UK - Reading University is a globally renowned institution. Ranked amongst the top 1% of universities in the world, its reputation for teaching, research and enterprise is formidable. Reading is also home to some of the country's most beautiful campuses and a number of heritage buildings. It was in respect of one such heritage site that the university contacted POLARaudio, seeking a solution to an audio headache on a grand scale.

The Great Hall, situated on the original London Road campus, is a Grade 2 listed building which hosts a wide variety of events, not least of which are graduation ceremonies for thousands of students. In response to a growing number of adverse comments in relation to the poor audio quality at such events, the university's Vice-Chancellor took the decision

The Netherlands - Designed to attract over 500,000 visitors each year, Utrecht's new Tivoli Vredenburg venue covers 31,000m2 and features five auditoriums, 22 dressing rooms, 11 circulation spaces and 24 bars/restaurants. Designing a communications system for such a complex venue was a daunting task, but ASL Intercom had the right solution.

The city's Tivoli and Vredenburg venues have been major centres of music for over 30 years. Bringing them together under one roof with the city's Jazz Centre was achieved by incorporating the existing Vredenburg symphony hall into a brand new, €150m, venue and adding four major new performance spaces around it.

To make each venue within the new Tivoli Vredenburg as versatile as possible, the 22 dressing rooms are not allocated to particular auditoriums/stages. This made the job even more difficult for Utrecht-based Switch Concepts, the com

Slovenia - Beautiful Ljubljana Castle dates back to the 12th century and is one of the landmark attractions of the Slovenian capital. It has recently taken delivery of Robe CitySource 96 LED flood fixtures which are being used to illuminate external elements of the Courtyard for summer evenings and various events.

A colourful history has seen the Castle serve as a fortress, a military hospital, a prison and a temporary refuge for the homeless - amongst other things. More recently since the 1960s it has undergone extensive very tasteful redevelopment, and is now a busy event space with three main venues and a small theatre as well as being a top Slovenian tourist hotspot.

The CitySource 96s were specified by Tomaz Novak, the Castle's technical manager. They have been fitted with the integral Lumen Radio wireless DMX receiver cards allowing remote data control, which is especial

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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 - The industry stepped up at PLASA 2014 to care for its own by supporting Behind the Scenes UK, the new charity that will provide financial assistance to entertainment technology professionals in need due to serious illness or injury.

Fundraising kicked off on Sunday evening at the Knights of Illumination Awards Ceremony when Clay Paky's commercial director Pio Nahum presented a cheque to lighting designer Rick Fisher for Behind the Scenes UK. Pio explained to the large gathering that one of the last things approved by the late Pasquale Quadri was this generous contribution to the new charity.

On Monday afternoon, ETC's Fred Foster presented the cheque from the proceeds of the iRFR app which continues to provide an incredible income for the charity on both sides of the Atlantic. Tuesday saw Rosco's Mark Engel present a cheque for the proceeds from the sale of Roscolux Light

UK - The service to celebrate the life of Sue Burlow, managing director of Highlite UK Ltd, will be held on Thursday 23 October 2014 at 2.30pm, at Semington Crematorium, Devizes Road, Semington, Wiltshire BA14 6HL.

All are welcome to come to attend the one-hour service to show their respects for Sue, however please bear in mind that only invited guests will be able to attend the function afterwards.

Those who wish to attend are kindly asked to email details of where they are from, their association with Sue and how many people are coming, to jim@chippenhamlions.org.uk.

Sue requested that people wear bright and cheery clothes, as this is the celebration of a wonderful life and not a funeral.

No flowers please - donations can be made to Dorothy House Hospice & The new cancer ward appeal at the RUH Hospital, Bath.

USA - Metric Halo has announced the immediate availability of its new MH Dirty Delay plug-in.

Dirty Delay is a visceral, gritty, fantastic-sounding musical feedback delay processor with integrated Character and filters in the delay path. It can create "awesome vintage echo and tape-delay style sounds as well as lush and subtle spaces in a mix". New users are already finding that it is more "real" sounding than alternative in-the-box delay processors.

Not just a musical feedback delay, MH Dirty Delay is something special. With the integrated filters and character in the feedback path you can make it clean or dirty, vintage or futuristic, subtle or nasty.

With dual delay lines, cross-feed, feedback and distortion control, Dirty Delay is capable of creating extraordinarily rich and complex textures and patterns from your audio. Dirty Delay adds texture and m

USA - Following the success of the Satura Spot LED Pro, Elation Professional has announced the next in the energy-efficient Satura Series, the LED-based Satura Spot CMY, a high-powered LED spot luminaire with zoom, CMY colour mixing and dual gobo wheels.

The Satura Spot CMY's 320W LED engine delivers 11,700 lumens of power for an output across all colors that is comparable to 575W and even 700W discharge fixtures. It projects the flat field of light that designers favor with sharp zoom optics that emit a powerful, well-defined beam. For flexible beam angle adjustments, the Satura Spot CMY houses a 14-36 degree zoom with a uniform field of light that is maintained throughout the zoom range.

A CMY colour mixing system plus seven dichroic colours for added colour customization, including CTO color correction, blends a virtually unlimited variety of shades. A range of graphical ef

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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 - Production Resource Group has announced that Q Willis has joined their team in the UK as head of rigging services.

PRG's offering to the various markets is fortified with valued rigging and venue expertise. This will be reinforced with the knowledge and proficiency Q brings from 19 years in the industry.

In his new role, Q will be focusing on developing existing customer relationships in the rigging industry and also looking for ways to promote new opportunities.

"We have always maintained a good position within the rigging market but we are well positioned for growth. With Q joining the team he plays an important role in moving us forward," says Rich Rowley, chief sales officer.

"PRG have the platform for developing their valued rigging service," explains Q, "I'm excited about the opportunities ahead and look forward to developing and bringi

USA - CCI Power Supplies has announced a new, patent-pending power supply technology for high performance, full-range LED dimming.

Powered by CCI's new DimMaster LED phase cut power supply technology, dimmable LED fixtures can now be developed to match the dimming performance of incandescent fixtures.

Notably, say CCI, the technology supports the transition of high performance lighting applications to LED, by seamlessly blending highly cost-efficient LED lamp fixtures into existing incandescent lighting arrays. Users can make this transition without investing in new dimmers or consoles, and without new wiring, because dimming is driven by the power supply within the LED lamp fixture, the company says.

"DimMaster LED power supply technology enables retrofitted LEDs to match the full colour and dimming spectrum of incandescent lighting for architectural, theatre, church,

UK - Soundcraft's UK and Eire distributor, Sound Technology reports that both its award-winning Vi6 FOH console, and the latest addition to the Vi range - the Vi3000 - have both rocked the festival circuit this summer.

The Vi6 was deployed by premier hire company, Adlib, on events including Creamfields, the Liverpool International Music Festival, Kendall Calling Festival and the Wakestock Festival.

Now firmly established on riders, the Vi6 has been acclaimed as one of the easiest to use, most ergonomic, user friendly and best-sounding large format digital consoles around. Thanks to the integration of a proven DSP engine and algorithms from sister firm, Studer, the audio quality is crystal clear. The Vi6 also boasts an incredibly tactile "where you look is where you control' operating philosophy. The world-class effects and processing from Lexicon and BSS sets the Vi6 apar

UK - PLASA London 2014 welcomed visitors and exhibitors to ExCeL, London for the second consecutive year on 5-8 October and impressed with a ground-breaking show floor, an inspiring education programme and a host of important announcements. While exhibitors revealed their latest product innovations, the organisers uncovered plans for the future of the show.

Speaking at the PLASA Awards for Innovation and Sustainability 2014, held on the penultimate day of the show, PLASA's CEO Matthew Griffiths revealed some of the changes for 2015, which will redevelop the scope and delivery of the event. Under the leadership of Christopher Toulmin, PLASA's Director of the Events Division, the show is being remodelled to become a PLASA Member-focused event: developments will include moving from four days to three days, introducing a new floor plan concept, expanding the education offering and i

UK - For the first time in the UK, d&b audiotechnik GB is offering an open invitation to their Sound System Optimisation seminar. Each seminar runs for two days and invites participants on a journey through the theory and practice of acoustic measuring, adjusting and fine tuning.

Attendees should have a good understanding of sound system design, setup and tuning along with a confident understanding of basic electroacoustic principles in order to take full advantage of this seminar. This is a practical course that guides participants through the precise process of measuring and adjusting a sound system. Beginning with a good sound design and making it better. Starting with good and ending with great.

This is a busy two day seminar, delivered by the Education & Application Support (EAS) team at d&b audiotechnik GB, under the direction of the doughty Oran Burns. Participants are

The Netherlands - Tivoli Vredenburg is a new and architecturally impressive venue in the heart of the beautiful Dutch city of Utrecht. Equally impressive is its technical infrastructure, which features an array of DiGiCo mixing consoles as part of its extensive audio system.

A merger of former venues Tivoli and Vredenburg, both successful in their own rights for the past 30 years, Tivoli Vredenburg has been constructed around the existing Vredenburg theatre and concert hall, now known as the Grote Zaal or Great Hall, which remains in its original form.

The new building houses four additional rooms, Ronda, Pandora, Hertz and Cloud Nine, each of which plays host to different types of musical styles, with each designed by a different architect. Combining such disparate designs could have made the overall venue feel disconnected, but a cleverly thought out, cathedral-like foyer br

UK - Hawthorn recently worked with lighting designer Declan Randall, to provide an additional lighting package and video projections for Indika, a new musical dance spectacular. The production tells the story of India throughout the years using the medium of dance. The premiere of the first UK production of Indika had a hugely successful run at the new CAST Theatre in Doncaster, from 26 September to 5 October. The production will tour the UK in 2015.

Randall took full advantage of Hawthorn's Wysiwyg Suite, pre-programming the whole show prior to its one week production fit up at the CAST Theatre. Hawthorn was also contracted to provide technical support for the installation. The lighting package supplied included a range of Clay Paky fixtures including Sharpy, Sharpy Wash and Alpha Profile 800s.

The production featured classical Indian choreography to an original

UK - Cover band The Ultimate Eagles are celebrating the 20th Anniversary of the Eagles' album Hell Freezes Over by touring the UK beneath an Elation lighting rig of Platinum Beam 5R and Platinum Spot 5R Pro moving heads.

This is The Ultimate Eagles' fifth and biggest tour, and second using Elation lighting equipment. Pacific Sound & Light of Birmingham has supplied the lighting package for the When Hell Froze Over tour with lighting design by Nick Jemicz of Lighting Through Design.

"I have always been impressed with the CMY capabilities of the Platinum Spot 5R Pro as it is such a compact fixture," Nick says of the compact, energy efficient CMY colour mixing fixture that can be used as a spot or wash light. "The beams offer stunning, bright airborne effects with a good selection of color that I required for the design."

Mounted on an upstage

UK - Islington's famous Sadlers Wells Theatre is often called London's dance theatre. Initially dating from 1683, today Sadler's Wells not only promotes but also commissions and produces outstanding dance. However, in order fully enjoy a performance of dance, it is important that the audience enjoys the music in equal measure. To that end, installation specialists Scanaudio recently upgraded the theatre's induction loop system for the hard of hearing.

Since the introduction of legislation requiring public spaces to provide for all kinds of disabilities, induction loop systems have been installed in most public buildings and, over time, have become more and more sophisticated.

The Sadlers Wells system features two Ampetronic multiloop drivers, one MLD7 and one MLD9 which, are connected to low loss loop arrays installed along the seating rows of the rear stalls and first circle.

UK - Jazz Funk band Incognito celebrates its 35th anniversary this year and to mark the occasion the band was recently filmed at London's Shepherd's Bush Empire for a live concert DVD.

To ensure that the sound was as a tight as possible, Incognito's percussionist Joao Caetano took along his own selection of DPA microphones including four d:vote 4099 Instrument Microphones and a stereo pair of d:dicate 4011A Cardioid Microphones, which were used as overheads for the recording.

"Normally I use d:dicate 4011A cardioid microphones for studio work and rely on the d:vote 4099 Instrument Microphones for live performance, but on this occasion we were recording audio for a DVD so I supplemented the line-up with the d:dicate 4011As because I wanted to capture the best sound possible," says Caetano. "Our front-of-house engineer, Chris Lewis, was very happy that I had broug

Brazil - For the Brazil arm of Fox International Channels (Fox Brasil), coverage of this year's World Cup tournament also signalled the move from analogue to digital broadcast production.

Temporarily deployed in the broadcaster's studio at International Broadcast Center (IBC) in Rio de Janeiro, the Lawo audio consoles, routing system and video devices that made the move possible have in the meantime been relocated at Fox Brasil's permanent broadcast facility, also located in Rio.

The Lawo equipment comprises a Nova73 HD, which serves as the central audio router, a 48-fader mc² 56 MKII console and two further mc² 56 MKII consoles with 32 faders each. In addition, four Vpro8 video processing devices from Lawo's video product line serve as embedder and de-embedder units at the heart of the broadcast centre.

The shift to digital was prompted by the need for greater flexibility

USA - Clay Paky will centre its LDI promotion on its three key new products - Mythos, Supersharpy and Stormy.

Mythos, which recently won an Award for Innovation at the PLASA Show in London, is "a highly advanced form of hybrid light", say Clay Paky. "First of all, it is an excellent 470W lamp spotlight, which produces an outstanding large light beam, featuring a zoom that ranges from 4° to 50° (1:12 ratio).

"Light beam is sharp, with perfectly defined edges, from the first millimeters after the front lens right along its entire length. The zoom is optimised for focusing, which is separate from that of the fixed and rotating gobos. Its movements are smooth, fast and very quiet. Mythos also features a completely redesigned indexed visual effect disc, which may be superimposed on all the gobos (6 rotating and 18 fixed gobos), both in and out of focus.<

France - At the French National Museum of Natural History in Paris, September saw the 20th anniversary re-opening of the updated Great Gallery of Evolution space featuring an install of site-specific custom-designed Amadeus speakers.

The museum install features an assortment of Amadeus speaker and sub-woofer models to offer the public a Hi-Fi audio experience throughout the vast museum. Merging Technologies, Solid State Logic and Flux also added key ingredients to the new museum install to control the Amadeus speakers.

Amadeus' director of R&D, Michel Deluc, and designer Bernard BYK, created completely new speaker and subwoofer configurations for the massive, over 180-speaker, sound system install at the National Museum of Natural History.

The new speaker design has extended the Amadeus PMX Series with a super-compact 4-inch coaxial driver model, the PMX 4. Bernard BYK and M

UK - Robe Lighting celebrated its 20th anniversary in style at a special gala dinner event staged in their Robe Arena booth one evening during the 2014 PLASA Expo in London's ExCeL Centre.

The dinner featured a keynote speech by CEO Josef Valchar, an after-dinner speech by Patrick Woodroffe, followed by live entertainment from comedian and magician Paul Zenon. It was enjoyed by 300 Robe 'friends and family' including many who have been instrumental in the company's success.

Says Josef Valchar: "The dinner was a fantastic way to unite so many people who are and who have been involved in our journey".

The Robe story started from humble beginnings in 1994 when Josef and his business partner Ladislav Petrek founded the company and started making their own lighting and effects fixtures. In that relatively short space of time, Robe has become one of the world's leading m

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