Nigeria - Lagos based sound and lighting company Solution Media and Infotech has invested in its second Midas PRO live audio mixing console in less than a year from local Midas Distributor, NMK Electronics. The investment was made in order to deliver the total sound solution for Africa's biggest gospel music festival, The Experience Lagos 2012.

The PRO3, which was purchased at PALME 2011, was used on monitors while the PRO9, purchased at PALME 2012, took care of FOH. The event was attended by nearly 300,000 people and saw acts including Don Moen, Israel Houghton, Fred Hammond, Deitrick Haddon and many more deliver sharp performances.

"We purchased the PRO9 as a natural progression from the PRO3, which we'd bought the year before." explains Bamishile Dipo, sound engineer from Solution Media and Infotech Ltd. "We decided on the PRO9 because the PRO3 had so totally

UK - Entertainment lighting specialist White Light is headed to the Event Production Show next week at Olympia, London to showcase the latest energy saving innovations for event production from CORE Lighting and PR Lighting on Stand B38.

CORE Lighting specialises in battery-powered, wirelessly controlled LED lighting fixtures designed for instant illumination anywhere - events, parties and any other production where lighting fixtures need to be distributed over a wide area, and unsightly power and data cabling must be kept to an absolute minimum. On show will the Point15, Point20 and Point30 fixtures, all RGB-W, and the high-output Flood30, a white LED equivalent to a 750W tungsten spotlight, IP65 rated for outdoor use.

Visitors to the White Light Stand will also get a look at new products from PR Lighting, including the XLED336, a small and super bright LED moving light. The

UK - It is becoming difficult to turn on the TV on a Saturday night and not be treated to a display via the Clay Paky Sharpy.

However, the favourite of the talent show has another string to its bow as Rob Myer, managing director of Light Fantastic Production Services explains, "We have been providing lighting, audio , video and staging services to a wide range of private and corporate events across the UK and Europe since 2005. Our clients demand a high level of finish and are always looking to create a new visual aesthetic for each event.

"As long time users of Clay Paky products, we've recently bought Sharpys from Ambersphere Solutions to broaden our rental stock and these have proved extremely popular. A large part of our work is in hotel ballrooms or conference centres where height, power supply and rigging opportunities can be very limited. This is where the Sha

Europe - Barco Lighting Systems and AED group have confirmed a new partnership that will enable AED Distribution to serve as a 'master distributor' of High End Systems' products throughout the UK, France and BeNeLux. Effective immediately, this Agreement enables AED Master Distribution to make its large centralized stock available to other distributors and dealers. They will also have direct access to product knowledge, support as well as stock without having to deal with long manufacturing and/or handling and transport delays.

Glenn Roggeman, CEO of the AED group, comments, "Our mission as master distributor is to be a complete support tool to the distribution network with our experience of large demos, trainings, large stocks, experience in project sales, buying used equipment as trade in with leasing of new.

"The Distribution landscape is drastically changing and

UK / France - SSE Audio Group has acquired French lighting company M.E.S through its French subsidiary Melpomen. Both MES and Melpomen have bases in Nantes and Paris and have worked together extensively on sound and lighting projects in recent years.

MES Eclairages was founded in 1981 and is now the leading provider of theatrical and event lighting in western France. It has an extensive inventory of lighting equipment for rental including moving heads, LED units and control and also installs permanent lighting rigs into venues.

In 2012, sound rental company Melpomen, a member of SSE Audio Group since 2001, decided to establish its own lighting department and recruited Jerome Malen to run it. The move came as more and more event promoters in France are looking for a comprehensive and integrated hire equipment package. In line with this, Melpomen has also just created a video de

France - Clay Paky will show a spread of established and new products at SIEL 2013.

Sharpy Wash 330 is a compact, lightweight 330 W washlight, with the luminous efficiency, graphic and optical performance of a 1000W fixture. It is extremely silent and quick, and fitted with a complete CMY color system, special colors, 6.5°-48° zoom, mechanical dimmer, beam shaping filter and motorized top-hat. It is an eco-friendly light, allowing considerable running and consumption cost savings.

A.LEDA, the new Clay Paky RGBW-LED moving head range have a library of pre-set graphic effects customizable by the operator, electronic linear dimmer, stop/strobe effect and a dedicated channel for color temperature setting. Each LED colour can be dinamically and individually controlled.

The Alpha Profile 800 ST is billed as "the most modern moving beam shaper in existence today for us

UK - Continuing a successful long-running relationship, XL Events has once again supplied projection, controls and additional screens for the high-octane Live Action Arena at the annual Autosport International show at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham UK.

The Live Action Arena stages live racing demonstrations and stunt shows every day for the duration of the popular racing-themed show, which is named after the UK's most popular weekly auto racing magazine.

To ensure the crowd could enjoy all the action wherever they sat, XL Events, working closely with event production company, Network Productions, as well as production director Malcolm Forbes, supplied a 90m wide by 9m high front projection using six stacks of Barco projectors.

Each stack included one of XL's new Barco HDF-W26 26k projectors on top of a Barco FLM HD20, which gave a total output of 276,000 lumens

UK - Independent film and television production house Renegade Pictures have turned to LED lighting solutions from Gemma Lighting Limited for their latest show Car SOS.

Owned by Shed Media, Renegade produces popular television shows such as Don't tell the Bride and Popstar as well as award-winning films My kidnapper and Me and The boys from Baghdad High.

Renegade, based in London, were looking to upgrade their lighting to showcase the classic cars being restored as part of Car SOS, but wanted a more energy efficient lighting solution.

In order to meet their requirements two of Gemma's energy efficient LED lighting products were selected for the project - the Sovereign 96 LED High Bay and Spitfire 48 LED Floodlight.

Both lights give clarity and coverage with high lumen outputs and instant strike up times, whilst the long life span o

South Africa - HeronBridge College, a private school in a leafy suburb north of Johannesburg, has a new and very attractive auditorium. It has been equipped with a combination of LED and conventional luminaires, and provides users with a system that is easy to operate yet which has the creative capability to surpass regular school lighting.

Lighting consultant Denis Hutchinson did research on similar projects, and, using his experience as one of South Africa's top lighting designers, specified the tender. The tender was awarded to DWR Distribution who supplied a list of brands including Philips Strand, Philips Selecon and Robe as well as lighting bars, associated items and the installation which was carried out in December 2012.

"One of the difficulties in specifying equipment for schools is that all too often the gear is used for three weeks of the year and gathers dust

UK - Pearce Hire has once more demonstrated the diverse breadth of projects they work on, with a magical garden lighting feature installed over the festive season.

The beautiful landscaped gardens at Anglesey Abbey in Cambridgeshire were given a nocturnal facelift with a dramatic lighting design created by the team at Pearce Hire for the Winter Lights event.

"We'd like to think we created a little bit of outdoor theatre for the visitors to the gardens in the run up to Christmas," comments Pearce Hire's John Huson, project manager and key lighting designer of this project.

The Visitor Experience team at Anglesey Abbey were first put in contact with Pearce Hire by John Wootten of Eastern Events who has long-standing relationships with both Pearce Hire and Anglesey Abbey but, until now, had never put them together as a project team. As a result of this introduc

UK - As part of on-going expansion in LED equipment and systems at ELP, the company are now supplying the latest ARRI L7c fresnels.

No sooner had the first batch of units arrived, LDs Dave Evans and Stuart Gain nabbed them for The One Show - the BBC's flagship studio based, live magazine programme.

"Producers here at The One Show are very environmentally aware, they're continually looking to do things more efficiently," explains lighting director Stuart Gain. "We've always had an LED based set using ELPs wide range of Pixel Pars, Chromafloods and Chroma Battens to decorate the studio. So we were pretty 'green' before. Now we've decided to swap out all our 250 MSR fresnels for ELPs latest ARRI L7-C fixtures, we must be one of the most environmentally friendly mid-sized studios. Other than some news room studios, I can't think of any that would pull

USA - Passion Conferences, founded by Louie Giglio in 1997 as a means of reaching the 20+ million university students in the world for the glory of God, has become one of the world's largest gatherings of Christian young adults. Held in Atlanta, Ga., this past 1-4 January, Passion 2013 drew a record crowd of 60,000 college students representing more than 2,000 universities from 56 countries, who packed into the Georgia Dome for four days of prayer, inspirational speakers, worship and efforts to end human slavery.

Helping to create the environment that would bring together the tens of thousands of college students was the lighting/production design created by Black & White Live Ltd.(London), under the direction of Ian Cattle. The conference's production design was most dramatically expressed by a commanding circular stage at the center of the Georgia Dome. The massive stage was o

Latvia - Commissioned by the municipality of R?zekne, a small town of just 30,000 inhabitants in Latvia's easternmost region of Latgale, the new youth recreational centre Zeimu?s, also known as Caran D'Ache, has rapidly become an unmissable meeting point for the local youngsters.

Inaugurated in September 2012, Caran D'Ache offers now over 60 different recreational activities and workshops, regularly attended by more than 300 kids, from toddlers up till young adults of 25. Visitors can freely participate in singing, dancing, playing instruments, ceramics, drawing, sewing, checkers, chess and other clubs, all non-formal education and youth development initiatives aimed at improving, in a safe and supervised environment, the quality of life of young people through a creative stimulation of their own crafts and skills.

The architecture of this educational centre reflects the state

USA - Robert Juliat participated in Live Design's 2012 Concert Master Classes at USC, Los Angeles last month showcasing its fixtures for those attending the immersive two-day event and accompanying attendees to a performance of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, whose tour rig includes Robert Juliat Manon and Topaze followspots.

The Concert Master Classes by Live Design annually brings together the touring industry's top designers to discuss lighting and projection design challenges for the world of concerts. Award-winning lighting designer Jeff Ravitz, creative consultant to the classes, chaired an overview session on concert lighting design and gave a very personal perspective on how he lit Springsteen's Wrecking Ball Tour in another session. Other panellists included Steve Cohen, Marc Janowitz, Steve Lieberman, Anne Militello and Seth Jackson.

Robert Juliat's F

Norway - For the last four years, the award-winning W-DMX by Wireless Solution Sweden has been used in a very special festival in Norway, the Verket Musikkfestival. The two-day festival, held in the beautiful town of Mo i Rana, located just below the Arctic Circle, hosts some of Norway's best artists each year, with the 2012 festival hosting a sold out venue of over 5000 visitors each night. The crowds came to see 14 musical acts including Timbuktu & Damn, Dumdum Boys, Gabrielle and Melissa Horn.

W-DMX is a festival favourite, avoiding cable runs in high traffic natural settings and leaving no carbon footprint for venues set in beautiful locations. Up to eight W-DMX units have been used for the Verket Musikkfestival in past years to set the mood in the festival area and at the industrial park above the festival site.

Technician Christer Sylten explains, "For the 2012 fest

UK / Australia - SBLD is offering a student placement opportunity for an Assistant Lighting Designer - kindly sponsored by Robe Show Lighting - at Vivid Light 2013, which takes place in Sydney, Australia from 24 May to 10 June 2013.

The Vivid Light event attracts an audience of over half a million visitors, and is lit by an international team of lighting and video designers. The designs include lighting many of Sydney's most prominent buildings, and a series of art installation around the port area. The event also features live music performances, seminars and workshops for lighting practitioners, and public debates focusing on the creative industries.

The assistant is required for an interactive art installation and architectural project which both incorporate the latest in lighting and music technology. There will be the opportunity to get hands on with the design process an

USA - Country music superstar Carrie Underwood continues her Blown Away Tour with a large inventory of Clay Paky Sharpy fixtures on hand to accent the video components of the show.

Lighting designer Peter Morse of Peter Morse Productions in South Lake Tahoe, California based his lighting scheme around three extremely large, trapezoidal-shaped, moving LED panels, which posed dynamic weight, power and sight-line block challenges. A tilting projection floor added to the task, "necessitating a 'surgical' application to lighting design and programming to avoid washing out all the projected images," Morse reports. He decided to hang the trussing in a way to complement and amplify the angles created by the trapezoid-shapes moving LED walls.

Lighting programmer Brian Jenkins notes that, "we were crunched on programming time for starters and then there were compli

UK - Ambersphere Solutions will stage a series of regional open days throughout 2013.

The first one will take place in Glasgow on Tuesday 19 February between 11am and 4pm at the Scottish Ballet's headquarters (Tramway, 25 Albert Drive, Glasgow, G41 2PE). This day-long event will enable customers to see the latest products from Clay Paky and MA Lighting demonstrated in a 'real' environment and meet the team that delivers these products exclusively to the UK market.

On display at the Scottish Ballet will be many of the products that featured so significantly at the UK's showcase events last summer, including the Jubilee celebrations and the Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the Olympic Games. Plus the latest additions to the MA and Clay Paky portfolio of award-winning products.

"The open day will enable us to show the new Sharpy Wash - we are certain it will be just as po

USA - K/A/S Lighting, part of the Kaufman Astoria Studios (KAS) campus has announced that Bobby Flecker has been promoted to managing director.

In his new position, Flecker will manage the operations of the division and will bring new technologies including intelligent lighting, rigging, dimming and consoles and led lighting to the department. Together with Hal Rosenbluth, president of KAS, the team will strategize innovative ways to expand K/A/S Lighting's business portfolio throughout the city and region.

"Bobby is an industry leader and has proven over the past three years that he is an invaluable resource in our lighting division. He has worked on countless films and television shows in New York and will continue to grow K/A/S Lighting, making it the go-to source for all production lighting needs," said Rosenbluth.

Prior to joining K/A/S Lighting, Flecker was t

Argentina - German manufacturer GLP has added a new subsidiary office to its organisation in order to better serve the Latin American market. Based in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the office will be headed up by sales manager, Peter Hald.

"The Latin American market has been growing with interesting speed in the past few years," commented Mark Ravenhill, president of GLP US. "We have had plans for a Latin American operation, but needed to ensure that we had the correct structure in place to support it 100%. We have that now and can ensure that customers benefit from our high level of customer service."

Peter Hald commented, "I'm delighted to be joining the GLP team. They really have a great product line up with leading edge technology which I can't wait to bring to the Latin American market." Hald has recently been working in telecommunications, but is

Germany - Fashion show Show-Me recently celebrated its world premiere in front of about 2,000 guests at the Friedrichstadt-Palast in Berlin. The show boasts some impressive features: the legendary Parisian Haute Couture Designer Christian Lacroix created the costumes for the opening and closing ceremonies, and there was a 21m high waterfall on the stage, where 40 female and 20 male dancers performed.

The show's lighting set-up is equally impressive and mostly includes equipment from Lightpower. Ten Clay Paky Alpha Spot HPE 1500s and 14 Clay Paky Alpha Spot HPE 300s have been used, among other lights.

Marcus Krömer is again in charge of the lighting design. He reports, "For the first time in 10 years we are using a grandMA2 desk at Friedrichstadt-Palast for this show, along with the grandMA 'series 1'. Basically the lighting and video are split. The lighting is handled on

USA - grandMA2 went on a mission shortly after Christmas when almost 16,000 people gathered in St. Louis for Urbana 12, the triennial student missions conference held by InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA. Dodd Technologies Inc. furnished the grandMA2 full-size as part of its lighting, audio, video and scenic support for the event's arena show.

With the theme of God's 'Great Invitation', the conference ran at the America's Centre and Edward Jones Dome. Attendees had access to more than 100 workshops and over 250 mission organisations and seminaries exhibiting at Urbana 12.

Dodd Technologies was responsible for supporting the three main stages for the show: one for the worship band, one for drama and skits, and the centre stage for speakers and business activities. "We used one giant rig with 280 moving heads, which was set up so they could use some or all of it as they

UK - West London-based rental company, Entec Sound & Light were asked to supply lighting, trussing and rigging for a high profile one off concert by Malaysian Chinese superstar Fish Leong at Wembley Arena.

Entec was working for the show's producers Magic Sound and the project follows on from the massive success of another gig by Fish Leong last year at Hammersmith Apollo, also serviced by Entec

This time both the scale, the production values and the ante was upped considerably - and it all had to go in and out in a day.

The show's technical production manager Simon Tutchener co-ordinated all the different departments and oversaw the hectic production schedule on the day. Entec fielded a very strong and experienced crew consisting of Phil White, Pete 'Pepper' Schofield, Sudip Shrestha and rigger / crew chief Nic Burlace.

They worked closely in advance with Leong's lighting

Denmark - From 28 December 20 January, Lennon and McCartney fans were treated to the theatrical concert Hey Jude at the Forum in Copenhagen. A spectacular musical and visual treat with lighting design by Jonas B°gh, the Beatles-inspired show used a host of Martin Professional MAC luminaires, including the new MAC III Wash, with supply by Nordic Rentals.

"I needed a very powerful fixture to create an enormous 'background of light,' explains LD Jonas B°gh. "At the beginning of the theatre concert I used the MAC III Wash to light through an opening in the enormous back drop to create the idea of something threatening outside pushing to be let in."

At one point in the show an enormous backdrop falls and the MAC III Washes define the entire background of a bare and open scenography. "The fall of the backdrop reveals a full-size building crane and

Latest Issue. . .