Pharos - Leaderboard - May 2024

Video and AV

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UK - Christie has introduced the latest addition to the DS+ Series of dual lamp, single-chip DLP projectors. Compact and quiet, the projector delivers top-quality image reproduction for medium to large meeting rooms and classrooms, government facilities and executive briefing rooms where smooth, reliable operation is critical, says the company.

Optimised for brighter whites and vivid colour, the Christie DS+655 is designed for business presentations in high ambient light environments. It delivers 6,500 ANSI lumens and combines SXGA+ resolution with a contrast ratio of up to 7500:1. BrilliantColor, DNX, and the latest-generation 10-bit image processing technology produce "dramatic colour rendering and video reproduction, broader colour bandwidth, and significantly reduced image noise".

"The Christie DS+655 draws upon cutting-edge technologies and features the lat

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UK - The Ultimate Fighting Championship has returned to the UK, and PSL is once again supplying the event with Christie S+20K projectors and massive projection screens.

The UFC tours four British cities, taking its brand of mixed martial arts to the Odyssey Arena in Belfast, the Metro Radio Arena in Newcastle and the MEN Arena in Manchester. London's O2 Arena is the biggest tournament on the UFC's British itinerary. It can accommodate 18,000 fight fans, most of which have been introduced to the sport by the UFC Series broadcast on cable TV from the USA. An essential element in the arena presentation of the event is the giant screen, which allows the audience to follow closely the action and characters such as The Irish Hand Grenade, El Conquistador, The Hitman and Hands of Steel.

Although the sightlines in the O2 Arena are excellent, especially in this in-the-round conf

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USA - When the Disco Fever tour headlined by KC & the Sunshine Band made a recent stop at L.A.'s Greek Theater, thousands of disco fans of all ages turned out. Although the music may have been classic '70s dance tunes, the lighting effects were over-the-edge 21st century, thanks to Acclaim Lighting's X-Panel low-res LED screen system, which put on a high-tech display of colourful graphics on the wall behind the stage.

Lighting design/production company Stage-Tech used 36 X-Panel Frame Systems linked together to create the video display. The X-Panel is a lightweight 8.3" square panel with 25 high-intensity RGB LEDs that can be used in multiples to produce video, graphics, text, animated cartoons, or any combination. Each X-Panel Frame System consists of a 3' x 4' flying frame with 12 X-Panels and an Acclaim X-PD-150 power supply pre-mounted to it.

According to Stage

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UK - XL Video supplied video equipment and crew to two high profile performances at the 2008 Greenwich & Docklands International festival in London. The event presented a free programme of street and outdoor entertainment throughout the area, including Runand Time Is Like Flowing Water. Technical Manager for both events for the Festival was Richard Williamson.

XL's project manager Paul Wood comments: "This is the first time XL has been involved with this event. It was great to be involved with creative projects such as this, and it's good to see artists incorporating and experimenting with video in inventive ways."

Staged at The Queen's House next to Greenwich Maritime Museum, Runtold the history of running, with the help of dancing, choreography, music and HD video.

XL supplied four Barco FLM HDR18 projectors, two Doremi HD video hard drives a

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UK - London-based production company Event Concept has boosted its AV capabilities by offering the latest live digital sound, live video and media production services as well as VJ and DJ performances.

Commenting on the company's expansion, managing director Mark Beaver said: "We have excellent relationships with the industry's top sound and video suppliers and we will continue to partner with them on our larger projects. More of our clients are taking their events to full production level, needing a much wider range of services, so it makes sense that we have the skills and equipment under one roof to offer a more efficient, integrated solution where possible."

The AV team is headed by Jamie Corteen, former director of 2 Bit TV, a live video performance and events production company. Corteen is supported by AV production designer Jonny Stewart, formerly Head of Vide

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UK - Wembley Stadium played host to the Foo Fighters for two nights, which saw a packed stadium with upward of 80,000 strong crowds and support acts including Supergrass and members of Led Zeppelin as special guests performing with the band.

Having just got back from filming The Champions League in Moscow, Spidercam was brought in by Splinter Films, specialists in music and live events, to cover the massive concerts. Both nights' shows were filmed and the result was ready for cinema release at the end of the month, and will also be available for MSN broadcast and on Blu-ray DVD.

The stage design which included a B-stage that wrapped round the front of house control position was joined to the main open stage by a thrust walkway that ran almost the length of the pitch. This extensive performance area called for a different approach to filming and Spidercam provided full 360 degr

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USA - The Comcast Experience at Philadelphia's Comcast Center features an LED wall comprising 6,771 Barco NX-4 LED modules.

Situated in a breathtaking seven-story high glass atrium, The Comcast Experience is a joint gift to the citizens of Philadelphia from Comcast Corporation and Liberty Property Trust.

By transforming a public transportation hub into an artistic focal point for the city, The Comcast Experience encompasses a number of important "firsts." From a technology standpoint, the world's largest four millimeter LED wall is 83.3' wide by 25.4' high, and is comprised of 6,771 Barco NX-4 LED modules. With 10 million pixels mounted in a seamless flat array, the wall provides an extremely high degree of photo-realism - five times the resolution of high-definition television. Behind the scenes, Barco image processing equipment includes six DX-700 LED digitizers, s

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UK - Christie Control Room rear screen DLP projectors proved they can go the distance and beyond at the AT&T Global Network Operations Centre (GNOC) in Bedminster, New Jersey. Clocking in at one million combined hours of uninterrupted 24/7 operation, the projectors have run with zero hardware failures. The results were confirmed by AT&T, which installed 141 Christie RPMSP-D120U rear projection systems almost ten months ago in the massive 83m wide by 4m high GNOC video display wall in the nerve centre of AT&T's world operations.

The hours are based on the projectors running non-stop from their first full day of operation in late August 2007 through June 17, 2008. The routine changing of the consumable components, some of which may have been replaced during this period, is part of the normal expected maintenance and is not counted.

Christie confirmed the high reliability of its

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UK - Amid the continuing growth in membership and a broadening range of initiatives, this year's PLASA AGM and Lunch on 3 June saw a record turnout for the third year in succession, the Association reports.

Over 170 members and guests enjoyed a day in the glamorous surroundings of London's Hurlingham Club, where the AGM and members' questions were followed by a three-course lunch with a talk by renowned broadcaster John Humphrys.

In its fourth year as a combined AGM and Member Lunch, and its third at the Hurlingham Club, the event has grown into a major fixture on members' calendars and the growing demand for places means PLASA will almost certainly move to a larger, but equally special, venue for next year.

Members now see this as a prime opportunity to celebrate being part of an organisation that is moving the industry forward and to network with other members in relaxed s

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USA - Digital Projection International (DPI) received a product excellence award at InfoComm 08. The company's Titan 500 received the Best Video Projection Product/High Lumen award on the basis of a readers' poll conducted by Rental & Staging magazine.

According to Mike Levi, president of DPI, "Being recognized for excellence by the staging professionals who depend on projection equipment for their clients and their livelihoods is a tremendous honour. When we first conceptualized the Titan product range, our development team sought a lot of design advice from key customers in the staging community, and we worked hard to incorporate their ideas into the ultimate Titan platform.

(Jim Evans)

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UK - Creative Technology (CT) has appointed Charlie Whittock, as managing director of CT Asia Pacific. He was previously managing director of CT London and has been instrumental in setting up CT operations in China. He will be relocating to Hong Kong.

Dave Crump will take over as managing director of the CT London business with immediate effect.

"CT is now the largest division and contributor within the Avesco Group and these changes and the commitment to develop the business reflect the importance of the CT to the group and Avesco's strategy going forward," says CEO Ian Martin.

(Jim Evans)

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UK - Event services specialist PSL has expanded its sales team and its equipment inventory, in response to increased demand from the exhibition circuit.

Max Nembhard has joined the company as business development manager, having spent the last three years in the AV industry, most recently with Aspect Visuals. Nembhard has been recruited to the PSL sales team specifically to work in the exhibition sector, presenting PSL's inventory of AV and IT display technology to corporate customers, stand designers and builders and consultants.

As the rental market continues to flourish, PSL is building up its stock of flat screens, which have become almost de rigeur at exhibitions and as repeater screens at large live events.

Managing director Gary Davis comments: "There has been a market shift towards the more widespread use of LCD screens, which have a longer life expectancy and a

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UK - Bristol based video, AV and digital content production specialists R2 Digital Productions purchased a high specification Catalyst digital media server from Projected Image Digital (PID) and three Sanyo projectors for the current Random Concerts touring production of Oh What A Night.

R2 Digital Productions headed by Colin Rozee, are the tour's technical co-ordinators. At the end of 2007, producer Stuart Littlewood was keen to replace some of the physical set with video and give the show - which has been on the road for 11 years - a contemporary twist.

He spoke to Rozee who advised that large projections would be a way to achieve this, by which time lighting designer Nigel Catmur had already come up with initial ideas for a projected set design containing 51 different sized projection windows mounted onto three large onstage flats

PID supplied the fully integrated

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UK - French screen rental company, Supervision, who in 2009 will celebrate 25 years of delivering large mobile LED screens to events across Europe, was the main contractor to UEAFA at this year's Euro 2008.

As the demand for screens for use in public arenas was so high, Supervision ordered two digiLED d11N screens to add to its LED tour inventory.

The two giant 49.52sq.m digiLED d11N screens were installed in the Fan Zones at Basel's Kasernenplatz and Münsterplatz. The Kasernenplatz screen was built into a structure positioned at the side of a stage, whilst the one in Münsterplatz was centre hung above the stage.

Each day's programme started at 1.30pm, with live entertainment, bands and promotional sponsor videos being shown on the screens. DJs revved up the crowds before the football started and then kept the fans entertained during and after the matches. The Supervision

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Belgium - Barco reports that its CLM R10+ compact DLP projector was selected for use at Expo Zaragoza 2008. More than 30 CLM R10+ projectors are installed at different locations, across five pavilions. Running from 14 June to 14 September in the city of Zaragoza, Spain, the international exposition expects to attract over six million visitors.

This year's Expo theme is Water and Sustainable Development and Zaragoza has made enormous efforts to construct the exposition site completely in line with its environmental theme.

Expo Zaragoza 2008, labeled the biggest water festival on earth, features 140 pavilions and presents 5,000 shows in 13 different venues including a daily parade by Cirque du Soleil called The Awakening of the Serpent. Its most emblematic buildings are the Water Tower, an 80m high transparent building designed by Enrique de Teresa to

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UK - The atrium of the Blue Fin Building, part of the Bankside development in London, has become home to a LPC X controller from Pharos Architectural Controls. The media wall had special control requirements to be considered - not the least of which was the near-30,000 channels of control needed to support the Color Kinetic's iColor Flex SL fixtures that make up the media wall in the reception area for IPC Media. This is one of many landmark projects specified by Speirs & Major Associates, supplied by Architainment, installed by Lighting Technology Projects and featuring Pharos controllers.

Orri Petursson of Speirs and Major Associates says: "The media screen is 40m long x 3m high and is made up of 9,500 RGB LED nodes spanning the entire length of an atrium. The obvious way to deliver and manage the content for this LED installation was to use a media server, however, due t

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UK - To celebrate London's flagship championship tennis tournament, official banking partner HSBC transformed Wimbledon tube station into a virtual tennis court, with Nintendo Wii activities played on an Aquivo screen.

HSBC decided to transform London's Wimbledon tube station into a fully interactive mini tennis court for the duration of the tournament. Enlisting the expertise of Red Door Events, the station's outdoor concourse was immersed in tennis fever.

The area was creatively tennis themed with false grass and adorned with a range of tennis accessories to welcome both local and international visitors. The centre of the station's entrance featured an HSBC backdrop, which incorporated a 55" Aquivo and a Nintendo Wii which were both built into the set, on which commuters were encouraged to challenge each others tennis skills.

Insight AV sourced and specified the outdo

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- Hadrian: Empire and Conflict, the British Museum's latest major exhibition, which opened to the public on 24 July, sees the 360-degree projection system designed and installed by systems integrator Sysco deployed to dramatic effect for the second time.

The projection system, which helped the previous exhibition, ,I>First Emperor: China's Terracotta Army win the Museums & Heritage 2008 Award for Temporary or Touring Exhibition, was specifically designed to be reconfigurable - a technological 'first' both for the UK and the British Museum - thus maximising the Museum's investment in technology.

It features an array of 10 Barco HD Icon H250 projectors, arranged to project onto a variety of screens in different formats around the Round Reading Room's circumference - a space whose ornate domed roof was itself originally inspired by one of Hadrian's most iconic bui

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France - Projection specialists E/T/C Paris supplied Christie video projectors, an Onlyview control system, an extensive video camera package and a digital outside broadcast van for the Unighted event, staged at the Stade de France stadium in Paris.

Hosted by club promoter, Cathy Guetta, the event 'unighted' five of the world's best known DJs - David Guetta, Carl Cox, Tiësto, Martin Solveig and Joachim Garraud - in a swirling, high energy multimedia mix of aesthetics and emotions enjoyed by 45,000 enthusiastic party people.

E/T/C Paris was asked onboard by long-time collaborators Skertzò, who were chosen to create the show's scenic elements and image design.

In addition to the video projection and Onlyview system, E/T/C provided equipment and crew for all the image capturing and relaying elements of the show.

A total of 23 cameras were used - five broadcast, two w

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USA - Elation Professional has added the top-of-the-line Antari HZ-500 professional DMX haze machine to its lineup of Antari atmosphere effects. The HZ-500 is designed to provide creative and dramatic atmospheric effects for concert tours, stage productions and large clubs, with a prolific haze output of 3,000 cubic feet/minute. Yet, it is extremely quiet, easy to maintain and consumes relatively little haze liquid, while offering exceptional performance, says the company.

Despite its high output, the HZ-500 runs quietly, with a noise level of under 70dB at a 4-inch distance. The virtual silence of the HZ-500 enables it to be used in situations where low noise is desired, such as a stage production where microphones might otherwise pick up the sound of a motor running backstage.

It uses only one litre of haze liquid over 20 hours, despite its 3,000 cu. ft./minute output, makin

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Show News - Loudspeaker manufacturer Tannoy makes a welcome return to the PLASA show after being absent for a couple of years. The company will be using the Earls' Court event as the platform for a first UK demonstration of its newest pro-audio product lines, VQ and QFlex, as well as exhibiting some of the existing V-Series loudspeaker range.

Executive News - Bandit Lites has announced that Peter M. Heffernan, a 30-year veteran, has been named president of the firm. Effective immediately, Heffernan will take the reigns and serve as both president and C.O.O., a role he has held for the last 15 years. This move comes at a time of growth for Bandit and is the logical step in taking the firm to the next level, says the company. Heffernan began his full time relationship with Bandit Lites in 1978 and he has risen through the ranks. He served as lighting director and/ or production manager f

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UK - Stage Electrics is supplying in house sound and audio visual equipment for the entire run of Lift Festival 2008 which takes place this summer at Stratford and the Southbank Centre. Since 1981, Lift has been recognised as one of Europe's leading arts festivals, introducing theatre from over 60 countries to venues and unusual sites across London. At the heart of the festival is The Lift, a mobile venue and meeting place that hosts performances, exhibitions, workshops, discussions and screenings.

Andrew Sugg, business development manager at Stage Electrics says, 'The project requires a flexible system which can be used for many applications, from live music, dance and film to individual speakers. On top of this, we have also provided additional sound and audio visual equipment for one off special events such as outdoor film showings.

Robin Shepherd-Blandy, technical m

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Germany - On 20 July, the biggest LED video screen ever used at a major motor racing event - and one of the largest systems ever supplied by G-LEC - was installed at Hockenheim Ring.

In cooperation with Hockenheim Ring, host of Formula 1 Santander Grand Prix, the massive 300sq.m screen provided spectators in the Innen Tribüne - the long stand inside the track, where spectators were up to 400m from the screen - with a television view of the race, something that would have been impossible with a standard high resolution screen.

Using 299 Phantom30 frames, the 23m wide x 13m deep screen is thought to be the largest LED screen ever used at such a major motor racing event. Built specifically for the occasion, the screen needed to be easy to construct and de-rig, but also needed to present extremely low wind resistance. Indeed the pre-race days saw strong winds and torrential rain,

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UK - System integration specialist Sysco has completed an extensive audio-visual installation in a new visitor attraction, the Root Zone at RHS Garden Wisley in Surrey.

Housed in the spectacular surroundings of the award-winning, world-class Wisley Glasshouse, developed by the Royal Horticultural Society, the new Root Zone - the UK's first - is an innovative interactive area where visitors can learn about roots and the vital role they play.

Located in a cavern within the Glasshouse, the Root Zone's displays help all visitors learn about the interrelation between plants, plant health and what takes place underground.

The Root Zone's exhibit co-ordinator, Nicky Evans, the Society's first principal science education officer says, "You really do feel as if you are underground here, with technology re-creating and explaining roots and their functions. The lighting is low, an

  1. Creative Technology speeds into ExCel
  2. Gottelier Award: nominees announced!
  3. XLTV teams join forces for Foo Fighters
  4. Touchline takes on Avistar for UK
  5. XLTV on the road with Tom Petty
  6. E/T/C London at Edinburgh Tattoo
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