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Marquee Audio supplied a new L'Acoustic dV-DOSC system to Belfast's Production House, just in time for the city's biggest-ever Children in Need charity event, staged at the Odyssey Arena in Belfast. Production House flew 12 dV-DOSC, with four dV-Subs, each side of the stage for a line-up that included Ronan Keating, Lulu, Daniel Bedingfield and local star John Daly performing for 9,000 people.

The show was mixed by Harry McLean from BBC Northern Ireland, who was as impressed by the dV-DOSC rig as its new owner, John Willis of Production House. "The coverage was even, and the output and sound quality was impressive for such a physically small box. Once Harry had done a walk round the venue, he was completely confident that everybody in the arena would be hearing the same thing and that let him concentrate on mixing the show which, in true Children in Need style, was hectic from sta

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Rental company Centre Stage have made a strategic move into high-end PA, with the purchase of 20 Martin Audio Wavefront W8C/WSX stacks. Centre Stage proprietor, Graham Baker - who shares his Staples Corner warehouse facility in north west London with another W8C-based company, FX Music - placed the order through Steve ‘Bunty’ King at LMC Audio in London. This will give the combined companies a joint stockholding of 50 W8C stacks - providing ample power to undertake large stadium and arena shows.

In the past Centre Stage have specialised in one-off arts events shows and local authority events - and this summer provided coverage for Miss Dynamite at West Ham’s Upton Park stadium. Graham told us: "I was introduced to Martin Audio and have always felt confident about their systems. The day FX Music went out and bought 30 stacks the writing was on the wall."

He

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Midas has announced the launch of Midas DIRECT, a web-based service designed for the sale of pre-owned Midas consoles. As part of the Approved Pre-owned Console Programme, Midas engineers inspect each console - mechanical and electrical components, chassis, all modules, case and power supplies. The console is then music-tested before being offered for sale on the website. For further peace of mind, all consoles, regardless of age will be sold with a comprehensive six-month ‘unlimited hours’ warranty from the factory. Alternatively, if the console is less than three years old, the balance of the existing warranty will be transferred to the new owner.

Midas’ head of sales, David Cooper, says the new initiative has two key benefits: "Firstly it allows us to offer an upgrade service for our existing client base - say from an XL200 to a Heritage 2000," he said. &

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PCM’s Projects division has supplied the main theatre space in Dublin’s Liberty Hall Centre for the Performing Arts with specialist lighting bar winches. The new venue has been completely refurbished - along with the rest of this historically significant building. It was re-opened as the Performing Arts Centre by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, TD.

Installation of the new lighting and technical infrastructure was undertaken by Dublin lighting supplier Stage Lighting Centre, who also supplied a full set of stage curtains, complete dimming system and stage lanterns. They worked very closely with Brian Tracey, Liberty Hall’s head of technical, throughout the installation period. When it came to custom engineering and installing the specialist lighting bars required at the FOH and forestage positions, Stage Lighting Centre’s Paddy Farrell approached PCM.

Working to the s

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Martin Audio Blackline speakers have made their second appearance at a West Midlands football stadium - courtesy of Birmingham-based Argus Services Ltd. The contractors had already fitted Blackline F10s at Birmingham City’s St Andrews ground when the PA/VA specialists were asked to put a distributed system into Walsall FC’s Bescot Stadium.

Argus director, Jerry Matthews, said that a 30-year-old system had to be removed to accommodate the new Martin enclosures - which are used for music reproduction on match days. After the construction of the new Purple stand (formerly Gilbert Alsop stand), Argus were called in to bring the public address and sound reinforcement in the remainder of the stadium up to the same level. The solution was provided by 27 of Martin Audio’s Blackline F10s, assigned to five QSC 100V line amplifiers. These are all mounted individually under the s

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Arbiter Pro Audio has supplied Reading-based sound installers, Reflex Ltd, with JBL Evo intelligent speakers and AKG microphones for an impressive installation at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. The vast Churchill Hall auditorium is the largest MoD briefing facility in the South of England, providing lecture facilities for every officer candidate in the British Army in addition to hosting major conferences for high profile UK businesses and organizations.

The auditorium - seating 1,202 with a ceiling height of 50ft - was opened in 1970 and has been in constant use ever since. Matt Horwood of Reflex Limited was approached by Margaret Young, head of media support at RMA Sandhurst to improve the ageing facilities in the auditorium. With the help of specialist audio distributor Leisuretec, Horwood came up with the specifications for the project. In turn, he approached Arbiter to sup

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Artistic Licence has recently supplied Protocol-Converters for two large TV studio complexes, allowing the integration of DMX512 products with other control protocols. The ITN studios in Gray’s Inn Road have a mixture of Strand lighting consoles including 530, 300, and Galaxy units. A variety of dimmers, some using D54 and others DMX512, were connected to these consoles. The addition of four Artistic Licence Protocol-Converters has allowed equipment to be used in any combination. Protocol-Converters offer conversion of a variety of lighting protocols to or from DMX512. A Cue-Patch unit was also used, allowing the various studios to be combined in the most flexible manner.

Paul Flook, Head of Broadcast Engineering, told us: "The combination of the Protocol-Converters and the Cue-Patch has not only saved us money by allowing us to have a common control protocol but also allow

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Colin Park, managing director Australian-based pro audio manufacturer ARX Systems, has reported that following a general re-organization of ARX’s European distribution in early 2002, the company’s European sales have continued to increase through the latter half of the year.

ARX’s recently-appointed distributor for The Netherlands, Electric Audio, has supplied EQ-60 graphic equalizers to the Ogterop Theatre in Meppel; Maximix line mixers to Video Schaay in Rotterdam and EQ-60 and EQ-15 graphic equalizers to Super Sound, the Leiden -based rental company.

German distributor Show Service supplied DI-4 direct boxes and AFW 1 anti-feedback workstations to the Baptist Church of Waldbrol; EC 2 electronic crossovers and AFW 1s to the Detmold Gospel Church; Mixxmaster mic line mixers to Siro AV in Mainz and Maxisplit line splitters to AV Long in Lindlar, while Swiss distribu

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Two well-known names in the entertainment lighting industry have launched an "e-commerce website with a new concept" - Gearmarket UK - on 9 December. Keith Dale, ex-managing director of Celco and John Lethbridge, ex-managing director of Cerebrum Lighting, have been working with software developers for several months to come up with a concept that is possibly unique in the entertainment technology industry - a web-based customer loyalty scheme.

The Gearmarket site offers innovative new products and a selection of popular products from several key manufacturers from around the world. Buyers can shop and pay in Euros or Pounds Sterling. Most E-commerce sites present the potential buyer with a single price, invariably discounted - but one can never be sure how good the price is without comparing prices available elsewhere. On first sight, the Gearmarket website only appears to sh

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East London-based gobo and projection specialist, Projected Image, has taken on an additional new premises at its HQ in the Three Mills Island Studio complex, Bromley-by- Bow. This is part of an on-going expansion plan in line with recent company developments and the establishment of sister company Projected Image Digital.

In November, Projected Image announced an exclusive UK distribution deal with RADlite, the revolutionary new PC-based computer generated effects package. Expanding to the new, larger, 1100sq.ft premises will allow Projected Image to enlarge its gobo production facilities and move all administration into the new space, leaving the original area free to be set up and utilized as a permanent RADlite demonstration. "We’re very excited about the move," said director David March. "The intention is also to offer the facility to lighting designers and vi

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A new feature awaits some of the two million visitors who flock annually to Madame Tussaud’s in London. Guests can now stand on a podium between President Bush and Prime Minister Blair, and via a discreet camera have their image beamed onto a rear-projected screen above and behind them - thanks to a 120" New Wide Angle screen from dnp.

The installation is the work of systems integrators, Sysco, whose relationship with The Tussauds Group extends back nearly 10 years to when they first fit out sister attraction, Tussaud’s London Planetarium. Managing director Hugo Roche explained: "Over the years we have undertaken a lot of the Group’s AV work - sometimes winning competitive tenders, on other occasions being appointed during the design phase and working more on a design/build basis."

In terms of delivery, Sysco looked at a number of ways of achieving th

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Large screen specialist GL UK is supplying production company Endemol UK for the BBC’s latest pop phenomenon Fame Academy, with 55 panels of Barco I-lite 8 mm LED screen for the 12-week series. The screens were specified for the show by the original director Tony Gregory, who worked with GL UK on Big Brother earlier in the year.

Throughout the week, leading up to Friday, they are also filmed auditioning, working, performing and practising, etc. In the studios, the screen panels are configured in two very different-sized formats. One is a seven panel wide by four panel high widescreen, and the other is a three wide by nine high horizontal screen. The latter is split into three equal sections, allowing images of three different performers to be shown simultaneously. This effect is specifically used as they approach their ‘jeopardy moments’, after which the voting elimin

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QSC Audio has reported two major sales of its amplifiers via Dutch importer, Holland Audio Import (HAI) BV. The sales have been made to rental companies P&B Audio and Story Sound. P&B Audio purchased two racks, each containing a pair of QSC’s PowerLight PL4.0 and PL2.0HV models - as well as an additional PL6.0 rack to power the company’s Funktion One system.

At London’s PLASA Show, P&B discovered Funktion One’s Resolution 2 system and, noticing the demand for high-end larger scale FOH PA, they made the radical decision to do away with almost their entire previous inventory to invest in a larger system. "As a result, we switched to QSC’s PowerLight Series - and we wished since that we had done this years ago," says P&B’s Michel van de Beek. The new QSC system drives the company’s eight stacks of Funktion One Resolution 5/F218s. "W

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Lighting designer David Agress approached this year’s Radio City Christmas Spectacular with two specific problems in mind - how to maintain the artistic integrity of his lighting design for the show when there were multiple companies touring that same production simultaneously, and how to cut the load-in time at each move. Agress, working with programmer Paul Turner, turned to three separate building blocks and put them together in pre-production to accomplish both goals - the Prelite Studios in New York, XYZ positioning on Whole Hog II and WYSIWYG.

The team began work with the show file from the 2001 production. Two focus grids had been constructed, which the team called a Map. The first focus grid was built on the downstage 20’ of the deck, with 4’ centres stage left to right and 3’ centres downstage to upstage. The second grid was further upstage, with the

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The Jewish Free School's new campus in North London was officially opened by PM Tony Blair in October. Designed by leading UK architects Terrence O'Rourke, the new campus provides a base for approximately 2000 students.

In charge of the development of the 22,224sq.m facility was Jarvis plc, a facilities management and infrastructure services group, and the first company to win a schools project under the government’s Private Finance Initiative. The Jarvis team worked in partnership with the local education authority to create the facility, and also with a number of sub-contractors - amongst them Maltbury, who fulfilled the staging part of the contract.

As the facility's main hall is used for school presentations and exams, the Jarvis team wanted to provide under-stage storage for the exam desks without lifting the height of the stage. To achieve this, Maltbury designed and buil

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Metropolis Studios has consolidated its position as one of Europe’s leading recording studio complexes through the reconstruction of two of its main rooms around SSL consoles. The 72 channel SSL XL 9000 K Series will be fitted into the customized 5.1 and stereo Studio E and an SSL 9000 J into Studio A.

The move is certain to be seen as adventurous in the current climate and watched with interest by senior industry figures. The studio industry has been in a state of flux for a couple of years with a change in the way records have been made, resulting in a number of mid to large studios closing. Metropolis created studio E, one of the world’s first purpose-built music surround mix rooms in 1996 and was the first major studio complex to embrace the ProTools revolution in the early 90s. The Group was also unique in offering ProTools workstations for every session with Prism con

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21st century audio technology has joined 11th century history in the first ever Renkus-Heinz ST-STX installation in Europe. The Dala-Husby Church in the very heart of Dalarna, Sweden, has chosen the high powered Renkus-Heinz ST7, with built-in Class D amplification and integral processing, to deliver sound throughout its large, highly reverberant main hall.

The installation was supervised by DAT AB, Renkus-Heinz’s Swedish distributor. DAT installed the new Renkus-Heinz ST7/94 (90 x 40 degree dispersion) loudspeaker and a series of distributed nearfield speakers in the church, to minimize the effects of a long reverb time while projecting vocal and musical clarity throughout the building.

Faced with a limited budget and the requirement for a compact, simple, but state-of-the-art sound system, DAT measured the reverberation time at almost 4.5 seconds and created an EASE model of

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Cadac Electronics Plc reports that its J-Type Live Production Console features on three of the current Mamma Mia! productions. September saw the show's debut in Sydney at the Lyric Theatre, Star City, underlining the Australian's continuing enthusiasm for the sunny musical. In November, the first ever non-English language production premièred in Hamburg - at the refurbished Operettenhaus an der Reeperbahn. The Umi Theatre in Tokyo completes the picture for 2002, where Mamma Mia! opened on 1st December.

For this latter, Mamma Mia! is being staged by the Shiki Theatre Company at this brand new 1200-seat theatre, which is located in the new Bayside Tokyo Shiodome SIO-SITE complex. The show is the latest in a long line of large-scale musical productions under the Shiki banner, including Phantom of the Opera, CATS and The Lion King. The Shiki team was responsible for the design of the Umi

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Urbium plc notched up their 26th venue this month with the opening of the expansive Tiger Tiger in Newcastle. In keeping with their policy, the venue forms part of a new £70m leisure and retail development called The Gate at the top of Newcastle’s Bigg Market drinking circuit, in the shadow of the former Mayfair Ballroom.

To maximize an ideal location, Urbium brought back interior designers Tibbatts & Co to deliver this 1800-capacity multi-bar concept. With a large ground floor Tiger Bar, Moroccan-themed Kaz Bar, Manhattan-style Loft, colonial-style Raffles Bar and the retro feel of The Den, as well as a clever tunnel which acts as a bass trap into the industrially-appointed club, the venue caters to all tastes. There is also further evidence of the company’s move towards fine dining with the stylish, silver service restaurant. Yet where Newcastle has become truly groundbr

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St. John's Church in the Lebanese city of Achkout, 15 kilometres north of Beirut, has recently had a brand new sound system installed. With seating for 750 and a maximum capacity of 1,000, St. John's is one of the largest Christian churches in the area.

Installer Tony Abou-Khair outlines the brief: "In terms of speech intelligibility, the old system was not capable of doing justice to the demands of today. As an ever-increasing number of people have been frequenting the services, the sound system had to be expanded. The budget was tight so the loudspeaker cabinets we chose had to be capable of producing a balanced sound with excellent speech intelligibility, even without any type of external controller. As a result, we opted for the HK Audio Linear 3 Series. The acoustics in the front portion of the church are problematic because of a potentially unpleasant build-up of mid to hig

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L&SI’s series of industry networking events got off to a flying start on 10 October when 58 delegates joined the PLASA Media team and the technical production crew at the London Palladium for a backstage tour of the world’s most technically-advanced musical production, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

After a welcome drink in the Palladium’s Cinderella Bar, delegates were welcomed to the theatre by L&SI editor Ruth Rossington, before being given a fascinating potted history of the site and the venue by theatre manager Nick Bromley. Following this, the delegates were split into groups to begin the behind the scenes tour, which took in the automation control position, the lighting control room, the lighting rig, FOH sound desk, the under-stage engineering and the radio racks, plus a chance to view the amazing car itself, built by Howard Eaton Lighting Ltd. At each point, deleg

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Birmingham's SSE Hire has recently completed the first sale of a Nexo GEO loudspeaker system by a member of the UK GEO reseller network. Supplied as a complete package to Litton Lane, the system includes speaker enclosures, amps, processors, flying hardware and flightcases. As an existing Nexo Alpha user the addition of GEO to Litton Lane's hire stock was a natural progression for the Dublin-based company.

The system supplied by SSE included 18 GEO-S cabinets, four CD12 cardioid subs, two Nexo NX241 digital controllers, four Camco Vortex 6 amplifiers and flying hardware to suit. To complete the package, SSE also supplied its custom GEO cases, capable of holding seven GEO-S cabinets and all flying hardware in a ready-to-fly configuration. Also included were SSE GEO distribution boxes providing AC, signal and speaker distribution for the shock-mounted SSE Cube racks housing the Camco a

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Australia’s Gold Coast is home to the Movie World theme park - the brainchild of Warner Bros, and the only theme park in the southern hemisphere dedicated to the film industry.

Given the renewed interest in all things Scooby Doo, the park has launched a new dark ride - the Scooby-Doo Spooky Coaster - a $13 million indoor rollercoaster inspired by the feature film which was shot at Warner’s Movie World Studios.

Coaster cars carefully replicated from the film launch visitors on a hair-raising journey, complete with laser, lighting and sound effects, animatronics and a kaleidoscope of colour, depth, height and trickery of dimension.

One of the central players in the ride’s design was Australian laser specialist Laservision Macro-Media. The installation required a complete reversal of laser display rules: whilst discreet laser effects have previously been employed

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A special event at BBC TV Centre in Wood Lane, West London, on December 6 saw a unique demonstration of LED screen technology to an invited audience of television lighting directors.

The Society of Television Lighting Directors (STLD), Blitz Television Services of Elstree, UK, and LED screen manufacturer Lighthouse joined forces to demonstrate the newly installed Lighthouse LVP0630 screen on the BBC children’s television show The Saturday Show, which includes a special Saturday edition of Top of the Pops.

Presented by Lighthouse International sales and marketing director Graham Burgess and Saturday Show LD Rod Litherland, with Guy Horrigan, Dave Gunn and Blitz’s Scott Burges also on hand, the presentation aimed to explain the characteristics of LED technology and explore its creative possibilities. Topics covered included colour balance, contrast, camera angles, viewing d

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  2. Swedish Radio bench tests DTS as part of drive for surround sound broadcasting
  3. Charity Climb
  4. Marquee Audio supply latest tours
  5. Orange and Imagination Discover Wirefree Technology
  6. New Authorized Service Centres for ETC
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