Over 30 nominations were received from across the industry and these were narrowed down to a shortlist of nine finalists for the panel of judges to ponder upon. The judges for this year's awards were Rick Baxter, Ken Billington, Cory Fitzgerald, Elaine J. McCarthy, Rocky Paulson, and Bruce Rodgers.
The judges panel was chaired by Mike Wood, who said prior to announcing the winners: "We wanted to create an award series that had no rules except for excitement, no boundaries except for imagination and no restrictions other than the winners must have more magic than Harry Potter. The Rock Our World awards are intended to reflect the reasons we stay in this industry - that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when the lights dim down, the curtain goes up and you just know your disbelief is going to be suspended in a way it's never been suspended before."
The judges were given free rein to select as many or as few winners as rocked their world, and the winners were: Carallon Limited for the Pharos LPC X as used in the Cloud sculpture in Heathrow Terminal Five; Element Labs for the Versa RAY Screen as used at the 15th Asian Games in Doha; Pyrotek Special Effects for the Aqua Visual FX Water Screen.
ESTA announced the winners of the first annual Members' Choice Awards presented at the LDI and ESTA Awards Ceremony. The awards recognise outstanding entertainment technology products in three categories: Expendable, Widget and Equipment. The 2008 winners were: Expendable Category - BTH Lamp from OSRAM Sylvania; Widget Category (a tie) - Lex 3 Phase 3Fer from Lex Products and Gel Swatch Library for iPhone from Wybron; Equipment Category - Firefly Energy Series 5 Channel LED Illuminated Cable Protector from Firefly.
ESTA bestowed the 2008 Frank Stewart Volunteer of the Year Award, which recognises extraordinary effort by a volunteer or group of volunteers during the previous year, on the ESTA Membership Committee and on the Behind the Scenes Application for Assistance Review Committee.
(Jim Evans)
