Lighting

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UK - LSi is sad to report the passing of lighting designer and Society of Television Lighting And Design (STLD) committee member Chris Harris.
He passed away on 7 April whilst being treated for COVID-19 and associated complications.
Harris had over 45 years of experience in the entertainment and broadcast industries, including 14 years at BBC's Pebble Mill Studios in Edgbaston. He had worked at most of Birmingham's leading theatres, including the Birmingham Hippodrome, the New Alexandra Theatre, the Birmingham Repertory Theatre, and the ICC. He also managed the TV studio and theatre technical departments at Rugby School for many years.
Most recently, Harris was the lighting director for Channel 5's The Gadget Show.
The STLD says in a statement: "Chris was a tireless member of our committee, giving untold hours of his time to it and travelling many m

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USA - Created at The 5th Avenue Theatre in Seattle, Bliss is a new musical fantasy full of emotion and humour that shatters assumptions about what a fairytale princess should be. The empowering tale had its world premiere run 7-23 February and was enthusiastically received for its catchy music and non-traditional storyline, plus its scenic and lighting design.
The unorthodox ethos carried into the lighting rig as well where lighting designer Yael Lubetzky incorporated Elation Rayzor 760 luminaires in her design, an LED moving head fixture you more typically find in a concert rig, which is exactly where the LD first discovered it. “I saw a Rob Thomas concert at the Beacon Theatre in New York and saw the Rayzor 760 and thought these are exactly what we want in the show,” Yael shares. “When I saw the units sparkle effect, I was so surprised. I had never seen anyth

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USA - Every day, dancers at Sarasota Contemporary Dance, in Sarasota, FL, gather at the company’s studio to rehearse intricately choreographed routines that will later be performed before appreciative audiences.
On some occasions, the company’s studio in Sarasota’s bustling Rosemary District, will be turned into a performance space, either for a special dance, or a “behind the scenes” event put on for donors. When this happens those in attendance are invariably dazzled, not only by the graceful moves of the dancers, but also by the colourful and elegantly balanced lighting created with 20 Chauvet Professional Ovation P-56FC fixtures supplied by the New York-based Lighting Design Group.
The studio, which opened in 2018, is stylish and comfortable, but its relatively low ceiling presents a challenge for anyone lighting a dance performance. Fixtures that are rel

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Australia - Astera AX1 Pixel Tubes are doing their bit - both as energising effects luminaires and as practical lights - marking out the social distancing spaces - onstage at Delivered Live, a new performance-based web streaming concept for music and comedy.
The show is broadcast weekly from The Studio at Harry The Hirer Productions’ HQ in the Richmond district of Melbourne.
The project is being driven by artist agency Handshake Management, technical and production rental company Harry The Hirer Productions and The Victoria State Government, offering a mix of entertainment from some of Australia’s established and rising star artists who are based in and around the city.
It’s also designed as a fundraiser to provide vital financial assistance for those directly impacted by the devastating effect of the Coronavirus pandemic on the live show and events

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UK - Various landmark installations that have been lit with Anolis lighting fixtures have been turning blue on Thursday evenings for the Clap For Carers initiative in support of the National Health Service (NHS) and other essential workers.
This includes Rhyl Promenade in North Wales where several key features are lit; Bromley High Street in Kent, a major thoroughfare in the heart of the city and popular live music venue the O2 Guildhall in Southampton, Hampshire.
All the Anolis-lit areas across the seaside town of Rhyl are turned blue for the NHS including the Pavilion Theatre, Clock Tower, Sky Tower, waterfall, and seafront viewing shelters.
The 80m-tall Sky Tower is highlighted with ArcSource Outdoor 48MC RGBW integrals which transform it into an elegant beacon of light at night with smooth and even coverage of lumens up and down the mast.
The current Pa

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UK - Stage Electrics has supplied High End SolaFrame 1000s to the Gala Theatre Durham, owned and operated by Durham County Council.
The company’s Davie Bell says Stage Electrics “were able to demonstrate a number of fixtures to the Gala Theatre and assist in their process of choosing the right solution for their venue.”
Tez Errington, the acting technical manager at the Gala Theatre who made the purchase decision, explains: “This unit was considerable quieter than its rivals, offering more features, with clean cut colours and great shutter control, too. But the thing that sold it was both the light output and how quiet the fixture was.” The venue purchased eight in total with flight cases.
“Despite the difficulties facing everyone in the industry, I am pleased Stage Electrics was able to deliver these units ready for when the venue re-opens - let’s

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USA - John Clark, the production ministry lead at Red Rocks Church in Littleton, has had to dig deep and explore new ways of doing things now that worship services have moved completely online.
On Easter Sunday, Clark created a rich and engaging visual setting for Red Rocks’ online service that was, at once, powerfully moving, yet warm and intimate enough to engage viewers through sometimes small, mobile screens. Live-streamed on Living as One and featuring a 50-member ‘virtual choir’, the harmoniously balanced service was illuminated by a rig that featured Chauvet Professional COLORado, Ovation and Rogue fixtures.
“I like to think of challenges as opportunities,” explains Clark. “Lighting a completely streamed or online service definitely changes the game. A fair amount of principles stay the same, but by and large LDs are called upon to ‘throw out the p

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USA - Popular Nashville bar, restaurant and live music joint Rebar At The Dam has recently upgraded its stage with a new AV system. Featuring a rig comprised mainly of ADJ fixtures, the new setup offers touring quality production to the local performers and visiting artists who play at the venue each week.
Owned and operated by Nashville entrepreneur Rhonda Russell, Rebar At The Dam is a sister location to the original Rebar that has been a staple of Nashville’s Midtown area for the past decade. Located on the outskirts of town beside the J. Percy Priest Dam, the new Rebar opened a couple of years ago and is a considerably bigger facility with plenty of space to host live music. However, bands playing the venue had to bring in their own PA and had very little in the way of lighting, which led Rhonda to look at installing a permanent AV system towards the end of last year.<

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World - Chroma-Q is offering free weekly training webinars on a number of lighting topics.
The multi-award winning LED specialists kicked off the series last week with a webinar about LED Colour in Practice. This included an overview of some of the technologies that go into creating tools for discerning designers, why small details can make such a big difference when it comes to the end result.
“Supporting our wonderful industry and the individuals in it is our top priority,” explains Paul Pelletier, global brand manager. “It is important to us to use this time wisely and as an opportunity to help our industry learn new skills, as well as build on existing ones. We were delighted with the turnout of our first webinar and hope to reach even more people with

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Belgium - A short time ago, a group of road cases loaded with gear left the Sound&Co warehouse for what was supposed to be a four-month rental. Then the Covid-19 outbreak brought live events in Belgium to a sudden halt.
Although the lockdown is still very much in place, the cases are now playing a new role in bringing entertainment to the people. This time as backdrops in the improvised livestream studio that Sound&Co has set up in its 1,200sq.mfacility.
Quite a few people have been seeing those cases-turned-backdrops too. At last report, Sound&Co had streamed seven post-lockdown performances by DJs like Kaaprisun, Twallie, Lloyds and Sound of the Basement. Supporting them is a rig anchored by four Chauvet Professional Rogue R2 Wash fixtures and run with a ChamSys MagicQ MQ80 console.
“We wanted to create the look and feel of a club or party with

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USA - On 22 April, Elation Professional is launching The Elation Hour, a weekly virtual presentation that will delve into the more personal side of product development while also addressing the technology and process behind the company’s most popular product series. Also on the schedule are a series of discussions with some of the industry’s most noted designers who plan to share their own personal insight and experience across the broad scope of entertainment lighting.
Hosted each Wednesday by Elation national sales manager John Dunn and global product manager Matthias Hinrichs, the first Elation Hour presentation - Behind the Products - R&D - will take place on 22 April at 10:00am PT (6pm BST). The free webinar is an opportunity to hear about the more human aspect of a busy R&D department while gaining insight into the how and why behind some of E

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Europe - From mid-February to early March, German-Canadian singer Alice Merton was on the road to promote her debut album Mint +4. Merton is also known in Germany as a jury member of the popular TV show The Voice of Germany. Her Mint +4 tour took the artist to Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria, and Denmark.
The artist presented her repertoire of indie pop songs supported by a versatile lighting setup from GLP. The lighting and set design was a co-production between Merton's manager Paul Grauwinkel - with whom she also runs her own label Paper Plane Records International - and lighting technician Maximilian Hermsdorf, in close coordination with Merton herself. It was Hermsdorf who joined the tour as lighting operator.
The technical team around Merton and Grauwinkel had been in constant communication about new and existing products from the GLP ca

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USA - Bandit Lites’ Nashville shop is being transformed with an expansion that encompasses the entire building and multiple departments.
With a new suite of offices for the sales team, a new Technical Service Division shop and a prep floor area growing from 18,000sq.ft to 44,000sq.ft, the expanded shop will be better equipped to handle Bandit’s business including world tours, corporate events, festivals and system installations.
“Bandit had outgrown its current space,” comments Bandit Lites general manager Mark Steinwachs. “Making this move gives us more room to prep ever-growing shows as well as still giving us room to grow in the future.”
Bandit’s team has been practising social distancing and adhering to current state requirements, and select members were able to proceed with streamlining the expansion of the spaces including a mezzanine for i

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USA - Owing to the social distancing required to fight the coronavirus pandemic, live-streamed video has seen a surge in popularity over recent weeks. Individuals, organisations and corporations are all using this technology to stay in touch with their audiences, but many aren’t equipped with the necessary lighting technology to do it effectively. For this reason, ADJ has created a series of new lighting packages that are designed to make it easy and affordable for both individuals and organizations to enhance the visual appearance of their video recordings and live streams.
“With a bewildering amount of choice available, ADJ wants to make investing in the right live stream lighting as simple and cost effective as possible,” explains ADJ USA’s national sales manager, Alfred Gonzales.
“Our new Live Stream Lighting PAKs feature carefully selected bundles of lig

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Sweden - Riksteatern, the Swedish National Touring Theatre, was due to take its production of Love Songs on a three month tour of Sweden from early March, with lighting director and designer, Jörgen ‘Hajen’ Haimanas, choosing six Ayrton Diablo LED profile luminaires as a major feature of his lighting design, in what would be Diablo’s first national tour of Sweden. Due to the current Covid-19 crisis, the tour was only able to complete the first five dates before it was necessarily postponed by lockdown.
Love Songs is described as a ‘sentimental love bomb’, a musical evening depicting love in all its forms, featuring the musical talents of Arja Saijonmaa, Frida Beckman, Lisa Hu Yu, Robert Hannouch and Peter Järn. Haimanas used his considerable lighting talents, to create an incredible array of looks using the six strategically placed Diablo units in a desig

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France - The coronavirus pandemic has already seen many examples of those in the entertainment technology and production industry putting their skills and resources to good use - from morale-raising actions to physical contributions and manufacturing items to aid the massive efforts worldwide to contain the spread of infection.
In normal times, S-Group is a busy full production and rental operation with four regional bases and a HQ in Alès, north of Nimes in the South of France, and this time of year they’d have an average of 20 tours on the road as well as servicing numerous long term rentals.
However, with the live show and event Industry at a complete standstill, S-Group’s manufacturing division has instead energised its 3D printing capabilities to assist in producing protective visors for workers engaged in the various frontline healthcare and first response s

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Mexico - Verge Aero recently added a new dimension to Mexico’s biggest and oldest carnival. A 130-drone display, in the skies above Mazatlán’s Olas Altas bay, delivered a spectacular new twist to the town’s traditional six-day carnival celebration, Carnaval de Mazatlán.
Situated on Mexico’s west coast, Mazatlán has one of the world’s greatest carnival traditions. Held annually since 1898, marking Mardi Gras and the start of Lent, Mazatlán’s exuberant six-day carnival is reputed to be the world’s third largest, after Rio de Janeiro and New Orleans.
This year, Verge Aero’s drone technology, specially developed for live entertainment productions, was brought in to precede the spectacular firework display by local pyro supplier, Pyromar. Verge Aero worked together with local partner, Sky Precision, to create the light show and coordinate it with the hug

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USA - ETC has introduced On Headset, a new audio series that allows listeners to programme a major theatrical production in realtime whilst listening to the audio cues of a lighting designer.
“Our goal with this project is to fill the gap between the traditional classroom or ‘e-training’ methods of console learning and actually sitting behind an Eos desk in a theatre,” explains ETC senior field service engineer Victor Seastone, “This is a console flight simulator to help with both.”
The series features esteemed Broadway lighting designer Ken Billington and a lightly curated recording of the headset conversations during technical rehearsals of the New York City Centre Encores’ Me and My Girl in May 2018. The New York City Centre, a well-known and distinctive theatre, welcomes 300,000 visitors annually to its establishment which was founded

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Australia - On 15 April, Australian skies were lit up in support of those fighting the COVID-19 global pandemic whilst also drawing attention to the plight of the country’s entertainment industry.
Organised by ALIA, the event also served as a morale boost for the lighting industry. Production companies, sole traders, distributors and manufacturers all joined in the effort.
The brief was fairly open being just colourful with a bit of movement and initially, premises only were to be lit up. But many companies were able to light significant landmarks including hospitals, theatres, town halls, sports stadiums and even a lighthouse. Many sought permission from the aviation authorities to project high into the night skies.
In an act of generosity, Brisbane-based Gobotech offered free gobos to those taking part.
ALIA was “blown away by the number of participant

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USA - Stay at home restrictions have prevented the Clermont, Ohio Chamber of Commerce from holding its regular meetings. But now, more than ever, its member businesses are seeking guidance from the 50-year old organisation, particularly on the steps they can take to navigate their way through this period of lockdowns.
A highlight of the chamber’s educational initiative was the detailed and informative 8 April livestream it hosted by noted author and small business expert Brian Beaulieu, CEO of ITR Economics. A former US Labourr Department economist, Beaulieu delivered his presentation from the Events United Studio Lab, illuminated by a rig that featured Maverick MK2 Spot, Ovation CYC 1 FC, STRIKE 4 and Ovation E-260WW IP fixtures.
Beaulieu was able to communicate the intricacies of his ideas to the audience, located 900 miles from the New Hampshire studio, with the h

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Europe - This week will see the continuation of Absen’s series of webinars, with two sessions on Tuesday 21 April at respectively 9am (Rental & Staging) and 1pm (Introduction to LED), one session dedicated to fixed installations (Corporate & Retail) on Wednesday 22 April at 9am BST, and a two parts session (9am and 1pm BST) on Thursday 23 April which will provide insights on Basic Technical Knowledge of LED Displays. More webinars will also be offered by Absen in the near future.
The inaugural session, which was held on Tuesday 7 April and focussed on Absen’s rental & staging products, had in excess of 350 registrations and over 200 attendees; 84% of whom rated it as being either ‘excellent’ or ‘good’.
The next rental & staging webinar, which will be hosted by Absen’s rental & staging industry director Christian Cz

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UK - Fairport Convention’s annual Cropredy Convention in Oxfordshire and The Eden Sessions in Cornwall are the latest major music events to fall victim to the coronavirus pandemic. Both are being rescheduled for 2021.
Since its first staging in 1980, the Cropredy festival has taken place annually since on farmland near Banbury, Oxfordshire.
This year’s three-day event had been scheduled to take place on 13-15 August. It will now be staged over 12, 13 and 14 August 2021 (the equivalent weekend) on its usual site.
The line-up of acts will be carried forward: artists booked to appear this year have agreed to switch to 2021. Highlights include Trevor Horn Band, Clannad, Steve Hackett – Genesis Revisited, Richard Thompson, Matthews Southern Comfort and host band Fairport Convention.
Tickets purchased for Cropredy 2020 remain valid for the rescheduled fest

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UK - Manchester Cathedral teamed up with one of its long-standing event production partners, Sterling Event Group, to illuminate the façade of the magnificent building in a blue hue in a show of solidarity and support for NHS staff and key workers who are going above and beyond to support our communities at this difficult time.
Richard Bowden, managing director at Sterling said: “We wanted to show our support as a company for the magnificent work our NHS and keyworkers are doing in the battle against Covid-19. We have a great partnership with Manchester Cathedral and its work in the community. As a stunning landmark in the heart of our city we are very privileged to be able to illuminate it.”
At 8pm on Thursday 16 April, the display was supported by representatives from the Greater Manchester emergency services as everyone clapped for carers.
The cathedral w

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USA - Elation is expanding the Fuze series with the Fuze SFX, a new concept LED Spot FX moving head designed for a variety of applications requiring a compact and powerful multi-purpose luminaire.
The Fuze SFX is a combination of spot and effects fixture capable of projecting tight beams to wide washes using a highly efficient optical design while providing over 12,000 lumens of output from a 300W White LED engine. Unveiled at the LDI show in November, the fixture received an enthusiastic response and is now shipping.
The SFX allows for even stage washes utilising its variable frost filter while a wide array of colours is possible from a seamless CMY colour-mixing system plus seven-position colour wheel. Housing 18 carefully designed gobos and a 4.5° to 38° zoom, the Fuze SFX can create mid-air FX as easily as precise image projections.
The Fuze SFX is powerf
  1. ETC releases power controls for LED systems
  2. Madrid’s Glub-Glub invests GLP profiler
  3. Studio Gear installs RJ followspots in Milwaukee
  4. Robe for first Delivered Live shows
  5. Stage Electrics wins Globe Theatre contract
  6. LIT Lighting starts streaming service
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