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Russia - World-renowned lighting designer Durham Marenghi has used a selection of Clay Paky products, including the new A.leda B-Eye K10 and Sharpy Washes, to deliver a truly spectacular lighting design for the opening and closing ceremonies of Sochi's 2014 Winter Paralympics.

With a stadium audience of over 40,000, plus tens of millions of viewers tuning in worldwide, the Winter Olympics has been a much-anticipated event. Marenghi used a lighting rig originally specified by lighting designer Al Gurdon for the Winter Olympics Opening and Closing Ceremonies, to create a spectacular new design for the Paralympics Ceremonies.

"I was tasked with enhancing the artistic elements of the ceremonies of the Winter Paralympic Games with a lighting design that would thrill both the liv

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Singapore - Electronics & Engineering Pte Ltd (E&E) has been appointed as the new Singaporean and Malaysian distributor for Allen & Heath, effective 1 April 2014.

Bardy Hayes, president of Global Market Management, Inc., regional sales managing company for Allen & Heath in Asia Pacific, said, "E&E is a company with a rich history and a promising future. It is an honour to do business with a company with this level of professionalism and deep technical expertise. We look forward to a long and mutually successful relationship."

Gary Goh, Deputy managing director, Electronics & Engineering Pte Ltd, commented, "We are honoured to be representing the Allen & Heath brand for the Singapore and Malaysia markets. It is indeed a joy to be working with such a reputable company that shares the same level of passion for audio excellence."

(Jim Evans)

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Spain - Martin Professional has named Barcelona-based Earpro as the exclusive distributor of Martin products in Spain. As a member of Harman's distributor network since 1988, Earpo will expand the sales and distribution of Martin Professional lighting solutions in the Spanish market.

Commenting on the appointment, Miguel Mezquita, managing director, Earpro, stated, "The new cooperation between Martin Professional and Earpro further reinforces the close relationship and commitment that Earpro has had with Harman for more than 25 years. This agreement will undoubtedly benefit the interests of customers and users throughout the Spanish market. With this new setup, they will have access to the most comprehensive offering of AV solutions across the professional sector."

"Within the past three years, our people have done an amazing job reaffirming Martin Professional'

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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 - As Meyer Sound's official partner for the north of England, the centrepiece of Pro Audio Systems' stand at PLASA Focus Leeds (29-30 April 2014) will be the manufacturer's latest loudspeaker technology, the new MJF-210 stage monitor. This will be the first public showing of the new unit anywhere in the UK.

PAS's rental division were the first in the UK to add MJF-210s to their inventory, and the new modules have already completed their first hire jobs to great acclaim. Road-ready stock is available for demonstration purposes whether prospective clients are looking to rent or purchase.

Pro Audio Systems' presence at the show has also been completely revamped for 2014, focusing on the company's status as representatives for the leading brands in professional audio. Much more than just a sales outlet, visitors will be able to meet the PAS team and explore the other elements t

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New Zealand - Four Allen & Heath Qu-16 digital rackmount mixers were used for the recent New Zealand Folk Festival in Auckland. Running for 40 years, the event annually attracts a line-up of international touring artists.

"There are certain considerations when mixing folk bands; firstly there are many unusual instruments - including bouzoukis, dulcimers, seven string acoustic guitars, harps, and accordions with built in mics, musicians unexpectedly come back on stage to perform with other bands, the crowd like a mix where you can hear a pin drop but at a "festival" level, and vocals must always be on top of the mix," explains engineer, Davyd Hodge. "That's why I need a dedicated surface area to manage this event."

Previously, Hodge has used a 40-channel analogue GL2800 from Allen & Heath but opted to use the company's new Qu-16 digital mixers arra

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UK - MilTec (UK) Ltd will be showcasing a wide range of new products at the PLASA Focus show in April (Stand N-C07). In addition to the usual stand in the New Dock Hall, the company will have a live demo room in the Holiday Inn Hotel next door. Demos will be running all day and will give visitors an opportunity to listen to the successful Blakite range of speakers and to see a selection of LED lighting products.

The Blakite speakers were designed by MilTec and are built in the UK. Most are loaded with British drivers. New additions to the range are a compact stage wedge, loaded with a 12" neodymium driver and concentric HF horn, together with a 6" trapezoidal speaker for installations and small conference work.

The success of the speakers has inspired the company to expand the UK manufacturing base to include amplifiers and LED Lighting products.

The new amplifiers

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UK - RCF will introduce a number of new products to the UK market for the first time at this year's PLASA Focus in Leeds (29-30 April 29-30, #N-D20).

For pro audio professionals unable to make it over to Frankfurt for last month's Prolight+Sound showcase this will provide the perfect opportunity to assess RCF's new suite, which provides a number of different, mission critical solutions.

Following the success of the HDL20-A active line array, much attention will be focused on the compact HDL10-A - ideal in both live sound reinforcement and reliable installed situations. With purpose-designed transducers, the system is powered from a 1400W (peak power) two-way digital amplifier, while the sound is processed from a powerful DSP. Rental companies will also be impressed by the system's fast and easy set up.

Another legacy product following the rich heritage of the ART 7 series is

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South Africa - Quite literally MGG Productions have done it again. Thanks to the success of a sci-fi concept they came up for a corporate conference held last year, MGG were asked by their client Eventworx to recreate the entire look for the same event hosted in January 2014.

MGG's newly appointed general manager, Denzil Smith, who joined the company in December, took the production to a new level. With a team of professionals at his side including lighting designer from MGG, Kevin Rieck, and the assistance of system technician, Thomas Peters, the event was technically flawless.

This was no mean feat as the event, which ran off a grandMA2 full size, included close to 150 Robe fixtures, 48 ClayPaky Sharpies (forty more Sharpies than last year) and some 400m of Prolyte Trussing besides a list of other fixtures.

"It ran so well," said a clearly pleased Denzil Smith. H

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Italy - Keeping the 36,000 inhabitants of Italy's Casalecchio di Reno healthy is the prime objective of the town's fitness centre, Lodi Club. And with the benefit of a new Yamaha MTX3 matrix processor with custom control, the club's audio system is as fit as its instructors.

The system is designed to play background music and broadcast announcements. Installed several years ago by Bologna-based Rokepo, it was due for an upgrade earlier this year as part of a wider club overhaul. Rokepo's Roberto Valentino knew that the MTX3 would be ideal for audio routing and system management.

"When the MTX series was launched, I immediately liked the versatility and great potential of this product, in addition to the excellent audio quality we are used to from Yamaha digital mixers," he says.

"The only potential problem was that I felt the user interface would be a bit too

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UK - BBC Daytime Glasgow recently commissioned a new quiz-show pilot to be trialled for BBC Network. The new pilot featured a number of word-based challenges and various other challenges was presented by British Bakeoff's host Sue Perkins.

UK production group Boom Pictures, who recently acquired production powerhouse Twofour Group, produced the show. Lorraine Heggessey, who worked closely on the show, is the executive chair of Boom Pictures Group(The former BBC1 channel controller, and CEO of Talkback Thames).

BBC daytime commissioner Jo Street ordered the non-transmittable pilot, which was recorded in front of a live audience at Studio 1 at The BBC Wales Television Centre in Cardiff, with a view to take the series to Manchester's new MediaCity, should the show be taken forward to series.

The appointed lighting director to the project was Steff Jones, who worked close

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UK - UK - The only British surviving Second World War-era submarine, HMS Alliance, stands proudly in Gosport, just across the water from Portsmouth.

It has undergone a major £7m restoration project to bring it to life as a visitor attraction, allowing people young and old to go on board and experience what it would have been like on the vessel throughout historic wars.

The audio system was devised by sound designer Sarah Angliss, who also programmed the submarine's novel, generative audio system using MaxMSP. DJW was briefed to install the AV hardware and design, programme and install elements of the audio soundscaping throughout the 218ft submarine. The solution needed to help bring the submarine 'back to life', submersing visitors in the feel of a working vessel.

While throughout its award-winning, 28-year history DJW has worked within some unusual environments (cast

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South Africa - Keystone Production's Christopher Bolton made 12 Clay Paky B-Eye fixtures the lighting showpiece for the 2nd Annual SA Premier Business Awards hosted at the Sandton Convention Centre on 19 March. Bolton took on the role of production director for the event and was also responsible for the set, AV and lighting design.

Special care was taken to make the SA Premier Business Awards a prominent occasion. "Peter Whale from Outlaw Events, our main client, contracted CAP events to take care of all the artists and entertainment," commented Bolton. The content mostly consisted of collaborations between Lloyd Cele (Idols fame) and The Soweto Gospel Choir.

Outlaw contracted Jonathan Le Roux from Keystone Productions to manage all the production requirements. MGG were nominated as the preferred technical supplier. "As always, we received awesome support from M

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Kazakhstan / Serbia - Lighting designers Dmitriy Karabetskiy and Viktor Trifu both specified Avolites consoles for their individual designs for Kazakh and Serbian X-Factors.

For the Serbian series X-Factor Adria Trifu and his partner Arsa Zlatkovic opted for the intuitive feature set of the Avolites Expert Pro to manage the show's vast amount of pre-programming. Whilst over in Khazakstan lighting designer Karabetskiy, a seasoned Avolites user, chose the Avolites Titan Mobile desk with Titan software.

"X-Factor Khazakstan is now in its fourth series and to celebrate this we wanted the show to be a 'spectacular'," explains Karabetskiy. "In terms of technology this has meant that the show is huge. I am using over 300 fixtures, 111 of which are moving heads."

Karabetskiy's lighting design is fast-paced and theatrical with each performer's

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UK - UK based drapes, starcloth, LED and visual effects specialist S+H Technical designed and built a custom 'Crufts' LED sign and supplied quantities of its standard RGB LED starcloth for the main show ring of the 2014 edition of the world's most famous dog show.

The event was staged at Birmingham, UK's National Exhibition Centre (NEC)

The Kennel Club initiated the idea of the sign and the starcloth, used for the first time in 2012 by Jon Pope, the show's Lighting Designer since 2009. Having a special, flexible and highly visual 'Crufts' ident in the form of the colour changing sign has been a great benefit to the background aesthetics of all the presentations taking place in the ring.

The main show ring - in the NEC's LG Arena - is the hub of the action for all four days of the event which culminates in the renowned 'Best in Show' competition. It is broadcast on More 4 and

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South Africa - DWR Distribution welcomed Andy Duffield from GDS to South Africa for the second time.

"I primarily came out to see new projects and to carry out some training with the DWR sales team," said Duffield. "I should tell you they are excellent, supportive and open to information."

Duffield is particularly fond of the Arc System range. "If you have 15 minutes in front of someone to show them how to get LED into an auditorium, they get it straight away," he explained. Because the Arc System is designed with theatre in mind, LED is made beautiful and relevant to its environment. "It's about understanding what the theatrical experience is all about," said Duffield. This means dimming correctly in LED and getting great colours.

GDS celebrates its tenth birthday in June and Duffield has been with the company for six. "My CV isn

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UK - Solid State Logic has announced the appointment of Dr. Enrique Perez Gonzalez as chief technology officer for Solid State Logic's Board of Directors. Dr. Perez has been promoted from his current role as head of R&D and became a board member effective 1April.

"Enrique is one of those rare individuals who has deep technical ability, first-hand experience of our markets and the skills to manage product research and development effectively," states SSL's CEO Antony David. "Even more importantly, he has the vision to build upon our technical heritage and the resources to take us forward."

Dr. Perez joined SSL in 2011, spearheading the development of the Tempest processing platform and SSL's new Live console. An electronics and communications graduate from ITSEM, Mexico, which included a year at Australia's Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, he is an a

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USA - The Pro FS 15R from Elation Professional is a high-output, medium-throw followspot with efficient Platinum source that projects "an exceptionally flat field beam with no hotspot". Useful wherever manual control of an intense lighting beam is required, and ideal for shows and venues of all sizes, it features a sharp 6-10 degree beam that projects effectively up to 150'.

An efficient optical system with anti-reflection lenses combine with a Philips MSD Platinum 15R lamp to produce 13,500 lumens of cool white 8000°K light (6010 Lux @ 20m). The ultra-efficient lamp runs at a max power consumption of only 320 watts and lasts much longer than a traditional discharge lamp. No adjustment or cleaning of the reflector or lamp is required.

The Pro FS 15R comes with seven interchangeable dichroic colours that reproduce perfectly with a variable CTB/CTO filter that allo

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UK - Roland Systems Group (R-B12) will be bringing professional audio and video together at PLASA Focus (Leeds, 29-30 April 2014), providing total solutions for live performance as well as professional audio and video production. With a focus on newly launched products for live mixing, switching, recording and web streaming, Roland will exhibit the VR-3EX AV Mixer, the M-480 and M-200i Digital Mixing Consoles, the VR-50HD High Definition AV Mixer, V-800HD Live Video Switcher and S-2416 Digital Snake at the show.

Now available with a five-year warranty, the Roland M-480 48 Channel Digital Console offers an enhanced level of flexible audio processing with superb sound quality, powerful functions, expandability options and intuitive operation. With 48 mixing channels plus 6 stereo returns for a total of 60 channels, six built-in stereo (dual-mono) multi-effects and twelve graphic E

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UK - Country and leisure park operators, Park Leisure, recently undertook a £2m upgrade to its Amble Links 'owners-only' holiday park on the Northumberland coast - part of the Granary Leisure Complex.

Preferred AV integrators, Promotiontime NE, carried out the technology design and fit-out of its main entertainment area, The Links Owners Only Bar & Entertainment Lounge, as well as the refurbished Old Storehouse restaurant/bar, turning exclusively to a Martin Audio AQ solution for all its requirements.

Brian Graham, who took over Promotiontime NE 10 years ago, has been a frequent user of Martin Audio systems over the years, and in particular the Blackline series - but the compact AQ architectural range has opened up a number of new opportunities for him.

"Martin Audio is generally our 'go to' brand for most requirements above a basic bar, and I would probably have

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UK - Scrub, a division of HHB Communications Ltd. specialising in serving the post production industry, has supplied a full Dante networking solution to Clearcut Sound Studios' audio post production facilities.

The recent upgrade to Clearcut Sound Studios includes the installation of a Dante audio networking system, providing real-time audio routing between four mix rooms and studio computers. Dante, an IP based audio transmission format, is capable of supporting 100s of digital audio channels at resolutions up to 24-bit uncompressed, and sample rates up to 96kHz.

Scrub also supplied Clearcut with HP Z820 studio computers configured with Yamaha AIC128-D Dante Accelerator PCI Express audio interface cards, and Yamaha MY-16-AUD Dante expansion cards which are fitted to their DM2000 mixing consoles. All of the Dante interfaces are connected to a Gigabit Ethernet switch with stand

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UK - Following on from a successful KV2 supplement to their hire inventory for last year's 42nd Street tour, Blitz Communications have further invested in the brand for the current Fiddler on the Roof tour featuring Paul Michael Glazer.

Chris Jordan at Blitz communications had utilised many brands over the years, but feeling audio quality had generally declined in favour of convenience, he was looking to buck the trend and move forwards with something that offered a more musical solution, but presented in a modern way. Along with Ross Portway, who had worked on the successful 42nd Street design, they arranged for Richard Brooker, the Sound designer for Fiddler on the Roof, to be introduced to the KV2 Audio brand.

"I was asked to have a listen to KV2 Audio by a colleague and went along to a very impressive demonstration," says Brooker. "I fou

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