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Portugal - The wireless DMX system W-DMX, from the Swedish Company Wireless Solution Sweden AB, is now available in Portugal.

The choice for this system is based upon its extraordinary flexibility and reliability, according to Fernando Lopes, lightening technical manager of the system installed at Toyota Box, in Lisbon. He says: "The W-DMX is fast, reliable and very useful. No problem was found! We have saved a lot of time by setting up this lights system for this musical." The system was supplied by Audinova, the Portuguese W-DMX authorized distributor.

These wireless transmission systems have been availablein Portugal, since the 1 March. The chosen spot was the Toyota Box Cultural Space, at the Alcântara Docks, in Lisbon, which hosts the Musical Friday the 13th! This musical play portraits the urban life of a group of friends - their loves and their sorrows

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UK - For the recent outing of the BBC Saturday night prime time quiz show Test the Nation came a new set design, new studio layout and incorporated the Pulsar ChromaFlood 200. The latest set design by Simon Kimmel was a bold step forward from the previous version and gave lighting designer Dave Davey a few challenges to tackle.

The new set incorporated large specially formed sections designed to provide a backdrop where the celebrities are situated and to indicate team colours around the contestants. The specially formed sections are made from an opaque polycarbonate material and are around 1200mm.sq. with a raised centre section which measured around 600mm.sq.

Dave Davey needed the centre section to be lit by a colour-changing fixture that would cover the intended area from a minimal beam throw distance. The beam throw distance within the set was a maximum of 500mm, al

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USA - At 42,000sq.ft, TAO Las Vegas continues the trend of large restaurant and entertainment venues situated within the city's glitzy hotels. The $20m TAO at the Venetian bills itself as an "Asian city" offering a unique vibe only found in ancient ruins and temples. The 400-seat restaurant, banquet facilities, hip ultra-lounge and 10,000sq.ft nightclub was opened in September and instantly became a popular destination.

The action starts when the restaurant opens daily at 5PM and doesn't stop until the nightclub closes at 5AM. Everyday, 160 TAO employees keep the party going. Inside TAO, a hand-carved 20ft tall Buddha greets guests as it floats atop a reflecting pool filled with koi fish. The nearby moat area contains floating tables for VIPs while a catwalk leading to the women's bathroom also serves as a pseudo-runway. Above the dining area sits eight private skyboxe

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UK - At the official opening, visitors to Our Dynamic Earth, one of Edinburgh's leading visitor attractions, travel forward in time and witness how decisions they take today influence life on our planet in years to come. This new experience features a 360-degree high-definition seamless digital projection, sensory seating set on rotating floors complete with interactive voting in an immersive dome theatre. As main contractor for the FutureDome project, Barco teamed up with Alterface - a company based at Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium - to design the entire interactive program and content.

When entering the Future Dome, a time travel host offers visitors several choices to influence the future of the planet, based on their personal interactions with a 360-degree film, presented on the dome. Atmospheric music, lighting and ambience deliver an experience that is tense, thr

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UK - Reading-based lighting and rental company Blinding Light designed and supplied lighting equipment, a Catalyst digital media server and video content for all the LED walls and lightsources, plus crew, for the Microsoft Midseason Party, staged at London's Hammersmith Palais. The event featured performances from Girls Aloud, Soul II Soul and Earth Wind for Hire.

Ambiguously titled "decadence" - a word with many meanings and inferences - the party wasn't corporately branded at all. However, it had a loose time related theme celebrating the chronology of Microsoft's origins in the 1970s through to the present day.

Taking this as a starting point, Blinding Light's Paddy Stacey evolved a conceptual design for event production company Sledge, which helped them to win the pitch. "I thought I'd create a set of visuals for the venue and occasion using technologies spa

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Hungary - The organisers of the annual Audio-Visual Creative Fair in Brussels have announced a new event to be staged in Budapest this year. The Brussels event brings together manufacturers, importers, distributors, renters, service providers, experts in imaging, sound, lighting, special effects, virtual images, image synthesis and multimedia, attracting over 15,000 visitors each year. The Budapest event - ACF Central Europe - has been introduced in repsonse to requests from exhibitors, say the organisers.

Hungary is enjoying a real economic boom with over 300,000 companies in the capital alone - a figure which has grown annually for the past decade. ACF Central Europe aims to bring together all companies seeking to develop their networking in Central European countries; Hungarian companies presenting their latest technological innovations; and exhibitors from bordering countrie

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UK - A dAFTdATA eDMX wireless system was used to beam DMX from the top of a 55 metre high tower block to the lighting desk down below for one of the new National Theatre of Scotland's inaugural productions, Glasgow Home.

This was staged on the Cranhill Estate - a notorious, sprawling, dilapidated 1950s housing scheme in Glasgow's Easterhouse area. Glasgow Home directed and conceived by John Tiffany (deputy director of NTS) was one of 10 site-specific works that kick started the NTS, which has no permanent base. The production was centred around an 18-storey tower block on the estate, and was set in seven different flats on seven different floors. The concept was that characters in the tower were being investigated by MI5, who sent abseiling cameramen down the side of the building filming the action taking place inside. This was relayed to a projector at the base an

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USA / Germany - Meyer Sound is strengthening its investment in the German market by applying more resources from the company's California factory to Germany. As part of this effort, Western regional sales manager Jim Sides will act as a liaison between the Berkeley headquarters and Polch-based Meyer Sound Germany.

Meyer says Germany has always been a strong market for its self-powered loudspeakers, and that the last few years have seen exceptional growth for the company in Germany and throughout Europe. Recent large purchases of MICA and other products by German rental companies further convinced Meyer Sound to commit additional resources to Germany.

"One thing we have noted many times in the company's history is that the closer we are to our customers, the happier they are and the more our business grows," says Meyer Sound executive vice-president Helen Meyer. "

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USA - Tomcat USA is providing equipment for the long-awaited Soul 2 Soul II tour starring country music's power couple, Faith Hill and Tim McGraw. The 70-date tour kicks off in Columbus, Ohio on 21 April, 2006. The concerts will feature solo performances by Hill and McGraw, as well as a special set of duets - all performed while surrounded by a number of custom products from Tomcat USA.

The set features truss circles, including one 50ft OD medium duty circle, one 19.5ft OD medium duty circle plus one 16ft OD light duty circle. Tomcat also provided eight custom variable TAB connections for these circles and 32 custom motor pick-up brackets will help make a number of other lighting effects around those circles possible.

Speaking of lighting effects, eight custom 4ft x 6ft light frame pods will provide even more visual impact. These pods were manufactured with special tran

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UK - The PSA Welfare & Benevolent Fund has received a donation of £500 from entertainment and architectural lighting control specialists Zero 88. The company decided that, for Christmas 2005, it would send its season's greetings to the world by e-mail and instead donate the money it would have spent on cards to a suitable charity.

Zero 88's Claire House and the management team settled on the PSA Welfare & Benevolent Fund to be the recipient of their donation, and their cheque was gratefully accepted by treasurer John Jones.

PSA Welfare & Benevolent Fund chairman Mike Lowe, of Britannia Row, comments: "This was a fantastic gesture by Zero 88 and a reminder of the generosity of spirit that's happily still a feature of our industry."

(Lee Baldock)

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Europe - Belgian rental firm EML is touring Europe with Simple Minds, using an assortment of Adamson's Y-Axis and SpekTrix line arrays to accommodate the needs of each individual venue. The Scots band, with over 20 top 20 hits to their name and over 30 million records sold, is performing in over 40 venues across Europe to promote their new, critically acclaimed studio album Black & White 050505.

The UK leg of the tour saw Adamson partner Concert Sound based in Luton, providing all sound reinforcement products. When the tour makes the rounds to Belgium and Holland, EML will use a mixture of Y-18s and Y-10s provided by EML Belgium and EML Holland respectively. In Scandinavia and Germany, Nordic Rentals, Adamson support for Denmark, Sweden and Norway, will pitch in some Y-18s for the local shows. Livesound B-AG from Bern, is supplying Simple Minds with product for the Switze

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UK - Orthopaedic implant manufacturer Biomet UK Ltd has ordered a large quantity of audio and video cable from UK cable specialist VDC Trading. The cable has been incorporated into the company's growing stock of audio-visual equipment, which plays an important part in servicing Biomet's sales, marketing and medical education programme.

"Throughout the year, we run a large number of sales, marketing and training seminars, including courses for clinical education with live surgical links from operating theatres to seminar rooms that enable surgeons to learn more about surgical techniques and our products," says Irwin Crowe, Biomet's International Marketing Services Manager. "Each of these events has a requirement for audio visual equipment and we have now invested in our own systems because it is more cost effective to buy the equipment than to keep hiring it in.&qu

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USA - Systems integrator Pro Sound partnered with consultants Pelton Marsh Kinsella and the Hunt Construction Group to design and install an audio system for Glendale, Arizona's new Cardinals Stadium. Pro Sound innovative enough to match the rest of the stadium's construction, which has already been featured on the Discovery Channel's Extreme Engineering program.

But the team achieved more than outstanding sound quality for the 63,000-seat stadium with the design; they are also saving the owners upwards of $100 million over comparable projects of this size and scope, according to Pro Sound's president, Rod Sintow: "The simple fact that Meyer Sound equipment is self-powered enables us to accelerate our installation schedule by 12 weeks," says Sintow. "The UPA-1Ps were installed in eight days. If we'd done that with unpowered speakers, that alone would have t

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UK - Autograph Sound Recording has recently been awarded the sound contracts three major musicals, thus considerably strengthening its position in the theatre rental market. The company will supply three musical Broadway imports - Avenue Q, Wicked and Spamalot, all of which have West End openings over the next few months.

These productions add to their already impressive musical portfolio, which includes Les Misérables, Mary Poppins, Guys and Dolls, We Will Rock You, Mamma Mia!, Billy Elliot, The Lion King and the recently opened Sinatra at The London Palladium. Autograph is equally well represented in the play market too; supplying Embers, Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?, Blackbird, The Crucible, Smaller, The RSC Season at The Novello and Resurrection Blues.

Both Avenue Q and Spamalot are designed by the prolific

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UK - Lisburn, Northern Ireland-based Zest Audio is an audio-visual company that has produced its own unique Award winning hard-disc music control system - called 'Atmosphere' - that allows the user to output controlled music in up to four independent zones. Zest Audio Ltd has recently installed Atmosphere into Northern Ireland's newest bar and grill venue - The Cardan in Lisburn.

The Cardan brings a new level of sophistication to Lisburn, with its upstairs club Distil keeping things going into the darker hours. Atmosphere was the natural choice for owner Jon Poots to keep the ambience appropriate to the design and feel of the bar. Poots says: "I used Atmosphere in my last venue and was delighted with the control offered and the service provided by Zest Audio, it was the natural choice for The Cardan. Again I am delighted with what is achieved and with the back-up service.&q

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Belgium - One of the most famous and revered venues in Europe, the Ancienne Belgique otherwise known as AB has always carefully protected its reputation as a groundbreaking venue. From its early beginnings, through acts like Blondie, The Ramones and Lena Lovich, to the present day with Starsailor, Rufus Wainwright or Heather Nova, AB has come to be known as the place to play for up coming bands.

No surprise then when the technical director Marc Vrebos chose to invite all serious pro-audio manufacturers to demonstrate their latest sound systems when the time came for renewal of the house PA. "The previous system had been installed in '96, we knew from our own experiences, and from listening to what touring sound engineers told us, that the time had come for a line array," he said.

AB's head of sound Tom Janssen, assisted by Sven Van den Broek, AB's longest serving in-

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UK - Projected Image Digital (PID) has supplied Element Labs VersaTUBEs and VersaTILEs LED products for two new Gala Casino installations - one in Tottenham Court Road, London and one in Leicester. In both cases, the Tubes and Tiles were specified by designer Paula Reason from Cadmium Design. Reason, who likes to integrate lighting and kinetic energies into her interior designs, and the two Gala installations followed on from her pioneering work using VersaTILES in the bar at London's recently refurbished Hard Rock Café - where she first met PID.

The Tottenham Court Road Gala installation utilises 45 VersaTUBES, integrated vertically into a central feature of the main bar on the first floor. This is part of an extensive aesthetic revamp for the venue. The physical installation was completed by Viking Electrics and PID commissioned the TUBEs to Reason's specification. The

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UK - Sennheiser is sponsoring a new campaign from the House Ear Institute (www.hei.org), a research and educational outreach body which aims to ensure healthy hearing for all. HEI's new 'It's How You Listen That Counts' campaign is helping to get the word out on safer listening to teens everywhere.

"This is a critical time. Teens are at a greater risk than ever in terms of hearing loss," says Marilee Potthoff, director of marketing for the House Ear Institute. "Sennheiser's support of HEI programs is valuable in helping us reach the young consumer audio market, and is bringing greater exposure to what is proving to be a very successful public education campaign."

HEI, a non-profit organisation dedicated to advancing hearing science through research and education to improve quality of life, was established in 1946. Its Sound Partners hearing conservation pro

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UK - Autograph Sales has recently strengthened its service and support team by acquiring the knowledge and expertise of George McKechnie of dBA-UK. McKechnie is no stranger to the world of professional audio, having almost 30 years' experience of being actively involved with many aspects of audio reproduction and sound reinforcement, working closely with many well-known audio providers.

He has spent several years working with Martin Audio along with a very long stint with BSS Audio Ltd providing the audio community with technical support and servicing. He is still - although not working for BSS actively - supporting the entire breadth of the BSS product lines.

(Lee Baldock)

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UK - Prism restaurant, in the City of London, has recently undergone an upgrade of both its lighting and sound systems, provided by full service AV company Mushroom Event Services.

Restaurant manager Belinda Jarman, administration manager Hannah Ross and marketing and communications manager Hannah Westway were instrumental in instigating the change. "We wanted to have a very definite change of atmosphere in the evenings," explains Ross. "Each day, we change from being a more formal lunch venue to a very relaxed evening venue and we wanted a look to reflect that. With the lighting that Mushroom has installed we've definitely achieved that, to the point where we have had a series of reviews that name Prism as the place to be with our red lighting theme and 'The Brain' wall projection."

To achieve this, Mushroom supplied red cold cathode low voltage lighting a

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UK - St Edmundsbury Theatre Services (SETS), the Bury St Edmunds based production and hire company, has taken delivery of a D.A.S. Audio self-powered Aero28A line array system. This is the first such system to see service in the UK. D.A.S. Audio has long been recognised as a serious player in the European and global markets, and Sennheiser UK, the UK's exclusive distributor, sees this as "a major breakthrough in an area crowded by several longstanding manufacturers", the company says.

SETS owner Marcus Eustace says: "Our team handles the logistics of several hundred productions a year, many of which utilise quality PA systems. We believe the D.A.S. Aero gives the quality of audio reproduction required for both theatre and outdoor events. In choosing the new system we worked with James O'Leary of CoNi who has a strong reputation in supplying this type of equipment.

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Australia - Jands has announced that the latest addition to the Vista family, the Vista S3, is a finalist in the prestigious Australian Design Awards. Nominated by designer 4design, and entered in the consumer section, the Vista S3 is a product of five years development and a dedicated Jands R&D team of nine people.

The product is described in the ADA finalist pages as "an innovative lighting console for the programming and control of lighting for live performance. Through innovative software and compact design the Vista S3 allows the user to build lighting designs visually on screen. The Vista software provides an intuitive and creative process for creating lighting effects and uses a window-based system similar to modern computers. All aspects are seen in timeline format which gives an entirely new approach to design and performance to speed the programming process. The V

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UK - TMB UK has moved to a new location, and now has new phone and fax numbers. The company can now be contacted at: TMB UK, 21 Armstrong Way, Southall, UB2 4SD, UK.

(Lee Baldock)

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UK / Africa / Middle East - JVC Professional is to distribute the Edirol V-440HD video and graphics mixer for the UK, Africa and the Middle East. Building on the success of the Edirol V-4, the V-440HD is capable of eight video inputs, four SD and four HD or RGB video sources.

Among its features is the ability to link multiple units together, enabling single HD images to be spread across many output displays - ideal for multiscreen applications. In addition, the mixer can be remotely controlled by any Edirol instrument via MIDI or RS-232C. Other features are, picture-in-picture with joystick, size-dial to control position, size, pan and zoom, plus a lock facility can be used simultaneously with the keyer in the HD and graphics section. The built-in TBC and real-time upconverter and scaler all ensure totally smooth transitions.

You can now happily mix together your existing SD v

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