Brazil - With the help of trade bodies, PLASA and MIA, the APRS assembled 10 British companies, including eight sharing a national booth called the Great British Audio Embassy, who presented their wares at the annual AES Convention at the Expo Centre Norte.

Participants from the pro-audio, broadcast and sound reinforcement industries shared a specially designed booth at the heart of the show, creating a great first impression and receiving the glowing attention both of visitors to the show and of the host of local distributors and manufacturers with whom they were looking for local partnerships.

Console and auxiliary stalwarts SSL and AMS-Neve re-launched their Brazilian presences along with first time appearances from CB Electronics, XTA/MC2, Martin Audio, Sonnox, JoeCo, Sonifex, Sonic Distribution and Resolution magazine.

The Great British Audio Embassy booth also p

France - "The most majestic French musical ever" is currently on tour after four months at the Palais des Sports in Paris. Its lighting equipment is based on Clay Paky Alpha Profile 1500s.

The producers Dove Attia and Albert Cohen have set their work against an exceptional historical backdrop. It is centred on the most intense period of French history, the storming of the Bastille, which marked the beginning of the French Revolution. In the middle of this storm, the two leading characters, a young enthusiastic revolutionary and a lady-in-waiting loyal to the Queen, embark on an impossible love affair. This is the underlying theme of a story full of twists, and a wonderful excuse for a series of catchy electropop tunes.

Always eager to use new show technology, the producers entrusted the set design to Giuliano Peparini, who is famous for having worked several times wi

The Netherlands - Wireless Solution Sweden reports that Fairlight BV has been named distributor for W-DMX products in The Netherlands.

Michel Arntz, director of Fairlight says, "We are happy to start our cooperation with Wireless Solution. Wireless Solution is a strong brand. We are confident that our customers will be happy by providing new, innovative and good solutions with Wireless Solution with the service customers know from Fairlight."

He adds, "We very much look forward to exploring the mutual benefits and continuing to develop our business relationship with our customers and partners in The Netherlands. Our goal is to solve the problems for our customers and find the right solutions. With Wireless Solution, we found the right partner for the future and a brand with a lot of opportunities for our customers."

"Fairlight is an incredibly knowle

USA - Robe takes their policy of listening to what lighting and visual designers are requesting to new levels of commitment with the new Robe Robin Cyclone product, which made its US debut at the PLASA Focus exhibition in Orlando, Florida last week, following a worldwide launch at Prolight+Sound 2013 in Frankfurt

Robe collaborated with Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania based lighting designer Scott Warner on this highly innovative product - featuring an integrated fan in the centre of a moving head, surrounded by a ring of 24 high powered individually controllable RGBW multichip LEDs.

Warner was in Orlando on the Robe booth to see the production model Cyclones for the first time ... and was delighted. "It's very special to have something you draw and dream about brought to life in this way," he enthuses.

Warner originally hit on the idea when touring with a client in the UK

Sweden - CAST Group's revolutionary 6D live tracking solution, BlackTrax, made its big show debut at the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest in Malmö. BlackTrax performed "flawlessly" in the first high-profile demonstration of its creative and practical potential for the realtime automation of lighting and video content.

Working in conjunction with Martin Kuhn of Switzerland's Moodbox, CAST deployed BlackTrax for two major performances at the event - the opening act of the semi final, Urban Orchestra, and the return to the Eurovision stage of 2012's winner, Loreen.

Technical director Ola Melzig comments, "Thanks to BlackTrax, we were able to do things that no one has ever done before - it took the show to a new level. With over 1200 lighting fixtures and almost 30 of the largest, brightest video projectors in the world, we clearly don't make equipment decisions casual

USA - Zorro: A New Musical has claimed a lot of firsts for ETC's Eos family of lighting control products. It was the first West End musical controlled by an Eos desk. It was the first large scale show in Paris run on an Eos. And now it's adding another accomplishment to the list: Zorro is the first theatrical production in America to feature ETC's newest lighting control desk, Eos Titanium ("Ti").

The debut of Ti coincided with the preproduction of Zorro at the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia, so lighting designer Ben Ormerod and programmer Andi Davis decided to put it to the test. Says Davis: "I'd previously had the pleasure of programming the first ETC Gio musical in the UK, which was a great experience, so I was keen to have the opportunity to use the Ti so soon after its official launch."

Ti was used to accomplish all programming for

Belgium - Luc Peumans of Painting With Light designed spectacular lighting and visuals for the 2013 Jim TV Awards AKA 'The Jimmies', staged at the Ethias Arena, Hasselt, Belgium, which celebrated some of the best musical talent in the country.

Peumans - known for creating innovative and eye-catching all-encompassing visual environments - was called by the popular Jim TV music channel themselves and asked to come up with something eye-catching for the occasion.

It's the first time he's been involved with the high profile event, which features an hour of awards broadcast live, followed by the Jimmie's Festival - a five hour telethon featuring the winners plus a stellar line up of other local international artists which this year included Elie Goulding, Jessie Ware, The Opposites, Coone, MarK with a K, DJ F.R.A.N.K. and many others ... which also goes out live.

So the challenge

UK - Blackburn-based lighting and visuals specialist HSL supplied lighting, LED screen, a Kinesys automation system and crew to the UK and European arena legs of international vocal group Il Divo's Greatest hits tour, following on from their successful collaboration last year.

For the first time, Il Divo performed with Welsh soprano Katherine Jenkins on the tour, which featured lighting designed by Dave Davey one of the UK's most successful television lighting designers. Davey's work includes high profile shows like The X Factor, which is where he originally met Il Divo's Creative Director, Brian Burke.

The tour visuals featured some spectacular crossover lighting styles from both TV and live disciplines.

Davey has worked with HSL on a number of projects. For the tour, he brought in Tom Sutherland as touring lighting director, and together they visualised the s

Romania - A wide selection of Robert Juliat spotlights, profiles and followspots have been chosen for the new lighting installation, following a major refurbishment, of the historic National Theatre Vasile Alecsandri in Ia?i, Romania.

The theatre, which was named after one of Romania's most famous poets and actors, hosts the Ia?i Romanian National Opera and is listed in the National Register of Historic Monuments. It has recently undergone a lengthy seven-year renovation during which time its programme of events was spread out across theatres all over Romania.

"This disadvantage of multiple locations has transformed over time into an advantage for us," explains Mr Aurel Anton, Chief Lighting Engineer at the theatre. "Throughout this time we were able to accumulate knowledge and experience from all these other theatres which helped us to define precisely what we

Sweden - Slovakia's Leader Light was a key official supplier to this year's Eurovision Song Contest, with 160 units of LL stage beam were located directly on the stage.

"For the company this was a new experience which we much appreciate," says managing director Julius Szaraz. "Leader Light constantly tries to improve technology and I think this is an evidence of the quality of our products."

LL stage beam is a LED fixture which is designed for graphic back/front stage lighting effects for the entertainment market. This cool white light is compatible with DMX and it offers quick installation with camlocs.

(Jim Evans)

Sweden - A total of 11 x grandMA2 light consoles were used for running lighting and video at the 2013 Eurovision Song Contest, staged at the Malmö Arena, Sweden.

Four grandMA2 light consoles, plus four as backup, were controlling around 1,400 fixtures. The three video grandMA2 light, one as backup, were playing back content stored on 22 media servers via MA-Net2 feeding 28 x Barco HDQ-2K40 projectors. They had 94m video pixels in the show and were running up to 16 video layers on the media servers. 4 x MA onPC command wing were used as well for technical support purposes.

The 2013 event took production, presentation and visual imagination to new heights of style, ambition and excellence under the technical direction of Ola Melzig. This was created by a carefully crafted blend of Fredrik Jönsson's lighting, Mikki Kunttu's video and the set designed by Viktor Brattstrom and Fr

China - ADJ has opened a sales and distribution facility in the world's most populous nation. Located in the city of Pan Yu, the new Guangzhou ADJ China will sell ADJ products exclusively to the Chinese market.

According to Toby Velazquez, president of the ADJ Group, the company's move into China was prompted by feedback from Chinese consumers, club owners and concert managers. "End users in China have been exposed to our lighting products in other countries whether in Asia or elsewhere; and have been impressed by their performance as well as by our branding. Over the past few years, more of these end-users have been asking where they can get our products in China. Our new operation in Pan You was started in response to this demand."

The ADJ products offered by the new operation will be similar to the lighting ADJ has marketed successfully in other parts of the world

UK - White Light will return to the ABTT Theatre Show this June, exhibiting on stand 133 in the show's Orange Hall. The entertainment lighting specialist will showcase the latest lighting, and effect products for the stage and staff will be on hand to discuss White Light's range of services which include Hire, Sales, Installation, Technical Service, and Events.

Appearing on stand 133 will be White Light exclusive products from manufacturers Altman, Chromlech, CITC, CORE Lighting, James Thomas Engineering, JB Lighting, Look Solutions, LSC Lighting, Rainbow Colour Changers, and Wireless Solutions.

The James Thomas JT30 truss system will form the structure of the White Light stand. The new JT30 system, developed with installations in mind, features unisex fork connections, tapered fork holes, and adjustable joints. With these features, technicians can make connections quicker and

Indonesia - Clay Paky has unveiled its latest luminaires to major Asian rental companies and TV stations at a demo Jakarta in Indonesia.

Clay Paky area manager Alberico D'Amato and the Italian LD Giovanni Zucchinali collaborated with Clay Paky's Malaysia-based Asian distributor Acoustic & Lighting System for the show, with their newly opened Indonesian branch, which offered end users in the region the opportunity to experience the company's latest breakthroughs in lighting technology.

On show were Clay Paky's A.Leda K10 and K20, the Alpha Spot QWO 800, the Alpha Spot 700 HPE, the Alpha Wash 1500, the Sharpy, and - making its debut in Asia - the new Sharpy Wash.

"The 60 or so rentals companies and TV representatives were incredibly impressed with the quality and features of all of Clay Paky's new luminaires," says Acoustic & Lighting System's Eugene Yeo. "We re

Estonia - Renowned for producing some of the best theatre in Europe, Vanemuine Teater in Tartu, Estonia, launches its new production of Grease directed by Georg Malvius, featuring a vibrant lighting design by Palle Palmé who is utilising over 100 Robe moving lights.

These are part of a new installation at Vanemuine in the theatre's 660 seater Big House venue.

The installation is part of a much wider upgrade programme which has seen all eight Estonian state supported arts and culture venues receive a major lighting refit - with Robe moving lights deployed across all sites.

Involving over 500 fixtures distributed around the country, this has been co-ordinated by Robe's Estonian distributor, Tallinn based E&T Ltd.

Palle Palmé is based in Stockholm and works internationally on a wide variety of shows across theatre, live music and corporate event sectors.<

China - The newly reopened Yau Ma Tei Theatre has put a modern twist on traditional Cantonese opera. The historic 300 seat venue in Kowloon, Hong Kong, features the latest ETC technology, with layers of the highest quality conventional and LED light.

Originally opened as a cinema in 1930, the Yau Ma Tei Theatre screened films from a variety of genres until it closed in 1998. Nearly a decade later, the building was saved from being bulldozed when it was declared an architectural and cultural landmark. The government decided to revitalise the area, beginning conservation work to transform the former cinema into a performing arts venue that would become home to a Cantonese opera troupe.

During the renovation, power consumption in the theatre was a big concern. The aging building has limited electrical capacity, so the lighting system had to be green. The staff decided to install

UK - A substantial lighting rig featuring over 150 Robe fixtures was used by 'house' lighting designer and TV lighting director Tim Routledge to create a production design for the 1xtra / In New Music We Trust Arena at BBC Radio One's 2013 'Big Weekend' event.

The high-profile three day musical extravaganza staged in Ebrington Square, Derry-Londonderry, Northern Ireland, kicked off the UK festival season in style.

The lighting equipment for this stage was supplied by the HSL Group incorporating PSI who provided all rigging and support. The two companies have recently merged offering even more comprehensive rental operations throughout the UK and Ireland.

The 1xtra / In New Music We Trust stage was located inside The Venue, a 5000 capacity multi-purpose temporary structure erected for Derry's 2013 year as European Capital of Culture. The house lighting rig in here also contai

UK - Award-winning lighting designer James Thompson is using pure beam Clay Paky Sharpys to throw laser like beams across the audience in his show design for The Script's current sell-out world tour.

Thompson - who was presented with a Knight of Illumination Award in the category of Concert Touring and Events for his work with The Script in 2011 - has praised the impact the Sharpys can have in a lighting design.

The Script show, which has been designed to reflect the name of the Tour - '#3', features a huge video backdrop with three parallel video fingers that reach out into the audience, both along the floor and overhead. Although Thompson uses the Sharpy's sparingly he has worked them into his design seamlessly, using them to deliver high impact, audience-embracing effects. Where they are used each look exploits the sharp parallel beam acting to punctuate the music and the v

Brazil - Robe participated with local distributor Newart at the 17th Brazilian exhibition and conference organised by the AES (Audio Engineering Society) in Sao Paulo, taking the opportunity to highlight its latest innovative new products, including the RobinN Pointe, the MiniMe and the MMX WashBeam.

Attracting lighting, sound and video professionals from Latin America and the US, AES Brazil Expo registered a 10% growth in visitor numbers. AES Brazil president Armando Baldassarra stated, "More and more international launches are happening in Brazil which continues to raise the profile of AES."

On the stand, the new Robin Pointe and MiniMe fixtures were shown in Brazil for the first time, making a big impact on visitors who wanted to see them in action and asked for personalised demonstrations continually throughout the show.

Newart CEO Francisco Pinheiro commented,

Denmark - Two new Fresnel luminaires in Martin Professional's award-winning MAC Viper Family of moving heads are now shipping.

The MAC Viper Wash and MAC Viper Wash DX with internal framing are full-range wash luminaires capable of performing at the high level you would expect from a professional wash light. Both luminaires feature the same compact form, impressive speed, superior light quality and beautiful colours of the MAC Viper Family and use the same 1000 W HID source.

The Wash DX version houses a unique internal framing system that enables designers to shape and control light projection onto stages, performers, scenery, scrims or any set element with great precision. The internal framing system makes it a highly capable, automated substitute for a conventional daylight Fresnel fixture.

At 33 000 lumens of output, both the Viper Wash and Viper Wash DX are brighter than

USA - Martin Professional, Inc. is pleased has announced that on 3 June industry expert and long-time industry professional Grif Palmer will join the company as business area manager, rental - US.

Palmer brings to Martin a wealth of knowledge and industry experience, having worked as VP of Sales for High End Systems, regional sales manager for Barco and most recently as VP of sales for LED Source. His roots in the industry stretch back to 1985 when he founded Core Systems, and he has amassed an abundance of key contacts since.

Brian Friborg, president of Martin US, commented,"Grif's hiring is a real coup for us. His deep roots and distinguished experience in the industry will be invaluable in developing new contacts and strengthening existing relationships with rental customers and LD's across the country."

Palmer, who will be working out of Martin US's Florida hea

UK - Entertainment lighting specialist White Light is pleased to announce its streamlined White Light Distribution network, focused on business to business sales and support for exclusive products and brands.

The enhanced distribution network will provide sales and support of White Light exclusive products to dealers in the UK, with some products available throughout Europe and worldwide. The new structure allows UK dealer access to products from 13 exclusive lighting, rigging, and effects manufacturers including ADB Lighting Technologies, Altman, ArKaos Pro, CORE Lighting, Chromlech, Galaxia Electronics, Interactive Technologies, James Thomas Engineering, JB Lighting, Look Solutions, LSC Lighting, Rainbow Colour Changers, and Wireless Solution.

White Light Sales Director, Peter Threadgold explained the company's focus on these essential brands, paired with expanded services.

UK - Lighting and visuals rental specialist Colour Sound Experiment supplied lighting and LED screens to Vodafone UK's annual conference staged at the Birmingham Hilton Metropole Hotel at the National Exhibition Centre.

It was the first year that CSE has been involved in the event, where they were working for producers, The Red Lodge Agency.

Three main areas needed technical production - the conference sessions in the hotel's Monarch Suite; a gala dinner and awards ceremony in the Palace Suite and then the after-show in the Kings Suite.

Colour Sound's project manager Fletch created a production lighting and visuals design for all three rooms and led a team of 11 technicians and engineers who worked closely on site with Rhys Sion from Red Lodge.

"The main challenges were the scale of the event and a short timescale - as is often the case," explains Fletch. "H

Czech Republic - In 2013, the Showlight Conference was staged in the Czech Republic for the first time, at Cesky Krumlov and with Robe Lighting as the main sponsor.

Nearly 400 visitors embraced the mediaeval town for the three days to enjoy a lively mix of presentations by industry professionals working in all areas of lighting and visuals plus networking opportunities as well as getting a taste of life in and around Cesky Krumlov.

Various fact-finding and sightseeing visits were an integral part of the conference itinerary, allowing delegates to see some of the local commerce and business activities first hand.

This included a tour of the city's famous Baroque Theatre complete with original wooden and rope stage machinery, and other specially arranged visits encompassed pencil and cosmetics factories and a graphite mine.The visit programme also took in the Mestske Theatre,

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