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UK - When London's Royal Opera House re-opened its doors at the end of 1999 after a three-year refurbishment programme, the performances were, for the most part, lit with conventional luminaires. Since then, as automated fixtures have become quieter, the Royal Opera House has added them to their stock, along with multimedia devices, to enable them to meet their challenging schedules.

The control desk, however, is a 10-year old ETC Obsession which Nick Ware, senior lighting manager at the Royal Opera House, admits is long past its sell-by date: "No IT equipment would be expected to have this kind of shelf life and the Obsession can no longer cope with the kind of demands we want to place on it."

ETC dealer White Light, a long standing supplier to the Royal Opera House, is replacing the main auditorium's Obsessions with three ETC Eos 8K systems. The next generation of

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Isle of Man - Impact Products (Europe) Ltd recently supplied Chauvet Lighting's COLORado LED series had its RGB mixing capability put to the test when Event Lighting Services used them to light up the landmark Falcon Cliff overlooking the promenade in Douglas, Isle of Man in support of the Breast Cancer Care charity's official "In the Pink Day".

For the third successive year, the island was renamed the Isle of Woman for a weekend of fund-raising activities commencing Friday 24th October. In support of the event ELS were once again delighted to accept a request from professional services firm Maitland & Co, whose offices are housed in the former hotel, to donate their services by illuminating the building totally in pink for three nights.

ELS used four of Chauvet's Colorado 1 9-channel wash lights and two COLORado 3 12-channel bank systems. Both ideal for outdoor use

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USA - Behind the Scenes, the charitable initiative of The ESTA Foundation has confirmed the winners of the 2008 LDI Raffle. The Grand Prize ticket for a $10,000 dream vacation was drawn by Christian Choi, the very first Behind the Scenes grant recipient. The winner is Ken Vannice from Leviton Lighting Management Systems who is well known in the industry for his tireless work on behalf of standards and certification.

The winning ticket for the Second Prize of a $2,500 Amazon Gift Card was drawn by Rick Fisher, who took a short break from lighting Billy Elliott on Broadway to receive LDI's Theatre Lighting Designer of the Year Award. Rick is one of the founders of Light Relief, the UK based industry charity. Holmes Brown from PRG was the lucky winner.

Peter Finder of Rose Brand was the winner of the Third Prize, a $1,000 Amazon Gift Card which was drawn by Tim Hansen. Tim

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USA - Samuel Ryder (who died in 1936), was brought back to life at the Ryder Cup Gala thanks to Digital Illusions' Musion Eyeliner holographic projection system, the first of its kind in the U.S., and A/V leader NMR Staging & Events.

NMR Staging And Events director of audio, Lou Castelluci, spec'd a DiGiCo CS-D5 for the production to manage over 24 inputs of video, myriad wireless mics, recording/playback functions, and outputs for both the live audience and broadcast recording decks. The console's ability to handle the Digigram EtherSound technology proved invaluable, as Castelluci was able to keep the audio all-digital by sending eight channels of EtherSound out of the console to his Nexo PA. via his Nexo 242 digital processors.

"Since we already owned the EtherSound Cards for the Nexo NX242s it only made sense to have a digital board that could handle the EtherSound ou

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UK - 3M reports that Volkswagen UK has installed dynamic wide screen and interactive digital displays using Vikuiti Rear Projection technology in its Chelmsford and Milton Keynes dealerships. Volkswagen is using the displays to play vibrant video that captures customer attention and maximises brand assets to their full potential, says the company.

A 96" 16:9 Vikuiti screen has been hung on the first floor of the newly built flagship Volkswagen dealership in Chelmsford, Essex. A ceiling mounted projector beams streaming video designed to educate, entertain and inform customers of the latest Volkswagen offers and information, which is controlled by Volkswagen UK head office in Milton Keynes. Positioned above an open atrium on the ground floor, the giant screen is intended to catch the customer's eye and drive traffic upstairs to peruse the used car stock.

"We have been

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Portugal - Merging Select in Lisbon has taken on exclusive Adamson Distribution for Portugal. The deal was negotiated by Adamson director of European sales, Andy Weingaertner. The company's operations focus on sales, technical support, and education, aimed at commercial markets of touring, contracting, install, and corporate needs.

Merging Select aims to build long-term partnerships with their customers by providing them with a support and assistance program. It includes on-going services such as technical consulting, sound design, installation services, training and education, optimization and problem solving.

Director of technical support Wladimiro Garrido says: "This new partnership is an opportunity to work with a brand that is determined to take a leadership position in the marketplace. We believe in Adamson's capacity for constant innovation by their ability to rela

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UK - Rental company Lite Alternative has purchased four Novalight Nova Flower fixtures from UK distributor Lightfactor Sales, which are in action on the UK and European legs of Coldplay's Viva La Vida world tour.

The Nova Flowers - a high powered fully programmable 'flower effect' with DMX controllable pan, tilt, colour shutter - are positioned upstage of the band, and used sparingly, but for some spectacular back lighting effects and aerial impact.

Mark "Sparky" Risk initially lighting directed the first legs of the tour (now taken over by Fraser Elisha), and he comments, "They create nice big aerial beams and because they move and change colour, are proving extremely dynamic."

Coldplay are currently touring the US with lighting provided by Illinois based Upstaging, who have also purchased four Nova Flowers. They hit the UK in December.

(Jim Eva

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South Africa - The Guy Butler Theatre in Grahamstown, near the south-eastern coast, plays an important part in the city's National Arts Festival, one of Africa's largest and most colourful cultural events. With more than 500 shows from opera to cabaret, fine art to craft art, poetry readings to lectures, they needed a desk that was reliable and easy to learn. They settled on an ETC Congo, which they have recently upgraded to v5.

Venue manager Deon Lottering, says: "We purchased the Congo two years ago to replace our ageing desk which had become unstable. We wanted an intelligent desk which would last, and have regular upgrades. We also needed at least 24 masters or sub masters, as many touring shows need to improvise. Congo was exactly what we were looking for."

Continues Deon: "We used Dave Whitehouse, an ETC certified contracted trainer at Electro-Quip in Port

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UK - The Electric Proms have been running since 2006 and the third edition closed on Sunday 26 October. This festival is dedicated to creating new moments in music and more than 60 artists performed in London and Liverpool

Litestructures was approached by head of stage Ben Ranner at The Roundhouse in London to supply the main stage set for the venue. The stage, using LiteDeck, the modular staging system from Litestructures Hire department consisted of a tiered Orchestra riser supported by additional rolling risers. The set measured 8' high, 40' wide and 16' deep.

Litestructures hire manager Ben Brooks comments: "It was a real pleasure working on the 2008 BBC Electric Proms in such a prestigious venue as The Roundhouse. We supplied a spectacular looking stage set made entirely from standard hire products; this allowed us to provide the benefits of a bespoke stage de

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USA - The first annual Rock Our World Awards were presented at ESTA's Annual Dinner on 23 October, the evening before the LDI show. These awards, which recognise groundbreaking achievement by ESTA Members in new products, product applications, or projects were created to acknowledge the genius of both the creator of technology and the designer or integrator who applies the technology in a real world environment.

Over 30 nominations were received from across the industry and these were narrowed down to a shortlist of nine finalists for the panel of judges to ponder upon. The judges for this year's awards were Rick Baxter, Ken Billington, Cory Fitzgerald, Elaine J. McCarthy, Rocky Paulson, and Bruce Rodgers.

The judges panel was chaired by Mike Wood, who said prior to announcing the winners: "We wanted to create an award series that had no rules except for excitement

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UK - 59 sold out dates and a total audience figure estimated at 400,000 makes the Lee Evans Big Tour the UK's largest stand-up comedy tour of 2008. Taking in arenas the length and breadth of the UK, visual appeal was an important factor right from the very start. A Lighthouse R7-ER LED screen, supplied by audiovisual services company Creative Technology (CT), is at the heart of the set.

A total of 150sq.m of R7-ER configured as a large 16:9 aspect screen formed the centre piece for the stage set, plus two IMAG side screens in portrait format ensured that Evans' visual comedic style reaches each and every audience member.

The average size for the central touring screen is 10.16m x 6.1m (10 panels wide by 8 panels high), which closely approximates the 16:9 format initially specified. The look of the show was transformed at London's O2 Arena - the largest venue on the tour

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Germany - Commissioned by Airbus, the Hamburg events agency Kontrapunkt staged the hand-over of the first A380 wide-bodied jet to the Emirates airline with a multimedia show that included elaborate panorama projections for the 500-plus guests gathered on the premises of Airbus in Hamburg. Images of the official hand-over to the Arab airline went all round the world. To provide media support for the delivery of the aircraft, Kontrapunkt engaged the tst Gesellschaft für audiovisuelle Systeme, a company based in Berlin.

For the event, tst provided among other things a 20 x 4m soft-edged panorama projection using purpose four Barco FLM R20+ projectors of 20,000 Ansi lumens each in connection with ten Wings Platinum 3 from AV Stumpfl for the master, slave and redundant computers as well as further equipment. A particular challenge for the tst team was the very short projection dista

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UK - Lighting Technology Projects, part of the PAI Group, recently hosted an event at the group's Llanelli HQ to highlight the Philips' Solid State Lighting (SSL) and Vidiwall Systems products, for which Lighting Technology Projects (LTP) is a Value Added Reseller, offering turnkey project solutions and full service support.

Over 60 invitees attended from all sectors of the professional entertainment and leisure industry. They included architects, lighting and visual designers, project managers, specifiers and end clients of all types.

Products included the latest Philips' Vidiwall indoor and outdoor LED display solutions for the sports, leisure and retail industries - specifically the Candeo and Delta LED walls.

A comprehensive selection from Philips' range of RGB and intelligent white LED lighting productswere also available for close up examination along with the Color Ki

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Singapore - Swissotel The Stamford has announced the re-launch of New Asia, a club located in the south-east of the city. Juan Luis Garcia, general manager of D.A.S. Audio Asia and assistant manager, Eduardo López, visited the recently inaugurated premises equipped with D.A.S. sound systems. The audio installation was completed by Lingtec under the supervision of D.A.S. sound engineer, Joan La Roda, who travelled specifically out to Singapore to help with the installation.

Designed in amber, brown and gold, the club is lavishly decorated with an incandescent chandelier and features some stunning audiovisual effects. Aiden Macaulay, general manager of Swissotel The Stamford reports, "We have every confidence in the sound quality D.A.S. delivers."

The dance floor was equipped with model RF-12.64 Reference systems and model CA-215 Aero units were chosen as subwoofers.

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USA - Summerfest '08 was staged at the Marcus Amphitheater in 75-acre Henry Maier Festival Park, along the lakefront in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Summerfest, which ran from late this past June through early July, attracts almost one million people per year and plays to an audience of 25,000 per afternoon/evening. For the 2008 event, the local theatrical people servicing the Amphitheater had wanted small, compact, bright followspotsand opted to use Robert Juliat Victors.

"Followspots can sometimes seem like they require three hands," says Marty Lazarus, president of theatrical dealer Chicago Spotlight. "You need to operate the iris," he says, "move it around, and change the colour."

Lazarus claims that with the Victors, you "don't need three hands. What's more, they've got that famous 'Juliat' perfectly even field."

(Jim Evans)

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Norway - The Gand Church in Sandnes, near Stavanger is used both as house of worship and for cultural events. Sound Projects' agent for Norway PA Produksjoner (PAP) is responsible for the newly installed sound reinforcement system based on the Sound Projects Dreamline system.

PAP managing director Jan Olav Sandsmark reports, "Amongst other larger PA companies in the Stavanger region, the church contacted us for an alternative to the existing system. As in everyday life, there were many contradictory demands to be met: the system had to enhance intelligibility when used with a lapel microphone in conventional worship services. On the other hand immaculate reproduction of gospel rock bands was desired.

"Additionally, the new system had to be able to handle all the different events to be held in the church. And last but not least the system should fit in the church from

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UK - Point Source Productions supplied the lighting and rigging equipment for The Heroes Ball which took place at London's Hurlingham Club in September.

The evening took the form of dinner for 800 VIP guests followed by a band and a Charity Auction which aimed to raise £250,000 for Help for Heroes - the charity formed in 2007 to raise money for the rehabilitation of wounded ex-servicemen across the Armed Forces.

Lighting designer Jono Kenyon was brought in to design the lighting for the band, the charity auction and the general dinner states, and had the added responsibility of acting as production manager for the evening.

The brief was to keep the costs as low as possible since all funding would come directly from the charity, yet to produce a stylish event suitable for the large number of dignitaries attending. The lighting was designed to play a signif

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UK - Innovason has appointed Red Square Audio as its exclusive distribution partner for the UK and Republic of Ireland. Red Square is headed up by industry veteran and live mix engineer Paul Nicholson.

According to Innovason sales and marketing director, Xavier Pion, the timing for such a venture couldn't have been better. "All the pieces just seemed to fit together," said. "After ten excellent years handling L-Acoustics in the UK, Paul was looking for new challenges; on our side, we had just launched Eclipse, and were looking for a proactive partner in the UK to handle sales and technical support. As a sound engineer himself and having managed high end pro audio sales in the UK for a well known and respected brand for the last decade, Paul's knowledge of the UK market and the people in it is comprehensive to say the least. He is an ideal partner for Innovason in

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Israel - An In2Structures Maxi Dome made its debut in Israel as the VVIP Arena backstage at Paul McCartney's recent concert in Tel Aviv.

In2Structures is a South African based custom structures design and manufacturing company that is part of the Gearhouse SA Group. The 800sq.m capacity two-bay Dome at the McCartney show was supplied to Tel Aviv-based staging and rigging company Stage Design, provider of most of the overall event's technical infrastructure.

The Dome - launched by Gearhouse In2Structures as a fully flexible, aesthetically pleasing, structurally robust solution for all types of events - offered 12.5m of headroom and was located behind the main stage.

Its interior was fully fitted out and dressed by Market King complete with comfortable seating areas, a large central bar, a buffet area and a chilling one. A full lighting rig was hung on a circular truss above t

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Italy - Veline, the TV show hosted by Ezio Greggio took on a summer tour through 12 Italian cities, shooting several episodes in each. The aspiring 'Veline' who won each episode made the final , held at the Mediaset studios in Cologno Monzese (Milano), with record viewing audiences.

The final lighting system was fully built with Clay Paky material: 50 Alpha Spot HPE 1200, Stage Color 1200 and Alpha Beam 300. Photography director Massimiliano Cavenaghi stated, "I mainly used effects and spot lights on the public and backlighting for the girls' performances. The nature of the show favoured close-ups on the 'Veline' so we had few wide angles. Consequently, stage lighting needed to be white and restricted."

The Alpha Beam 300s were placed along the edge of the runway that led from the stage to the public and underlined the switches between the various performances

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UK - High Bentham on the western fringes of North Yorkshire has a new RGB LED-based colour changing cross. Designed, built and installed by Iain Henshaw of S1B.com, the cross is manufactured from 50mm diameter clear acrylic tubing and is 1.2m high.

The forward-facing element uses high-powered single-chip RGB sources to give full range colour changing, preferred over individual colour LED chips. The front of the cross is diffused using Lee 129 Heavy Frost filter to reduce the high intensity spots of the LED and give more uniform lighting.

The drop shadow uses an array of single white high-powered wide angle LEDs to create a permanent background improving contrast and lifting the cross from the stonework. Peak power consumption (with all LEDs at full brightness) is just 34W - less than that of a single T8 4ft fluorescent tube.

The cross generally sequences through a rainbow co

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UK - Stage Electrics is supplying all lighting and video elements for the 50th anniversary UK tour of West Side Story. Stage Electrics is working with the Ambassador Theatre Group, producers of this new production, which started its run at the New Victoria Theatre, Woking, and will continue to play at venues across the UK for a year-long tour.

The tour marks 50 years after the show made its London debut and is a vibrant new production of the original classic, directed and choreographed by Joey McKneely.

Stage Electrics is supplying an ETC EOS console, complete with tracking back-up. An ETC ION console has also been employed to make the moving light focus easier. Moving lights have been specified in the form of 16 Martin Professional MAC 700 Profile Units, 16 MAC 2000 Wash Units, two MAC 2000 Performance units, 20 Stagebars and 50 scrollers.

The video set-up includes t

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UK - The rising cost of energy has a serious impact and an increasing number of businesses continue to explore ways to reduce overheads. While CSR specialists continue to deliver carbon reduction targets, finance directors are demanding greater return on investment from energy-saving technology.

"As lighting constitutes 20% of western societies' energy bills, it's a huge concern," explains James Millar, Greenled's managing director. "It's also an obvious starting place to begin saving energy. It uses electricity, is easily addressed and cost correlations are highly visible."

The level of interest the company received at the Energy Solutions Expo, held at London Olympia in October, was evidence of a genuine interest in the benefits offered by Greenled's LED lighting, the company reports. Enquiries came not only from CSR/energy management and carbon reductio

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