USA - As New Yorkers celebrated the arrival of 2016, several thousand EDM fans rocked out at Big Week NYC, a series of concerts produced by RPM Presents and staged at Pier 94 and Pier 36 in the city's famous waterfront area. Performances by international artists like Rudimental, Nicky Romero, Knife Party, Future, Travis Scott, local heroes Chainsmokers, and young Dutch rising star Oliver Heldens were illuminated by Robe fixtures selected by Kevin Mignone, owner of New York-based KM Productions.

Kevin, searching for a new look to the lighting and a change from the moving light brand t

USA - Jack U, Steve Aoki, Zeds Dead, Flosstradamus, Big Sean and other EDM heavies are headlining the current Life In Color 'Kingdom' Tour, which is selling out venues in the US and UK. The set features a large replica of a lion, 56ft wide by 43ft tall, towering over the stage, with bright, blinking, moving eyes that are animated by Chauvet Professional's video panels.

"The eyes make the lion come alive and touch everyone in the audience," said Daniel Bouchard, production director of Life in Color, the popular festival, which this year is featuring the lion as part of its K

China - The renowned Martha Graham Dance Company recently toured China, giving audiences new insight into 20th-century American culture.

For performances at the Shanghai Grand Theatre (SGT), lighting designer Nick Hung added a new dimension to Graham's classics by using numerous Source Four LED fixtures controlled by a Gio lighting control system. ETC's Chinese dealer, Hangzhou YiDaShi Lighting Equipment Co, also played a significant role in the event, by providing technical support for the show.

The programme at SGT, Three Masters of 20th Century Art, featured several of G

UK - Award-winning acoustics and theatre consultants, Sound Space Design and Anne Minors Performance Consultants have combined to form Sound Space Vision. The move formalises their long-standing working relationship and will continue to build on their success in performance, education and assembly spaces, as well as broadening their reach within the built environment.

Sound Space Vision enhances the rapport between performers and audiences, combining excellent spatial and technical design by AMPC with superb acoustics from SSD. Popular with audiences and operators, their performance

Germany - The German Rock & Pop Music Association's annual Rock & Pop Award competition, supporting Germany's young musicians, has been hugely influential for over three decades. This year the 33rd edition took place at the 4300-capacity Siegerlandhalle in Siegen.

PR Lighting's German partner, Focon Showtechnic, was brought in by technical production company, BST Becker Studio Technik, to provide PR Lighting's PR5000 Spots and Beams to add further impact to the show. These met the requirement of the light designers, Claudia Cronauer and Christian Conrad. Focon product manager, Jens O

UK - Lighting designer James Bawn has employed the Clay Paky SuperSharpy to play an instrumental role in a range of recent architectural projects, including projecting light over vast distances from the iconic Victoria Tower in Huddersfield and a special one-night installation at the Halifax Transmitting Tower.

Yorkshire-based roofing company Ploughcroft commissioned Bawn to create a stunning light show at the Halifax tower to celebrate reaching a huge milestone in energy saving for homes, schools and businesses across the county. Named Ploughcroft Eco Northern Lights, the lig

On The Campaign Trail - Adele has issued a statement to distance herself from Donald Trump, after he used her music at his rallies. The Republican presidential candidate, whose slogan is "Make America great again", has recently been playing Adele's hit Rolling In The Deep as his "warm-up" music. "Adele has not given permission for her music to be used for any political campaigning," her spokesman confirmed.

It is not the first time Trump has been criticised for appropriating pop songs. Lawyers for Aerosmith star Steven Tyler sent Trump's campaign

Canada - Chroma-QColor One 100 premium performance, IP65-rated LED PARs have provided a powerful yet energy-efficient lighting solution to beam bold colours, soft pastels and stunning whites onto the massive exterior façade of the Toronto Power Generating Station - playing against the background of the national historic site at Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada.

, with millions of sparkling lights making up beautifully illuminated displays. Recently, the organisers have made a concerted effort to utilize only power-saving LED technology for their lighting designs.

Shear Display was

UK - TSL Lighting has acquired London-based rental company Point Source Productions. The move will see both companies' teams and rental equipment combining at TSL's premises during February 2016. Point Source's rental, projects and operations staff have also joined TSL. Customers will retain the same point of contact, levels of quality, service and value for money, say TSL.

Hire manager John Beer comments: "This is a huge step forward for our customers, myself, Ian and all the team joining TSL from Point Source. The operational systems, warehouse space and extra products availab

Italy - Popular Italian comedian Angelo Pintus was joined on stage by Clay Paky Sharpys for his recent tour. The show featured Pintus's simple, natural humour, his musical skills and his talent as an impersonator. Last year's show at the Mediolanum Forum marked the beginning of a period of technical cooperation between Leader Sound and Angelo Pintus's production team. Lighting designer Gianluca Brunelli put together a lighting rig for the over 60 tour dates in various theatres and for the show at the Forum.

Brunelli decided to put a few Sharpy units on the stage floor: "They wer

UK - Theatre designer Johanna Town made the most of Robe's new DL4S Profile fixture when lighting Pine at the Hampstead Theatre in London.

The setting for Jacqui Honess-Martin's new festive tragi-comedy is a Christmas tree retailer and the action spans a month over December from early morning to midnight. The witty and incisive narrative incites laughter and tears as a group of 20-somethings from mixed backgrounds and experiences sell Christmas trees from a street outlet ... along the way singing all those gloriously clichéd Christmas songs you love ... and hate!!!

H

USA - The sold-out Madness Fall Tour by Canadian singer, songwriter and record producer, The Weeknd, in support of his third studio album, Beauty Behind the Madness, was a spectacular production, with set and lighting design by LeRoy Bennett of Seven Design Works. It incorporated over 650 lighting fixtures from Ayrton - including 'every available IntelliPix-R fixture on the planet' - to help realise a design concept that delivered a multiplicity of looks from the subtly atmospheric to a totally engulfing spectacle.

The music of Abel Tesfaye, the musician known as The Weeknd, i

UK - Blinding Light, the corporate and event lighting specialist has announced that following the company's success and significant growth in 2015, it has now completed a move to new larger premises.

Consisting of over 20,000sq.ft, the new facility has warehouse space to provide ample storage to support the company's expanded inventory and growth for the future. There will also be dedicated prep & pre-production spaces for incoming crews to oversee and prepare larger shows prior to despatch to site, plus a dedicated space to allow clients to hold production meetings.

The new facil

World - Showlight (Florence, Italy, 20-23 May 2017) is now inviting lighting designers and directors, associates, programmers, scenographers, equipment manufacturers and others to submit their ideas for conference papers for the 2017 programme. Now is your chance to be part of this prestigious event!

The Showlight Quadrennial is one of the few international events organised specifically for lighting professionals by lighting professionals across the performance, television, film, architectural and event worlds. Held every four years, Showlight 2017 takes place in Florence and celebra

USA - The Rialto Center for the Arts, Atlanta, has seen its share of inspired performances since it opened its doors in 1916, but it's doubtful that anything in the 100-year history of this legendary venue ever surpassed the raw energy level at the BMI Trailblazers Awards. Sponsored by the largest music rights organization in the US, the invitation-only event honoured the outstanding achievers in gospel music.

The brightest stars in the gospel genre were there, including Grammy-winning sibling acts, BeBe & CeCe Winans and Mary Mary; so too were R&B stars. Together, they rocked the ho

Germany - Rental company HELi Showequipment of Mainz has recently made a purchase of Elation Professional ACL Series narrow-beam LED effect lights. HELI Showequipment has acquired 150 of Elation's new ACL 360i single-beam moving effects as well as a supply of Elation's ACL 360 Bar colour-changing bar luminaires with continuous rotation.

"Elation is an excellent company and the ACL 360i and the ACL 360 Bar fixtures are reflective of that," stated Uwe Heinrich, CEO at HELi Showequipment, which also stocks Elation's Pixel Bar luminaires in its inventory. "The accuracy and

Ireland - When Dublin based Lightsource were looking to replace their existing fleet of LED Pars, which were nearing end of life and no longer supported, owner Billy Mahedy's attention turned last year to SGM's P-5. "This solved all the problems, giving us everything we wanted and more," he said. "And because we are expanding a lot more into the outdoor market the versatility of an IP65-rated fixture was perfect."

And so when SGM launched the smaller P-2 wash light, in a similar low profile chassis but this time weighing just 6.1 kilos he knew it would extend the

Italy - Vacanze Romane (Roman Holiday) is back, 12 years after its debut at the Teatro Sistina in Rome. The opening of the 2015-2016 theatre season was entrusted to the notes of this musical, lit by Clay Paky. It was written by Armando Trovajoli and Pietro Garinei, and again starred Serena Autieri and Paolo Conticini. The play is a musical take on post-WWII Rome, inspired by the film of the same name by William Wyler, with Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn.

Lighting designer Francesco Adinolfi has already taken part in a theatrical project starring Serena Autieri: he was involve

South Africa - DWR is hosting the Robe Roadshow. Josef Valchar and Harry von den Stemmen from Robe and DWR's Duncan and Bruce Riley, Robert Izzett and Nick Britz will visit Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town.

New products on show will include the Robe Square, BMFL WashBeam, Viva, Robin DL7S, DL4S, Robe Strobe, Robin 1000 LEDBeam and Robin CycBar.

The dates are: Monday 8 February, Johannesburg; Wednesday, 10 February, Durban; Friday 12 February, Cape Town.

(Jim Evans)

Australia - Novatech Creative Event Technology have become the first Australian owners of the X4 Atom fixture from German Light Products (GLP).

"Sometimes you get that feeling, and you know that it's going to be a good, successful product," says Novatech's managing director, Leko Novakovic. "Novatech have purchased 48 units of X4 Atom, and four external power and control units. In addition to their creative potential, the X4 Atom's optics and colour output match the rest of our existing inventory of GLP fixtures."

Novatech's X4 Atom rig has already had its firs

Israel - Gil Teichman is one of the most flamboyant figures on the Israeli lighting design and production scene He is also a regular investor in Robe products.

His eponymously named company, Gil Teichman, purchased their first Robes some years ago, and in fact he's known of Robe right since the start in the 1990s, when they were an OEM manufacturer. The first ever Gil Teichman purchases were of the ColorWash and ColorSpot 1200 series, around nine years ago, followed by the 700E AT series, all delivered through Robe's Israeli distributor, Danor Theatre & Studio Systems.

A strong re

USA - In response to recent growth and in line with the company's strategic expansion plans, Elation Professional has announced several new appointments in its key headquarter sales staff. Elation sales director Eric Loader comments, "As part of a sales team realignment which will present new opportunities for our extremely committed sales team, these changes are designed to better support our dealer/distributor/rep network, offering more coverage and increased focus on established and developing markets."

The appointments see John Lopez, a 15-year veteran with the company,

USA - PixelFLEX has announced the appointment of Grif Palmer as its new vice-president of sales. With a wealth of industry knowledge and experience, Palmer will oversee the day-to-day operations of the PixelFLEX sales team while implementing the sales strategies necessary to keep pace with the increased market demand for the innovative line of PixelFLEX LED video technologies.

"We could not be happier about the introduction of Grif Palmer as our new vice president of sales for PixelFLEX," said Monty Rains, president and COO. "He has a very distinguished career in the t

UK - A new advert for the Android and iOS-compatible Huawei Watch features a projection mapped disused theatre space powered by Avolites Ai S4 servers.

Boomerang Television was commissioned to create the new watch commercial, featuring a dancer who moves in time to his own heartbeat, which is being monitored and displayed by the device. Dylan Wyn Davies, executive producer at Boomerang approached UK-based Rhodri Shaw, now director of Transition Video Ltd, to create the 3D visuals and projection mapping.

"Boomerang wanted 3D visuals that went in time with the music, accelerati

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