Pharos - Leaderboard - May 2024

Business

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UK - The first of Robe's new BMFL Spot fixtures to tour in the UK were specified by Boston based lighting designer Jeff Maker for the recent Gaslight Anthem tour - for which they were purchased by Leeds based rental company Zig Zag Lighting.

Jeff - whose CV includes imaginative lighting for several 'alternative' bands including All Time Low - presented his first lighting design for the US punk rockers who kicked off their Get Hurt album campaign. He was recommended for the gig for his creative flair by FOH sound engineer Joe Amato, who also mixes All Time Low.

Jeff has worked with Zig Zag on several previous occasions, and they are his rental company of choice for the UK and Europe.

Zig Zag's Neil Hunt says: "Essentially I needed a super-bright fixture to use on large spec shows that often have a high video or bright LED elements. Various fixtures appear on light

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Cayman Islands - Located due south of Cuba, the British Overseas Territory known as the Cayman Islands is not only well known as an offshore financial centre, it's equally regarded for its resort / tourism trade. And for the various concerts, festivals, and other special events that take place here, AI Rentals is the company to contact to handle the various logistical considerations. To ensure the best possible sound reinforcement for the myriad of projects that come through its doors, AI Rentals relies on its sizeable arsenal of loudspeakers from D.A.S. Audio.

Keith Tibbetts serves as the managing director of AI Rentals. The company owns a large assortment of D.A.S. Audio equipment, including 40 Event 210A 3-way active line array elements plus 24 Event 218A powered subwoofers. Additionally, the company owns several D.A.S. Action Series loudspeaker systems, including 12 Action 1

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Brazil - Under the wise guidance of jurors Alarico Sanchez, Césio Lima, Daniel Ridano, Danny Nolan, Francesco Romagnoli and Marcos Olívio, the second MA 3D contest was hosted in São Paulo, Brazil.

The first day of the contest started with a grandMA2 Advanced User Training course accompanied by a lecture by renowned lighting designer Danny Nolan in the evening. During the lecture Nolan illustrated his personal approach to designing a show.

The following day focused on the actual contest, starting with the 29 participants presenting their projects which had been programmed using the MA 3D software. From here, 12 participants made it to the second round on the following and final day. Throughout this final day, the contestants could illustrate their show on a real stage equipped with Clay Paky moving lights.

After this final presentation, the winners were announced: 1s

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Turkey - Tarkan, one of the most popular singers in Turkey as well as around the World, has met with his fans with nine concerts during September at the Harbiye Open Air Theatre. The spectacular stage was set by Staras, one of the top rental companies in Turkey which has invested in the cutting-edge Clay Paky Sharpy and for the first time they added the DiGiCo SD5. As exclusive distributor of Clay Paky and DiGiCo in Turkey, Asimetrik's expertise and dynamism lead to Staras's sourcing decision.

Staras rents sound, light and audio-visual systems and provide technical production services for events in a diversity of fields with 30 years of expertise. Staras closely follows the global trends and technologies to ensure outstanding events. Staras is already experienced with Clay Paky's spectacular lighting solutions with their previous purchases.

Morever, Tarkan's production team or

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USA - Coinciding with the reopening of an iconic Manhattan venue, PBS recently broadcast a 60-minute primetime special, Michael Feinstein at The Rainbow Room, as part of its Fall Arts Festival programming. As a loyal DPA Microphones user, Feinstein's long-time production manager and FOH engineer Andy Brattain ensured that the performer's microphone of choice was used for the taping, which included a variety show and a series of big band performances. Several DPA microphones were used for the production, including the d:facto Vocal, d:vote 4099 Instrument, d:dicate 4011 Cardioid and d:screet Miniature mics.

The PBS-special featured Michael Feinstein and a 17-piece big band, along with June Squibb, Christine Ebersole, Cheyenne Jackson, American Idol Season 11 runner up Jessica Sanchez and the noteworthy tap duo, the Manzari Brothers, all using DPA microphones. Workin

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UK - Opened in 1968 and part of University College London, The Bloomsbury Theatre is a true multi-purpose venue and one of London's busiest, hosting as many as 20 different productions in a single month.

The theatre presents a variety of productions, from rock 'n roll to ballet, drama, corporate events, film and opera as well as numerous UCL student productions. However it is perhaps most well-known as a comedy venue, one which has seen performances by Jo Brand, Mel And Sue, Eddie Izzard, Lily Savage, and John Shuttleworth among many others.

More recently comedy A-Listers Jimmy Carr, Ricky Gervais and Harry Hill have recorded shows there for DVD release. With almost 550 seats and with completely unobstructed views of the stage throughout the house, it manages to pull off the difficult trick of combining intimacy with the atmosphere that is only generated by a certain audience

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USA - Hip hop music comes in many forms and positive hip hop artists are finding mainstream success like never before. Grammy Award-winning artist and one of inspiring hip hop's most successful names, Lecrae, is one such example. Touring the US through the end of the year beneath an Elation lighting rig supplied by live events brand management company LabeLive, Lecrae's latest album debuted at No. 1 on several charts from the Billboard 200 to Urban, Independent and Christian charts.

LabeLive, out of Franklin, Tennessee, has provided full production and stage design for the artist's current Anomaly tour, which features a rig of Elation Platinum Wash 16R Pro and Platinum 5R Extreme moving heads, along with Elation Cuepix Blinders. LabelLive, who operated for five years as live production company Sixdegrees Touring before launching under the LabeLive name in May, support a f

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UK - So popular was a 'learn-to-drift' day out last year organised for staff, crew and regular freelancers by west London lighting and visual specialists Colour Sound Experiment ... that they revved, roared and oversteered their way right back for more of the same ... this time at Rockingham, the UK's fastest racing circuit..

The experience liberated a thousand petrol-head fantasies and gave everyone - at all levels of driving ability - a fantastic, all-action day of speed, skidding and sliding to remember. Colour Sound's Haydn Cruickshank, himself a bit of a drift exponent, illustrated first-hand the potential adrenaline rush and sense of achievement to be gained from this exciting motorsport.

Over 50 guests joined team Colour Sound eager to learn from the expertise and audacity of instructors from Learn2Drift (L2D), who taught everyone the basics of how to control an out-of-

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USA - This past November CNBC tapped The Lighting Design Group (LDG) to light their 25th anniversary celebration. This year also marks LDG's 25th anniversary. The elaborate event was held at Rose Hall, home to Jazz at Lincoln Centre, in The Time Warner Building. LDG staff designers, programmers, gaffers, and Local One I.A.T.S.E crew members worked to install the affair over the course of two days and within several Rose Hall locations.

The first event of the evening occurred in The Rose Theatre, lit by LDG president Steve Brill. The one-hour, panel show was broadcast live and hosted by CNBC's Jim Cramer, host of Mad Money. "Due to several variables we opted to use VL 3500s for much of the heavy lifting," said Brill. One was the shutter capabilities, which allowed granular control over the lighting of each panelist. "They are also very powerful units, allowi

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South Africa - South African audiences were captivated as War Horse, brought to the country by Pieter Toerien and the National Theatre, played at The Teatro, Montecasino in Johannesburg recently. The show then moved to Cape Town at Artscape Opera House from 5 December 2014. Technical support in both venues was provided by Gearhouse Splitbeam.

A truly iconic show based on a book written by Michael Morpurgo, War Horse was only designed to run for a couple of weeks . . . then they did it again and again and again and it's currently in its seventh successful year on the West End in London. The journey has seen the horses redesigned - the life-sized puppets were created and built in Cape Town by Handspring Puppet Company - and the early days saw performers receiving hours of physio every day. As the show was very physical on performers, more actors were brought in to ta

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UK - In December 2013 Stage Technologies' sister company Delstar Engineering was commissioned to provide a huge scenic structure for the set of ANNE, a new play about the life of Anne Frank. Produced by Imagine Nation, with set design by Bernhard Hammer and directed by Theu Boermans, the play is performed at the new 'Theater Amsterdam', a purpose-built venue in the Westerlijke Houthavens district of Amsterdam.

The play covers the two years that Anne Frank and her family hide in an attic in Amsterdam, as well as some events prior to their secret life and following their discovery and deportation by the Nazis. The intimate and powerful production not only utilises Anne Frank's own words from her diary but also plays out against a life-size backdrop of the Frank family's flat.

The audience views a series of projection screens that part to form a proscenium at various times

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Denmark - Danish brand Change Lingerie recently held an outstanding fashion show for the presentation of The Intimate Britney Spears, the collection created and designed in conjunction with the American pop star. Nordic Rentals, a leading Danish rental and event management supplier, opted for Analog Way's Ascender 48 to ensure a flawless and visually stunning show.

At the Forum in Copenhagen, Change Lingerie introduced the Intimate Britney Spears line in the presence of the artist, as well as 5,000 attendees. Nordic Rentals was selected to create an astonishing fashion show.

As a background to the catwalk and stage where lingerie models and dancers performed, an ultra-wide curved screen of 44m x 5.5m was utilised. A total of six Panasonic DZ-21 video-projectors were blended to provide the panoramic curved image. The entire show was built in a Watchout 5 system, with eye catchi

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USA - One way to keep the Halloween spooks away is to keep the lights on and that's what they did at Hard Day of the Dead Fest in Pomona, California, using an Elation lighting rig of Platinum Beam 5R's, LED moving heads, Par lights, and Elation LED video displays. Held on 1-2 November at the Fairplex, Elation dealers Stage Tech, Felix Lighting and Vision's Lighting delivered a large Elation package for Southern California's ultimate Halloween DJ and dance event.

The festival's Hard Main Stage incorporated a Mayan Pyramid design that was conceived by designer Charley Guest of Stage Tech of Santa Fe Springs, California, their fifth year doing the event. The scaffold structure was 210' wide and 70' tall and was accentuated by using two Elation video products throughout the structure's facia. The Hard Stage setup featured Elation EPV 375 HO LED panels that were specified, says Charl

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USA - Birmingham, Alabama's Iron City is a new 1,300-capacity music venue that plays host to acts both local and national. It occupies two former automotive warehouses downtown that the owners gutted and renovated to hit the perfect middle between steely grit and modern elegance. As general manager Mike Creager put it, "At Iron City, we aim to do everything a cut above. From production to hospitality, we always shoot for a high standard."

That philosophy extends to sound reinforcement as well. Creager worked with Tim Ogletree at MediaMerge (Chelsea, Alabama) to design a zero-compromise system that would be appropriate for Iron City's wide footprint. Rather than a line array, Creager and Ogletree designed a point-source system using Danley Sound Labs' patented Synergy Horn loudspeakers and Tapped Horn subwoofers.

Although sometimes sceptical of the system's relatively

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UK - With just 24 hours notice, London based large format projection specialists, The Projection Studio (TPS) delivered a full projection design to enable a giant image of the BandAid30 music video to be projected onto the Houses of Parliament in Westminster.

It was the first time a full motion video has been projected onto this landmark building.

The song is helping to raise funds and awareness in BandAid30's ongoing fight against Ebola.

TPS's Creative Director Ross Ashton received the call on Friday afternoon from Des Shaw at event production company Ten Alps, who had received final clearance from Bob Geldof, on all the permissions to make the high-profile event happen on the Sunday evening in front of the world's press.

Says Ross Ashton, "We were called at 13.30 on Friday, and by 13.00 on Saturday we had started the install. Naturally I was thrilled to be involved.

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China - PR Lighting fixtures had a major presence at the recent 22nd APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) Welcome Banquet, which was held at the Water Cube in Beijing.

This event, whose theme this year was 'Shaping the Future through Asia-Pacific Partnership', was very much a showcase for Chinese entertainment and stage lighting brands, providing a great opportunity for the Chinese event technology industry to show its new image and underline how far it has come. And the attendees, represented by the leaders from 21 member countries, were certainly impressed.

The lighting was divided into three distinct sections, and as the leading entertainment lighting company in China, PR Lighting was chosen for its advanced and reliable products.

The first part of the journey was 'The Welcome Pathway' - the road between the Bird's Nest Stadium and Water Cube - which was designed by c

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Ireland - Dublin-based Sound Productions recently designed, supplied and commissioned a new JBL beam steering public address system for St. Agnes Catholic Church in the Parish of Crumlin.

Having installed the previous PA system around a decade ago, the new sound solution was specified as part of a complete church renovation project.

According to Sound Productions' senior project manager, Peadar Carley, the aim of the new system was to maintain and improve intelligibility using a more architecturally discreet solution.

"The renovation included the installation of new hard wood flooring which was previously carpeted - and with no absorbing surfaces, this meant that the RT would increase to 3-5 seconds. Therefore we needed a speaker system that would provide precise beam steering," he said.

He turned to a pair of JBL Intellivox-DS280s, distributed in the UK and Eire

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USA - Weather conditions have always been the overall challenge and concern for outdoor event providers.

Aside from its impact on visitor attendance, adverse weather conditions impose huge additional costs on lighting equipment deployment - or rather it did. SGM's LED G-Spot moving head, is not only IP65 rated, making it weather resistant, but also includes an active dehumidification device. This reduces the risk of internal condensation while allowing lighting designers to unleash their creativity to the full - in whatever weather is thrown at them during an outdoor event

In recent months, three major amusement parks in the USA have all installed the G-Spot for their main attractions: Cedar Point in Ohio, Kings Island in Ohio and Carowinds in North Carolina.

Behind these installations is Andrew Strain from Blue Haze Entertainment, whose passion is the entertainment business

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UK - Sound Technology, distributor of Soundcraft in the UK and Eire, has announced further dates for its popular Soundcraft Vi Series training course.

The dates are as follows: Wednesday 21 January 2015, Tuesday 17 February 2015, Wednesday 18 March 2015, Wednesday 22 April 2015 and Wednesday 20 May 2015.

The course is held at Soundcraft's Potters Bar, Hertfordshire head office and factory, with an opportunity to visit the factory floor to see the Vi manufacturing process. The exception is the January 2015 session which is hosted by Adlib in Liverpool.

Presented by experienced Vi Series engineer and Adlib director Dave Kay, the training is relevant to the Vi6, Vi4, Vi3000 and Vi1, and also covers the new Soundcraft Realtime Rack plug-in engine.

The course is free and open to engineers, venues, hire, installation and production companies.

For more information and to regist

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UK - Avolites Ai S8 media servers completed an elegant makeover of the London Coliseum, draping the stage in video content for the British Fashion Awards, held to celebrate the contributions of British designers, creatives and models over the past year.

The glitzy event, attended by some of the biggest names in British fashion, was set against a backdrop including a main projection surface of eight Panasonic projectors blended to create a 6598x830 screen.

Ben Miles used two active Ai S8 servers, with another two used as reserve and programming systems. Another 1920x1080 HD feed to the camera PPU fed the IMAG screens content, such as fashion shoot clips, awards and winners graphics, mostly created by StrangeBeast.

Of the two active servers, one had the UI and three outputs and the other, the UI and two outputs, all outputting 1920x1080 at 50Hz, beautifully synced together.

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South Africa - With a background in electronic engineering and having followed the development of LED lighting for many years, Julian Cohen, owner of Johannesburg based rental company Avstage, had been waiting for LED technology to catch up with discharge lamps.

Three decades ago he designed and manufactured large display panels using discrete LEDs and now at last the opportunity came along to purchase new lighting including 12 Robin 300 LEDs, an Avolites Tiger Touch 2 and a haze machine.

In the greater rental market, Avstage caters for corporate events. This environment is unlike rock concerts where lighting is a major element of the production. "Most of our clients are non-technical and when catering for gala dinners or conferences, lighting is more about creating ambience and is only an element of the entire event. It's not about which light is being used and its techn

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Japan - It was a challenge for the technical crew of Fuji Television Network (Fuji TV) and Fuji Media Technology (FMT) to find the right fixture to light a set built in the globe shaped observation studio located on the 24th floor of their building. But in the end, they realised that ETC's Selador Desire D60 Daylight luminaires were the right fit.

"Our task was to light this set built in a space that was once a coffee shop, with minimal power," says Hitoshi Hoshino, the executive manager of FMT. "The space also had only 2.4m to the ceiling, so it was impossible to use incandescent lights, not only because of the power restrictions, but also the heat."

The set was built for the live morning breakfast show Mezamashi TV (Alarm Clock TV); behind the cast are windows with a view of Tokyo that creates a backlight that changes with the time and weather. The bigges

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USA - When one of US television's most visible sports anchors launched his new sportstalk TV/radio show in early October, lighting designer Victor Fable turned to a lighting package of studio-optimized Elation lighting equipment including DW Series and TVL Series professional white light LED fixtures to light the set.

Rich Eison, well known by US football fans as host of NFL GameDay Morning on the NFL Network and a mainstay on ESPN's SportsCenter from 1996 to 2003, hosts The Rich Eison Show broadcast live Monday-Friday from DirecTV's El Segundo, California Studios on the Audience Network, as well as Fox Sports Radio.

In the summer of 2014, while the space was being refurbished into a television studio for the three-hour show, Victor had time to contemplate his design and the lighting fixtures he would need. "I wanted a variety of professional white light and other

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UK - The new Jaguar XE was spectacularly launched in the UK amidst a fully produced musical theatre-style show - staged in a 3000-seat proscenium theatre within London's Earls Court. The 90 minute performance involved 17 different Jaguars through the ages. A Morris Minor, a cast of west end performers, a 30-piece orchestra positioned upstage on a moving riser and musical performances from the likes of Emeli Sandé, Eliza Doolittle and the Kaiser Chiefs were woven in to the narrative fabric of the show.

Freelance sound designer, Sebastian Frost worked closely with Imagination's head of sound, John Del Nero, to create natural theatre sound on the vast 53m x 30m stage, utilising a TiMax SoundHub audio showcontrol delay-matrix, supplied by London-based production hire company, Orbital Sound, not only to contain the sound but also to ensure the 3000-strong audience in the raise

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