UK - London- based production specialists LarMac LIVE co-ordinated all technical production aspects Creamfields 2011, with a team led by production manager Ian 'Lar' Greenway, assisted by Anthony Norris.

It was the second year that LML has worked in this capacity for event producers Loudsound, for whom they also facilitate production on several other major UK festivals, including Rockness and Bestival.

The site featured nine main arenas and a substantial hospitality area including - for the first time - two outdoor stages - North and South, with a line-up headlined by The Chemical Brothers, Armin van Buren, Tiesto and David Guetta.

(Jim Evans)

Germany - The latest installation of Meyer Sound's MM-4XP miniature loudspeaker system recently debuted at MADE, a mix of a creative space, studio, and gallery, located on the ninth floor of a high-rise in the bustling heart of Berlin. Designed as a vibrant environment for artists to envision, create, and exhibit interdisciplinary projects, the 400sq.m venue is a showcase of contemporary building design and adaptability.

MADE is as much an art gallery as a collaborative platform to serve and inspire the creative minds. It can be used as one large room for art shows and concerts and at other times, it can be divided into five separate areas to accommodate other functions. All interior walls are movable and removable and the furniture can be rearranged to accommodate any room configuration. For sound reinforcement, Til Schwartz and Ivo König of Berlin's IT Audio created an equall

UK - Showsec revitalised and rejuvenated its operating strategies to maximise the secure environment and customer experience at this year's Creamfields festival - the first of a five year deal with Cream International Events.

Creamfields, which took place from 26-28 August this year in Daresbury, Cheshire, has grown from a small dance festival spawned from the underground clubbing culture, to one of the UK's largest events pulling in crowds of over 50,000 people with major chart headliners including Chemical Brothers and Swedish House Mafia.

This year Creamfields added a third night to the line up, and welcomed more than 45,000 campers across the weekend.

Mark Logan, director at Showsec, said, "It is no longer a niche dance-based demographic in terms of audience base; it's a mainstream festival where guest experience is of paramount importance to the organisers.

"

UK - Scottish hire company, Ward Steedsy, provided the PA for the Solfest Dance Tent over the recent August bank holiday weekend, selecting a combined Allen & Heath iLive digital mixing system to manage FOH and monitors.

Solfest is a non-commercial music and arts festival with a warm atmosphere set between the Solway Firth and the Lake District in Cumbria, featuring a massive range of musical and cultural adventures. Hosting live acts and DJs including Subsource, The User Friendly, Utah Saints and the Freestylers, the Dance Tent was managed with an iLive-112 Control Surface at FOH and an iLive-R72 for monitors connected to an iDR10 MixRack with a digital mic split via A&H's ACE protocol to an iDR0 miniRack.

Partner, Steven Ward said, "For the third year running we have provided the PA for the Solfest Dance Tent and for the third year running we have had an iLive at FOH. T

USA - The University of California, Davis, School of Law has procured Barco's FSN presentation system to improve the production capabilities of its audio visual platform, enabling the law school to produce broadcast-quality events for viewing throughout its classrooms, the larger education community and via its website.

To date, the law school has used the FSN to produce and disseminate programming of high-profile events, including a 2010 debate between candidates for California Attorney General, a hearing of the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, a panel discussion regarding a 2010 gubernatorial debate on the UC Davis campus, and the school's own Law Review panel.

"With the FSN, we can broadcast our events 'live' to all of our trial practice and appellate class courtrooms and lecture halls, beam content to on-campus digital signage, and stream programs 'live' over the in

Italy - The new Juventus Stadium located in the Continassa area in Turin has a capacity of 41,000 seats and 120 executive boxes and it will be the centre of a totally renewed area that also will include a large 34,000 m2 commercial mall, the first Juventus Museum, a parking area with 4,000 vehicle capacity and many other facilities.

The stadium complex is equipped with state of art equipment and latest technology. It is a very modern facility and all the audio solutions feature RCF products. The RCF commercial audio department has been involved in the project since the beginning and designed the total audio solution for the stadium and for the other buildings in the complex.

Beside RCF Installed Sound and Commercial Audio products, special cluster design applications and other special products have been developed to fit into this major project.

"Being part of a large sc

UK - Fairport's Cropredy Convention is a rare event - a successful festival that has run for more than 30 years on the strength of its original concept, the music of legendary folk rock band Fairport Convention and friends. Its distinctive identity has given it a special niche status on the UK's summer festival circuit.

Festival director Gareth Williams, himself for many years the monitor engineer for Fairport Convention, and his PA supplier Pete Russell of SSE Audio Group chose the new Nexo 45°N-12 stage monitors for the Cropredy stage, deploying 10 units for up to eight mixes, all powered by NXAMP 4x4s.

This year's line-up, headlined by Fairport Convention, also included Horslips, Badly Drawn Boy, Seasick Steve, The Coral and UB40. The busiest man on site was Jasen Hattams of SSE, who mixed monitors for every band except Fairport itself. He had a few things to say about

UK - Back by popular demand and in the new location of Ward Park in Bangor, Northern Ireland, the Tennents Vital Festival made a spectacular resurgence after a four year hiatus, with a star studded two-day line up headlined by The Script and Eminem.

Production Services Ireland, was asked by promoters MCD to take care of all lighting and production rigging needs for the main stage. PSI's Sean Pagel states, "It was great to see the return of Tennents Vital and a huge amount of enthusiasm and energy from all involved went into ensuring that it had the best production values and a fantastic vibe."

Pagel's lighting crew included Darragh McAuliffe, Richie Flanagan and Rob Meyer.

The lighting had to match Eminem's rig - designed by Dan Boland - as fixture perfectly as possible. PSI rigorously adhered to the specification, requesting very few substitutions. The Script (LD

UK - The UK's largest light festival returns to Durham this winter with 30-plus installations including works by Tracey Emin and David Batchelor.

Event producers Artichoke have announced the first details of Lumiere 2011, the biennial festival that celebrates artists working with light in all its forms. It will be staged over four nights, 17-20 November 2011. Artichoke has been commissioned to deliver the festival by Durham County Council, with funds from Arts Council England and a panoply of other funding bodies and sponsors.

In 2009, the inaugural Lumiere festival drew an estimated 75,000 people into the city, and generated some £1.5m for the local economy. For Lumiere 2011, festival producers Artichoke will bring together a mix of international, national and local artists and designers, all using the medium of light to create artworks "to delight, surprise, and s

Blitz has been selected as the latest member of the global AV Alliance, which is now represented by 46 event suppliers in 26 countries.

The AV Alliance is a network of leading event technical rental specialists committed to delivering performance, service and quality at the highest possible level. The network boasts 2,725 employees, undertaking 46,209 projects each year with equipment sourced from 210,676 m2 of warehousing. Alongside Blitz, England will be represented by two additional organisations; Smart AV and London Audio.

Munir Samji, Chairman at Blitz comments, "We are thrilled to have joined the AV Alliance and to now have access to unrivalled resources across the world. We already supply quite a number of events across Europe, but we will now be in a strong position to provide a comprehensive service in North America, Europe, Asia, Australia and South Africa."

Sim

UK - Chauvet reports that its COLORado Batten 72 Tour linear wash lights have been installed in Theatr Brycheiniog , the first solar-powered theatre in Wales. The fixtures were specified by Stage Electrics.

Twenty COLORado Batten 72 Tour fixtures were added to the theatre's lighting rig for a multitude of applications, such as front, side, cyc and overhead lighting. The LED-fitted fixtures joined the existing rig of half LED, half-incandescent lighting sources.

"The challenge has been for lighting designers to adopt different fixtures," Geraint Thomas, technical manager for Theatr Brycheiniog, said of the use of LEDs in a theatrical setting. "As new lighting designers come here, we first go over the equipment to prepare them to go from incandescent to LEDs."

The use of LEDs has made a marked improvement in regards to power consumption and heat generation.

Saudi Arabia - The largest Milos trussing installation in the Middle East to date was built for a special presentation ceremony to give out the 2011 Makkah Awards for Excellence, staged in the Hilton Hall of the Jeddah Hilton Hotel, Makkah Province, Saudi Arabia.

Milos trussing and staging products from Bright Star were used to build a spectacular stage set for the event, including a 50m diameter circular truss that circled the perimeter of the entire presentation space, which was also used to hang a 360 degree projection screen and an 18m diameter round stage.

The installation was designed by Hattan Madani, who was also Bright Star's site and project manager for the event. Bright Star is a leading technical and event production company based in Jeddah, headed by Ibrahim Madani, and with a large stock of Milos products.

(Jim Evans)

UK - Batman Live tour directors will join leading Tait staff to reveal production secrets behind the astounding Batman Live show at a seminar during this year's PLASA exhibition in Earls Court, London, at 5pm on Monday 12th September.

Tait is widely considered as global leaders in the design, manufacture and tour logistics when it comes to scenic motion, and were an obvious choice for production director Jake Berry (who was in charge of all technical elements) and set designer Es Devlin as they conceived one the most ambitious live touring productions ever seen.

Berry and Devlin will be joined at this unique seminar by James 'Winky' Fairorth, president of Tait Towers, alongside Dana Bartholomew from Fisher Technical Services (FTSI), also part of the Tait Towers group. Following presentations by each of the panellists there will be a question and answer session fo

Europe - PRG is to hold a comprehensive online auction of used equipment in October in order to revise the European equipment pool. The company will sell equipment, which is rarely rented or will no longer be offered due to strategic reasons.

The material originates from the inventories of PRG Germany, Belgium, Switzerland and UK as well as EML and Showtec. In total, approximately 6000 lots of lighting, audio, video and rigging equipment will be offered for sale.

Troostwijk Auktionen GmbH & Co. KG will be responsible for the realization of the two-day online auction. The aim of this auction is to further optimize the rental pool concerning equipment quality and clearness, says the company.

The complete illustrated auction catalogue of the equipment to be auctioned will be available from the beginning of October on the following website: www.TroostwijkAuctions.com.

From the

CyberMotion, said by developers XLNT Advanced Technologies to be "the world's first fully integrated motion control system", is officially launched at PLASA 2011. The company says it will bring "a new world of stage automation to the European concert touring, events, theatre and installation markets".

CyberMotion, developed by XLNT Advanced Technologies, is designed not only to change the philosophy of motion control but to open the horizons of stage engineering to new creative potential. The system is 'Plug & Play' and fast to install.

XLNT CyberMotion is a complete range of motion products designed specifically for the entertainment industry. SIL3 certified state of the art technology is used to create a unique series of intercompatible products to create "breathtaking shows and installations" as well as the durability for cost efficient global touring

ETC's award winning Eos lighting control family is expanding - but the newest desk in the range isn't! The buzz since July (when ETC gave its end users at the company's CUE conference in Wisconsin an exclusive first look) is about the elegantly compact design of the new Gio - a high functionality desk in a smaller footprint. The desk's international launch is taking place at PLASA 2011.

"Gio puts together the control-surface depth required to do large shows in a mid-ranged, ergonomically engineered package," says Matt Kerr, ETC's associate entertainment market manager. "We designed it to be the professional solution for space compromised productions and touring."

Positioned in the middle of the popular Eos range, between the Eos and the Ion desks, Gio features the family's powerful hardware and software for sophisticated effects - like pixel mapping and media serv

Christie has unveiled the next generation of its 3-chip DLP Xenon platform - the Christie J Series - at PLASA 2011. This new platform targets a variety of applications within the rental, staging and fixed install segments, requiring high brightness, superior performance and crisp, clear images - all in a compact, rugged and reliable package.

"The best image in the world just got better," said George Tsintzouras, senior director product management, Business Products, Christie. "Christie has taken its highly successful Xenon product line and evolved it with exciting new features like embedded Christie Twist that allows for image warping without the need to purchase additional electronics cards. Driven by a Xenon illumination system that offers the best colour reproduction and stability, J Series also offers lenses with Intelligent Lens System (ILS) functionality and three

Promising "no more overloads on stage", Eilon Engineering is launching a new, improved version of Ron StageMaster wireless and wired load monitoring and overload prevention system, featuring longer transmission range, longer battery life, faster update rate and more, at PLASA 2011.

Tens / hundreds of load cells' measurements are displayed on one laptop screen and create a real time load map, allowing the rigger to detect an overload and handle it before it becomes dangerous.

The load cells enable minimum headroom loss and have up to 1500 battery hours; up to 96 wireless load cells, or up to 256 wired load cells with just a single cable descending from the truss. All wireless and wired load cells are displayed on one laptop screen as a real-time load map, overlaid on the stage-plan layout (AutoCAD etc), enabling the rigger at the venue to immediately identify the location of

Describing it as 'the ultimate background music tool", Ohm is showing its BootiQue all in one background music system at PLASA 2011.

The BootiQue sub, says Ohm, holds all the tricks, providing an arsenal of inputs including RCA (Phono), iPod (line in jack) and a USB port. More than one BootiQue system can be linked together, creating zones using the RCA link. The onboard three-channel amplifier powers the 10" bass driver and all eight satellites, making this system a true all in one solution.

Worried about fire regulations? A fire alarm mute connector ensures compliance with regulations for peace of mind. Independent controls are provided for master, bass and mid high volume parameters, enabling the right balance of sound to be achieved throughout a venue. The rear control panel includes essential functions such as ground lift, polarity reverse, input gain, sub/sat EQ and a

UK - Leading pro-audio brand Lab.gruppen is delighted to announce the launch of an innovative 1U power amplifier range developed specifically for the installation market.

Lab.gruppen's compact and ultra-efficient E Series of power amplifiers offers traditional Lab.gruppen performance to a market highly concerned with spiralling global energy prices and environmental pressures.

The E Series provides ample power reserves with amazingly low power consumption, therefore reducing the total cost of ownership below that of conventional designs. E Series utilizes much of the unique design philosophy and energy-efficient concepts debuted in the Swedish company's flagship PLM 20000Q touring amplifier, but here deployed in a 1U, install-centric platform.

The new range draws on over three decades of tour-honed design and manufacturing expertise to deliver a unique combination of perform

Midas has unveiled the latest additions to its PRO Series of digital consoles, the Midas PRO2 and PRO2C live audio systems, at PLASA 2011. The PRO2/PRO2C takes the audio quality, performance and values of the top-end Midas XL8, and makes them available at a price point well below the general-purpose mixing console average, states the company.

Despite being the smallest and least expensive Midas digital consoles, the PRO2 and PRO2C represent a quantum leap forward for digital mixing, both in technology and concept. Essentially the same console, the PRO2C has eight fewer input faders and the smaller frame, at just 750mm by 850mm. Both consoles share the same high quality components and finish as the rest of the PRO Series, including the Alex Cooper-designed mic preamps, A-D converters, and daylight-viewable screens. This offers a reassuring continuity and provides extreme functionality a

UK - Specialist UK-based entertainment industry LED manufacturer i-Pix is launching two new products at PLASA 2011 and previewing upgraded and improved versions of two of its other most popular existing product lines on the stand of its UK distributor White Light (2-Q13/2-Q18).

The Satellite was the first i-Pix product designed and produced after the company's launch in 2006, and soon became a best seller and a firm favourite in all sectors of the entertainment industry. At PLASA 2011, the Satellite Mk II is launched.

This takes advantage of the massive leaps forward in LED technology in the last five years. The unit is still in the same compact package yet has four times the light output. Colours include RGB and a 5600°K daylight white. There are also improved homogenised optics.

The Satellite Mk II offers 16 bit self-contained DMX for control, or it can be run as a sta

UK - Entertainment lighting designers are increasingly looking to LED lighting solutions to take advantage of more compact luminaire designs, unparalleled energy efficiency and dramatically lower heat signatures. At the same time, they demand solutions which light the stage and people on that stage with brightness, rich colour and precision focusing. With this in mind, Philips will launch the StagePainter D60 2000 system at PLASA 2011.

"The StagePainter goes beyond existing LED stage lighting capabilities to provide superior control over colour consistency and brightness, creating drama and spectacle with simplicity and ease," says Philips. The Philips StagePainter D60 2000 system enables lighting designers to 'paint' the scene they want with rich, bright and powerful LED illumination. "This enables them to recreate the same scene flawlessly, fixture after fixture

UK / Germany - Cloud Electronics, UK-based manufacturer of high-quality pro audio products, has announced S.E.A. Vertrieb & Consulting GmbH as the exclusive distribution channel for the full range of Cloud audio mixers, zoners, multi-channel amplifiers, and audio distribution systems throughout Germany, effective 15 October 2011.

S.E.A is a distributor of audio solutions for commercial installation, broadcasting, live sound reinforcement and studio products, employing a very enthusiastic and dynamic team of professionals in Emsburen, Germany.

The Company has been distributing audio and music equipment in Germany for more than 12 years and has sales, marketing, administration, technical and logistical facilities in Emsbúren, but also utilises 3rd party logistics and warehousing to provide nationwide coverage for all its brands, including Cloud.

Uwe Kirchfield, director and f

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