Slovenia - Ljubljana based Intralite is a leading Slovenian lighting rental company working in all areas of the industry - festivals, concerts, corporate, theatre and TV - and is committed to offering the very best service and the latest technologies to its clients.

It was established in 2007 by Ales Pirman, who first bought Robe moving lights in 2003 when running his previous lighting company, which was a smaller one-person operation.

The first purchases were 575 XT Washes and ColorSpot 575 ATs which were such a success that he continued down the Robe route after he set up Intralite.

"I needed good value, highly featured moving lights that were reliable and solid rental company workhorses," he explains. "Robe was a lot more accessible than any of its competitors on several different fronts," he comments, adding that the service, support and backup offere

USA - Lighting designer Jason Rothberg has selected the Clay Paky Alpha Spot QWO 800 fixtures for the current tour of indietronica band Passion Pit. Atomic Lighting of Lititz, Pennsylvania supplied the lights, which are garnering raves from Rothberg on the road.

Passion Pit is continuing its national tour after releasing its second LP, Gossamer. More dates are planned for 2013.

"I've never toured with Clay Paky lights, but these have been fantastic," Rothberg reports. "They're different from other lights of this type. They are smaller and brighter, and the zoom is amazing. They can go from a super tight beam to a super fat beam in an instant. They're brighter than anything else we've encountered."

Rothberg, who is also the tour's lighting programmer, had previous positive experiences with Clay Paky 700 fixtures but calls the 800 units "even be

UK - Nick Gray from creative lighting and visual design practice Renegade was commissioned by show producers Bacchus to light the main venue at the British Fashion Council's 'London Collections : Men AW 2013 menswear showcase, staged at the Hospital Club in Covent Garden.

Additionally, Gray lit two high profile off site shows - Aitor Throup's ground-breaking New Object Research at The Dog Eared Film Studio in Covent Garden and Jonathan Saunders' collection at Victoria House in Holborn.

Renegade also sourced and co-ordinated all the necessary lighting equipment and supplied their own hand-picked crews.

The Hospital Club was the official British Fashion Council (BFC) show space at the hub of the event, featuring up to four shows a day .

The space was almost square and surrounded by white walls, seating bays and runway floor. A central 'spine' truss was installe

USA - It may not have looked like your grandma's Empire State Building (ESB), but a grandMA2 full-size enhanced the dazzling pixel mapping of the New York City landmark that launched the building's new lighting system.

The world-famous ESB recently revealed its new, one-of-a-kind LED tower lights with a first-ever light show on the landmark, which was designed by noted lighting designer Marc Brickman. The stunning display featured six Hippo media servers, controlled by a grandMA2 full-size and operated in conjunction with the Philips Color Kinetics (PCK) LSM control system and its associated network. The media servers drove 11,500 pixel-mapped DMX channels to four types of Philips Color Kinetics RGB and white fixtures located on the building's top four tiers where they replaced old metal halide and fluorescent fixtures. All four sides of the structure were pixel mapped making th

New Zealand - Ten years ago, the first of many copies of LightFactory, the PC-based control system, was put on sale. Founder and CEO Martin Searancke developed LightFactory out of a passion for the industry and a knack for writing code. Today, the control system enjoys worldwide success, which is a credit to its power and economy, as well as to the hard work of its founder and employees (one of which is his wife, Helen).

Before LightFactory, Searancke had co-founded a dot com company and then invested the profits in what was then his hobby of lighting design. Before long, the new company was thriving. The motivating factor was his search for the ideal controller. Unable to find an affordable controller with powerful features, Searancke wrote a small application called "DMX Expander," which eventually led to the development of LightFactory.

"I had purchased a sma

UK - The Mayflower, Southampton, has chosen to replace much of its existing lighting stock with Philips Selecon SPX luminaires. The purchase follows an exhaustive testing and comparison process, which saw the SPXs benefit from a grueling 'destruction test' and shoot out against a number of other manufacturer profiles.

Neil Daykin, senior lighting technician at the Mayflower says: "We were looking to replace our old Strand Lighting Harmony profiles and had originally planned to replace them with the same fixtures that we already have FOH. When we received the demo SPX units to try out we very quickly changed our minds and ultimately we unanimously agreed that the SPX route was the best solution for us."

Daykin explains the reason for the change of heart: "We were surprised to discover that optically the SPXs are far superior to other fixtures. They are ideal for

Germany - Robe CitySkape 48 and CitySource 96 and Anolis Inground 12 RGB LED fixtures have been specified and installed to illuminate an eye-catching collection of art and sculptural works by Volker-Johannes Trieb in an area including a huge garden, a gallery, an event location and the renovated old Railway Station in Sutthausen near Osnabrück, Germany.

The whole area is called Iktomia and consists of several beautiful and engaging art works in the grounds of the newly refurbished station complex. Many of them are large and constructed from ceramic and rusty metal, including a wall built from 20 tonnes of residue iron.

These are skilfully integrated with the natural attractiveness of the gardens, creating a series of scenes and industrial interventions with which people can interact as they pass through - be it for a meditative wander to appreciate the gardens or to visit the

Denmark - Clay Paky Sharpys have helped Denmark celebrate its finest music with a stunning lighting design for the Danish Music Awards 2012 by Kasper Lange.

Lange specified an army of powerful, pure beam Sharpys to create an array of effects, including a semi-circle surround of bright, red beams to envelope Danish singer Aura as she performed her hit In Love with the World.

"The Sharpy has been my favourite profile fixture ever since it was launched, and has been in my designs for all my TV shows ever since then," says Lange, who has worked on many of Denmark's most high profile music events. "I needed a small profile fixture that was able to cut through the massive number of wash lamps and videoscreens, and the Sharpys are very stable, aggressive little work-horses. They deliver the best beam in the business - every lighting designer's dream."

The

UK - The most creative and experimental use of new generation products is often found at the hands of indie/dance production designers. This has been proven recently by Rob Stanley, of ZEROdB Live, who has been using the entire inventory of 44 SGM XC-5 LED strobes newly purchased by Haydn Cruickshank's Colour Sound Experiment (CSE).

Formed three and a half years ago, and famed for their work in the Drum 'n' Bass and more experimental corporate sectors, ZEROdB Live have continually been placing SGM's low-profile, high output platform on their "dream kit list" for gigs since they became part of the CSE stock.

The XC-5 RB strobes debuted on ZEROdB Live gigs at Mint Festival, Leeds and award winning Hospitality Brixton in September. "They have not been off our kit list since," confirms Stanley. "We do BIG shows, and the XC-5's are right on the money."

UK / The Netherlands - Artistic Licence Engineering is set to launch sunDial, a range of modular lighting controllers for smart illumination, at ISE 2013 (stand 8-R232). The display will highlight the mix-and-match versatility of the sunDial range, using DMX and DALI controllers to drive various sources, including mains-powered lighting and the latest in LED technology.

The landscape of lighting is evolving towards a greener future, but the introduction of more eco-friendly sources such as LED is just part of the story. Only by using and controlling fixtures in a more intelligent manner can we harness the full potential of the smart approach to lighting, says the company.

Artistic Licence Engineering's sunDial range provides the technology to make this happen. To ensure maximum versatility, the MC80-DMX and MC64-DALI controllers respectively accept DMX512 and DALI input data.

UK / The Netherlands - MilTec (UK) Ltd will be exhibiting at the ISE exhibition in Amsterdam. On show will be a selection of LED stage lighting and professional audio products, all designed by Miltec at their headquarters in Kent, England.

On the stand will be the highly successful LEDHead Batten2 which has become a major hit with installation and rental companies in the UK and Ireland. Fitted with 18 x 8W quad-colour LEDs it can be used as a conventional batten, pixel-mapped for stunning visual effects or employed as a cyclorama wash using the 'Cycwash' diffuser option.

Making its debut will be the LEDHead 3DPixelTube. This is a three-dimensional LED matrix system made up of LED tubes hung from a ceiling or truss. Each LED can be pixel-mapped to allow spectacular 3D effects.

Also featured on the stand will be a multi-function speaker cabinet which can be used as a single so

- Alan Titchmarsh is back with a new series of his ITV tea-time chat show. Roger Williams designs the lighting show, with equipment provided by Richard Martin Lighting (RML).

To enhance the warm and homely feel of the set, Williams' specification consists of Alpha Spot 575, Alpha Spot 300, Martin MAC Aura, James Thomas PixelPar 90s and LED Par cans.

In each daily episode, Alan approaches topical news and debates. He also cooks meals with resident and celebrity chefs, chats to celebrity guests and enjoys music numbers.

(Jim Evans)

UK - Night arrivals at Edinburgh airport over the festive season will have seen a stunning example of Black Light's capabilities. To help kick-start the recent re-branding of the airport, the company's technicians installed an array of LED luminaires to colour the control tower purple, turning it into a striking new night-time landmark for the city.

"The project was designed for the airport's recent re-branding and was carried out on behalf of the award-winning design company Speirs + Major," explains Dave Moffat, one of Black Light's event project managers who oversaw the temporary installation. "We used an array of equipment from Robe's CitySkape range to create the stunning effect the airport wanted. It was a great project to work on and its success highlights our expertise with LED technology and our dedication to deliver the artistic vision of our clients.&qu

UK - Point Source Productions Ltd, the London-based hire company, has started the new year by investing in over £250,000 of new hire stock, expanding its inventory with equipment from manufacturers such as Chroma Q, Clay Paky, ETC, GDS and Selecon.

The investment comes on the back of an extremely successful year in 2012 for the company as it supplied events surrounding the multiple celebrations in and around the capital.

"The high-profile sporting and royal events - and the various spin-offs generated by them - during the summer kept us busy and has enabled us to expand our stock in readiness for what is promising to be a very busy 2013," says Point Source Productions' MD, Stephen Capel.

"We decided to increase our moving light stock by delving into the impressive Clay Paky catalogue and have invested in the Alpha Spot HPE 700 profiles and A.Leda K10 was

Norway - This year's electrifying Nobel Peace Prize Concert saw Philips Vari-Lite VL3000 Spot luminaires, supplied by Norway's AVAB CAC, star as the power luminaire of choice for respected lighting director Nick Collier.

"The main challenge in lighting this particular show is the variety of performers," explains Collier, who took over lighting design duties from original designer, Al Gurdon. "The design has to bring out the best in Peter Bingemann's excellent set, and allow us the ability to deliver a unique look to each of the tracks. To this end, the VL3000 Spot is the obvious candidate. It has a very bright lamp, with excellent zoom optics."

American actress Sarah Jessica Parker and Scottish actor Gerard Butler hosted the annual event held at the Spektrum Arena, Oslo while performances came from Kylie Minogue, Jennifer Hudson and Seal amongst others.

T

UK - The eco-conscious and budget-minded now have a new way to cut back on energy expenditures, according to manufacturer ETC. ETC's Paradigm Responsive Controls - the latest additions to the award-winning Unison Paradigm family of architectural control - are a sleek, convenient way to reduce wasted electricity in any space, the company says.

Paradigm Occupancy/Vacancy Sensors use passive infrared sensors (PIR) to detect vacancy, automatically shutting lights off when a space is unoccupied. They can also be configured to turn on when someone enters a room. ETC's architectural market manager Joe Bokelman says: "The Occupancy/Vacancy Sensors save energy because you're not paying to light an empty room."

The sensors are available with masks to prevent trips or false triggers. Instead of having to dismantle the product to install the masks, the Paradigm Occupancy/Vacancy

Slovenia - Robe is the moving light of choice at the prestigious Cankarjev Dom in Republic Square, Ljubljana, Slovenia, which has over 100 Robe products in its inventory.

Named after writer and playwright Ivan Cankar, the building was designed by leading Slovenian architect Edvard Ravnikar and opened in 1982, complete with a large basement area that is fortified to withstand a nuclear attack!.

It is the largest Slovenian cultural and congress centre and features six venues - the biggest is a 1650 capacity concert hall - plus several galleries and studio spaces. It's both a producing and a receiving venue staging a wide variety of shows, events all year round, from opera to dance, popular music to choral, orchestra to drama ... and everything in between.

Sometimes there are multiple shows a day, and up to 15 different performances a week is not unusual during the busy periods

USA - Bandit Lites had the privilege of lighting the 31st Annual Texaco Country Showdown, the nation's largest and longest running country talent search. The event took place at The Ryman Auditorium on 17 January and was hosted by singer/songwriter Jewel.

California band Poor Man's Poison, one of five finalists, triumphed over the competition, which included Kassie and Ben, The Brothers Roberson, Deidre Thornell and Kate and Corey. The winning act was selected by a group of industry executives and artists, and was awarded a Grand Prize of $100,000.

Lighting designer Mark Carver has provided the lighting design for the contest for several years, and has become adept at transforming The Ryman. Parts of a circular truss, made up of two arch trusses, created a twin circular look over the stage. VL 2500s and Coemar Halos were hung over the stage, while Bandit GRN fixtures washed th

UK - Working with lighting designer, Petter Skramstad, PRG have provided an innovative lighting system to feature at the Topman/BFC show for Family Productions.

As part of London Collection Men's Fashion week, Topman's show took place at The Old Sorting Office in New Oxford Street.

The space featured a creative curved design with a 100m catwalk that weaved around the venue, designed by 42 Architects. PRG's Loz Wilcox, provided over 100 Chromlech Jarag fixtures, which in a break from their traditional use as a dynamic eye candy effect, were suspended above the catwalk and used as the primary lighting fixture for the collection. The luminaires were suspended from a piece of custom rolled barrel stipulating the line of the catwalk around the venue.

Continuing with the curved theme, the walls surrounding the audience were bespoke backlit cycloramas using 36 ColorBlaze 48's and 7

Sweden - Experienced Swedish lighting designer Henrik Lundin is discovering that SGM's new X-5 LED strobes are making an increasingly powerful contribution to his show designs.

A member of the successful Stockholm-based company Satellite Live, since touring with eight of the new white strobes from the newly set-up SGM Sweden (headed by Mikael Uddh), he has never looked back.

One of the latest dance extravaganzas to undertake an extensive club tour with the strobes has been electro/hip hop group Maskinen (The Machine). "Because we were often visiting clubs with limited access to power, the X-5, with its low power draw when compared with the traditional energy hungry xenon sources, became a natural choice," he says.

The X-5 is not only a high-efficiency white LED strobe but its astonishing power is harnessed in an extremely compact form factor. By combining LED techn

UK - A lucky student from Birmingham's top creative, digital and performing arts academy has landed the opportunity of a lifetime; lighting the stage at the star-studded BRIT Awards ceremony.

Devante Benjamin, 17, from Birmingham fought off tough competition to join two students from London's BRIT school to work alongside some of the best in the business; preparing, installing, operating and de-rigging lighting equipment at the high profile event hosted by James Corden at London's 02 Arena next month.

Currently in Year 13 studying Production Arts at Birmingham Ormiston Academy (BOA), Devante has already had the chance to work on a number of high profile events including the Olympic and Paralympic opening ceremonies.

He said: "I've been lucky enough to get the opportunity to work on a lot of really exciting projects during my time at BOA, but this will be the biggest by

UK - Knight of Illumination Award-winner and lighting designer Cate Carter has harnessed the precise and powerful beam control of Philips Vari-Lite VL3500 Wash FX luminaires to create a beautifully focused, and surprisingly intimate, show for Elbow at London's 20,000-capacity O2 Arena, provided by Lite Alternative.

"The VL3500 Wash FX provides me with both a powerful beam and even coverage for the stage wash," explains Carter. "The range of the zoom allows me to use these fixtures in different capacities to fulfill multiple applications and also the quality of the color mixing gives me a really diverse palette, from which I can build many different looks."

The design, a deconstructed yet no less imaginative version of the full production tour from the previous year, is both intimate and expansive and as expected not just restricted to the stage.

"The

UK - Leading UK lighting rental company Siyan invested in additional Robe MMX Spots to keep up with the demand for these popular fixtures and a busy autumn order book.

High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire based Siyan, headed by Nick Valdez, services numerous tours, shows and events including a healthy pick of exciting 'bands of the moment'. The company also has a reputation for nurturing and producing new and emerging young lighting designers, operators / programmers and technicians.

Half of the new 24 MMX fixtures went directly out on tour with Feeder, where they were specified by LD Ewan McRobb and used as the main lights on the rig. McRobb had also taken some of Siyan's original batch of MMXs out on the Bryan Adams tour at the end of 2011. Siyan recently had MMX Spots out on Skunk Anansie's European tour with LD Andy 'Foxy' Smyth, which ran throughout November.

Nick Valdez expla

USA - Bandit Lites has announced the hiring of Andy Reese as the newest technical assistant to its Technical Services Department. Reese will be coordinating with the both the technical services and the sales departments to ensure that all customers (internal and external) get the parts and supplies that they need.

Originally a Knoxville native, Reese received his bachelors of science from Middle Tennessee State University, where he majored in the recording industry with a concentration in music business. He has since relocated to Nashville after working in Tulsa, OK as both an event and operations coordinator for the BOK Center and as the changeover manager for the Ted Constant Convocation Centre.

"I'm excited to be part of the Bandit Lites family," said Reese. "I respect this company and its tradition of quality in products, customer service and care for employ

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