UK - Stage Electrics says it has identified that it is possible to incorrectly use the Squelly Adaptor, thereby rendering the product dangerous. The earth pin can be inserted correctly yet the neutral pin can be inserted into the live socket of the adaptor, leaving the live pin of the plug exposed.

Although the company says the product is perfectly safe if used correctly, it has taken the decision to withdraw and recall the product from the marketplace, and is asking owners of the units please remove this product from use immediately.

Stage Electrics says it contracted a design and manufacturing company of considerable repute in the UK within the domestic electrical market, and is therefore extremely disappointed to find this issue with a product which they were informed conformed to regulations.

Stage Electrics has set up an information point on their website on how to retu

UK - Colour-Tramp is a versatile lighting controller for two- and three-dimensional arrays of colour changers. Since its launch, it has become a market leader for large architectural lighting systems with installations worldwide, according to its manufacturer, Artistic Licence.

Colour-Tramp leads the way in the convergence of light and video by allowing the designer to choose their preferred medium. Lighting designers are able to use the free-of-charge 'off-line' version as an authoring tool for the client presentation, with the benefit that once the contract is won, the off-line programming can be re-used for the actual show.

The latest version release (1.45) contains a wealth of new features that have been requested by customers or simply needed for a particular installation. One particularly innovative feature is the concept of visual mapping fixture date. Colour-Tramp uses

UK - On 31 August and 1 September, the Association of Lighting Designers is holding its first Forum, in collaboration with Rose Bruford College. A two-day event, the Forum is comprised of "Pick and Mix" workshops and discussions based around a central theme, relevant to modern theatre practice to help educate members and share ideas.

The "Pick and Mix" format has been designed to make the event as flexible as possible to those with work commitments. The event is free and food and drink will be provided. This year the theme is Digital Scenography. With the use of video projection and other digital media becoming more widespread in Theatre, the worlds of video and lighting are converging. The aim of the Forum is to raise awareness of this equipment and it's use, and discus how it is going to affect designers in the future.

Workshops throughout both days will

USA - Gear-Source Inc has launched a new website specifically marketing Martin Professional pre-owned inventory. The site (www.MartinCheckMarked.com) is now online and features a 'Check Marked' program, developed in cooperation with Martin - a sliding scale system in which five Checks designates an item as almost new, with one 'Check' indicating a product that has extensive usage hours. New value-added services are under development to add further value to the program, say GearSource.

The site is the first of its kind, and although designed exclusively to move Martin pre-owned inventory, it is managed and operated through GearSource.com's complex backend site administration system.

As part of this agreement, all existing Martin dealers will have full access to the dealer level of the system, and can also gain access to GearSource dealer prices on other brands, which will appea

UAE - Production Technology LLC, better known in Dubai as Protec, recently provided full lighting production services to their Dubai-based client, Al Nabooda Automobiles, for the Middle East's largest-ever car launch. The event took place in the iconic Sheikh Rashid Hall of Dubai's International Convention Centre. One grandMA full-size, one grandMA ultra-light and two NSPs controlled the vast variety of lights during the show.

Al Nabooda, the leading Audi distributor in the Middle East, launched the latest top of the range SUV from Audi: the Q7. The event was attended by over a thousand invited guests, including several local VIPs. The set consisted of, among others, eight hydraulic scissor lifts, four of which lifted two cars through the stage, with the other four featuring UK based pyrotechnic performers from Phoenix Productions. Eight cars were flown in from the roof of the v

USA - Entertainment Technology has announced the release of software version 3.1 for the complete line of Marquee lighting control consoles. "We are very excited to be releasing software version 3.1 for the Marquee lighting control consoles," says Alan Keen, Entertainment Technology product manager. "As the popularity of all Marquee consoles continues to grow, we are dedicated to providing lighting programmers with the latest technology to complete their lighting designs."

Designed by Horizon Control, Marquee software version 3.1 introduces new moving light and intensity effects, independent attribute timing, redundant tracking backup, a new colour picker tool, and astronomical time event control.

Robert Bell, Horizon control product manager, said: "For this release, the most challenging hurdle for the development team was to 'tame' our very powerful e

USA - Altman Rentals has appointed Sabrina Asquith to its staff as a rental agent. "We are very happy to have Sabrina join our strong team," says Randy Altman, owner of Altman Rentals. "Her focus will be on working with many of our existing clients as well as introducing the services that Altman Rentals can offer to new clients as we continue to expand. Customer service is a main priority for us and I think that Sabrina understands that and will offer first rate support to our customers."

Prior to joining Altman Rentals, Asquith worked in sales and customer service for City Theatrical Inc. Asquith is looking forward to working in the rental shop side of the business; she is a graduate of SUNY Purchase Conservatory of Theatre Arts and Film Design Technology with a Lighting Design focus. "I like being able to work more directly with the customers," sa

Romania - Mondy's Club - a 1,000 capacity nightclub on the Romanian Black Sea coast - has recently reopened after full redesign and refurbishment, which was completed in just 45 days. The venue leads the way in the country in many ways: it hosts the largest bar (12m long), it is the first to install large beds for the comfort of the night revellers and displays not one but two large fishtanks, one as an eye-catching backdrop to the main bar and one as a most unusual flooring to one of the bedded relaxation areas.

Local company 3 Fingers was responsible for the entire design and installation for club owners Calatis. Although all the furniture was custom-made, the walls were purposely kept bare and white to emphasise the vast LED lighting installation. A total of almost 16m of flexible colour changing Tryka LinkLED systems illuminate the main bar fishtank and the second bar front,

UK - UK distributor Stagetec has announced the product line-up from Compulite for the PLASA Show. The company's Dlite range was officially launched at PLASA last year and has already been popular in a wide range of applications including TV studios, theatres, arts centres, schools and colleges. This year sees the launch of the largest system in the Dlite family with an integral 48/96 channel manual console.

Also new, CompuPACK is a range of portable digital dimmers being launched at PLASA.Available in either 12 x 2.5kW or 6 x 5kW power ratings, a range of formats will be shown including hard-wired, UK 15A, Ceeform, Schuko, Socapex and Weiland. CompuPACK can be controlled via DMX or Ethernet and incorporates both MCB protection for the incoming mains supply and an MCB per output channel. The built-in LCD display and function buttons allow quick and easy set-up of a whole host of

France - Located in Vallée de la Maurienne, Savoie in the French Alps is the family-oriented ski area of La Norma. Henri Ratel, La Norma's mayor, and Bruno Garros, managing director of Martin Professional France, met in 2004 to discuss the idea of creating a special one-week event with dynamic lighting during the ski season. Mutual interest was quickly recognised and a plan agreed upon: Martin would provide technical know-how and equipment while La Norma would offer Martin Architectural the opportunity to invite customers to experience the resort dressed in an overall dynamic lighting concept.

The event was a success and ultimately the town's tourist office chose to invest in the lighting to illuminate both the town and the base of the ski area. La Norma wished to associate the dynamic lighting scheme with the resort's new blue and rose-colored logo as well as the town's

Worldwide - After her last album The Emancipation of Mimi Mariah Carey has launched her World Tour The Adventures of Mimi. Beginning in Tunisia, the journey leads trough the USA, Canada, Japan and ends on 28 October in China. On the road with Mariah are two grandMA full-size consoles and four NSPs.

The MA system was great support to lighting designer Justin Collie and lighting director Michael 'Sparky' Anderson who applied among other things 56 Vari-Lite 3000 Spots, 50 MAC 2000 Wash, 38 Atomic Strobes, six 7K Syncrolites and 44 Color Kinetics Color Blasts for the lighting rig. The task of programming the show was given to programmer Demfis Fyssicopulos. He comments: "As expected for Mariah the production is as big as she is. Everywhere one looks, there's something that just can't be missed."

The performance area consists of two stages - a main stage and

UK - HSL Group Holdings is exhibiting at PLASA 2006 for the second time in its own right, highlighting its diverse range of products and services. The Blackburn-based company has three divisions - HSL Rental, HSL Rigging and HSL Sales & Distribution.

Recent concert touring projects include Massive Attack's summer festival tour, which saw HSL investing over £100,000 in new Chroma-Q ColorBlock LED fixtures for their distinct 'visuals wall' designed by UVA. They also supplied Robe Robe ColorWash and ColorSpot 1200AT moving lights, PAR cans and scrollers, ZR 33 smokers, two hazers, a technician and a Wholehog II console run by lighting director Rohan Harrison.

HSL also supplied all lighting and rigging to LD Dave Byars for the Beautiful South's Superbi tour, and will be supplying eight arenas, including the main outdoor stage, of lighting for the 2006 Creamfields fest

UK / USA - New York City-based City Theatrical is launching a new line of CE compliant products at PLASA this year, and for the first time, CTI's most popular products will be fully compliant with the new Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) regulations, as well as having CE certification.

Products that already had CE compliance and are now also RoHS compliant include AutoYoke, EFX Plus2, and all products in the WDS Wireless Data System family. Products gaining CE with full RoHS compliance for the first time include four products in the PDS family of power/data supplies for Color Kinetics products: PDS-750 TR; PDS-375 TR; PDS-375 TRB; and PDS-50, as well as the City Theatrical Projector Dowser and DMX Iris.

CTI's president Gary Fails commented: "The entire world is increasingly aware of the hazards of electronic waste, particularly leaded solder. Since our products

USA - Ben Harper's music is a unique combination of rock, soul, and blues with roots in reggae. His latest album, Both Sides Of The Gun, is no exception. The singer-songwriter and his band, the Innocent Criminals, will be promoting his eighteen-track album in a twenty-two date U.S. tour.

Ben Harper and management team including tour manager, Scott Cadwallader, production manager, Kenny Nicholson, and lighting designer, Keith Wissmar chose Bandit Lites to supply lighting for the tour.

"Ben [Harper] expressed a very keen desire to add video as a new element to his show- simple, big images. This obviously affected the lighting design from the European tour, which had no video. Keith [Wissmar] took this onboard and came up with a very smooth blending of the lighting and video elements," explained Dizzy Gosnell, of Bandit's San Francisco office.

Bandit's own Shaw

UK - The Glade stage at Glastonbury Festival was the forum for cutting edge electronic and dance music. In 2004 the team behind Glade started their own event and continued running the stage at Glastonbury. The Glade Festival provides a platform for electronic music from around the world.

The atmosphere combined with the range of dance music and live acts with top live acts and DJsperforming back to back throughout the day is unique. Running late into the night things switch over to a more chilled and laid back pace, but it is the blend of stages and areas that make the festival so enjoyable, notably the Overkill and Breaksday tents.

The Breaksday stage is a mix of break and psy trance. Live acts include Hybrid, Krafty Kuts, Meat Katie and many DJs from Canada, Australia and Italy. Breaksday featured an arch of AC Lighting Colour Block as a centre-piece over the stage with each

USA - System Of A Down, supported by David Benveniste of Velvet Hammer Management, tour manager Ken Denson and production manager Janet Taylor, recently wrapped up a tour as part of Ozzfest- a touring festival with two stages and approximately 15 bands. In its eleventh year, Ozzfest kicked off on 29 June, in Seattle, Washington and wrapped up on 13 August in West Palm Beach, Florida. System Of A Down shared time with Ozzfest's very own Ozzy Osbourne headlining the show. This is the eighth year Bandit has provided lighting for System Of A Down.

System Of A Down's lighting designer, Chaz Martin chose to incorporate four 36 lamp pods with 600w ACLs, 20 atomic strobes, 12 Martin 2k washes and 12 Martin 2k profiles (six moving lights on each pod). Martin used a Martin Maxxyz console with a Martin Maxedia linked to the console.

Martin said that the general idea was to create somethi

USA - Production Resource Group (PRG) has named Darren DeVerna president of the company's east coast operations. He will work out of PRG's offices in New York City, Mount Vernon and New Windsor, NY, and North Bergen, NJ.

DeVerna most recently served as PRG's senior vice-president of business development. He also managed the company's lighting, audio, and video operations in the northeastern US and oversaw PRG's support for theatrical productions on Broadway and on tour throughout North America.

He began his career with Four Star Lighting, which he was instrumental in growing into one of the major lighting companies serving the Broadway market. He was president of Four Star when the company merged with PRG in 2001.

"Darren literally grew up in the entertainment industry and his range and depth of experience give him an unparalleled ability to understand a client's needs

UK - Dialight Lumidrives has introduced four new 110v/240v power LED drivers designed for use with single colour light arrays and ideal for interior architectural lighting applications.

Each driver is compatible for use with Dialight Lumidrives' range of single colour light arrays including Lumilines, Lumispots, HL11 and HL16 products and linked LED modules. They are therefore ideal for use in retail, restaurant and office locations.

Range leader is the VariLED 16, a dimmable 350mA output driver which can drive up to 16x 1W LEDs in two banks of eight. Dimming is via a remote potentiometer or 0-10V input.

The Microdriver 8 can drive up to eight 1W LEDs or six 2W LEDs. A selection of sevendifferent output voltages is available. The VariLED 16 and Microdriver 8 are 109.5mm in length, 50mm wide and 23.5mm high.

Dialight Lumidrives also has two new compact LED drivers available

UK - Wireless transmission is a fast-growing technological phenomenon which is already being widely used in the entertainment industry, and the technical team at Navigator Systems, computer specialists in the entertainment industry since 1995, have put together a free information website to assist people when they're designing and building wireless networks, whether it be for shows or community projects.

"As visitors make their way through the free information pages, it will soon become apparent that the wealth of hands-on experience in projects such as Wireless FOH control, Wireless DMX distribution and conference delegate hot spots as well as an understanding of the physics makes the Navigator Systems Wireless website one to add to your Favourites list," says the company.

(Lee Baldock)

USA - Syncrolite, the US-based pioneer in the production and design of automated xenon skylights who introduced the first DMX-controlled xenon light to the industry in 1989, is promising a brand new product to be introduced in Las Vegas at the LDI trade show (20-22 October). Syncrolite, and the new product, can be found at LDI on booth 179. The company will also exhibit at the forthcoming PLASA Show in London (10-13 September) on stand D34.

(Lee Baldock)

UK - Bandit Lites would like to recognise the fourth annual recipient of their Bandit Lites Excellence in Lighting Award. The award was given to a promising student at the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts (LIPA). The school opened in 1996 with the help of Former Beatles' legend, Sir Paul McCartney and former actor, Mark Featherstone- Witty. Dedicated to people interested in pursing a career in arts and entertainment, LIPAoffers diploma, degree and postgraduate courses.

The awards ceremony took place on 29 July, 2006 at the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts' graduation. Kathy Sandys, a lecturer in Theatre and Performance Technology, presented the award.

The Bandit Lites Excellence in Lighting Award went to Miriam Evans, who graduated with a Bachelor of Arts with Honors in Theatre and Performance Technology. Her citation read, "in recognition of her

UK - During the summer an interactive campaign - 'Join the Party with Bacardi' - was launched in Dutch cinemas to promote the Bacardi drink. The advertisement was filmed in the Now & Wow Club in Rotterdam. The recognisable theme of girls and boys partying with Bacardi was used to accompany the additional storyline of the DJ wowing the girl.

VisualDMX was specified as controller for the DJ Booth which boasted an LED wall and thus the necessity of a Matrix controller with the versatility and strengths that are offered by Matrix Mania, the specialised Matrix controller within VisualDMX. Matrix Mania's ability to quickly adapt all inbuilt matrix patterns to the red, Bacardi-style colour theme proved very useful and saved the crew valuable time when programming on site, say the company. The LED and VisualDMX equipment was supplied by Amsterdam-based rental company, PartyTime.

(Lee

Austria / UK - LDDE will launch its brand new SpectraLed144* Line at the PLASA Show. The SpectraLed*144 Line is the first colour mixing unit for the professional theatre, television and entertainment application with an RGBAW configuration of 144 x 1W high-power LEDs, say the company. With its compact design of only 1200x120x80mm (LxWxH) it is designed for use on stages, events and show lighting of all kinds, say the company.

With its 36 x 1W blue, 36 x 1W green, 24 x 1W red, 24 x 1W amber and 24 x 1W cold white high-power LEDs, the system enables the reproduction of the full spectrum of colours on stage. The unit shares the same dsign of housing and the clever multicore concept of the company's award-winning SpectraConnecT5. Each Unit can be fitted with two different optical-modules with beam angles of 10° and 25°. A slot in the front of the unit allows for the insertio

UK / USA - On Broadway, the runaway hit Avenue Q has already won the Tony awards for Best Musical, Best Score and Best Book. If this wasn't accolade enough, its lighting designer, Howell Binkley, this year scooped the prestigious Tony Award for Best Lighting Design for the musical Jersey Boys. Both musicals were programmed using a grandMA lighting control system.

Lighting designer Ken Posner for the Broadway musicals Hairspray and Wicked has also used grandMA control systems. Now, with Sinatra and Avenue Q already running on grandMA in the West End, Wicked is the next to move over from Broadway to the West End, scheduled to open on 27 September, 2006. Interestingly, the Apollo Victoria Theatre, home to Wicked, already has a fixed installation of a grandMA ultra controlling its LED house light system.

The consoles have alr

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