Spain - Clay Paky Sharpys have one again played an integral role in an epic stunt by trailblazing light artists Marshmallow Laser Feast (MLF) and lighting designer Matthew Button, who have combined their creative genius to pull off a sensory spectacular for Lexus Europe and singer will.i.am.

The technological feat, which is part of Lexus's campaign for the Lexus NX SUV, sees will.i.am create a choreographed laser light show in time to his hit #thatPOWER, using a trio of Lexus NXs on a disused Spanish runway lined with 350 motion-sensitive lasers and Sharpys. The number-one artist was challenged with directing the three cars to hit the beams at the right cadence to synchronise with his track.

"The fantastic beam quality was the driving force behind the choosing the Sharpy," explains Button. "Having used them previously on a project for Castrol where they

USA - Avid and Focusrite have a history of industry-shaping collaborations, from the world's first plug-ins to feature a fully skeuomorphic GUI (D2 and D3), to the original Focusrite-designed Mbox interface that brought Avid Pro Tools software to the masses, and Control|24TM, Avid's first mid-format console. Twenty-one years after that first collaboration, Avid and Focusrite are "in deep discussions once more, the results of which they look forward to announcing soon".

Dave Froker, CEO of Focusrite PLC, comments, "We want to make the experience of using Focusrite hardware and Pro Tools software together the best possible experience for all our customers. Avid recognises Focusrite as an ideal companion to Pro Tools and Focusrite recognise Pro Tools as the most mature professional recording platform for new Focusrite customers to adopt.

"Focusrite are the l

Dubai - Protec, the one of Dubai's largest event rental companies used its BlackTrax real-time motion tracking system and its d3 Technologies' 4x4pro media servers to deliver some complex projection mapping for the grand opening ceremony for the World Air Games 2015 held at Sky Dive Dubai.

Sheikh Mansour bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, President of Dubai International Marine Club (DIMC) ushered in the 4th FAI World Air Games (WAG) at an impressive and colourful opening ceremony on December 3, 2015 in front of an appreciative audience of nearly 5,000 spectators, which included officials and contestants from over 50 countries.

"It was great," said Polish microlight team member Kajetan Ruks. "I've never seen anything like it before. And now, I want to see it again." Joao Franciso, who came from Portugal to compete in the air navigation race said, "O

UK - This year saw the live TV ceremony, hosted by Dermot O'Leary, award EastEnders Best Serial Drama, Suranne Jones scooped Drama Performance, Best Newcomer went to Shayne Ward and Ant & Dec won Best Presenter for a 15th year running.

Arena Seating co-sponsored the 21st year of the star-studded event to supply 678 fully upholstered flat tip-up Diplomat seats with arms, which were installed in the front stalls section of London's O2 Arena, reserved for the VIP TV personality nominees and winners

Martin Clark, Arena Seating project manager and his 12-strong team, took just one day to install the prime view seats close to the stage, as well as the indoor and outdoor glittering red carpet. The build was completed in two halves, first the red carpet under the VIP seating was laid followed by the seat installation, then finally completed once the outdoor VIP red carpet had

USA - The Los Angeles Theatre on Broadway and Sixth Street in downtown Los Angeles is especially hot, sweaty and crowded. Today this sumptuous art deco palace built by Charlie Chaplin in 1931 is the location for an episode of TV show Scandal and rehearsals for the camp musical Carrie - The Killer Musical Experience. Chaplin, whose photograph with Albert Einstein adorns the gilded lobby, would be proud that, despite the lack of air conditioning and the crumbling plaster walls, his dream is still alive.

A week before opening night, lighting designer Brian Gale is on stage setting trim heights and focusing lights. He works with the confidence and calm that comes with a CV that would leave anyone slack-jawed. While officially 'retired' after 24 years as a fulltime designer with the Walt Disney Company, he is currently engaged as a consultant on six Disney projects, in

UK - Adlib has supplied a Coda TiRAY sound system to Liverpool Philharmonic's new venue, Music Room, a completely flexible space accommodating between 160 to 250 people depending on a cabaret, theatre or standing configuration. The venue, which opened in October 2015, has been built as part of the £14.5m refurbishment of the 1939 Grade II*listed Liverpool Philharmonic Hall.

Liverpool Philharmonic is one of the UK's most progressive music organisations, home of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, presenting more than 250 concerts and events annually including classical rock, folk, roots, music, festivals, film and comedy at its popular city centre hub on Hope Street, and delivering over 3,000 music education sessions each year for communities throughout Liverpool.

Adlib has been involved with supplying equipment and technical expertise to the in-house Production

South Africa - Three further African countries have embraced the popular singing competition The Voice - South Africa, Angola & Nigeria - with all three series recorded at and broadcast from Stage One, Sasani Studios, Johannesburg - and all featuring over 100 Robe moving lights prominently on their respective lighting rigs.

Johannesburg based production company Multi-Media is co-ordinating and supplying all technical elements - including lighting, sound, video, rigging and staging - for broadcaster AMPN (African Media & Productions Network) TV over an 11-month period which ends in July 2016.

Multi-Media's technical project manager, Chris de Lancey put together the team who are making it rock which includes lighting designer Joshua Cutts, asked on-board for his experience and flair in lighting live music TV shows as well as his reputation for innovation. Dewet Meyer wo

Ireland - Dublin's 398ft high Monument of Light Spire was transformed into a giant 'Lightsaber' in December to celebrate the premiere of the new Star Wars film, The Force Awakens, using powerful fixtures controlled by Avolites' Titan One DMX USB Dongle.

Commissioned by Disney, Tom Rohan of event production house Eventco conceptualised the installation alongside lighting designers Mick Murray and Matthew Cregan. The team used 16 of Clay Paky's intensely bright SuperSharpys to beam colours up the Spire to create the Lightsaber effect.

The event lasted for three weeks, with the team checking and controlling the lighting via CCTV, connected to the internet, which sent live images back. They then accessed the laptop within the Spire using the TeamViewer app.

"We did initial focusing on an Avolites Tiger Touch II and then transferred the show to a Mac laptop with th

Croatia -Although Croatian distribution company, Sunflower d.o.o. set up back in 1996, it was only after 2010 that the country's infrastructure had professionalised itself sufficiently to support brands of the calibre of Powersoft.

This year the Italian manufacturer, through its regional account manager (EMEA), Stefano Previtali, did a deal with the Rijeka based company, appointing them as their new distributor for the territory. This enabled the brand to join other high prestige names like d&b audiotechnik, XTA and DiGiCo in the top tier distribution portfolio.

According to Sunflower's Tomislav 'Kuki' Koran the new alliance will do much to raise the profile of both companies, as previously Sunflower had only represented a small and virtually unknown OEM Chinese amplifier manufacturer. "Powersoft will certainly be used for high performance applications," he said.

USA - Metalcore band Atreyu have a knack for painting pictures with their music. Philadelphia-based LD Lenny Sasso did justice to the group's imagination in his lightshow on their recent tour by drawing on the zone control and pixel mapping features of Chauvet Professional Rogue and Nexus fixtures provided by Squeek Lights.

After working on Atreyu's tour for their sixth and latest studio album Long Live, Sasso described how he went beyond illuminating the stage to reflect the varying moods of the music. "The music of Atreyu can get pretty intense and it evokes powerful images," he said. "I wanted the lighting to keep up, to reflect this and contribute to taking the audience on a journey. So, for example, when there were sections of songs that were slow and dramatic, instead of doing a random slow dimmer fade between the lights as I normally do, I opted to

Russia - Allen & Heath's GLD digital mixing system has been installed in the concert and cinema hall of the System Operator of the Unified Energy System's head office in Moscow, Russia.

As part of an audio refurbishment, the GLD system was selected by installer, Audio Video Solutions, the system comprised a GLD-80 console installed in the control room, with AR2412 and AR84 remote I/O racks located at the surface providing 32 local analogue inputs and 16 local analogue outputs. The GLD is complemented by a QSC speaker system.

System Operator of the Unified Energy System is a state-owned organisation providing operational and centralised control of Russia's unified power system. The head office occupies a large building in the historical centre of Moscow, and the 500-capacity hall is used to hold a variety of events, from management and staff meetings to musical performances a

UK - Lee Valley Leisure Trust came into operation in April 2015 to run 14 of the major sports venues and other sites owned by Lee Valley Regional Park Authority.

Last summer Martin Audio partner, Old Barn Audio (OBA) undertook a sound system upgrade at the £31m Lee Valley White Water Centre in Waltham Cross, one of the host venues for the 2012 London Olympics, using the manufacturer's new CDD range. Such was the level of satisfaction that the integrators were immediately asked to provide a similar Martin Audio solution at another Group venue, Lee Valley Ice Centre in Leytonstone.

Within this cavernous space, the operators host a range of learn-to-skate and public skating sessions, while the international sized ice rink is also home to the Lee Valley Lions and London Raiders Ice Hockey teams and the Lee Valley London Skating Club.

But the 15-year-old system was start

USA - Behind the scenes at the Emmy-nominated Jimmy Kimmel Live, lighting designer Christian Hibbard is busy bringing the shows musical performances to life. With two outdoor stages that host the hottest musical acts from around the world, Hibbard is asked to create the ideal lighting environment that best personifies the varying musicality of each artist. Understanding these challenges, Hibbard needs lighting instruments with a number of quality capabilities, which he has found in the VL4000 BeamWash luminaire from Philips Vari-Lite.

"I've been at Jimmy Kimmel Live since the beginning and we've been doing the outdoor concert series since the inaugural episode where we featured Coldplay," began Hibbard. "The lighting rig is different every time depending upon the band performing as each artist will have a look that's appropriate for their style of m

UK - On 21 January 2016, as it welcomed members of the industry to its Embassy Theatre for the annual Association of Lighting Designer's (ALD) New Technology Showcase, The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama was delighted to announce the establishment of the Richard Pilbrow Scholarship.

With special thanks to alumnus and renowned lighting designer Richard Pilbrow for his generosity, the Richard Pilbrow Scholarship will support a young lighting designer at the School as they undertake the training necessary to embark upon their professional career.

Richard Pilbrow is both a graduate and an Honorary Fellow of Central, as well as an internationally renowned stage lighting designer, author, theatre design consultant and theatre, film and television producer. He is a pioneer of modern stage lighting in Britain, and his work has been seen in London, New York, Paris, Berlin, V

UK - The Knight of Illumination Awards (KOI) 2016 has launched and submissions are already coming in for its Television and Concert Touring and Events categories.

This year marks the 9th KOI Awards, which celebrates the creative talents of international lighting and digital content designers working in the UK in the sectors of TV, Theatre and Concert Touring and Events.

The 2016 edition will see the event moved from its usual date in early October to the 18th September to coincide with the PLASA London 2016 exhibition. The venue for the sparkling awards ceremony and dinner has also moved to join the PLASA show at its new location of Kensington Olympia.

Submissions are open for the Television and Concert Touring and Events categories and shows performed or broadcast between 1st August 2015 and 31st July 2016 in the UK are eligible. As with previous years the Theatre sectio

Independents' Days - This week, the UK music industry celebrates the third Independent Venue Week (IVW) with a week-long series of gigs all across the country. Led by London-based agency I Like The Sound of That, the seven-day long campaign is supported by the Arts Council through its Grants for the Arts funding programme. Its reach is expanding with 120 venues now taking part, from Aberdeen to Exeter and Belfast to Norwich. Among venues joining this year are Quay Arts (Isle of Wight), The Soundhouse (Leicester) and Nambucca (north London).

Helen Sprott, director of music at Arts Council England, says, "Arts Council England is pleased to be supporting I Like The Sound of That and their brilliant Independent Venue Week project for the second year running. It is vital that independent venues are recognised for the value they bring both to their local communities and the nati

USA - Bandit Lites has made a sizeable purchase of Ayrton's newest fixtures, including Ayrton CosmoPix-R, IntelliPix-R, MagicBlade-R, MagicDot-R and MagicRing-R9.

"I'm very excited that we have added a large variety of Ayrton products to our inventory," said Jake Tickle, Bandit's director of technical services. "Ayrton has taken a refreshing approach to their fixture design, adding innovation and consistency to their entire product line. From a service and maintainability stand point we couldn't be happier."

These products will all be seen on upcoming 2016 tours, including Dave Butzler's lighting design for Garth Brooks, Mike Swinford's lighting design for Jason Aldean's We Were Here Tour, Nick Whitehouse's lighting design for Thomas Rhett and Little Big Town's 2016 tour.

Las Vegas-based Morpheus Lights, the exclusive US distributor for Ayrton, was ple

Ireland - Croke Park in Dublin has been at the heart of Irish sporting life for over 100 years. Boasting a capacity of more than 82,000 people, the stadium is home to the Gaelic Games and the headquarters of the Gaelic Athletic Association. The venue is also a prime location for meetings and events, so when its flagship Hogan Suite recently underwent refurbishment, Doughty Engineering was called upon by Cine Electric to supply all the new facility panels.

David McKeown, project manager at Cine Electric explained: "This is an extremely prestigious job for us - Croke Park isn't just a stadium, it's Ireland's national stadium and is held in very high regard both by those of us who live here and visitors from around the world. We were initially brought on board by the electrical contractor, CJ Ryder Lawlor, to facilitate all the specialist infrastructure, LED lighting and rigg

Qatar - During Qatar National Day in December 2015, Creative Communication Group (CCG) was the company responsible for the sound through the whole Corniche area that included five different locations including the fireworks show. In order to cover the whole area with audio, CCG incorporated Xirium system, purchased from local distributor Nicolas Kyvernitis Electronics Enterprises (NMK), to ease the set up on areas where cable crossings were difficult and extended more than 100m.

The purchase of Xirium system for the event included four transmitters and 20 receivers. One of the challenges of whole project was to get signal across roads and extended it more than 300m. Xirium was used in the repeater mode and thanks to the system's software technicians were able to see the signal strength in different areas and plan accordingly.

CCG was established in 1998 in GCC as a full serv

Germany - In Berlin the New Year is traditionally greeted at the Brandenburg Gate. To welcome in 2016, TLT Event AG was once again in charge of production and technical implementation of the popular event. The turn of the year was also the go-ahead for TLT to invest in a RockLink system, which came into operation for the first time on NYE to provide a redundant fiberoptic network for the MA-Net between FOH and Dimmercity.

"As we are placing great value on reliability for our productions, we have been working with Rock Solid Technologies' RockSwitch Mk2 for some time. Moreover, there was an increasing internal necessity to invest in a redundant fiberoptic network", stated Helge Rabethge, technical director Light and Rigging.

"For the buying decision, it was important to us to invest in a reliable system that consists of as few individual components as possible

UAE - Nicolas Kyvernitis Electronics Enterprises (NMK), distributor of Clear-Com in the United Arab Emirates for the live sound market segment, has recently supplied eclipse Staging Services with FreeSpeak II and HelixNet Partyline.

eclipse has purchased two HMS-4X HelixNet digital four channel headset/speaker main stations, 30 HelixNet digital two channel dual listen monaural beltpacks together with four dual channel 4-wire interfaces, two FreeSpeak II base stations and thirty FreeSpeak II digital wireless beltpacks.

Both FreeSpeak II and HelixNet were used at the third annual Internet of Things World Forum (IoTWF) that hosted over 2000 attendees in Dubai World Trade Centre. 24 wired stations of HelixNet and 16 wireless stations of FreeSpeak II covered intercommunication between the production and technical teams.

"The system was very easy to set up and operate. I w

Europe - After completing a successful sold-out tour of the US and Canada for much of last year, with a Martin Audio MLA PA provided by Showtime Sound LLC, popular actor-comedian, Kevin Hart, and his production manager, Scott Tydings, ensured they maintained continuity by asking Capital Sound to provide a similar rig when the What Now? tour arrived in Europe.

One of America's fastest rising comedy talents, Hart has released four comedy DVDs and appeared on numerous TV shows and in blockbuster films; he has over 20m worldwide followers each on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

As for Tydings he had clearly enjoyed the MLA experience both with Kevin Hart and fellow comedienne Amy Schumer. The fit with Capital Sound, who also specialise in providing sound reinforcement for top-drawer stand-up comedians was an obvious one - although as general manager Paul Timmins explained, the

Switzerland - The last day of March 2016 marks the end of the 25th year of operation for Merging Technologies. Claude Cellier founded the company in 1990 after his departure from Nagra and immediately embarked on a journey involving many ground-breaking innovations.

If Pyramix is the best known, the more recent introduction of RAVENNA/AES67 Networked Audio Interfaces, Horus and Hapi, is no less significant. In fact, these converters very quickly established themselves as the pinnacle of audio excellence as witnessed by the vast majority of Grammy nominations for classical recording using either or both converters. Networking has introduced many benefits and has revolutionized the facilities using this technology and with the industry approval of AES67, the options dramatically expand. Merging recognized the importance of allowing the maximum number of devices to connect to its

UK - Disney and Cameron Mackintosh's musical Mary Poppins originally opened in 2004 and ran in the West End for three years. Since then over 11m people worldwide have seen the show, which has just returned to the UK, opening in October at Curve in Leicester. The musical will tour the country until the start of 2017.

The demanding tour is packed from start to finish with stunning special effects and in order to be able to re-create the exact same magic in every venue, senior production manager Chris Boone enlisted the help of Unusual Rigging.

"I have a long running relationship with Unusual Rigging - they're my go-to company for all my rigging needs. The last job we worked on together was the Barnum tour, which in comparison to Mary Poppins was far less complex. Unusual Rigging has supplied over 60 chain hoists to suspend the Mary Poppins tour

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