Lighting

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18 November 2024

USA - Coppell, Texas-based Alford Media, an event services company with more than 220 corporate events worldwide to its credit annually, has invested in a large complement of Ayrton Rivale fixtures for use on its busy roster of projects. ACT Entertainment is the exclusive distributor of Ayrton lighting in North America.

The purchase marked the first Ayrton fixtures in the Alford inventory. “We have always been interested in the Ayrton line; they make a creative product, and we have been looking for an opportunity to jump in,” says lighting manager Blake Taylor. “The Rivale nicely filled a gap in our profiles line and had some newer features that helped drive our decision,” such as variable CRI, infinite pan and tilt and an IP rating. “These were improvements and upgrades over the profiles we already had.

“ACT has always been great about g

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18 November 2024

USA - The Playground creative team called upon an artful blend of dramatic colour changes and various set and video configurations to endow each chapter of the Megan Thee Stallion narrative for The Hot Girl Summer tour.

“The tour consists of three main acts that really drive the creative intent,” explained Curtis Adams, who, along with Sooner Routhier and Trevor Ahlstrand was the co-production designer of the tour. “Act 1 featured Megan's hard-hitting Snake beginnings with sharp lines, powerful silhouettes, and stark colours. Act 2 centred around Megan's Butterfly era and had a dichroic colour palette. The softer pastel-like colours were a vast departure from the hard-hitting show open, which culled a difference in mood and helped emphasise her metamorphosis.

“Act 3 focused on Megan's human embodiment,” continued

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18 November 2024

Australia - Production company Chameleon Touring Systems has made a significant investment in Elation’s Proteus Maximus and Proteus Brutus power luminaires, greatly expanding their ability to deliver robust lighting solutions for high-profile tours and major events across the region.

The new fixtures, supplied in late September through ULA Group – the exclusive distributor of Elation products in Australia and New Zealand – have already seen action.

In early October, Chameleon upgraded the lighting rigs for two landmark events: the 2024 National Rugby League (NRL) Grand Final at Accor Stadium in Sydney and Knockout Outdoor, Australia’s largest outdoor music festival at the Sydney Showground.

Chameleon sought to replace several outdated lighting fixtures in their inventory from brands that no longer offer this category

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15 November 2024

UK - Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Starlight Express, re-envisioned for the 21st century, has taken to the stage in the specially designed Starlight Auditorium at London’s Troubadour Wembley Park Theatre.

With new orchestrations, choreography and songs, the story of a child’s train set that magically comes to life retains all its original wonder, with thrilling roller skate races around the auditorium and powerful performances from the 40-strong company of ‘rolling stock’ (engines and carriages) in an immersive production that begins from the moment the audience steps into the theatre. The audience is closely entwined in the action which takes place on a near in-the-round main stage with racing track ‘spokes’ leading off between sunken areas of seating and around the auditorium.

In anticipation of a long run, the show’s producers, Mi

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15 November 2024

Europe - Highlite International has announced the new Furion Series from Infinity, a collection of IP65-rated, high-performance moving heads. The Furion Series combines power, precision and versatility with a comprehensive range of high-end features.

The Furion line-up offers eight models that span the essential categories of spot, profile, beam, hybrid and washbeam. Each is designed to enhance creativity and provide a comprehensive set of tools for lighting designers.

Each specific Furion model has its own strengths and is optimised with many built-in features for creative freedom to push the boundaries in professional environments.

The Furion Spots and Profiles (S602, S402, P602 and P402), for example, feature a 'flat field LED' light source that produces a uniform field of light with very little loss of brightness towards the edges. The Pr

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15 November 2024

Estonia - Kuressaare Castle on the island of Saaremaa provided a magical backdrop and a beautiful setting for the 2024 Saaremaa Opera Festival, staged in a 68m-long 29m-wide 2000-capacity temporary arena elegantly butted up to the castle.

This year’s host company, Fundació Òpera Catalunya (The Catalan Opera) from Spain produced a week of special back-to-back opera shows and related events, with lighting equipment and crew supplied by Tallinn-based rental specialist E&T, comprising almost all Robe luminaires.

The Robe moving lights included eight MMX Blades, 23 x LEDWash 800s, 16 x MMX Spots and four LEDBeam 350s, joined by 24 x ParFect 100 SWs, all rigged and tech’d by a crew of five led by Andres Sarv working closely with the Catalan Opera’s lighting designer David Galvez.

Catalan Opera’s technical manager Raul Vilasis

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15 November 2024

UK - Lighting designer Phil Supple utilised 56 x Astera Tubes – 40 x Titan and eight each Hyperion and Helios – to illuminate 137 windows across 57 rooms at the George Heriot School in Edinburgh, Scotland, for Where to Begin, the opening event of the 2024 Edinburgh International Festival (EIF).

This Edinburgh International Festival production was created by Pinwheel and delivered in partnership with The Macallan, for which Phil worked closely with creative agency Pinwheel under the artistic direction of Katy Fuller and co-director Simon Sharkey, together with composer Roma Yagnik and video artists, Yeast Culture.

Where to Begin celebrated the energy, vibrance and spirit of Edinburgh, Scotland’s heritage and mythology as well as the alchemy of invention, carefully blended in with a festival atmosphere evoking emotion, inspirati

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15 November 2024

USA - Dierks Bentley’s Gravel and Gold tour concluded with its 21 September show at the American Family Insurance Amphitheatre in Milwaukee.

The tour celebrated the landmark 10th album in Bentley’s successful career, and he wanted to make it memorable. Talking to a reporter, Bentley described how the concept behind this tour grew out of a single question. “What we do if this was the last time we were going to play this city? What kind of show would we put on?”

With a mandate like that, Bentley and his production team strove to create something special, which is precisely what they did on this 30-city tour with production design by Bruce Rodgers, lighting by Chris Reade, and video by Luz Studio.

Collectively this team created a massive, wide open panorama with minimal props and fixtures on the stage deck, a potent flown lighti

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15 November 2024

UK - CrowdGlow has announced a new addition to the CrowdNet family of products. The CrowdNet Nano transmitter is a small USB-based transmitter that allows lighting designers to control up to 2,000 phones at smaller sized shows to create amazing light shows. The new Nano transmitter is available for purchase with a life-time usage licence, compared to the company’s full-size transmitters which are dry hire only.

“The CrowdNet full size transmitters are suited to larger arenas and stadium sized shows, however we wanted to create a new product to cater for the smaller end of the market,” says CrowdGlow. “We’re thrilled to be able to enable the same level of high-end crowd light shows, but making them more economically feasible for smaller shows.”

The CrowdNet Nano has all of the same CrowdGlow features available including: RGB screen colours

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14 November 2024

UK - ETC Ltd has officially moved to its new eco-building and base in the UK, in London. The new site is more than double the size of ETC’s former premises boasting over 35,000sq.ft of floor space. The move marks a significant milestone in the company’s growth and expanding business offering.

ETC’s own in-house team has developed the design for the new building, which includes larger demonstration spaces and increased capacity for training, logistics, conferencing, collaboration and more. There is also a new visualisation suite in the building available for industry professionals to use and prepare their shows in. The additional warehousing space also holds significantly more inventory to meet the growing demands of the business and support the needs of ETC’s customers.

The new building is lit and controlled

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14 November 2024

UK - Production Park has announced its first major TV commission after Warp Films, Plan B and Matriarch Productions chose it as the production base for new Netflix drama, Adolescence.

The one-shot crime drama will be fronted by an A list cast including Stephen Graham (Boiling Point, Bodies), Ashley Walters (Top Boy) and Erin Doherty (The Crown). Produced by Sheffield-based Warp Films, Matriarch Productions and Plan B for Netflix, Adolescence tells the story of a family’s trauma when a 13-year-old is arrested for the murder of a teenage girl.

Warp used Production Park near Wakefield as the main base for cast and crew, who spent a total of six months on site over the summer. The Park’s newest stage Studio 005 is normally used for large-scale arena tour productions, but on this occasion became th

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14 November 2024

Australia - The Hordern Pavilion, often referred to as ‘The Hordern’, is one of Sydney's most historically significant landmark venues. Originally opened in 1924, it now regularly hosts live performances, dance parties, sports tournaments, trade shows, conferences, and a variety of other events.

Recently, the venue unveiled a new house lighting scheme featuring 46 Anolis Ambiane RGBW XPs, specified and installed by SimpleMotion Lighting (SML), a specialist in venue infrastructure lighting.

With a portfolio that includes high-profile venues such as the Sydney Opera House and numerous other theatres, concert halls, and recital spaces, SML was approached by The Hordern’s operators, Playbill Venues, to reimagine the lighting of the venue. The aim was to replace the outdated halogen lighting system with a more modern, energy-efficient solution that

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13 November 2024

World - Pearl Jam embarked on their Dark Matter world tour in May, sharing their introspective brand of rock with audiences across North America and Europe before heading to New Zealand and Australia in November. Lighting designer Kille Knobel has worked with the band since 2000 and complements the Dark Matter shows with a minimalist yet impactful design that uses Elation KL Panel XL soft lights as a key visual element in creating the distinctive looks.

The show brings video projection to the forefront with soft, organic visuals and minimalist lighting. When choosing fixtures for the tour earlier this year, lighting vendor Upstaging hosted a fixture shootout in Los Angeles for the designer, where she ultimately selected the KL Panel XL and Proteus Maximus as part of a larger lighting package. The fixtures were essential in creating the desi

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13 November 2024

UK - The bang was provided by the starter’s pistol as the Day at the Races themed quiz night got underway. The DiGiCo quiz night is a celebration of hire companies and the communities they serve, with all proceeds from those attending going towards their two chosen charities, Backup Tech and Stagehand, the PSA’s benevolent fund.

The Quiz represents a chance for suppliers, hire companies, manufactures and businesses to get together in a relaxed environment to connect, do badly at quizzing and most importantly raise money. The evening was a complete success with £14,000 being shared between both charities.

On the night Backup was represented by Lee Dennison, trustee and vice chair, Scott Arnold, trustee, and Sarah James, PR, all raising awareness of the way that Backup can help industry professionals and their families.

“Backup

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13 November 2024

Romania - In just three years, Constanta’s Beach Please! has become one of the largest urban music festivals in Europe drawing hiphop, pop and electronic headliners. The 2024 show, held 10-14 July, featured a stage spanning 82 x 26m with a lighting rig comprising 430 moving light fixtures.

To match the colossal scale of the production, stage and lighting designer Andrei Predut of Apart Productions brought in 36 Claypaky Skylos, which made their Romanian debut in spectacular fashion.

Predut positioned the Skylos in groups of six placed at key points in the 3D decor. “As soon as we let the beams loose on the sky during the setup and programming time, we got instant reactions of awe,” Predut reports. “Crew from all departments started a pilgrimage to FOH so they could inquire about this never-before-seen breed of fixture.

“The second w

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13 November 2024

Germany - On the first evening of Wacken Open Air, German medieval rockers In Extremo headlined on the Louder Stage. The band’s lighting designer, Martin Heining, expanded his design especially for the Wacken show, by including 12 of the new high-performance Creos washlights from GLP, adding onto the already extensive festival design of LD Jerry Appelt. The Creos stood out for their “impressive output and outstanding colour depth”.

Equipped with the latest RGBL LED technology (18 x 40W, arranged in three lines), the Creos offers an impressive variety and intensity of colours. Heining used the weatherproof (IP65) devices to deliver a strong backlight with bold colours, creating impressive depth between the set and the video wall.

“The Creos exceeded my expectations,” says Heining. “Their high output and impressive colour quality made a sig

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13 November 2024

Poland - The Gdańsk Shakespeare Theatre (Gdański Teatr Szekspirowski) is a Shakespearean theatre in the middle of the thriving industrial port city of Gdansk. Designed by Italian architect Renato Rizzi, it opened in 2014 and is built on the site of a 17th-century theatre, known as the Fencing School, where English travelling players once performed English Renaissance Theatre works.

In 2022, the Theatre purchased 11 Robe T1 Profiles which have become an essential lighting element for all their predictions, explained head of technical, Jòzef Leoniuk, and these fixtures have helped enrich the experience of lighting shows at the busy venue.

A major reason T1 Profiles were selected – after a competitive shoot-out with other products – was for their silent running plus features like the CRI, the range of CT whites and the refined dimming curve, as w

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13 November 2024

Germany - Following the success of LEaT con 24 in Hamburg, LEaT X is returning in spring 2025 and will take place on 19-20 March at the Ofenwerk in Nuremberg. The pre-season event for the event technology industry was fully booked in record time – clear proof of the enormous demand and strong interest.

“The enthusiasm for LEaT X is overwhelming,” says Duc Nguyen, director of LEaT. ‘The fact that we were fully booked in such a short time confirms that we have hit the nerve of the industry with the compact and targeted format of LEaT X. We are delighted with the positive response and the trust placed in us by the exhibitors.”

This year, LEaT X 25 will once again be supported by leading brands from the event technology sector, who will be presenting their innovative products and solutions in Nuremberg.

Interested companies have the opp

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13 November 2024

USA/Europe - ETC has advanced its fanless product line further with the new High End Systems Halcyon Silent. This luminaire balances silent operation with the feature set of ETC’s flagship Halcyon family.

Suitable for concert halls, opera houses, and other noise-sensitive venues, Halcyon Silent is convection-cooled to eliminate distracting sounds. Acoustics specialists Müller-BBM conducted testing on the luminaire to confirm its quiet operation. At full intensity with background noise removed, Halcyon Silent sound levels measured at 13 dBa. Sound pressure levels less than 20 dBa are considered inaudible.

Halcyon Silent brings 18,400 lumens as well as a 5.5-60° zoom range to the stage. The fixture also arrives with a new patented colour-mixing system utilising 12 flags. With this technology, users can achieve brighter, more consistent pastels as w

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13 November 2024

USA - Designed to deliver ‘a far-reaching swathe of potent ultraviolet light wherever it is required’, the new UV Par 100IP from ADJ is a versatile and rugged LED-powered UV luminaire. With a tough construction, flexible mounting yoke, and ‘all weather’ IP65-rating, it is designed for rental and production companies looking for a flexible and professional solution that delivers the classic ‘black light’ look, says ADJ.

The UV Par 100IP features a powerful 100W C.O.B (Chip On Board) LED source, which has an average operational life span of 30,000 hours. It outputs ultraviolet light in the 390-399nm range, which generates a visible purple light as well as fluorescence effects that cause white and UV-active décor and materials to glow vividly. The fixture has a wide beam angle of 120°, allowing a single unit to cover a wide area of a stage or crow

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12 November 2024

Europe - Moonbears and ADJ have made a new distribution agreement for ADJ products in the Netherlands. This collaboration is part of ADJ’s strategy to strengthen its market position in Europe and will provide a new route to market for ADJ entertainment lighting and atmospheric effect products in the country as well as increased support for smaller production and integration companies.

While existing customers and new large accounts will continue to be served directly by ADJ, partnership with Moonbears will make ADJ products more accessible for smaller businesses. For Moonbears, ADJ’s range perfectly complements the company’s existing catalogue, providing new and existing customers with access to ADJ’s range of fixtures.

Patrick Veldman, owner of Moonbears, explains: "ADJ has a strong position in the Dutch market. We see this partnership as an

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12 November 2024

USA - Antari USA has appointed Jennifer Ramirez as its new marketing manager. With over 15 years of experience in brand management, public relations, and marketing, Ramirez will take lead on advertising, digital marketing, and social media initiatives. She will also collaborate closely with the team on brand strategy, product marketing, and overall brand development.

"I am thrilled to join the Antari USA team," said Ramirez. "I look forward to contributing and strengthening Antari’s position in the industry while working alongside such a talented team."

Ray Villasenor, general manager of Antari Lighting and Effects USA, comments, "We are delighted to welcome Jennifer to the team. Her extensive experience and skills make her the perfect fit to lead our marketing efforts and enhance brand positioning in the market."

Additionally, Ivan Zavala

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12 November 2024

USA - With its bandshell set against the majestic backdrop of its namesake hills, the more-than-a-century-old Hollywood Bowl casts a captivating spell. Rolling Stone named the legendary amphitheatre, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, one of the USA’s 10 best live music venues.

Replicating this kind of splendour at a modern indoor arena is a tall order, but Bobby Grey of Notan Creative LLC was up to the challenge recently when he was called upon to light Audacy’s superstar- studded We Can Survive concert at New Jersey’s 18,000-capacity Prudential Centre. 

Held annually in support of mental health advocacy, the event routinely features many of music’s biggest names. This year’s concert was no exception, as artists like Justin Timberlake, New Kids on the Block, Tate McRae, Benson Boone, Khalid, and Isabel LaRosa took the s

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12 November 2024

Saudi Arabia - Prolights products illuminated the world's first WWE Experience, located in the heart of Boulevard City during Riyadh Season. This attraction offers visitors an immersive WWE experience, featuring interactive exhibits and the WWE SuperDome, where fans can create their own characters and step into the ring.

A complex lighting setup was essential for this installation, covering exhibition spaces, interactive zones like the arena, and the Graveyard Undertaker game. The lighting needed to be both effective and stylistically consistent.

Pro Lab, the distributor of Prolights in the GCC and MENA regions, supplied over 830 Prolights fixtures, including EclProfile CT+, EclProfile FS, Mosaico FX100, EclDisplay DATFC, EclPendant FC, Astra Profile600IP, Ruby, Studio CobFC, and EclMiniFresnel. Additionally, custom gobos were provided to enhance the