Projects

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Europe - Björk’s ninth studio album, Utopia, was announced last summer, with the promise of a supporting tour this year. That tour kicked off at the Háskólabío Theater in the artist’s native Iceland. Headline appearances at the All Points East festival in London and Primavera Sound in Barcelona followed in May, with We Love Green Festival in Paris and Northside Festival in Arhus in June.
A run of own headline shows will follow for July, including The Eden Project UK, Gent, Rättvik, Helsinki and Rome. Front of House engineer John Gale joined Utopia’s touring team during its production stage in March, choosing a DiGiCo SD12 as his preferred method of control, that rental company CS Audio purchased from SSE Audio Group.
“Björk spent a long time producing and mixing the album and was very specific about the effects she wanted, in particular the pannin

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Belgium - Belgian TV and stage entertainment producers Studio 100 asked Painting with Light to design lighting and video, including content creation, for their 2018 Ketnet (Children’s TV channel) musical Team UP, which played to sold-out crowds in four major cities around Belgium.
Directed by Tijl Dauwe, the production starred musical actress Goele De Raedt and Ketnet-wrapper Sander Gillis in the lead roles, accompanied by a cast of 12 - 15 year-old new actors and singers who auditioned via TV series Ketnet Musical, a reality style competition devised to source potential new singing, dancing and acting talent.
Painting with Light’s Paco Mispelters worked hard to deliver a tourable lighting design to meet everyone’s dramatic expectations and fit into an expedient budget. He took Studio 100’s impressive double-decker set design as a starting point

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USA - The members of German supergroup Alphaville always dreamed of playing at Hollywood’s Whisky A Go Go. The synth-pop stars’ wish came true recently when they journeyed to the US and performed two Whisky a Go Go shows over the Memorial Day Weekend. Supporting their high-energy performance with fresh looks were eight Chauvet Professional Rogue R1 FX-B LED fixtures.
“This was a dream come true not only for Alphaville, but also for many of their diehard fans in the US,” says Richard Kay, who has been with the band as its lighting designer since 1998 and has toured 91 countries with them. “The whole experience was a bit surreal – LA, Hollywood, palm trees, who wouldn’t love it? Marian Gold (the band’s lead vocalist) always wanted to perform at Whisky a Go Go. We were on tour in the US last year; we all knew about Marian’s dream so we did some sniffing, met s

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USA - Hayley Kiyoko tour engineers Dusty Black (FOH/TM) and Nic Monaco (Monitors/PM) continue to expand their use of the Allen & Heath dLive digital mixing system as they set off on their latest summer tour season. Building upon the buzz of Kiyoko's recent hit album release, Expectations, upcoming performances include shows at dozens of arenas across the US and Canada supporting the Panic! At The Disco Pray For The Wicked tour.
Having worked together for over a year as a FOH/monitor engineer team, Dusty and Nic each selected a compact C1500 dLive Control Surface along with a shared 96kHz 160x64 FPGA Core DM48 MixRack as their console of choice. Utilising the multi-surface feature within the dLive, the same MixRack engine works across two surfaces.
Speaking to the sound of the dLive, Dusty says, "The desk is very transparent and easily transfers from

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Belgium - ArKaos continues to expand its work and partnerships in the architainment, architectural and commercial creative media installation sectors on a recent project in the International Terminal at Brussels’ Zaventem Airport.
This is a collaboration with lighting and visual designer Koert Vermeulen of creative agency ACTLD.
The power and flexibility of ArKaos’s Kling-Net control protocol and Kling-Force LED interfaces have been harnessed to bring dynamic control to a 30,000 pixel video and kinetic sculpture which runs above the main travellator leading from the jetway to the baggage reclaim hall.
ACTLD was commissioned by Toerisme Vlaanderen (Flanders Tourism) to design, specify and supervise the production. For the installation, integrators Create won a public tender to deliver the project based on ACTLD’s specifications.
ArKaos and ACTLD have

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Germany - Berlin-based Complete Audio has been supporting local punk rock band Beatsteaks with production almost since they formed more than two decades ago.
Now the group can sell out the massive 24,000 capacity Waldbühne Berlin amphitheatre - and for their recent outdoor show there André Rauhut’s company rigged their flagship Martin Audio MLA.
Complete Audio had been the first company to invest globally in the new MLA platform when it was launched eight years ago - and it was the first choice both for this show and a second open-air show the band are due to play in August, this time at the slightly smaller Kindl Bühne Wulheide in Berlin.
The rental company are no strangers to the Waldbühne, having worked there many times in the past, and Rauhut has system pre-sets to meet the challenges of a sensitive site. “Due to it being situated close to a residenti

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Italy - Italian singer-songwriter Vasco Rossi entertained 50,000 fans at the Stadio San Nicola in Bari as part of his Non Stop Live 2018 stadium tour.
Lighting the tour was the artist’s long-term LD Giovanni Pinna, who included over 300 Robe moving lights on the rig - a mix of MegaPointes, Spiiders and LEDBeam 150s - all supplied as part of the lighting package by Rome-based lighting rental company, BOTW, and used to create plenty of excitement and hi-impact.
The starting point for the tour design for Giovanni and the Vasco creative team - was the show-stopping event in Enzo Ferrari Park, Modena last summer, Vasco’s one and only live appearance to celebrate 40 years of mainly-thrills-with-a-few-spills in entertainment - in front of around 250,000 people, the largest rock concert in Italy to date.
The Modena Park design presented a simple, bold, raw ind

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USA - Light City Baltimore is an annual event that takes place at the Baltimore Harbour celebrating light, music and innovation. This year, the Baltimore Office of Production and Arts decided to add a new stage to the event - Club Light City - to showcase DJ sets in Kaufman Pavilion by Rash Field. The organisation tapped Baltimore-based RCI Systems to provide sound reinforcement for the new music venue.
“The stage featured DJ acts which require a dynamic stage monitor system for the performer while also covering a small dance floor in front of the stage. The main PA was designed to project sound into the area in front of the Pavilion, which was approximately 200ft wide by 400ft deep,” explains David Hoover, senior account manager for RCI. “We used our EAW KF850 rig for the stage monitor system and our new EAW RADIUS sound reinforcement system to cover the outdoor area.

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USA - In the Netflix original comedy series Grace and Frankie, characters played by Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin and Martin Sheen learn to adapt to their worlds gone haywire.
But for Scott Webb, lighting programmer from Local 728, all is in control in the studios with High End Systems’ Road Hog 4 and Hoglet 4s.
Webb purchased and supplies the Road Hog 4, which runs lighting for the two main stages for the Emmy-nominated series. The show is now filming its fifth season at Paramount Studios in Los Angeles. In prior seasons, Webb rented a Full Boar 4, and purchased the Road Hog 4 at the start of season four.
Webb also owns and supplies two Hoglet 4s with DMX Processor 8000s. One system runs lighting on a third stage, while the other is moved to other set locations when needed.
Citing 500 conventional dimmers and various LED film lights in the rig, Webb not

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USA - Technological innovation is nothing new at the Rio Grande Theatre. Opened in 1926, as a silent movie hall, the two-story building was retrofitted three years later with sound equipment, making it among the earliest theatres in its state to show ‘talkies’. It was also the first business in Las Cruces to be air conditioned.
History repeated itself earlier this year, when the venue, which now hosts a diverse mix of theatrical productions, concerts and special film showings, took a technological step forward by replacing its old stage lighting with a new LED system that features a collection of Chauvet Professional fixtures supplied by Hubbard’s Music.
“This project involved replacing the existing conventional fixtures that Rio Grande was using,” said Will Sadler, project manager for Hubbard’s Music. “The theatre wanted a more flexible lighting system

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UK - Artists Ross Ashton and Karen Monid returned to York Minster to deliver an immersive and intricately crafted sonic and visual work - Northern Lights.
The video projection and sound installation was commissioned by the York Minster Fund as the culmination of The Northern Lights Dinner fundraiser. This was held as part of a four- year campaign to build an on-going endowment for the protection and restoration of the Minster’s historic glass. This involved illuminating the vault of the nave and famous Great West Window, known as The Heart of Yorkshire.
Ross & Karen are known for their projection and audio artworks. Their style of mixed-media 'installation performance' has developed over a series of innovative projects at many different locations. They worked at the Minster in 2010 when they produced Rose, another spectacular artwork

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USA - Audio-over-IP has proven its worth in countless installed-sound applications. Now, as concert touring has become the single largest source of revenue for most music artists, AoIP (specifically the Dante protocol) is going out on the road, saving space, weight and time - all critical elements in the economics of touring.
Redhook, NY-based Firehouse Productions has been an early adopter in the transition to Dante and this year has both Jack White and Nine Inch Nails on tour using AoIP systems they’ve built using Focusrite RedNet components.
Jack White and band hit the road on in April in his erstwhile hometown of Detroit in support of his new LP Boarding House Reach, which was released a month earlier. The tour is covering the U.S. and Europe, and the audio control system assembled by Firehouse Production utilises an array of RedNet units that will allow

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USA - A large brassy blues and funk ensemble should be supported by a bold lightshow that covers the stage with intense, colourful and fast-moving light. Or so thinks Jeff Hinton, owner of 815 Productions, who put this theory into practice in late April when he lit a benefit show by Late Nite Blues Brothers and 10 of Soul with a high-octane lightshow created with a collection of 14 Chauvet DJ Intimidator fixtures.
“When I have a super energised band with a lot of people in it, I like to get a lot of light directly on the performers and keep my light sources close to the stage,” says Hinton. “In my view, this is the best way to support the music. If you don’t do this, you always run the risk that your lighting will get lost.”
With its high-domed ceiling and deep stage, the historic Dixon Theatre, where the benefit was held, and which was the beneficiary of th

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UK - White Light was recently chosen to oversee a bespoke lighting installation in the Making the Modern World gallery - one of the flagship galleries at the Science Museum, London. The gallery features some of the museum’s most remarkable objects and artefacts, such as the Apollo 10 Command Module and the first-ever Apple computer, that are now illuminated by SGM’s R-2 Rail Lights.
“I was looking for a source that could fulfill a range of functions, including daytime exhibition lighting and event lighting. As a result, I needed a fixture that allowed full remote control of colour and intensity,” explained WL’s lighting designer, Jason Larcombe, in regard to choosing SGM’s R-2s.
WL was asked to deliver a system that would keep the museum’s existing look during the day, yet have the ability to be transformed at night for special events.
“I

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UK - Liverpool-based rental and production specialist Adlib supplied lighting and sound equipment and crew to the recent Just Passing Through acoustic tour by American singer / songwriter and musician Ray LaMontagne.
The UK dates saw the artist get up close to his fans in an intimate touring environment, joined onstage by Wilco bassist Jon Stirratt. It’s the first acoustic tour by LaMontagne for seven years and has been “extremely successful”.
The production team was led by production manager Mark Jones. Adlib provided an L-Acoustics K2 sound system with system tech Mike Thorpe and the lighting rig was looked after by Adlib’s Kevin Byatt.
The K2 was actually specified by Mark Jones and LaMontagne’s FOH engineer Ryan Pickett was very happy to go with that decision, “It’s such a smooth and ‘musical’ speaker and that’s why Mark chose it a

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Germany - Countless parties take place on May Day in Germany and this year one of the best took place in Cologne as hometown band Brings rocked Lanxess Arena with a high-energy Polka Party. TSL Production of Cologne supported the event as the full-service technical provider and used a full complement of Elation lighting gear to support the rock ‘n’ roll show.
Brings have been performing for over 25 years and the evening proved a nostalgic journey through the band’s long list of hits. Some 13,000 guests attended the four-hour concert, which took place in combination with an after-show party. Lighting design was by Dominik Schmid, head of lighting for Brings, along with Frank Schmitz, technical supervisor and owner of TSL Production.
TSL Production supports Brings as technical provider at all their concerts and developed the entire technical concept (lighting, vi

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UK - LM Productions has added two new AV products to its expanding rental fleet.
The Eastbourne-based event production company has taken delivery of Digital Projection new M-Vision Laser projectors. These projectors pack a real punch at 18’000 lumens and 10’000:1 contrast ratios and produce amazing images, says the company. All LMP’s rental projectors come complete in flying frames ready to go and we offer 8’000 to 35’000 lumens and everything in between. LMP has also added a Kinetic lighting system with over 150 pieces. This system offers high performance DMX winches with a drop of up to 6m coupled with 25cm RGB LED lighting spheres and is controlled by the latest Matrix5 software & hardware systems.
The Kinetic lighting system is modular and offers the flexibility to configure to bespoke designs. The system had been well received on a recent project of

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China - Daydream Festival, first staged in Belgium in 2010, is a multi-national music festival that has travelled to Mexico, Spain and the Netherlands, and landed in China in April 2018. Daydream China boasted more than 54 international artists playing across three stages in Shanghai International Music Park.
The organisers chose NEXT-proaudio for the Bass Dream Stage, with the equipment supplied by Real Music, local distributor for NEXT-proaudio.
The main hang was 10 LA212x per side, and 24 LAs418 stacked in front of the stage as low-end-fill. The DJ monitor featured two LAs118 plus three LA122 per side and another four X15 deployed as the floor monitors.
Richie Wang, Real Music’s CEO, adds: “The sound pressure on the Bass Dream Stage with LA212x was amazing.”
(Jim Evans)

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South Africa - South African rock band Prime Circle have acquired Robe lighting fixtures for their current live tour. DWR Distribution supplied Robe MiniPointes, Robin LEDBeam 150s, Robe VIVAs and a Le Maitre MVS Hazer.
“We’ve worked with DWR for quite some time now and the products are just amazing,” said Marco Gomes, bass guitarist and Prime Circle’s manager. “We firstly wanted to get lighting kit for touring purposes, but we also wanted to make sure that the product would be right. To us, there is no better product than the Robe gear.”
Prime Circle are currently touring their seventh album If you don’t you never will. Their new gear includes eight Robe MiniPointes, eight Robin LEDBeam 150s, two Robin VIVAs and a Le Maitre MVS Hazer.
“We are excited and hope that this will up our game, up our touring, and take the performance a step highe

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UK - Christie Lites UK has made a major investment in Kinesys automation equipment. The stage lighting company’s British operation has purchased 24 half-tonne Liftket motors with Kinesys Elevation 1+ vari-speed controllers, complete with LibraCELL load monitoring shackle pins and the brand’s powerful and flexible Vector control software package.
Christie Lites UK account handler Andy Strachan comments: “Kinesys is constantly appearing on riders and technical specifications - a strong sign of their success and that is across all sectors of our work - corporate and industrial, concert touring, television and theatre”.
Christie Lites CEO and founder Huntly Christie made the decision to go with Kinesys, together with Andy Strachan, Roy Hunt and Mathew Ilott who are all part of the Christie Lites UK’s account management team.
The Kinesys investment is an in

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Finland - Hippotizer is the media server of choice for Finnish National Opera and Ballet’s landmark production to mark 100 years of Finland’s independence.
The Finnish National Opera and Ballet (FNOB) marked 100 years of Finnish independence with a number of exclusive events. Its headline event, Land of Kalevala, premiered in November 2017 running for 26 performances until February 2018.
Taking place in the FNOB’s home base, the Opera House in Helsinki, Kenneth Greve’s ballet spectacle explores the very essence of Finland and the Finns through dance. The team behind this occasion was very carefully assembled, with Mikki Kunttu taking charge of set, lighting and projection design.
The main concept of the stage design was 38, 12m tall pillars flying through space, creating different three-dimensional scenes and transitions. Mikki’s wish was to crea

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USA - The annual Billboard Latin Music Conference landed in Las Vegas in April with a series of star-studded events featuring Avolites-controlled lighting supplied by Miami-based production specialist 3G Productions.
The four-day conference was held at The Venetian hotel's Marcello Ballroom and hosted a series of performances and talks from Latin music stars including Steve Aoki, Maluma and Bad Bunny. The conference's audio, lighting and video were provided by 3G, who this year introduced Avolites consoles for the first time following the company's recent investment in the brand's Titan and Ai ranges.
"We've been doing this event for 12 years in conjunction with our client ACME Productions," says Juan Ugas, 3G's lighting sales manager and production manager for the conference. "ACME trust our ability to be able to control the conference's various shows live and delive

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UK - The National Theatre has embarked on a ‘progressive upgrade’, predominantly of its Martin TW1 halogen tungsten wash inventory. This month, the theatre took delivery of a total of 42 MAC Encores from Martin by Harman dealer Stage Electrics. All 42 units have been installed in the permanent rig at the Olivier Theatre.
The acquisition forms part of a 10-year plan, as Paul Hornsby, the NT’s lighting resources manager, explains. “We review which equipment has reached end of life and decide what needs to be retired first - but the decision is driven by LDs as well. We only go dark for five days a year and we managed to replace these on the rig without losing a show.”
The purchase was authorised jointly by Hornsby, head of lighting Matt Drury, and Jack Williams, lighting supervisor for the Olivier Theatre, following a three-day evaluation against a number of co

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Hungary - Event management company TéDé Rendezvények has invested in a Martin Audio Wavefront Precision Series (WPC) system. The order comprised iKON iK42 amplifiers and was completed via Martin Audio distributor BG Event Kft.
The new PA debuted at the two-day Bősi Motoros Találkozó (Bősi Motorcycle Meeting), with 10 bands entertaining 2,000 people. “We received a lot of positive feedback from visiting technicians, many of them amazed by the sound of the system. It not only delivered power but pure, highly intelligible sound in every way.”
According to Balázs Szentiványi, purchasing manager at BG Event Kft., the idea of upgrading the rental company’s inventory came about as soon as Martin Audio announced the Wavefront Precision family. He says: “TéDé already owned a W8LM Mini system and since they are on a healthy growth path they were in need of a l
  1. Funktion-One and MC2 at World Cup stadium
  2. Allen & Heath dLive in the mix for BFMV
  3. Danley brings clarity to Cathedral Church
  4. Chauvet shines on Steely Dane
  5. Ashly amps revamp county courthouse
  6. DiGiCo and dot2s at SU Woordfees festival
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