Robe - LEADERBOARD - Feb 2025
PLASA Show 2025 - Banner - June-Aug 2025

Lighting

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Dutch dimming innovator IES was showing its iSine core dimming engine. Recently acquired by ETC, IES now has the backing of ETC's global research, marketing and service resources. ETC's CEO Fred Foster said: "IES was the pioneer behind sine wave dimming technology in Europe. At the same time ETC has been developing sine wave products in the US. With the acquisition of IES, we've had the unprecedented opportunity to unite the best people and ideas in the field and create sine wave solutions for the worldwide lighting market."

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Leading digital media specialist Scene Change announced the arrival of the next generation of the acclaimed Hippotizer digital media server family by Green Hippo. The current Hippotizer range has proved enormously popular since its launch at PLASA 2003, with applications ranging from nightclubs and events around the world to stage shows such as the new musical Mary Poppins, opening soon in London's West End.

The new Hippotizer family consists of three members all built around the same Generation 2 technology. All three offer a fully hardware-accelerated graphics engine for super fast playback, full support for almost any file format - including sound as well as video - a second monitor output offering full preview of all layers and effects, an advanced 3D engine, multiple control options and a host of new effects. Unlike many media servers each of the new Hippotizer models offers a ma

City Theatrical - Banner - July 2025

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Creation, a new lighting desk from GLP, was shown in prototype form. The company were coy about its features but the control surface indicates a serious piece of kit. GLP also showed two new 575W moving heads with electronic ballasts. Extremely compact, they weigh in at just 19kg.

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A brace of new products from Coemar; I-Wash LED an automated LED washlight, with RGB mixing. The popular I-Spot 1200 now comes in an EB (electronic ballast) variant. New to the I range, I-Wash 575 and I-Spot 575, both remarkably small units for their output, and both also available with electronic ballast, greatly reducing weight.

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If it wasn't the big red blow-up man that drew your attention to the MBN Eventproducts stand, then the repeating videos of clubbers bouncing around in foam undoubtedly did. As well as nightclub staples like foam and confetti cannon, the company was promoting its new Airdome, an inflatable waterproof housing for moving heads.

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The newest addition to ETC's Smart solutions line is SmartFade, a compact lighting console ideal for first-time users, educational establishments and amateur groups. SmartFade has three operating modes: Two Preset, Normal and DMX Backup.

PLASA also saw the European lighting market get its first look at Congo, the latest console developed with the respected Avab brand. A new version of Safari software, V3.5, has also been released and for a limited time is being offered free to users who register name and system details at a new Avab website administered by ETC.

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PLASA debutant Enttec had a successful show: on a mission to appoint European distributors for its lighting control solutions, the Australian manufacturer took the opportunity to launch its versatile Datagate DMX routing engine.

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PRG this year had much to show and tell. With no visible evidence of the grim reaper in sight, VLPS and LSD Fourth Phase shared the stand, mingling easily with one another and their respective customers. There is a review period underway examining the integration potentials, with particular focus on combining rental stock, management systems and equipment tracking. The new VL3500 from Vari*Lite was displayed - a lamp that takes the existing VL3000 and adds a shutter mechanism by removing one gobo wheel. More significantly, the EX1 media server takes the current trend for such systems to the extremes, with the ability to create stunning effects in the 3D realm. Features include keystone correction by virtual shutters (mouse grabable at each corner) and 3D movement control by pan and tilt functions on the lighting desk.

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Something for everyone on the stand of MilTec UK. New PR Lighting 575 and 1200 wash/profiles were flying the flag for moving heads, while the company's own-brand power amplifiers were attracting attention from users with lower budgets. Beyma loudspeakers were on show to interest PA manufacturers, with Ecler mixers and Universal Effects foam cannon of interest to the nightclub fraternity.

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Australian lighting control manufacturer LSC revealed its new XTC console, taking the best features from the popular MaXim console and re-packaging them in a striking, compact club console format. LSC's EKO DMX dimmer is now available as a hybrid machine with architectural features - it talks DMX and also offers environmental features such as internal memories and remote wall stations.

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MD Kirsten Eicher said Look Solutions was having an extremely busy show with many international visitors on the stand interested in its extensive range of fog machines. The company has recently opened a new office in the USA to respond to its growing market.

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Optima Lighting showed its new Matrix 300 spot moving light fixture. With 575 and 700 Spots and Wash fixtures in all three ranges 'coming soon', they were testing the water at PLASA for the first time. The fixtures are designed and engineered in the US and manufactured in Romania.

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Being positioned next to the Bandit Lites bar meant that TMB-UK had a captive audience for much of the show. Dominating the stand was an eye-catching, star-shaped array of ColourPix LED fixtures, a product aimed at the increasingly blurred area between LED lighting and video.

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XTBA featured a range of products, among them its new DMX Audit and The Splitter View DMX splitters. The View shows what's occurring on the DMX line and also transmits, so the user can add and set levels to DMX channels. The Audit takes that info to another level, enabling all DMX parameters to be changed. It can fix 'bad' DMX with a couple of button presses, and it can send 'fast', 'slow' or 'lazy' DMX to help different DMX strings talk to one another!

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Element Labs showed the latest generation of its popular LED products - VersaTILE and VersaTUBE. VersaTILE now has factory-set colour calibration as part of its fourth generation upgrade. This close control over colour accuracy also allows faithful reproduction of more difficult colours such as grey, brown, fleshtones and pure white, say the company. Meanwhile, VersaTUBE has also been enhanced with improved colour rendition and other features.

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Tryka LED launched several new products including a new 110V driver, the Module 144 Power Flood with inbuilt driver and the Modulation Driver RF18, a master/slave system controller for connecting up to 256 slave units to one master, with 18 LEDs per unit. Thus, 5,000 LEDs can be controlled via one small DMX remote.

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Mico Lighting deals with all the major lamp manufacturers - Osram, Philips, Lee, Sylvania, and sees PLASA as a vital meeting point for leading practitioners from the worlds of theatre, concert touring and other areas of performance. The company was also promoting its new lamp recycling service.

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Leprecon products ranged from small two-scene 12-channel memory assist controllers to full memory consoles for conventional and moving light systems. Also shown, compact tree-mount and UL-recognized dimmer packs, custom touring and installation dimmer racks and architectural dimming and control solutions.

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The PISA 42 DMX projector was on show on the Lagotronics stand, offering powerful light output balanced by an efficient heat management system. At PLASA for the first time was the linear lighting device based on DMX technology, which allows direct control of LED strips.

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First time exhibitors at PLASA, PG Stage Electrical, was having a good show meeting up with serious buyers. PG introduced the Dexel Lighting range from Brazil to the UK market, aimed at low-budget applications.

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Some nice products from Studio Due; launched at SIB in Rimini earlier this year, the Photowall 1200e ('e' for electronic ballast) is a ruggedized slide projector with a 1200W HMI source and 90 images pre-loaded. Four fully editable user programmes give a total of 682 scenes for stand-alone control (without DMX). The CS line is expanded with the CS2, a pair of 250W 28V lamps in Par 64 enclosures on a moving pan and tilt yoke with onboard dimmer.

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UK - The Board of Directors of James Thomas Engineering Ltd has issued a statement announcing that Mervyn Thomas is no longer an employee of the company, following a management restructuring which has also seen the appointment of John Hickinbotham as coordinator. Hickinbotham, known to many as Jig, has worked for the company for many years and will join the team responsible for customer liaison.

Pixel Range sales continue to be handled by Andy Walters and Ashley Lewis, and truss and lighting sales by Chris Waller and Tina Hall. John Hickinbotham should be contacted at the e-mail address given below with communications that would have previously channelled through Mervyn Thomas, say the company.

(Lee Baldock)

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USA - First came the Concept:1 and Concept:2, two DMX combination scanner/laser effects from American DJ. Now the company has taken this "concept" a step further and added the Concept:Color, a DMX colour changer with the same design theme as its cousins.

The new Concept:Color is the ideal fixture for DJs, clubs and bands, Scott Davies, general manager of the American DJ Group of Companies: "The popularity of the Concept:1 and Concept:2 convinced us to add a colour changer to the line, so that users could run an ensemble of matching effects."

The Concept:Color offers 15 colours plus white, along with two prism-like quadras that split the light beam into four colours. As an added bonus, a removable Frost Filter lets DJs create a dreamy "wash" effect when desired. The Concept:Color includes two DMX channels that can be conveniently hooked up to the s

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UK - Redditch-based sales, installation and service company Enlightenment has recently supplied 16 Robe moving lights to the Coliseum Theatre, Oldham, a busy 580-capacity producing house with a hectic and varied show schedule.

The eight Robe Spot 575XT and eight Robe Wash 575XT moving lights are part of a three-phase upgrade to the theatre's production lighting system undertaken by Enlightenment that has also included the supply of a console and dimmers.

Robe fixtures were initially suggested to the Coliseum's chief LX Phil Davies by Enlightenment's Paul Swansborough. They did a shoot out between Robe and assorted other brands, and Davies made his decision after careful deliberation. Beforehand, he'd spent a considerable time convincing the theatre's artistic director of the merits of automated lighting, and that they would greatly enhance productions generally and be a highly

  1. Clay Paky at the 2004 edition of Nights of Light
  2. White Light exclusives in Mary Poppins!
  3. Color Kinetics strengthens OEM and licensing
  4. James Thomas management restructure
  5. DHA seeks new designs for Gobo library
  6. Intelligent LED lighting from Super Vision
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