USA - Bruno Mars and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers were given a dazzling backdrop to their performances at the Super Bowl XLVIII Half Time show at the MetLife Stadium, New Jersey, on 2 February by Bob Barnhart's spectacular lighting.

Barnhart, of Full Flood, LA, incorporated 220 Ayrton MagicPanel 602 fixtures into his design to enhance the vibrancy and dynamism of the performances on stage.

The MagicPanel fixtures were arrayed in two massive, raked banks which flanked the performance area and served to extend the visual impact of the stage within the massive 82,500-seat stadium. The MagicPanel banks were arranged in two 'chevron' shapes which were mounted on custom-made risers that rose from 4" at the front of the stage to 11" at the back with each row staggered to sit 6&

Australia - Having regularly used Optocore products for events requiring custom audio distribution, Australian rental staging company, Novatech Creative Event Technology, has now gone further.

The company first adopted Optocore systems back in 2012. According to project manager (audio), James Sacca, "At the time we were looking for a solution that would transport multiple channels of audio as sends and returns. Due to the nature of the particular event, we also needed something that could be quickly cabled after a series of road closures.

The multimode fibre made this an easy task. We were more than happy with the reliability and performance that Optocore products offered and our system design engineers have continued to utilise Optocore products ever since."

Most recently they have purchased a series of X6R-FX converters, equipped with AES I/O, to move up from ana

UK - Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway returned to TV screens on Saturday 22 February with the promise of a daring and dangerous head to head challenge for the stars of the show. Entitled Men on a Ledge, the terrified twosome (one of whom has a real fear of heights), were escorted outside onto the ITV studio roof and prepared to take part in a race from the top of the 90m high ITV tower down to the ground.

The stunt was planned and executed by Unusual Rigging's technical director Robin Elias, who explained, "Men on a Ledge is the latest in a list of Ant and Dec challenges we've worked on. We were presented with a 'wish list' by the show's producer about five weeks ago, outlining his vision for the challenge. It was our job to find a solution and design the systems to enable it to happen."

From the beginning of the project, Robin knew there would be

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Case Study: Hans Zimmer Live

When award winning film composer Hans Zimmer brought his smash-hit tour Hans Zimmer Live to North America fall 2024, the show's audio team sought out to bring infrafrequency bass to the show to add new depth to the show's audio experience. The team chose Danley Sound Labs.

UK - Following the success of last year's events, A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd's Video division - the exclusive UK dealer for Green Hippo media servers and LedGo video display solutions, and an official partner for Christie Digital projectors - are holding more UK video open days in conjunction with these leading brands, on Tuesday 1 April (AC-ET North, Leeds) / Thursday 3 April (AC-ET South, High Wycombe).

The events will showcase the latest innovations from these marques at the forefront of video production in the entertainment sector, as well as demonstrating how these complementary technologies together provide versatile video system solutions.

Green Hippo's Hippotizer media servers range continues to develop new features and components, ensuring its footholding as the market leader in video and media control solutions. Products showcased include the new Rac

USA / UK - Electrosonic reports that March 2014 marks the 50th anniversary of the company's founding. In 1964 the company started with two rooms in London's Greenwich vegetable market. Five decades later, Electrosonic is an international, multi-million dollar business with headquarters in Burbank, California, and offices worldwide.

Electrosonic's story is complex but in many ways it parallels the history of audio-visual technology, and provides a window into how the industry and its services and products have changed.

Founded by Denis Naisbitt, Michael Ray and Robert Simpson, the company opened with the strapline "Electronic Control and Audio Systems". From the start, Electrosonic combined the manufacturing and selling of products with the building of complete engineered systems. Key product categories included electronic lighting control, multi-image slide projectio

South Africa - Stage Audio Works Technology and Engineering Group has established itself firmly, not only on the South African horizon, but also within the African continent. Building on this maxim, the company has announced the acquisition of Event Technology Namibia, a long-standing sales partner, resulting in the opening of the Southern African office based in Windhoek.

The 1350sq.m warehouse and office space will service customers across Namibia, Angola, Zambia and other neighbouring countries, offering quicker access to stock of a diverse product range, support, product service, training and much more.

Commenting on the new office, branch manager Joppie Maritz, said, "Setting up our new office in Namibia underpins our commitment to the territory. The new office will offer demonstration and training facilities and a diverse inventory ready for same-day dispatch."

Russia - At the XXII Olympic Winter Games organised by the Sochi Organizing Committee (SOC), part of the competitions were held in Krasnaja Poljana (the ski resort 45 km away from Sochi), while the heart of the Games - the Olympic village - was located on the Black Sea coast, in the town of Adler, 28 km from Sochi.

All the buildings surround a central water basin, where it is located the Medals Plaza.

The Medals Plaza was the heart of the village. Here, the award ceremonies took place every evening, giving prizes to the winning athletes of the various competitions; the medal assignment of the Olympic Winter Games 2014 was interchanged with musical performances by Russian and international artists.

DTS was present in the Medals Plaza with its products: 285 D.T.S. moving heads (203 x RAPTOR, 40 x MAX and 42 x NRG 1201), were installed on the stage; 149 RAPTOR were hanged to a

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OPUS X4 PROFILE – the most powerful LED moving head from Cameo to date

The OPUS® X4 PROFILE is the new flagship model from Cameo and is among the most powerful LED moving heads on the market. Equipped with a 1,400-watt LED white light engine, this spot profile moving head produces an enormous light output of 50,000 lm, providing powerful spot and gobo projections on even the largest stages and much more.
www.cameolight.com

UK - Pirates, mermaids and a boy who can fly without wires come to life under the sculptural throw of Clay Paky's Alpha Profile 1500s in Music Hall founder Geert Alaert's £10m video-mapped arena spectacular - Peter Pan, The Never Ending Story.

The technically ambitious show presented Belgium-based lighting designer Luc Peumans with a worthy challenge as he negotiated 'lighting light' on the production's projection based set.

"It's a completely different approach to lighting design, because the projection dictates the colour and mood as well as the angles of the key light," explains Peumans. "In addition, everything is meticulously timed. I specified the Clay Paky Alpha Profile 1500s as the rig's workhorses because of the sheer power of the beam and their quick dynamic response function, which worked perfectly with the fast-moving animation."

UK - A collaborative event industry skills initiative, formed in 2010 by Delta Sound and White Light, welcomes Metro Broadcast and The Royal Albert Hall to the 2014 undergraduate programme. The growing initiative is an educational programme for stage technicians at the UK's leading universities and theatre schools aiming for a career in live events. The initiative helps prepare students for work and provides an opportunity to gain valuable insights into the industry offering advice on production planning, project management, creating a CV and interview tips.

The initiative reaches out to students of RADA, Central School of Speech and Drama, Academy of Live and Recorded Arts, Mountview Academy, Rose Bruford College and the Guildford School of Acting.

This project was originally created by Delta Sound's projects director Lee Dennison, and Head of Events at White Light, Stuart Cr

Europe - In response to growing industry demand, PLASA Events Ltd has announced that two new PLASA Focus events will take place in Europe during 2014.

The first of these new events - and the first PLASA Focus to be staged in mainland Europe - will take place this summer, when PLASA Focus: Brussels open its doors in the heart of Belgium's capital city, on 1-2 July. PLASA Events reports that initial interest from exhibitors has been very positive, with over 30 companies already applying for space in Brussels, including brands such as ADJ, Chauvet, d&b audiotechnik, Robe and Shure.

Having introduced the successful PLASA Focus event model in Leeds, UK, in 2009 and subsequently in various cities across North America, PLASA has long been aware of the market's desire for more of this type of event in Europe. The BeNeLux region was one of the first to be considered for a regional mark

Welcome Home - The Liverpool Everyman theatre has re-opened after being rebuilt at a cost of £27m. The Everyman became famous in the 1970s for launching the careers of actors like Bill Nighy, Julie Walters, Pete Postlethwaite and Sir Anthony Sher. Its rebirth comes as Liverpool City Council plans to cut its culture budget by 50% by 2017, although the council said the Everyman would be protected. The first production on the new stage will be Shakespeare's Twelfth Night starring Matthew Kelly and Nicholas Woodeson, which opens on 8 March.

Kelly and Woodeson are returning 40 years after being part of the illustrious Everyman company of the mid-1970s. The talent at that time also included actors Bernard Hill, Jonathan Pryce, Alison Steadman and Trevor Eve, writers Alan Bleasdale and Willy Russell, singer Barbara Dickson and poets Roger McGough and Adrian Mitchell. The t

Germany - LDR has announced a new addition to its range of followspots for the entertainment lighting industry, Astro 200 W LED.

Designed for the professionals, Astro is billed as the most powerful LED followspot available on the market.

The power of the 200W LED module is enhanced by a state of the art optical design which results in an outstanding light output and a perfect beam shaping at any angle.

Dimming is fast and accurate with a resolution of up to 512 steps controlled from a single channel through DMX/RDM signal or from a control knob positioned on the rear panel of the unit.

Fabiano Besio commented, "With more than 20 followspots in the range, unique stylish Italian design, LDR products are recognized for offering the best performance in their category at an affordable price. With the introduction the Astro LED followspot we target to reinforce our marketin

USA - Chauvet Professional has added two new PAR-style fixtures to its popular COLORado family of LED wash lights: the COLORado 2-Quad Zoom Tour and COLORado 2-Quad Zoom VW Tour. An RGBW and a variable white unit respectively, both of these fixtures utilise 14 extremely bright 15-watt LEDs to emit powerful illumination for concerts, tours, productions, theaters, nightclubs and events of all types. Quiet and flicker-free in their operation, they're suitable for use in broadcast rigs and studios as well.

The COLORado 2-Quad Zoom Tour and COLORado 2-Quad Zoom VW Tour also each include a variable 6°-30° zoom, controllable manually or via DMX, which gives designers the versatility to use them as a wash, a beam - or both in the same rig. Additionally, both models feature five dimming curves for programming flexibility and 16-bit dimming resolution for extremely smooth fades.

Belgium - Antwerp-based Revolution Event Support is one of Belgium's leading production companies, supplying sound, lighting and stage design to many of the country's best-known artists. Recently the company bought a pair of Yamaha CL5 digital mixing consoles to ensure its clients enjoy state-of-the-art sound.

Founded by Bart Faut 20 years ago, Revolution is run by Bart along with around 20 freelance staff. Supplying systems for both national and international shows, the company has built up a roster of regular clients who appreciate Revolution's commitment to quality and reliability.

As a longtime user of Yamaha audio products, Bart's inventory includes M7CL, O1V96, PM3500 consoles and Nexo PA speakers. But with touring productions becoming increasingly sophisticated, more inputs and outputs were needed. Revolution therefore purchased two CL5 consoles, along with two Rio3224-

USA - Mackie has announced the release of Master Fader 2.1, the primary control app for Mackie DL Series Digital Live Sound Mixers. Master Fader v2.1 delivers new features that appeal to the professional user, including enhanced output processing.

"With 1.5m shows mixed using DL Series mixers, we wanted to focus on features that our pro users would appreciate," commented Ben Olswang, Mackie product manager. "So we added new, powerful output processing that replaces expensive outboard system processors."

Drawing from user requests, Master Fader v2.1 features a four-band parametric EQ (PEQ) on all outputs. This new EQ works in parallel with the current 31-band GEQ to give users even more control over their outputs. The new PEQ also includes separate high-pass and low-pass filters with variable slope control. Also new to each output is alignment delay. With up

UK - Shure Distribution UK (SDUK), distributors for QSC products in the UK, recently supplied a QSC Q-Sys audio management system to RG Jones Sound Engineering for use in the renowned Serpentine Gallery's new art space in Central London, the Serpentine Sackler Gallery.

Like the original gallery, the Sackler sits next to the Serpentine lake from which both venues take their name, but the newer gallery, which opened in Autumn 2013, is on the north side of the bridge and is envisaged as a space for the display of cutting-edge works that will complement and contrast with those on view in the original gallery.

The Magazine, as the building now housing the Serpentine Sackler is called, a former gunpowder store dating from the Napoleonic Wars, was comprehensively refurbished from 2009 to 2013 by a team led by Zaha Hadid Architects, following many decades as a humble store for park ma

Germany - Adamson Systems has announced new E12/E218 touring packages ideal for touring and rental houses that need system flexibility, fast setup/teardown and the most powerful mid-high performance in a 12" line array available in the world.

"The E12/E218 combination is ideal for sound companies looking for a flexible line array and subwoofer that can work for an act moving from a theatre to an arena to an outdoor festival," explains James Oliver, director of marketing and sales for Adamson. "We've designed the system so it can be used in front of 20,000 one night and in an intimate theatre setting the next.

"Both the new E12 and E218 have extremely efficient power handling which allows us to minimize the footprint on the stage and reduce the total cost for the end user," he adds. "There isn't a more flexible product in the world of line arr

World - Three million ticket sales, 35 countries played... This does not happen by accident. The Australian Pink Floyd Show, one of the world's most successful tribute acts, have spent many years honing their craft. SW19's Kevin Hopgood has played a significant part in making this touring powerhouse's show the technical success it is. His role for the current tour has expanded and, along with Paul Crockford, he has taken on overall management of the band as well as the production.

Kevin has been working with Australian Pink Floyd since 2003, having originally been brought in when their collective star was in the ascendant; they were moving from theatre-sized venues to arenas and going to places they had never toured before.

"They brought me in for my global experience, to take the production up a notch," comments Kevin. "So I brought in a team of people I knew w

Spain - International lighting distributor, MGC Lighting, has appointed Rosa Comba Lopez as international sales administrator for their Spanish office in Valencia.

Rosa, also from Valencia, will be a key member of the sales team, assisting with order entry, quotations, lamp and LED sales; she will also be visiting customers.

Rosa previously worked at Antares Iluminacion, S.L. as a domestic sales and administration assistant. Working for the company for 12 years, she gained wide sales and administration experience in the lighting industry.

Commenting on her appointment, sales manager at MGC Lighting, Spain Leoncio Ramirez said, "Rosa is very excited about the new job and is looking forward to new challenges and opportunities ahead. She is a very efficient hard worker and a quick learner, which together with her good telephone skills and sales abilities, will help MGC Lig

Benelux - Vivitek has announced a new distribution agreement with Sanel for Belgium and Luxembourg.

"Sanel's reputation for excellence and their expertise in the audio visual market have been central to Vivitek in choosing Sanel," " says David Zrihen, sales manager Vivitek. "With the enthusiasm of the Sanel team, their market development skills and support for the dealer, we expect to see solid growth for Vivitek in the Belgian and Luxembourg market."

Sanel is a Benelux-oriented company that provides and advises AV integrators, AV rental companies and digital signage specialists. Sanel is known as a distributor of amongst others Panasonic, and Sanel's core products are projectors of all sizes , professional LCD and plasma monitors, digital signage solutions and video conferencing, as well as a whole range of peripheral products for AV integration.

Vi

UK/Germany - Mushroom Lighting Technology has added significantly to its portfolio of distributed brands by becoming a UK distributer for three European brands - Mobiled, LTH and CLS.

With a team that boasts over 40 years experience in the lighting industry, Northampton-based Mushroom is a distributor, consultant and installer (for both temporary and permanent installations) of high quality lighting, sound and pyrotechnics. The addition of three major new lighting brands to its distribution portfolio gives customers throughout the UK a considerably wider choice of lighting products, whether for entertainment, architectural, retail or industrial applications.

The wireless LED fixtures from France's Mobiled mean that LED lighting systems can be put together which are remarkably versatile. Battery power and cable-free DMX control mean that very flexible systems can be put togethe

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