Sweden - Wireless Solution Sweden delivered an interference-free DMX signal at the 2008 Nobel Prize Banquet. This is one of the highest profile events of the year in Sweden. It is always held in the Blue Hall of Stockholm City Hall on 10 December. In addition to the King and Queen of Sweden, approximately 1,300 guests attend the event, and it is broadcast live on television.

Per Sundin was again called in as lighting designer for the event, an honour bestowed upon him for 12 consecutive years. Ola Melzig was production manager, overseeing all aspects of lighting and video from build

UK - This month, Hever Castle in Kent is hosting a Christmas spectacular featuring carols and music, huskies and illuminated gardens. The organisers have created an opportunity to view Hever Castle by moonlight, as the castle is adorned with traditionally decorated Christmas trees and the gardens illuminated.

Philips has sponsored the lighting for the festivities which also features a giant snowflake projected onto the front of the castle. This was created using Martin Professional's new Exterior 1200 Image Projector.

The Exterior 1200 Image Projector is the newest addition to Marti

USA - Elation Professional has introduced a low-lying fog effect machine that doesn't require dry ice or any connections to external units. The company's Antari DNG-200 Low Fog Generator is a self-contained unit that produces a continuous output of low-lying fog while running on X-Fog Ice fog fluid.

Featuring a 3M fog conducting hose, the DNG-200 creates low-lying fog straight from its nozzle, just like a regular fog machine. With no CO2 installation to hassle with, the DMX-controllable DNG-200 is operator-friendly, says the company.

"Until now, most low-lying fog machines had

UK - Video was used for the first time to project giant images onto the 353ft high Shell Building on the South Bank of the River Thames for the Mayor of London's 2008-09 New Year's Eve celebrations.

E/T/C London created a projection concept and suggested that they harness the flexibility and power of video for the first time on this event, on which E/T/C has worked for producers Jack Morton Worldwide for the last five years. With LG Electronics coming onboard as a new sponsor, they wanted to up the production values, making the show something extra special and more spectacular this ye

UK - For the first time in the UK, G-LEC is to open a dedicated sales office. Based in central London, G-LEC UK will manage all sales for architectural and other installations, as well as supporting G-LEC's UK rental partners.

Until now, rental projects have been the focus of G-LEC's business in the UK, but Lars Wolf, managing director of G-LEC Europe, wants to begin to put more emphasis on the company's new architectural products, saying, "Chimera, which we launched at PLASA this year, is a strong product for us. We already have 700sq.m installed in the BMW Museum in Munich, and

UK - XL Events is supplying audio and video equipment plus four crew for the CBeeBies Live Treasure Hunt UK arena tour which is being production managed by Nigel Mousley for BBC Worldwide.

XL Events' Rich Rowley says: "This is the fourth year that I have been involved in this project and every year brings a new set of challenges. This year we were looking at big rear projected images with the addition of a 'lifesize' giraffe and elephant to contend with. As you can imagine some pretty creative keystoning was needed to allow the beasts to move around backstage."

Ade

UAE - ORB, the fully mechanised LED globe, has caught the attention of the Middle East. It is now in the hands of set and stage rental company, IBS Decor LLC, which has secured the exclusive sales and rental agreement for the region.

"Although we only took delivery of the ORB very recently, we have already arranged for it to be used at the closing ceremony of Dubai Film Festival and at the Shakira concert in Abu Dhabi," says Nick de Fay, sales manager LED Products for IBS Decor.

"We feel the potential in this market for ORB is excellent," he continues. "In a

Serbia - Operacija Trijumf is one of Serbia's most popular television shows, combining a singing talent contest with Big Brother-style behind-the-scenes footage of the contestants in their shared house. Forming the backdrop on the stage during the contestants' performances, Lighthouse R10i/o 10mm LED panels are deployed.

66 panels of R10i/o LED panels, purchased by Operacija Trijumf production company Emotion Production, formed four screens on the stage.

"We choose the R10 panels partly on recommendation and partly because the only other LED screens current

Europe & Middle East - GearSource Europe has been appointed as the official Christie Digital Partner to sell their B stock products in the EMEA region.

Garry Nelsson of GearSource said: "GearSource Europe has quickly established itself as the premier web site for industry insiders wishing to buy or sell pre-owned lighting, sound, staging and video equipment. The association with Christie will enable us to offer even more video related products to our many users in the UK, Europe, Middle East and Africa".

Dale Miller, vice-president EMEA, Christie explains: "Our busine

Denmark - Maxedia Broadcast, the latest generation of Martin Professional's user-friendly Maxediamedia composer and playback device, is optimised for High Definition playback with ultra fast quad core processors, 1080p playback support and two dedicated engine outputs, says the company.

Two powerful graphics cards provide a dedicated user interface plus two engine outputs. Each output can be split over a maximum of three displays for custom wide-screen projections, allowing a maximum of six projectors to be connected to Maxedia Broadcast. Maxedia Broadcast supports a full pixelmapping

UK - MTFX has just invested in some new 5 way Firedance units. "MTFX's Firedance flames have been so popular with our customersthat I wanted to take them to their next level, which are these new 5 way compact units," says managing director Mark Turner.

"Each unit is light weight, compact and gives you a fantastic spread from such a small footprint. They are ideal for use on pitches and other sports arena and literally add a new dimension to flame effects. The other advantage is that the flames can now be coloured green, red, blue as well as the standard orange."

UK - Two Catalyst digital media servers are being used to great effect on the Kings of Leon Only By The Night tour in an integrated visuals show created by live visuals director Phil Haynes, lighting co-designer/director Ali Bale, creative designer & co-LD Paul Normandale and live video director Phil Woodhead.

The Catalysts - running a pre-release version of the latest V4.2 software which gives 10 submixes on 16 layers - are outputting the nine-camera IMAG mix and assorted playback content to 1000 tiles of Barco MiTrix screen and 270 Element Labs VersaTube HDs.

These latest s

UK - Set up by the Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG), the Digital Lab is a new £50 million facility at the University of Warwick in Coventry, designed as a high-quality research environment.

Its mission is to become the world's first multi-disciplinary centre, enabling leading digital experts to come together and deliver research, which can impact on all sectors of the economy. The Lab will initially focus on Digital Healthcare, Digital Manufacturing and Service, promoting innovation and boosting research opportunities between academics and user organisations.

The facility pro

France - The town of Asnières sur Seine just outside Paris has decided upon a new Innovason Sy80 digital mixing console to complete its AV inventory.

Thierry Plenier, who runs the AV department with department head William Baruch, comments: "I was fascinated by the Muxipaire (digital snake) when it first came out, and when we bought our first digital console in 2002, if I'd had the budget, I'd have bought a Compact Live. As it was, we went for another solution, which has served us well until now, but we are reaching the ceiling of its limitations in terms of mix capacity, and ou

Canada - Ross Video has announced the appointment of Jan Mills, as director, marketing communications. He enters his new position after 31 years with Ross, spending the last 10 years as media marketing manager.

"This promotion recognises the significant impact that Jan has made over the past 31 years with Ross. Jan has been instrumental in building and promoting our brand and communicating the innovation and integrity that it stands for." said Jeff Moore, executive vice president, sales &marketing. "

(Jim Evans)

UK - The Production, Operations and Artistic teams of Cirque du Soleil are currently looking for passionate individuals of all levels of experience to fill upcoming positions in a wide range of theatre-related technical fields, including automation, rigging, sound, lighting, carpentry, props, wardrobe, video/projection, stage management, artistic direction, technical direction and project/production management.

In an effort to attract the right people to fill these many roles, the company is hosting a recruitment event in London on Tuesday, 3 February 2009. This 'Red Curtain Recruitme

UK - dnp has announced the release of a new Ceiling Cassette for discreet installation of the retractable dnp Supernova Flex Screen. This will be available in the UK through distributors, Paradigm AV.

"Eight out of 10 installations with retractable front projection screens are currently ceiling-mounted, so we anticipate a dramatic increase in sales as a result of the introduction of the Ceiling Cassette for the Supernova Flex. This new installation option will undoubtedly drive new business for installers who work with the Supernova Flex Screens," says general manager of dnp

Spain - Design consultants Equipo 63 from Madrid approached Czech-based trussing manufacturers Milos to custom build a large stand for their client at London's World Travel Market exhibition, staged at the ExCel Centre.

Equipo 63 are known for their innovative approach to design and build projects of all types, and are always keen to incorporate cutting edge technology in the process.

They have worked with Milos and used their products on many previous projects. On this occasion, the Equipo 63 team designed the stand, which included a 12 x 12sq.m 'crown' flown above, holding a 10m d

Norway -projectiondesign will use Integrated Systems Europe 2009 to showcase a completely updated range of professional projectors, as well as the range of high-end home theatre products, and the latest in 3D stereographic projection systems.

Anders L°kke, international marketing and communications manager, notes the irony of projectiondesign this year choosing to showcase its products inside a 'blackbox'. "Given that many of our projectors are used in research applications which, for political, scientific, or commercial reasons are top-secret, it seems rather appropriate for

Belgium - Arkaos has released its latest media server software, Media Master. First announced at the PLASA show in London, the software is now, after months of final development and testing, shipping with immediate effect. Media Master has been designed specifically with show and lighting market in mind.

Built on ArKaos' latest generation of technology, Media Master runs perfectly and reliably on standard laptops or can play up to eight full frames-per-second HD movies on an octo-core server, says the company.

Media Master's new interface has been designed to give lighting designers

UK - Following the launch of Animotion Live, AV solutions company PSP has introduced another new concept to the market - 3D-holocube. PSP is working closely with the UK distributor, activ8-3D, which also delivers the 3D projection platform for the Animotion Live system.

3D-holocube provides an alternative advertising medium and offers a new way of enhancing brand experience. Ideal for point of sale applications within the retail market, product launches and live events and exhibitions, 3D-Holocube is a fully integrated, mini 3D holographic system that creates 3D video holograms to del

Norway - Succeeding the F30 series of DLP projectors, the new F32 series from projectiondesign is now shipping in SXGA+, 1080p and WUXGA image resolutions.

Like all of the company's new wave of product platforms, the F32 features Philips' latest VIDI lamp technology, along with completely revised colour management and configuration options. To these, the F32 adds active cooling, which enhances reliability and prolongs useful product life for a lower total cost of ownership, says the company.

The F32 offers projectiondesign's DuArch dual illumination architecture with 'hot swappable'

UK - Live event and audiovisual hire specialist First Network is the first UK company to add the new Panasonic PT-DZ12000 projectors to its product portfolio.

Dennis Georgiou of First Network reports: "We have been very pleased with the performance and popularity of the Panasonic range of projectors and have maintained a good stock, so investing in the PT-DZ 12000 was a natural progression. The features guaranteed from Panasonic, such as high resolution, clarity and brightness, along with Panasonic's sales and technical support, have often convinced our purchasing decisions their

UK - Exhibiting at The ARC Show for the first time, G-LEC UK will be showing its newest architectural LED lighting product, Chimera. Suitable for museums, interior design, themed spaces and hotel and corporate reception areas, the first installation is in the BMW Museum in Munich, where 700m² form an impressive media façade for BMW Square, the heart of the museum.

Combining two existing products - LEDs and printed circuit boards - G-LEC's Chimera is one of the first products to offer absolute flexibility of shape without compromising control over individual LEDs, offering designers

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