Business

Details
UK - Leading AV supplier McMillan UK Ltd has gone into receivership. At the request of the company's directors, Blair Nimmo and Neil Armour of KPMG Corporate Recovery have been appointed joint receivers. Headquartered in Arbroath, the business has 10 offices supplying audio, video, and visual communications equipment to the broadcast, post-production and presentation markets across the UK and Ireland.

Established in 1982, the business employs approximately 140 staff, with an annual turnover of £20 million to the year ended 30 June 2003. Blair Nimmo, KPMG Corporate Recovery Partner said: "The business has experienced trading difficulties due to the general economic downturn which has continued to affect the advertising and related industries. Fortunatel, McMillan enjoys a good reputation within its marketplace and has a portfolio of high profile customers; therefore we are

Details
Ireland - The Dublin Spire on O'Connell Street has been lit with Lumileds Luxeon LEDs in a project to provide the city with a striking new tourist attraction. Designed by Ian Ritchie Architects, the Spire is now Dublin's tallest structure, with Leda-Lite International selected to illuminate the Spire with aviation and architectural lighting that maximizes the impact of the overall design.

In total 2000 white Luxeon Star LEDs were used to light the Spire, creating a light output of 2000 candela in all directions and a structure that can be seen from up to 15 miles away. Leda-Lite used specially designed optics to create 360° of light around the aviation light. By turning the optics 90° the lighting solution spreads light down the entire length of the spire, emitting it through 11,000 perforated holes along the structure's aluminium core. These holes allow the architectural ligh

Details
UK - Electrosonic was awarded two top accolades at the recent 2003 UK AV Awards, held in Newport Wales. The company collected both Systems Company of the Year and Service Company of the Year. Electrosonic's submission for Systems Company of the Year included projects ranging in value from £400,000 to £2,000,000, covering applications from visitor centres to meeting facilities, with customers including production designers, consultants, and design and build clients. Developments within the solutions division of Electrosonic included use of distribution systems for communications content, remote monitoring of AV devices and events, and the programming of complex multiple media control systems.

The panel of independent judges included users, industry authorities, producers and market researchers. Judges commented: "Electrosonic's commitment to staff, process and engineering

Details
Singapore - Sebastian Song has opened an office for German pro audio manufacturer d&b audiotechnik in Singapore. Song, who laid the foundations of his 20-year audio experience with the National Theatre Trust of Singapore, said: "I've come to recognize the fundamental importance of consistency; that's why I've chosen to establish a dedicated office for d&b audiotechnik here in Singapore." The new office is located in the north-east of the city, just a short cab ride away from the Esplanade, the cultural heart of this famous City State.

Sebastian Song first encountered d&b audiotechnik's audio 'systems' in 1998: "I had started to see a rising demand for joined up thinking in Pro Audio," he explains. "The business needs systems solutions. Demand here is evenly split between high quality installations for theatres and concert halls, and a rapidly growing ren

Details
UK - Marquee Audio has sold the first of Yamaha new-generation SPX multi-effect processors into a high-profile application. Four of the new SPX 2000s are currently being used in Wembley's Fountain Studios on the final stages of Thames Television's Pop Idol. The first two were sold to music TV specialist Fred Jackson (of Jackson Post) for use on foldback. Stewart Chaney's Plus 4 Audio then followed suit, adding to his growing Yamaha stock. Both companies are long-term customers of Marquee Audio, who have been servicing Jackson's requirements since his days working with RG Jones. When he later set up his own post production production facility, Marquee were again on hand to meet the requirements for DAT players and other ancillaries. "If I want to try out something new Marquee are always very helpful. Andy Huffer knows intuitively what I'm looking for - he knows I'm in t

Details
UK - One of the North-East's leading audio-visual and event production company, The R&B Group, has announced a string of new contract wins on the strength of its commitment to make Newcastle and Gateshead the events capital of Europe.

Newcastle Quayside-based The R&B Group has a staff of 15 and offers a complete technical solution for presentations, events or shows using the most progressive technical equipment available in the industry. Its work takes them across the country and abroad and is synonymous with many household names such the Royal Shakespeare Company, Royal College of Nursing, Newcastle Chronicle & Journal Ltd, Northern Arts and the eye-catching launch of Gateshead's Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art.

The company's marketing team has just returned from a successful city conference with the Newcastle Gateshead Initiative, aimed at attracting London buyers into ho

Details
Spain - We Will Rock You, the hit musical by Queen and Ben Elton, opened its third production at the Teatro Calderon in Madrid on 3 November. The Madrid production joins the original production, still playing to packed houses at the Dominion Theatre in London, and the Australian production which opened in Melbourne earlier in the year.

Produced and directed by Luis Alvarez, We Will Rock You in Madrid has been lit once again by the award-winning lighting designer Willie Williams. Madrid does, however, mark the first involvement of a new lighting supplier for the show: Fourth Phase London was selected to supply the entire lighting rig. Supporting the action is a set design by Mark Fisher integrated with Williams' video and lighting design. Best known for his work in the music industry, most notably his close and ongoing collaboration with U2 (his design for their Zoo

Details
UK - Autograph Sales has confirmed that following extensive evaluation during the summer, the first two clients for MILO, Meyer Sound's latest addition to its M Series line array system, are Capital Sound Hire and Canegreen. Both London-based rental touring companies are long-term users of Meyer Sound products: Capital Sound has taken delivery of 32 MILOs while Canegreen has purchased 16 boxes.

Canegreen's relationship with Meyer Sound products spans two decades. The company was one of the first Meyer users in the UK and has continued to invest in the manufacturer's latest technology, keeping its Meyer inventory up to date. Canegreen is one of Europe's largest concert rental touring companies, with recent clients including Placebo, Michael McDonald, Craig David and Paul Weller. "At last, here is a line array system that will work in any venue without compromising sound qual

Details
Russia - Khabarovsk City in Siberia has opened the Palladium Palace, a substantial entertainment centre which doubles as an ice-rink stadium and a concert hall, with a powerful PA system capable of handling both configurations.

In ice-rink mode, the Palace is used for competitions at all levels, for training, and for a range of social ice skating activities. With a few modifications, the venue can be turned into a 7,000-capacity concert hall. PAL Systems has installed a flexible sound reinforcement system, which can handle either the skating competition or a live music performance, as well as the occasional outdoor concert.

A Turbosound Flashlight PA rig has been installed in the Palace, under the control of a permanently-moored Soundcraft K2 console to address the requirements of everyday use. This system is powered by two racks of Chevin Research Line 500 amplifiers, and is

Details
UK - The first HK Audio Cohedra Line array system to arrive in the UK has been delivered to York-based rental company JSS Audio, who will immediately be using the new line array for three important shows in London's Covent Garden.

Jem Walker, the owner of JSS, commented: "We had an extremely successful show with a large Cohedra system in the KC Stadium in Hull, Yorkshire in early September, hosted by Yorkshire FM station Viking Radio, with Foxy & Tom's Big Bash featuring headline artists Westlife, Triple Eight and a host of other acts. The artists, their crews, sound technicians and management, along with ourselves were all impressed by the great dynamics, transparent natural sound and exceptional dispersion characteristics of the 96 box system. The success of this event lead to many inquiries and it was clear that we would continue to use the HK Audio Cohedra line array.&q

Details
UK - London-based Entec Sound & Light has been appointed as an Approved Supplier of lighting services to top UK tourist attraction, the Natural History Museum. The appointment, which takes effect immediately and lasts for five years, is the culmination of a highly competitive tender process that saw Entec win the contract ahead of many top industry rivals. Under the contract terms, Entec will be invited to supply lighting services for the increasing number of private events staged at the Museum's premises in Kensington, west London.

"Our competitiveness, flexible approach and ability to meet the very tight deadlines for install and breakdown were all key factors in winning the Natural History Museum contract," says Entec's Noreen O'Riordan. It also highlights the range and diversity of events for which Entec can supply technical production.

This is the latest in a s

Details
UK - Around 115 Pixeon Color Stream tubes of various lengths have been supplied by distributor Lighting Effects Distribution (LED) - the recently launched division of Coemar UK - to VLPS Lighting Services for use on the finals of Pop Idol 2. Show designer Julian Healy built the innovative LED tubes into his set when the Thames TV production left Teddington Studios and moved to Fountain Studios in Wembley for the finals. The Pixeon has been supplied from VLPS' hire stock.

Lighting Effects Distribution has received enormous interest in the Color Stream effect since demonstrating it at The Bar Show back in June, and Julian Healy confirmed at an early stage that he would be using strips ranging in length from 500mm to 2000m, giving him in excess of 100m of tubing in total. These have been deployed in such a way as to emphasise the vertical and horizontal lines of the gantries, handr

Details
UK - Following its highly successful run at The National Theatre, Jerry Springer - The Opera recently opened at The Cambridge Theatre in London's West End, complete with a Cadac J-Type Live Production Console. Sound design is by Mike Walker, with Chris Simpson looking after the installation of the sound equipment which has been supplied by UK audio-visual equipment and services company Blitz. Mike Walker has been involved with the show since last year's Edinburgh Fringe production, which utilized a Cadac R-Type Touring Live Production Console.

With book and lyrics by Stuart Lee and Richard Thomas, with Richard also having written the score, Jerry Springer - The Opera is a fast-moving opera with a big sound. Everything is sung, in true operatic fashion, apart from the role of Jerry, which is spoken. Mike Walker elaborates on the task facing the sound team: "Thi

Details
USA - Legendary front-of-house engineer 'Big' Mick Hughes has worked for some of the biggest names in the business including Def Leppard, Ozzy Osbourne, Slipknot and UB40. But for most of the past 19 years, Hughes has been at FOH with San Francisco-based heavy metal phenomenon Metallica, during which time he has established many of the production benchmarks by which today's heavy metal bands are judged.

One element in that equation has been Hughes' relationship with leading microphone manufacturer Audio-Technica. He explains: "I've been using Audio-Technica for years because of the way A-T mics sound. I'll continue to use some of my 'old standard' A-T mics, but recently I have added some of the new Artist Elite mics to my setup, including the AE5400 and AE2500. The AE5400 on vocals has stunning tone with great highs."

In addition to the AE5400, Hughes is using ATM35s

Details
UK - HRH Queen Elizabeth II has formally opened The Capitol, the community arts centre in the Sussex town of Horsham, which has been extensively redesigned and refurbished, with Martin Audio cinema and theatre sound systems installed throughout.

Sound Associates provided an integrated design approach to the new audio and projection systems, including projection equipment, theatre PA, cinema sound, a combined PA/VA system and general communications. The building had been substantially reconfigured, its new layout featuring a small studio cinema, a larger 160-seat cinema, and the main 450-seat auditorium which is set up for dual use as a theatre and cinema.

For all three cinemas, Sound Associates chose Martin Audio's Screen Series of loudspeakers. "Martin has been making great inroads into the cinema sound market in the last couple of years," explains Graham Lodge of S

Details
South Korea - Over 1500 singers, musicians and performers held audiences spell-bound at Seoul's Jamshil Olympic stadium rcently for a spectacular production of Aida produced by Parma's Regio Theatre for local organizers CNA Korea. The event, which also included chariots, elephants and camels, was directed by Stefano Monti and had a 360ft by 60ft high four-storey set designed by Antonio Mastromattei.

Italian sound designer Daniele Tramontani was called in to design the huge audio rig supplied by Jinyun Cho's Seoul Sound, audio contractors at this ambitious event. Tramontani-based his choice of hardware on equipment he'd already used for important events, as far as mics, consoles and speakers were concerned. Following up on May's Pavarotti & Friends charity concert for which he was responsible for the sound system, and three DiGiCo D5 desks were used, he once again s

Details
Austria - With apologies to REM for paraphrasing their song title, but when your playing to an audience sat beneath half a hectare of glass surely wavelength should be a consideration? It might be more traditional for Sopranos to break glass, but violins have no trouble reaching those critical frequencies, and they were to be amplified. OK, so we exaggerate the potential, but when Karlheinz Stockhausen presents a new piece we know conventions will be broken, so it's as well to check anything else that might break.

The occasion was part of this year's Salzburg Festival, a performance of 'Helicopter String Quartet' by the renowned Stadler Quartet. Each of the four sting players performed from within an airborne Black Hawk helicopter (courtesy of the Austrian Army), while the audience sat in the all-glass Hangar 7, the new home to the Flying Bulls aerobatics team. This was notgoing

Details
Australia - Genelec has been up to something fishy in Sydney's Darling Harbour - the Finnish active monitoring specialist is providing the sound for the popular Disney/Pixar Finding Nemo exhibition at the Sydney Aquarium at Darling Harbour. The aquarium is one of the city's tourist hotspots and welcomes more than a million visitors each year.

The installation was carried out by local company, Switched On Living, which specializes in home automation systems. A Genelec system comprising 1030 and 1032 units with a 7070A subwoofer was chosen for its ability to perform equally well at low and high levels in a difficult acoustic environment.

Switched on Living's managing director, David Beauchamp, comments: "There are lots of hard surfaces and the venue is very large, and we knew that Genelec could be relied on to meet the challenge."

(Lee Baldock)

Details
UK - ShowCAD Artist has recently been installed in the latest superclub to open in the UK. Mercy nightclub in East Anglia, owned by Peris Leisure, is situated in the centre of Norwich and has a capacity of over 2,000. Lighting installer Richard Jarvis of Creative Laser Services, based in Tiptree, Essex, fitted the Artist system to control a wide range of effects lighting, including seven Coemar Ispot 575 moving heads, 10 Martin Mx10 scans, six Martin Wizards and four Atomic strobes.

The ubiquitous colour changing was supplied in the form of eight fixtures, each featuring eight Optopod 30 LED Par 36-tyle lamps, making a total of 64 colour changing heads surrounding the dancefloor. By utilizing all of Artist's built-in effect generators, powerful scenes were quickly put together which would have taken significantly longer with many other desks.

Norwich also saw the first UK inst

Details
USA - Using the same design principles as the already successful ZR 24/7 Hazer from Jem, the Martin Magnum Hazer is a true club hazer giving light shows refraction with ease. The Magnum Hazer incorporates some of the most complex technology behind a simple interface, making it one of the most effective, mid-sized haze solutions available today, say Martin.

With DMX as standard (optional digital remote available soon), the Magnum Hazer comes with an elementary analogue control panel. It also features new technology in the digital calibration of its electronic system - leaving technical adjustments to its on-board software. To ensure an even haze dispersal every time and in any environment, the Magnum Hazer uses a VGA system (variable geometry airflow), adjusting the airflow inclination between 0° and 60°. An Auto-fan mode also adjusts the radial fan's output to achieve a consis

Details
UK / International - Digital projection specialist Scene Change has appointed seven new international dealers for its acclaimed Hippotizer digital media server range, following the attention the product attracted at this year's PLASA Show. The new dealers are Stonex (Spain), Wide Angle (Lebanon & UAE), Clearlight Shows (Australia), TMB (UK), TMB (US), Technical Supply (Japan) and Halo Lighting (UK).

All will be offering Hippotizer in all of its versions: Hippotizer Lite (media playback and effects with keyboard control), Hippotizer Pro (playback and effects controlled by a touchscreen), Hippotizer DMX Club (DMX controlled playback emulating an automated light) and Hippotizer DMX Stage (full control of media playback and effects using DMX).

Halo Lighting in the UK has added the Hippotizer range to its hire and sales stocks, and will be offering Hippotizer Pro, Hippotizer DMX Cl

Details
Dubai - Dubai-based superstar-of-the-turntables 'Cowboy' is generating more heat in the run-up to the biggest DJ showdown the Middle East has seen - and he's not even competing. Reigning champion Cowboy, who hails from Lebanon, has agreed to sit on the judging panel at the forthcoming PALME 2004 DJ of the Year Competition in Dubai. The DJ promises tough times for contestants, at this stage likely to number more than 200 from all over the world. It was revealed this week that prizes will be worth $40,000 and organizers are spending $100,000 staging the event..

The DJ contest runs in conjunction with the massive PALME expo, the region's first professional sound, light, audio-visual and systems integration exhibition. It was held for the first time earlier this year and organizers say the coming expo, to be held 17-19 February 2004 at Dubai International Exhibition Centre, will be

Details
Canary Islands - In the city of Puerto del Rosario on the island of Fuerteventura, one of Spain's most 'Latin' rock bands, Café Quijano, was in concert during the island's regional festivities. Once again, rental company Audio Luz, located in the city of Gran Tarajal, was responsible for providing the sound reinforcement and stage monitoring systems.

24 ST-112 mid/high units were flown (12 per side) and 16 ground-stacked ST-218 low frequency units made up the main PA. Six ST-1800 systems (ST-112 and ST-218) were used to provide front-fill for the first few rows. All the systems were powered using QSC amplifiers. Audio Luz says of the ST-1800 systems: " They provide us with high sound pressure levels and absolute reliability. What we like best is that we don't have worry too much because we know they perform well."

Stage monitoring was handled by 14 D.A.S. passive tw

Details
UK - Coca-Cola Great Britain has been flying high in London's Piccadilly Circus for almost 50 years, but the company recently brought its brands to life in a new way with Lighthouse's new LVP1650 LED screen. Measuring 32m wide by 6.6m high at its highest point, the screen comprises 88 standard LVP1650 panels, along with approximately 170 bespoke LVP1650 panels to allow for the curvature of the screen and front access for maintenance.

Coca-Cola used a hand-picked team of British designers and technical experts, who spent over a year working to create one of the biggest and most intelligent signs of its kind and allows The Coca-Cola Company to deliver cutting-edge entertainment to transform the face of the world's most famous billboard. Lighthouse's Simon Taylor explains the strict brief: "There could only be a gap of a 1mm (maximum) between panels ensuring it was completely

  1. RCF launches new website
  2. Robe rocks with Deep Purple
  3. Lighting from Fourth Phase on Remembrance Day
  4. Age-Sex-Location to be staged at Riverside Studios
  5. Architectural projects for Clay Paky
  6. DMXCreator appoints distributor for UK & Eire
Page 620 of 1813

Latest Issue. . .