Canada - CAST Software has announced the release of Vivien 2014 with new graphics, some serious new and improved features, myriad performance enhancements, and some Library additions.

The new Import Wizard imports JPEG or PDF format floor plans directly into Vivien and includes onscreen features, such as rotation, selecting insertion points, and it will even properly scale the floor plan so you can start planning the space right away, making it easier and faster to work in Vivien. New features for file importing facilitate management of layers to ease management of AutoCAD2013, and st

USA - Clay Paky's A.leda B-EYE LED moving head continued its highly successful launch at LDI, following its initial debut at PLASA London 2013 where it picked up a PLASA Award for Innovation. At LDI, which took place recently in Las Vegas, the A.leda B-EYE K20 was given the coveted title of 'Best Debuting Lighting Product'. In recent years this award has been assigned to products destined for sure future success, including the Clay Paky Sharpy in 2010 (honourable mention) and the Sharpy Wash in 2012.

Marian Sandberg, Content Director of Live Design, explained the reasons for the award

UK - Sky Broadcasting recently turned to entertainment lighting specialist White Light for equipment and advice for the new production setup in their sports programming studio space. The project - revamping Sky studios 4 and 5 for the new football season - involved combining the two spaces with a new layout and design concept. For the project White Light supplied CORE Lighting Colour Point uplighters, Pulsar Chromascape AR111 fixtures, Robe 300LED washes and ETC Source4 Mini profiles.

"The idea was to bring Sky's entire Saturday football programming under one roof - literally,&qu

UK - Black Light has been busy championing ETC's Source Four LED CYC units. Not only is it the first company in the UK to have the fixtures in its hire stock, it has also recently run a demo day to highlight the CYC's strengths and has hired out a number of the units for their first ever use in a live event in Scotland.

"We love breaking new ground," says Black Light's head of marketing, Barclay Dakers. "It was fantastic to see these unique units in action and to give our friends in the industry the chance to get their hands on them and see just how well they work in a

Israel - When the managers for the news studio at TV station Channel 10 in Jerusalem were looking for new lighting, they knew they would need something small but high powered for their relatively compact studio. They invited ETC's Israel based dealer Danor Theatre and Studio Systems to visit and discuss a range of different products. As marketing manager Erez Hadar explains, "We talked about the pros and cons of fixtures from several different manufacturers, before it was agreed that the ETC Source Four LED would be the best tool for the job."

The managers were impressed by

UK - Moving light specialists, Richard Martin Lighting (RML), have made a major investment in SGM's new-generation LED portfolio, with the purchase of a large quantity of new P-5 RGBW wash lights. These were pressed straight into service on the BBC's Children In Need fundraiser, where they became a focal point in the children's programme Blue Peter, for which Lee Allen was the LD.

After having these low profile, high efficiency fixtures on his radar for some time RML operations manager, Steve Wells, decided the time was right to act and placed the order - which included 43°

USA - Robe Lighting enjoyed one of its "busiest and best" LDI exhibitions to date at the Las Vegas Convention Centre, which saw their stylish, eye-catching all white booth - complete with spectacular lightshow designed by Nathan Wan - win 'Best Big Booth Design' category of the 2013 LDI Awards.

LDI 2013 was the first big US exhibition to showcase the Pointe - Robe's award winning small, super-bright, multi-purpose moving light ... and fastest ever selling product - and this fixture was the centrepiece of Nathan's lightshow, together with other new innovations like Robe's ROB

Ukraine - PR Lighting's new generation LED architectural fixtures have been specified to provide a colour-changing wash of the new PortCity Shopping Mall façade in the city of Mariupol.

CORTMI, the PR Lighting Ukrainian distributor, was able to meet the client's lighting requirements. Explained CORTMI marketing manager, Stanislav Serbin, "The initial task was to offer an energy saving architectural lighting system for a certain part of the façade that would provide minimal luminosity of 200 lux. LED-based fixtures were requested from the very beginning to minimize running costs

Eurovision Latest - Serbia has pulled out of next year's Eurovision Song Contest in Copenhagen, citing financial difficulties. The country's broadcaster said the "high costs necessary to participate" had led to the decision. Serbia won Eurovision in 2007 with the song Molitva by Marija Serifovic, but failed to qualify for the grand final in Malmo, Sweden this year. Other countries have also said they will sit out next year's competition, including Serbia's neighbour Croatia. Bulgaria and Cyprus will not be taking part either, with all four nations' broadcasters saying i

Australia - PR Lighting has announced that, with effect from 1 November, Jands will be distributing its product portfolio in Australia.

"We are very excited to have PR Lighting on board as part of the Jands professional lighting range," said Tim Kennard, lighting sales manager of Jands. "PR has been around for over 29 years as a manufacturer of professional lighting products and I think it's fair to say that so far they have exceeded our expectations in every area.

"Prior to signing on with PR we visited their factory in Guangzhou and the facilities are world cla

USA - In one of the New York Stock Exchange's (NYSE) most anticipated days ever, social media giant Twitter rang the opening bell on Wall Street to market its initial public offering on 6 November. A lighting display featuring Martin Professional lighting fixtures, provided by See Factor, brightened the façade of the NYSE with Twitter's globally recognized logo the entire day.

Rental company See Factor designed the system for the NYSE façade with Martin's MAC 2000 wash lights - the standard See Factor uses for events at the NYSE. For most NYSE events, a full crew installs the system

Australia - As part of the week of celebrations for the 40th anniversary of the Sydney Opera House, Crown Prince Frederik and Australian -born Crown Princess Mary of Denmark visited the Harbour City to honour the Danish architect J°rn Utzon's crowning achievement.

In cooperative effort between SBS, the Danish Broadcasting Corporation, the royal couple and the charitable Bikuben Foundation, their Highnesses presented the annual Crown Prince Couples Awards at the Joan Sutherland Theatre, the first time the awards ceremony has been held outside its native Denmark since its inception

UK - Black Light has been busy championing ETC's ground-breaking Source Four LED CYC units. Not only is it the first company in the UK to have the fixtures in its hire stock, it has also recently run a demo day to highlight the CYC's strengths and has hired out a number of the units for their first ever use in a live event in Scotland.

"We love breaking new ground," says Black Light's head of marketing, Barclay Dakers. "It was fantastic to see these unique units in action and to give our friends in the industry the chance to get their hands on them and see just how well

South Africa - Every year thousands of predominantly Afrikaans speaking South Africans embark on a two hour drive from Johannesburg to Sun City's Superbowl to attend Huisgenoot Skouspel where some of the best Afrikaans artists are heard and the most popular artists of the year are honoured. This year was no different as fans either stayed at Sun City for the weekend, or commuted on the day, to see their favourite performers on one stage during October 2013.

The production strongly embraced a theatrical feel, with carefully selected songs and nostalgic video content stirring emotions.

UK - Lighting designer Andy Hurst created a completely new lighting, set and visual design for the latest Chase & Status UK Arena tour which started off their campaign promoting their new album Brand New Machine.

HSL has supplied Chase & Status with equipment right from the start of their touring career, and production manager Michael Clegg once again sourced all lighting and LED screens from the company, where they were looked after by project manager, Mike Oates.

The design involved over 150 moving lights plus substantial quantities of Martin LC and EC LED screen.

Hurst's

USA / Canada - Electronic rock and art fuse in the eclectic sound of Phantogram as the duo from New York State are currently enjoying the crest of a wave of anticipation.

Lighting designer Ed Warren - known for his stylish and inventive stagecraft - was asked to create lighting for their latest US and Canadian tour which was out for a month playing a variety of venues between 800 and 1500 capacities to sold out audiences and receiving rave reviews.

Warren chose eight of Robe's tiny LEDBeam 100s to be a key part of the toured lighting rig - which had to fit into a trailer being towed

Latvia - LumenRadio and Company NA have announced a distribution agreement whereby NA Company will serve as the distributor for the CRMX brand in Latvia.

"Company NA gives LumenRadio a strong partner in the Latvian market," says Jessica Björk, sales & marketing manager at LumenRadio. "With their excellent sales presence, technical support and strong brand awareness, I believe we are heading towards a really successful business relationship."

Company NA, founded 1994, is one of the leading professional companies in Latvia, with a wide range of light equipment, li

USA - The Miss America pageant returned to its Atlantic City origins this year and lighting designer Allen Branton was charged with lighting the cavernous Boardwalk Hall and making sure 53 beautiful women looked their best whenever the TV camera turned their way. He was aided by Clay Paky Sharpy and Sharpy Wash fixtures from Atomic Lighting in Lititz, Pennsylvania.

Branton marked his sixth consecutive year lighting the pageant, which was televised on ABC-TV. After spending a number of years in Las Vegas the show moved back to Atlantic City where "the venue, audience and scenery d

USA - High End Systems chose the LDI trade show to debut four new products that spanned the categories of control, digital, and automated lighting. The expansion of all product portfolios comes on the heels of what has been a very successful 2013 for the company.

Following the HOG4 family of console products launch, High End Systems launched a new breed of Hog at LDI, the HedgeHog 4. Alongside the product launch came the announcement of a new type of partnership. Elation Professional will distribute the HedgeHog 4 in the US, Canada, Latin America, South East Asia and India. This agree

USA - As of 1 November this year, Le Maitre USA, LLC relocated to Las Vegas, just 30 minutes off the Strip, and it's a move that couldn't have come at a better time, the company says. With a new president at the helm in the US, further investment in R&D and production at Le Maitre's pyrotechnics manufacturing location in the UK, and a steady stream of new products being added to their already extensive portfolio, Le Maitre believes it is "exceptionally well placed to forge ahead in North America as well as around the rest of the world".

The move from Le Maitre's previous US

UK - The stunning combination of light and video for Kings of Leon's summer dates was the work of Paul Normandale. It was left to board operator Ali Bale to elicit the best out of Normandale's design.

For Bale, this was the inaugural journey on a grandMA2 console. "I had been using the same desk almost exclusively for the last fifteen years; like most people you tend to stick to what you're used to. A desk is a very personal choice but Paul encouraged me, telling me that I wouldn't regret giving the MA2 a try. And, in fact, it was the ability of the board to allow you to set it u

Italy - Lighting designers Stefano Limone and Gianfranco Saponaro included 12 Robe Robin Pointes and eight LEDWash 600s in their scheme at the Teatro Franco Parenti, one of the larger venues at the new Elita Ouverture Festival, a celebration of EDM and electronic arts staged at various venues in Milan, Italy.

The lighting for the duration of the festival was looked after at the venue by Walter Lutzu, who has also been a keen Robe user for some time and loves the new Pointe multi-purpose fixtures in particular. He says: "It's a great product, lightweight and compact, with a host o

Serbia - Croatian megastar Gibonni recently played a special concert in the Kombank Arena, Belgrade, Serbia in front of 20,000 fans who all went crazy for the occasion! The lighting utilized 22 x Robe Robin Pointes and 36 LEDBeam 100s which were specified by lighting designer Sven Ku?ini?.

Ku?ini?, based in Zagreb, Croatia started working with the popular singer, musician and composer this year. Ku?ini? is a well-known LD in Croatia and was offered the gig following his high profile work with Croatian rockers Prljavo Kazaliste plus a plethora of musicals, concerts and events.

Gibonn

USA - The new office for Christie Lites New York is officially open for business. The warehouse is in a newly renovated 30,000sq.ft space at 13B Division Street in Fairview, NJ. This 14th location further strengthens Christie Lites' multi-office network supplying full service stage lighting equipment rentals across North America.

Said Christie Lites VP Rentals Ken Alexander, "We are proud of this new expansion which allows us to directly service our already loyal Northeast client base like never before and also provides the perfect avenue to reach new clients in the months and ye

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