USA - Bandit Lites is continuing its summer of music festivals by providing the lighting for the CounterPoint Music Festival, where more than 60 artists including Widespread Panic, Zedd, Umphrey's McGee, Knife Party and The Roots performed on one of the events five stages across Georgia's Kingston's Down 5,000 acres.

The lighting coordination for the three-day event was managed by 3srCreative, with Seth Jackson working with Bandit to create looks that would be visible both during the day and evening. "The main stage had a much larger rig with the MAC Vipers," said crew chief Shawn Worlow. "All of the stages used a 4 ZR foggers and Base Hazers. We used a lot of fog and haze for the day time performances with open white and less saturated colors to make it all pop more during the daytime."

CounterPoint's mainstage consisted of three 42' trusses, backdrop and

Canada/USA - Chroma-Q Color Force 72 LED battens are being rigged in an inspired fashion to spell out the word HIP for Canadian rock band, The Tragically Hip's current 2015 tour.

The group, which have had nine No.1 albums in Canada, recently embarked on the Fully Completely Tour, playing their album of the same name in its entirety to their legion of fans.

Brent Clark is production designer for the North American tour, which kicked off in Toronto in January and to date has visited other major cities including New York, Chicago, Boston, Washington DC, and Montreal.

"The concept behind the staging and lighting was to make it look a bit 'throwback'," says Brent. "The grid with the Color Force 72s on is meant to look like an old fashioned digital clock. Spelling out the word 'HIP' was my idea, as the band are affectionately known as The Hip - and using the

USA - Although the Chauvet Professional team arrived at InfoComm with great enthusiasm about the products they would be exhibiting, even the most optimistic among them didn't anticipate the size of the crowds that would stream into their booth - nor the overwhelming praise that attendees would lavish on the company's latest innovations in lighting and video.

"We knew we were bringing some very special products to InfoComm," said Ford Sellers, senior product manager for Chauvet Professional. "But we were amazed by the turnout at our booth, which remained packed throughout the show, and quite thrilled and honoured to hear all the positive things people were saying about our products.

"A lot of thought, research and development goes into every product we bring to market," added Sellers, "so this terrific response at InfoComm reaffirms our belief that

UK - A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET) Ltd. is hosting a two-day charity cycle ride between its High Wycombe and Leeds sales offices on 18th - 19th July 2015, to raise money in remembrance of a beloved colleague, the late Kevin Fitz-Simons.

Kevin held an important senior role as Northern Lighting Sales Manager in AC-ET's Leeds office. He was an extremely well liked and respected colleague, and a larger than life character. During his diverse career spanning over 30 years, Kevin built up an incredible number of customer relationships and friendships. He sadly passed away on 31st December 2013, aged 53.

This event - known as the 'Fitz-Simons Challenge' - is being organised by Stuart Burdett, Technical Sales Executive for AC-ET's Video product division. It will raise funds for two great charities which would have met with Kevin's approval, and aims to secure a minimum of &p

Fiji - Working closely with gaffer James Tinsley and his team, Aurora have sent out a full location package to the latest series of Love Island.

The team have been working round the clock to get things ready for the latest batch of islanders. To support the installation, Aurora has provided everything from Tungsten to tape, distro to desks, plus site power and a range of bespoke electronic installations and LED set pieces.

Commenting on the project, Aurora MD Nick Edwards said, "preparing the gear and taking care of the logistical challenge of transporting a full location package to the Island in the sun was the easy part - thankfully James and his team are on board to make sure the 12 islanders are viewed in the best possible light during their six weeks excursion to paradise!" Love Island runs on ITV2.

(Jim Evans)

USA - Each year Caravan Stage take their mobile venue - the 30m tall ship Amara Zee - on tour to a selection of coastal cities - with a stunning and provocative production, and the 2015 season kicked off with a continuation of their successful experimental musical Hacked: The Treasure of the Empire in Brooklyn, New York, where the Amara Zee wintered.

Lighting designer Lutz Gock and assistant LD Katie Davies used their new Robe LED fixtures - four DLX Spot moving lights and six LEDForce 18 PARs rig - on what Lutz describes as the "almost upside down" lighting plot.

When it comes to lighting Caravan Stage performances, there are several very specific requirements.

With no stage roof, the kit is exposed to the elements during the set-up, rehearsal and show periods. Lighting, sound and video equipment are all powered by an on-board generator so it is limited, wh

Sweden - LumenRadio has announced the launch of the CRMX TiMo FX - the latest product launch for the entertainment industry designed to simplify the implementation of wireless DMX & RDM into a multitude of applications. Built on the TiMo platform which launched late last year, the FX module enables TiMo to act as both an RDM enabled receiver and a DMX transmitter, selectable by the user.

This version of TiMo is expected to be of interest to manufacturers building fixtures with stand-alone modes, such as battery uplighters, where one fixture can be configured as a transmitter and further fixtures down the line can be linked as receivers. By building on the same feature set as the hugely successful TiMo RX RDM, TiMo FX adds the transmitter capabilities required to link series' of fixtures, whilst retaining popular features such as the DMX Window which made TiMo RX RDM so easy to i

Brazil - Singer-songwriter Luan Santana recently released his fourth live album and DVD Acústico, which - as its title suggests - was recorded acoustically. The recordings took place in Quanta Studios in Sao Paulo, with a retro setting and dress code leading you back to the Broadway Sixties. Shortly after the release, several of the singles reached the top of the Brazil Hot 100 Airplay chart.

For this production, as for previous Luan Santana productions, Spectrum Design e Iluminacao supplied a complete technology solution. LED products from SGM assisted in conveying the old theatre style with a total of 30 P-5 wash lights, 80 X-5 LED strobes and 40 SixPack blinders.

The SixPacks were mounted in the grand upper façade, giving the marquee the effect and look of the halogen emulating lamps, whilst offering the brightness and low power consumption of the LED light sources

UK - This year's First Night Riders charity motorbike and classic car tour of British theatres, which raises money for The Theatrical Guild's (TTG) vital work, takes to the roads on Friday 3 July.

This year marks the sixth year that some of the theatre industry's biggest movers and shakers zoom together for a weekend aimed at raising awareness and much-needed funds to help TTG support Backstage and FOH staff in need. Established in 1891, TTG is dedicated to looking after theatre personnel who, due to a variety of circumstances need welfare advice, counselling, educational sponsorship and many other forms of help.

The charity has many supporters in the industry, including Dara O'Briain who is also a Trustee of The Theatres Trust.

Taking place from 3-6 July, this year's route starts in Scarborough and visits the Spa Theatre & Grand Hall and The Stephen Joseph Theatre. Over the

UK - This year's First Night Riders charity motorbike and classic car tour of British theatres, which raises money for The Theatrical Guild's (TTG) vital work, takes to the roads on Friday 3rd July.

This year marks the sixth year that some of the theatre industry's biggest movers and shakers zoom together for a weekend aimed at raising awareness and much-needed funds to help TTG support Backstage and FOH staff in need. Established in 1891, TTG is dedicated to looking after theatre personnel who, due to a variety of circumstances need welfare advice, counselling, educational sponsorship and many other forms of help.

The charity has many supporters in the industry, including Dara O'Briain who is also a Trustee of The Theatres Trust.

Taking place between 3rd and 6th July, this year's route starts in Scarborough and visits the Spa Theatre & Grand Hall and The Stephen Joseph Thea

Fair Pay - Apple Music reversed its payment policy, a day after the singer Taylor Swift said she was refusing to allow the company to stream her album 1989. In an open letter to Apple, Swift said she was withholding the record as she was unhappy with the three-month free trial offered to subscribers. Now Apple says it will pay artists for music streamed during trial periods. Swift had said the plan was "unfair", arguing Apple had the money to cover the cost. "I find it to be shocking, disappointing, and completely unlike this historically progressive and generous company. "We don't ask you for free iPhones. Please don't ask us to provide you with our music for no compensation."

Olympic Achievement - The International Olympic Committee will receive an award at IBC2015 for its work on conserving and managing its audiovisual archives. The awar

Austria - UK entry's Electro Velvet's LED costumes for Eurovision 2015 featured a bespoke design by LED specialists Light Initiative.

"We were approached by creative director Dan Shipton and the BBC Eurovision team to help make Electro Velvet stand out during this year's performances," says Bryn Williams, creative director of Light Initiative.

Working alongside costume designer Frank Strachan and his costume maker Natascha Stolle, the team incorporated 20,000 video-mapped LEDs into the outfits with 5,500 on singer Bianca's dress alone. Unlike many incarnations of this idea seen in the past, the costume team's clever design 'seamlessly' assimilated the LED into the costumes, along with the fabric, glittering sequins and tassels, with no detriment to the overall aesthetic.

"It was of paramount importance that the costumes be beautiful," says Williams. "

UK - The new 300 seat Quarry Theatre in Bedford has opened to wide acclaim. Audio Light Systems were contracted to provide rigging, audio, AV & lighting in the space which has been created within the Grade II listed 19th Century St Luke's Moravian Church.

Working to a Theatre Plan specification Audio Light Systems installed a Slingco grid, BJ Designs suspension systems, Doughty Engineering IWBs & facility panels, ETC lanterns, Christie projectors, Zero 88 control and dimmers, Yamaha & EM acoustics sound equipment among other manufacturers.

"This is a truly impressive and well thought-out space, that has come together very well. The ability of Audio Light Systems to install the entire technical infrastructure really helps with synergy of a space like this," says Trevor Cross MD Audio light Systems.

(Jim Evans)

USA - With strong reviews, word-of-mouth recommendations, and 12 Tony Award nominations, the musical Fun Home appears to be right at home on Broadway. Based on an autobiographical graphic novel by Alison Bechdel, it is an unusual show - a delicate, rather than big and flashy musical - according to lighting designer Ben Stanton, who found himself with a low-tech show in need of high-tech lighting.

Stanton uses shifting pockets of light to follow the action from scene to scene, defining rooms of different shapes and sizes as furniture appears and disappears through a complex series of traps. Using an ETC Eos Ti lighting desk, programmer Alex Fogel built a low-res pixel map encompassing the whole stage, with each lighting area as a separate pixel. By applying a gradient to the intensity parameter of the area lights, he was able to smoothly drag focus around the playing area,

USA - University of California, Irvine's (UCI) Claire Trevor School of the Arts presented The Electra Project, famed Romanian director Mihai Maniutiu's reimagining of the classic Electra story.

This avant-garde piece followed Maniutiu's minimalist style, using very little scenery to create a provocative production. Under Maniutiu's direction, lighting designer Martha Carter and scenic designer Morgan Price brought this story to life. Carter used Martin Professional's atmospheric effects to play on the audience's emotions as the titular character battles through her story. They used UCI's existing JEM Glaciator X-Stream and paired it with a JEM Ready 365 hazer which Martin loaned to the students to help fill out their production.

The initial planning started with only a 15-page script and notes from Maniutiu to have minimal scenery. While Carter and Price had their work

UK - Having already worked with a wide variety of different organisations and venues this year, White Light has provided its services on yet another immersive piece of theatre - the world premiere of Heartbreak Hotel at The Jetty, Greenwich. Produced by Managing Mayhem and Zebedee Productions, Heartbreak Hotel opened at The Jetty on 11 June with White Light acting as a production partner.

The show sees The Jetty, which formerly served as a coal-unloading point for Blackwall Point Power Station, transformed into a purpose built structure which allows audience members to check into what is a unique experience.

Prior to the recent popularity of immersive theatre productions, White Light had already established strong working relationships with companies such as Punchdrunk. Their most recent project, the co-production with the National Maritime Museum entitled Aga

USA - Big musical numbers, whimsical props, flashy dance sequences - all are key parts of any Broadway musical, and the Roundabout Theatre Company's production of On The Twentieth Century delivers all of these. From the moment the show curtain goes up, RC4Magic Series 3 Wireless DMX and Dimming takes centre stage, supporting a Tony award winning show that was also nominated for four Drama Desk Awards, nine Outer Critics Circle Awards and three Drama League Awards.

"Almost every piece of scenery in this show uses wireless dimming, along with several props, most of which have multiple fixtures requiring wireless dimming," says Brian Maiuri, production electrician at the American Airlines Theatre. "And the show's main scenic element is a life-sized train automated on a free spinning turtle that transports the train up and downstage as well as left to right. Th

UK - Event technical delivery expert FIX8Group has appointed Helen Marenghi as project coordinator.

Helen's role will be predominantly to support FIX8's existing project managers across all current and future events/projects and other company related work. It will also involve implementing and managing various operational processes and software that will help the company manage its time and equipment more efficiently as the company continues its rapid growth.

Helen brings a wealth of experience to FIX8. Her recent roles have included senior events manager at Cuffe and Taylor Ltd and working on prestigious shows such as the Rod Stewart Tour 2014 and Lytham Proms Festival. She has also worked as assistant video and graphics producer for WorldWide Shows (WWS) on the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympic Closing and Paralympic Opening Ceremonies and lighting and content viewing room assistant

Denmark - Martin Professional has confirmed the shipping of its VDO Sceptron LED video fixture with 10 mm pixel pitch. Martin's VDO Sceptron family is a line of outdoor-rated LED video fixtures for the touring and rental market.

"The feedback we received on the VDO Sceptron has been truly amazing," said Wouter Verlinden, product manager for LED Video, Martin Professional. "It seems people have been waiting for this kind of product, and really appreciate its versatility. It can be used as a lighting fixture or an LED video element, and can be combined into many different looks."

With an extensive range of field-exchangeable optical accessories that offer a wide variety of looks, the VDO Sceptron is one of the most versatile and touring friendly LED Video solutions available. The VDO Sceptron's optical accessories-including diffusers in various shapes and len

USA - Elation Professional has launched Emotion, a digital moving light that marks the company's entry into the digital lighting market. A joint project between Elation Professional and High End Systems, the Emotion is a compact yet powerful moving head digital luminaire "that brings to the market the latest in next generation digital lighting technology, pioneered and proven by High End Systems".

The Emotion is a plug and play DMX moving light just like a traditional moving light yet houses an on-board media server. Think of it as a moving light with 100s of digital gobo patterns and animation effects with a projection quality that allows for use in a wide range of professional stage, studio, theatrical, club and event applications.

This moving head digital light houses a built-in content library that includes the entire Elation gobo catalogue with royalty-free digi

USA - The Live Design Products of the Year Awards 2014-2015 were held on Thursday 4 June at the Jerry H Labowitz Theatre for the Performing Arts, during the New York Master Classes (NYMC), and the Mythos climbed onto the highest step of the podium once again in the Luminaire category.

After winning the PLASA Award for Innovation and Best Debuting Product at LDI 2014, the Mythos has also won this prestigious accolade. Francesco Romagnoli, Clay Paky area manager for North America and Latin America, and Bob Gordon, founder of ACT Lighting, Clay Paky's distributor, received the award from the hands of David Johnson (LDI/ Live Design publisher) and Marian Sandberg (LDI/Live Design content director).

Romagnoli said, "We have received yet another trophy from the industry for a product which is the result of Clay Paky research and entirely designed and manufactured in Italy. I wo

Belgium - Lighting and visual design practice Painting with Light's new office in the Paardenstallen (stables) at the C-MINE development in Genk, Belgium was officially declared open by Genk Mayor, Wim Dries, at the weekend.

The restoration of the listed building - once home to the Winterslag mine's working ponies - has been a three-year labour of love by Painting with Light founder and CEO Luc Peumans, working together with local architect Ruben Hermans. It also represents completion of the final element of Stage 1 of the wider C-MINE project -- led by Genk City Council - to regenerate the site of the former mine which is right at the heart of Genk's rich industrial heritage.

Says Luc, one of the best known show and lighting and multimedia designers in Benelux, "I was delighted with just how many people came to the event to share an incredibly proud moment in the company

Israel - Koltech is a forward thinking lighting and audio rental company based in Beersheva, Israel's seventh largest city and the biggest in the arid Negev desert region to the south of the country.

The company is owned by Yossi Bendavid - popularly known as Zak Zak which means talkative - and Shlomi Auitani. The pair worked together at a previous company for several years and then set up Koltech seven years ago.

Koltech initially specialised in supplying technical solutions to theatre and opera productions. Their reputation soon spread along with their operational scope, and they quickly found themselves supplying concerts, outdoor festivals and a whole range of corporate and business events as well as arts projects.

They decided to invest in Robe for the first time in 2011, purchasing MMX Spots.

They already knew of the brand and its reputation from a couple of sources

UK - Aurora Lighting Hire is supporting lighting director Gurdip Mahal and gaffer James Tinsley on the new BBC One adventure quiz Prized Apart.

Working with production company Electric Ray and set designer Julian Healey, Aurora has provided a full service installation to the extensive studio lighting set up at Farnborough Five.

In keeping with the dry heat of the show's Morocco based location adventures, LD Gurdip Mahal has bathed the set in a desert glow created using a blend of MAC Viper Profiles, MAC Auras plus Vari-Lites VL3500 and VL2000 that mirror the arid on screen conditions.

Adding to both the vibrancy and versatility of the lighting design, Martin Viper Performances and Rush PARS are mixed with Sunstrips and Shapeshifters whilst Super Nova Flowers, Sharpys and Source Fours take care of highlights and keying.

Julian Healey and Gurdip Mahal have previously

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