South Africa - Extron Electronics is creating major talk ability on local soil with the recent opening of their new office in Johannesburg and their participation as exhibitors at Mediatech Africa. With offices around the world and a long standing support to the African ProAV market through the EMEA office in The Netherlands, the decision was made to establish a physical presence in South Africa where they will be able to increase support and provide easy access to training.

"One of the exciting things we have experienced recently is the positive reaction we are getting from our customers who have attended the first training classes in our Africa office. The classes help us build a strong relationship with our customers and help attendees' gain the skills they need to grow their businesses," remarks Jérôme Guéras, vice president of sales, EMEA.

Extron

Spain - The multi award-winning Christie MicroTiles display solution was firmly to the fore throughout the 27th Goya Awards ceremony held recently at the Auditorium Hotel in Madrid. There were two T-shaped stands on stage where the winners received their prizes and gave their speeches - each made up of five MicroTiles modules.

In fact, the idea of using MicroTiles actually came from the Spanish Film Academy itself. It specifically asked Elenco Audiovisión, the company commissioned with supplying the audiovisual equipment for the prize-giving ceremony, to use MicroTiles. The two displays received the signal from the mobile unit broadcasting the event.

"MicroTiles are ideal for creative displays because you can put them together in any shape or size imaginable. And afterwards you can reshuffle them into completely new designs", says Marcos Fernández, Christie sales d

UK - In an effort to drive the movement toward a common protocol for audio networking, Calrec has joined the AVnu Alliance, the industry consortium dedicated to the development and promotion of a professional-quality streaming standard for networked audio and video content based on the IEEE 802.1 Audio Video Bridging (AVB) standards.

"The AVB standard addresses Ethernet's most serious shortcomings as a transport for streaming audio," said Calrec technical director Patrick Warrington. "We know a lot about audio networking and have already brought two solutions to the table because we want to ensure that our customers' needs are well-represented in the new protocol."

"We are very pleased to welcome a broadcast audio leader like Calrec to AVnu Alliance," said Lee Minich, AVnu Alliance Marketing Work Group chair and president of Lab X Technologies. &q

UK - For the UK premiere of the fifth installment of the Die Hard franchise, Twentieth Century Fox brought in Premier to produce the London premiere of A Good Day To Die Hard.

Reflecting the full-on action of the movie, and providing a backdrop for the arriving stars including Bruce Willis and Jai Courtney, the Leicester Square premiere included a genuine ex-active-service helicopter alongside the red carpet outside the Odeon.

To add a little extra glamour to the heavy machinery, Premier brought in XL Events to provide scenic LED along the base of the 17m long flatbed truck on which the helicopter sat.

The low level of the truck provided XL with a challenge as there was limited space around the base in which to rig the LED. XL Events supplied 56 tiles of Pixled FX-11 for the event.

Pixled FX-11 was selected for the job due to its lightweight 450mm square tile size a

UK - The PLASA Show, a driving force in the development and promotion of the professional entertainment technology industry for over 35 years, is preparing to launch the most important edition in the show's history this Friday 15th March 2013. Taking place at Excel London for the first time this year, the show will open under its new name PLASA London 2013, in its new dateline of the 6-9 October.

PLASA CEO Matthew Griffiths explains; "PLASA London 2013 reflects a new focus on international visitors, which is the number one reason we moved to Excel. Excel London is just five minutes from London City Airport, which handles 350 flights per day from over 40 international destinations. London is already the best connected City in the world and this October, PLASA London 2013 will take place in one of the best connected venues in the world, and that's a fact."

With seven o

Germany - Having been involved with the exhibition for a number of years, Christie this year returns to exhibiting in its own right at Frankfurt Prolight+Sound 2013 ( booth # 9.0, C57) presenting a number of advanced rental staging solutions for the industry touring and corporate event segments.

Products from the popular and powerful Roadster J and M Series 3-chip DLP projectors, along with Christie Nitro Solutions integrated moving yokes and digital projector systems will form the centrepieces on the stand - accompanied by Christie MicroTiles in different shapes and formats.

The Christie Nitro YK100 is a single-arm yoke that has been purpose designed for the Christie M Series and Christie LX1500 to provide a range of brightness levels (5,700 to 15,000 ANSI lumens) to choose from. This flexible system includes an interchangeable head system that enables users to replace the vi

Australia - The Intercontinental Sanctuary Cove in Queensland is one of Australia's premier leisure, conference and incentive destinations. Working closely with Staging Connections, provides a full event service from state-of-the-art audio visual equipment, meeting aids and technical assistance.

With such a varied range of events to cater to, Staging Connections has found the flexibility of their JBL VRX900 Series Constant Curvature Line Arrays to be ideal, so much so they ordered even more JBL VRX932LAP speaker and JBL VRX918SP subwoofers.

"The VRX line array is a welcome addition to our audio inventory," commented Matt Danks of Staging Connections. "These powered top boxes are light which means they are easy to fly and saves time not having to set up additional amplifier drive racks."

"They sound great. The array has an even sound-field and wide di

South Africa - The 9th Annual Channel O Music Video Awards was held at the Walter Sisulu Square in Kliptown, Soweto, South Africa. It comprised of a mega dome structure and an enormous lighting rig. For control lighting designer Joshua Cutts relied on one grandMA2 light and with one MA onPC command wing as backup as well as one MA NPU (Network Processing Unit) all provided by AV Unlimited.

A professional group of companies and individuals put the event together. Television production company Don't Look Down Convergence Agency were responsible for producing the event for DSTV while AV Unlimited supplied the full technical. The dome structure in which the event was held was supplied by IN 2 Structures, part of the Gearhouse Group of Companies. The set designer was Garrith Castelyn from AV Unlimited and Dreamsets were involved in building the stage. For the fifth consecutive year,

UK - Ian Hall has been promoted to sales director at Total Solutions Group. Joining the company nine years ago as sales manager, Hall has watched Total Solutions Group (TSG) evolve to engage with the ever growing demands of special projects. "From Slick to Solutions is a heady mix. TSG's involvement in providing specialist engineering skills to the ceremonies section of the London Olympics last summer was the high point in what has been for me, a tumultuous nine years since Slick Trussing first became part of TSG in 2004," says Hall.

In recognition of Hall's experience and success, company founder and group CEO Chris Cronin has asked Hall to step up to the role of sales director. Cronin comments: "Since he first arrived Ian Hall has demonstrated a balanced approach to the TSG business. While driving the roller-coaster of special projects with their unforeseen eng

UK - PLASA London launches its first show at ExCeL London today with free entry for the first 5000 people to register via its new website. Taking place on 6-9 October 2013, the new name, new venue, and new autumn dateline aren't the only changes afoot for the industry-owned event.

PLASA CEO Matthew Griffiths explains, "This year marks the first stage of the show's long-term strategic development. ExCeL is located just five minutes from London City Airport, which handles 350 flights a day from 40 international destinations, and ExCeL's seven onsite hotels provide thousands of rooms within walking distance. With increased connectivity to Europe and beyond, as well as new, world-class facilities, we hope to send a clear message about the show's plans for future international growth."

In addition to the new campus-style experience for international visitors, PLASA Events

UK - A giant multi-touch glass screen, purpose manufactured by Bedford-based specialists, Paradigm AV, has taken centre stage at the University of Wolverhampton's new six zone Visualisation Centre.

Opened in mid-March, and the brainchild of the University's Innovation 1st project team, this futuristic technology suite has been repurposed out of existing space in the Business Solutions Centre on the Wolverhampton Science Park.

While AVM Impact won a competitive EU tender to install the six rooms, they chose projection specialist Paradigm AV to design, manufacture and install the glass display - measuring 3545mm x 2232mm, and billed as the largest Windows 8 touch-screen in the West Midlands - which will allow the local business community to interact with it collaboratively. The facility is designed to provide local SMEs in the West Midlands with a minimum two days (12 hours) of

UK - There can be no better endorsement for a company that a client who returns year after year; each time asking for a more detailed specification, more equipment and greater participation. Alex Leinster, MD of Chaos Visuals Productions UK can report precisely that. "Since the initial call from Bacchus in February 2011, requesting an LED screen and playback package installed two days later, our involvement at London Fashion Week has grown season by season.

"Last season the new lightweight 20K projectors from Panasonic allowed us to bring projection to the catwalk that could hold its own against the show lighting. This season, touchscreen technology was added to allow visitors to interact with, and customise, their experience of the Canon cinema."

Returning to the sumptuous surroundings of Somerset House, Bacchus PR and London Fashion Week upped its game this ye

USA - Video equipment rental company Pete's Big TVs is providing the video equipment, cameras and d3 media servers for the new 2013 production of the Dreamgirls tour which kicked off in late December 2012/early January 2013. It tours North America until early June, followed by Japan, with more dates expected.

Working with MB Productions, Pete's Big TVs is providing the main set of the show, comprised of 400 digiLED MC15 (15 mm) LED video panels in three screens, which all track and fly in different configurations. They are also supplying two d3s from d3 Technologies. More than a media server, the d3s serve as a 3D stage simulator, combining a timeline based sequencer, video playback and video mapper all in one.

Howard Werner of Lightswitch designed the media content and the show system in 2009 when an older production of Dreamgirls began an eight-month run in Seo

South Africa - American electronic musician, Skrillex entertained South African fans in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Durban at the start of March 2013. The main technical supplier in Cape Town was Gearhouse, while in Johannesburg it was supplied by CES and in Durban by Insane Sound.

At the Wavehouse in Durban, lighting and video freelancer Thomas Peters assisted with the lighting.

"Reading through the Skrillex rider and adjusting accordingly for Durban, Vimal Rawjee (Insane Sound) and I came up with what we thought would be a viable rig for the show, which the production's management (Skrillex's Production Manager is Baptiste Chavaillaz) quickly approved," explained Thomas Peters. "While we did not have most of the first-choice fixtures available in the quantities requested, the substitutes we offered were all perfectly acceptable. The MMXs blew the touring LD aw

Australia / UK - Sydney will once again be immersed in light, music and creative ideas as Vivid Sydney returns for a fifth year from 24 May to 10 June. For the first time the programme will be streamed live from the web address below. The live streaming will take place 11pm Wednesday 20 March (GMT) / 10am Thursday 21 March 2013 (Australian Eastern Standard Time).

Vivid Sydney highlights include: the lighting of the iconic Sydney Opera House sails; 3D mapping projections on Customs House and the Museum of Contemporary Art; interactive light sculptures and installations; public talks, debates and workshops from innovative global creatives and thought leaders in collaboration with Vivid IDEAS; and performances from local and international musicians at Vivid LIVE and Vivid MUSIC.

The 18-day event, the largest of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere, is a major celebration of the cr

UK - HTC recently launched their new flagship mobile phone, the HTC One, at two simultaneous events in London and New York.

Brand experience agency, SSG Create, producers of the global event, brought in XL Events for the London launch to provide projection, media servers, plasma screens, HD camera system/PPU, and HD recording system.

To unveil the new device, XL Events provided a two projector blend using XL's new Barco HDF-W26 units on to a screen behind the presenter.

This front projection was particularly challenging due to the requirement not to cast any shadows from the presenters including HTC CEO, Peter Chou.

This requirement, coupled with the restricted rigging at the venue, meant the projectors had to be flown from an angle and the images warped via a Coolux Pandora's Box supplied by XL to achieve the desired image quality.

The main show content was delivered fr

UK - Technical production specialist Universal Event Productions (UEP) based in Tring, UK, is celebrates 15 years in the live events industry in style - by staging a two-day music extravaganza, Chilfest, on 5-6 July 2013. The event was instigated by UEP's MD Steve Butcher, and will also help raise money for two charities, the Iain Rennie Grove House Hospice Care (IRGH) and AWA - Women supporting Women against domestic violence.

The festival site will be Pendley Activity Meadow - owned by event sponsor Pendley Manor - with a capacity of 7000 for each of the two nights. The programme for Friday 5 July will include a line-up of contemporary pop artists including Little Mix, Loveable Rogues and Heather Small, while Saturday's 1980s themed evening will feature Tony Hadley, Howard Jones, Rick Astley, Midge Ure, Carol Decker and Hazel O'Connor.

All the technical infrastructure for Ch

Canada - A.C. Lighting Inc., has provided an ArKaos A-30 media server for a recent TEDxYorkU think tank event at York University, Toronto. York University is one of Canada's leading interdisciplinary research and teaching universities, offering a modern, academic experience at the undergraduate and graduate level.

TEDx is a series of events organised in the style of TED, a non-profit organisation devoted to "ideas worth spreading". It started out as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment and Design. Since then its scope has become ever broader.

The TEDx events program is designed to give communities, organisations and individuals the opportunity to stimulate dialogue through TED-like experiences at a local level, sparking deep conversation and connections.

The TEDx events' celebrated format includes a suite of short, care

UK - Roland Systems Group (RSG) has announced the appointment of SCAN Computers as a dealer for both professional audio and video products. With their headquarters in Bolton, SCAN has a separate 'Pro Service' division which includes Pro Audio and Pro Video, serving clients as diverse as professional recording studios, schools, filmmakers and musicians.

SCAN has over 25 years of experience in providing PC based solutions to the audio and video markets and will focus primarily on supplying small format AV switchers such as the VR-3 AV Mixer, VR-5 AV Mixer & Recorder and V-40HD Multi Format Video Switcher, the VC-30HD Video Converter and the M-200i iPad Controllable Digital Mixing Console.

Taking advantage of the growth in the popularity of web-streaming, especially in the education sector, the expanding lineup of streaming-ready AV Mixers and Converters from Roland fit perfectly

Sweden - British digital motion graphics company SquareZero is updating its holographic representations of Björn, Agnetha, Benny and Frida ready for them to take centre stage at the Abba museum, set to open in Stockholm in May.

SquareZero previously created holograms to tour as part of the Abbaworld Touring Exhibition, but the new holograms will be even more lifelike than their previous incarnations, having been created using advanced motion capture techniques, followed by full CGI builds and rigging in 3D. Fans will be able to perform alongside the band in the museum, and performances with the SquareZero holograms will be captured and stored on the interactive tickets, which can be accessed remotely post visit.

The award-winning creative company spent nearly a year researching and animating to create the installation, which is expected to be one of the museum's most popular

USA - Leading Audio Video Bridging (AVB) platform provider Lab X Technologies has announced that its Xavity Audio For Xilinx Spartan-6 platform is the first entry to the AVnu Pro A (professional audio) certification tests at UNH-IOL. The Xavity Audio platform joins the Xavity enabled Titanium 411 ruggedised AVB switch which is being tested as part of the AVnu bridge certification program.

The Xavity Audio platform for Xilinx Spartan-6 is the first end station platform/product to enter AVnu Alliance's Pro A (professional audio) certification tests for conformance and interoperability (C&I). Once successfully through the testing program, Lab X will apply for use of the AVnu certification mark to denote that Xavity is AVnu-certified.

"Forging Xavity in the fire of AVnu C&I testing will make it an even stronger platform," states Lee Minich, president of Lab X Technologie

UK - In March 2013, the Teenage Cancer Trust held its regular series of fundraising shows at the Royal Albert Hall in London - the 13th year this has taken place. Supporting the charity, XL Video supplied LED screens, an HD camera system, recording and control for the series of seven events which, were curated by Noel Gallagher.

The line-up of international stars included music artists Ryan Adams, Kasabian, Noel Gallagher, Damon Albarn, Graham Coxon, and Paul Weller as well as comedy stars Russell Brand and Noel Fielding.

Flown above the stage, XL supplied an 8m x 4.5m Lighthouse R7 LED screen which showed IMAG footage of the shows combined with information films about Teenage Cancer Trust's work helping young people with cancer. Below the screen a 28m wide LED banner, formed from Pixled F-25, provided an additional scenic element as well as showing details on how the audience

USA - The quality, clarity and brightness of amusement park attractions, video and image-intensive shows, and exhibitions and virtual design applications take a significant leap forward today with the introduction of the new Christie D4K2560 and Christie D4K3560 projectors.

The new D4K models are the first projectors to combine 4K resolution, high frame rates at 60 frames per second (fps) and three-chip DLP technology. Both the Christie D4K2560 (25,000 centre lumens) and Christie D4K3560 (35,000 centre lumens) provide razor-sharp image detail - and video with smoother motion and transitions - for unsurpassed image quality and a more vibrant and appealing visual experience. The new projectors replace the Christie D4K25 and D4K35, respectively, and are perfect for any application requiring 4K, 60 fps, three-chip DLP projectors with high brightness.

"Christie is the only man

Germany - At ProLight+Sound, Panasonic are presenting a host of new display and projector innovations which answer specifically needs of the exhibition rental market and professional staging and events specialists. Visitors to the Panasonic stand will be able to meet Panasonic technical experts who will demonstrate applications, discuss solutions and answer questions.

Jan Markus Jahn, director of visual systems solutions business unit of Panasonic Systems Communication Company, explains "Panasonic will show display solutions that are at the very forefront of new technology and show our focus on meeting the needs of exhibition rental and staging markets. With everything from our hugely successful and award winning PT-DZ21K projector which lit up the London 2012 Olympic opening and closing ceremonies to our new display technology, we offer a massive range of innovative AV sol

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