings or make changes to existing shows online or offline to save and upload later. TCP/IP connectivity makes live mixing and processing possible over CAT5 or WiFi so different tasks can be managed in the Editor software and the GLD mixer surface simultaneously. For example, monitors can be tweaked on stage using a wireless laptop while another engineer runs the FoH sound check from the mixer. Also, a

UK - The National Rigging Advisory Group (NRAG) is pleased to announce its newly expanded remit to become a representative body for the entertainment rigging industry in the UK. Whilst created to oversee the development of the National Rigging Certificate, the success of that program allows the NRAG to now focus on additional initiatives to increase safety and competency in the industry. These include representing the interests of the rigging community on national committees and industry groups, promoting best practice and adherence to technical and safety standards, and acting as the source of information on rigging to the entertainment industry.

To further this vision, the membership of the NRAG has been enlarged to include a cross-section of companies, organisations and individuals representing the UK rigging community. The breadth of experience and level of expertise now gat

UK - Networking specialists ELC Lighting will be presenting developments to their product range at PLASA London 2013, on stand H20 from 6-9 October at London's ExCeL. With the move to a new exhibition venue and ELC Lighting's new dmxXLANv4 lighting network management software nominated as a finalist in the 2013 PLASA Rock our World Awards, Silvio Cibien and Joost van Eenbergen have every reason to be looking forward to the show.

Joining the now established Ethernet networks for entertainment systems, ELC Lighting will debut a new and faster switch component - Switch8GB - forming a new backbone of the network distribution system. With 8 ports Local Area Networks have speeds of 10/100/1000 GB, plus a fiber optic option is introduced on ports 7 and 8. Thanks to the multiple back up loop feature there is fast recovery of back up data in the event of a glitch or interruption of the s

Luxembourg - Following on the recent appointment of industry veteran Graham Rowlands to head the business development efforts of Music Group Professional brands Midas, Klark-Teknik and Turbosound, the company has announced that Rowlands will also take on responsibility for the Installed Sound division in the Asia-Pacific region.

Aimed at the integrated systems market, the IS division encompasses offerings from across the stable of MusicGroup brands, including Eurocom- Behringer's breakthrough line of DSP-based auto-mixers, integrated mixer-amplifiers and professional installed loudspeakers.

"We are building on success in the region and I am confident that Graham will amplify that success," stated Music Group founder and CEO, Uli Behringer. "Graham's experience at the contractor level, combined with his extensive network of partners in both install and pro audio

Latest Issue. . .