The Power of Advertising - Lily Allen has returned to the top of the UK singles chart with her cover version of Keane's Somewhere Only We Know. The song, used in a festive television advert for department store John Lewis, is tipped to be Christmas number one.

Critics' Choice - Three artists have been shortlisted for this year's Brit Critics' Choice award, won last year by singer Tom Odell. Chloe Howl, Ella Eyre and Sam Smith are in the running with the winner to be announced on Thursday 12 December. Howl has been compared with Lily Allen, while former Brit school student Eyre scored a number one as the vocalist on Rudimental's Waiting All Night. La, La, La, Smith's collaboration with producer Naughty Boy, also reached number one in the UK singles chart.

Voting for the 2014 Brit Awards opened for members of the music industry last week. Their shortlists fo

Denmark - For Danish pop and R&B singer-songwriter, Medina, this fall has been dedicated to her extensive Danish tour Tæt På.

Medina's lighting designer, S°ren Peglau, selected both variants of SGM's LED tubes for his design creation: 150 pcs 1-meter LT-100 and 50 pcs 2-meter LT-200, specifically acquired for this tour by rental company Comtech.

Peglau's vision was to place the tubes in various heights and depths to fill out the stage and make it seem random and unintentional. "The effect I was looking to achieve was for the lighting to drizzle down over the musicians. For this, I created content that moved vertically in a slow mode," states the designer, who for other pieces of music also produced a slow-running fire effect for the tubes.

Also the audiences were invited to become 'immersed' in the setting, with tubes hanging over their heads, for whic

UK - Buckinghamshire rental company Siyan supplied a floor lighting package for the recent UK and European leg of a tour by American psychedelic rockers MGMT, who are promoting their eponymous third studio album, to complete an eye-catching lighting and visuals design by Ben Silverstein.

Siyan's Tom Grant explained that Ben's spec did not originally contain Robe products, but as this is one of Siyan's main moving light brands, he agreed to the suggested substitutions and use Robe for the first time.

"It was a very positive experience all round and Ben was happy with the fixtures," comments Tom, who saw him craft a high impact show from the floor rig with six Robe LEDWash 600s and eight MMX Spots at its core.

For the larger UK shows, Siyan boosted the overhead rig with additional fixtures including 20 more MMX Spots.

A twin 22k video projection system was also sup

UK - When the University of Roehampton Drama Department decided to upgrade their stock of theatre lighting, White Light was the university's first choice as supplier. Jonathon Wilson, technical manager for Drama at Roehampton, wanted to drastically increase the university's lighting capabilities while also complementing their existing equipment.

With a tight budget and a very broad range of equipment needs, Wilson was looking for a supplier that could deliver a large selection of products, excellent value, and superior service. He found all three at White Light and worked with business development manager Jonathan Haynes to put together a working list of products for demo at White Light's base in Wimbledon. "I was able to see similar units side by side and properly evaluate them. That resource was invaluable in making informed choices about products," said Wilson.

Th

UK -Richard Martin Lighting (RML) which has been involved with Top of the Pops for many years, was asked to be involved in the annual Christmas and New Year specials.

This year the shows were filmed at Riverside Studios where all three stages were packed full of vibrant set pieces and lights, as well as some of the leading acts around right now. These include Rudimental, The Saturdays, One Republic and Chase and Status.

Dave Gibson was also reinstated as LD making it even more nostalgic. The vast lighting rig included Sunstrips, Sharpys, Alpha Beam 300's and 700's, Robin 100 LEDBeams, MAC 500's, 8 Lites and MAC Auras.

A show of such magnitude, with so much going on throughout, means that it is an ideal opportunity for LDs to try out some of the newer fixtures that are now available. Dave saw this opportunity and took it with both hands using both the Chauvet Nexus 4x4 and th

UK - Utopium supplied the full event production for guests to get into the swing of things at Nokia's 1920s themed Christmas party held at Colston Hall.

Transporting guests back to the glamorous era, Utopium provided over 200 lighting fixtures to create the perfect ambience for the evening. This included Chauvet Well Uplighters, which were strategically placed throughout the venue to enhance its art-deco furnishings and original architectural features.

The evening's entertainment was held in the venue's main auditorium where Utopium designed and installed a complete stage lighting package to accommodate the various performances. Acts included two live bands, a DJ, hula hooping and swing dancers. The team also supplied a 9m x 3m rear projection screen that enabled custom graphics to be displayed, as well as a feed from video DJ Cheeba.

Throughout the venue Utopium used Showte

UK - Production Resource Group (PRG) worked with the production team for popular cockney comic, Micky Flanagan, to upscale his summer theatre show - 'Back in the Game'. Equally successful as an arena tour, the show impressively sold out at 35 UK arenas, including three shows at London's Wembley Arena and seven at The O2.

Although not involved with the Theatre Tour, the PRG team quickly responded to the increased lighting, rigging and crew requirements, while helping to maintain some of the intimacy and atmosphere of the original theatre show.

Production Manager Adam Scott called on Scottie Sanderson and his team, to help ensure the tour design would work within the budget and could be managed within the time restrictions as he explains: "Micky's show escalated almost overnight. He started the year with a 90+ date theatre tour using local production, but that quickly rampe

Russia - High End Systems has announced the launch of a new support, service and Hog community portal for Russian speaking markets. The portal can be accessed by going to WWW.HOGHOG.RU.

The portal will be a place for Russian speaking Hog users to find information about software releases and new products as well as a place to share ideas and network. Hog release notes and news will all be translated into Russian, allowing the user to get closer to the Hog family.

The HOGHOG.RU team is a community of professional users from the countries of the former USSR. This project gives the chance to share knowledge and to provide an extra level of support for the HOG4 operating system.

"HOGHOG.RU has been created with the help of several leading pros in the industry for sharing their knowledge and experience for the next generations. It's a sort of a practical wikipedia for HOG use

France - Leading French television lighting designer David Seligmann-Forest used a selection of over 100 Robe moving lights - LEDWash 300 and 600s, LEDBeam 100s and MMX Spots - to light the studio elements of the latest Retour de Terre Inconnue programme.

Broadcast on France 5 and the France 2 network, the show was originated and is presented by Frédéric Lopez. It involves taking a celebrity to an unknown destination and meeting unknown people, with the aim of discovering distant people whose culture, traditions and lifestyle are threatened by the advance of 'modernity', in the process re-discovering a 'different' celebrity when they are dealing with a completely new and different environment.

The studio section of the show - recorded at Studio Deux Cent Dix, St Denis, Paris - takes on a talk-show format and follows on from the location movie. The most imp

USA - As New York's Grand Central terminal celebrates its 100th anniversary, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) Metro-North Railroad decided to create a beautiful lighting design for all travellers and New Yorkers to brighten up their holiday spirit. Partnering with Toshiba, a concept for a light show filling the west windows of the terminal was created by designer Michiru Tanaka, displaying coloured patterns and images during the evening hours. Bestek Lighting & Staging, Inc. deployed an impressive lighting system in the historical building featuring more than 350 Martin Professional lighting fixtures.

There were numerous challenges facing Bestek's team on the project from the start. Not only is Grand Central Terminal a historical, high profile landmark in New York City, but it's also a very active transportation hub, with 250,000 or more travellers and visitors pa

UK - Winchester's 75-seat Chesil Theatre has invested in Philips Selecon's PLprofile1s, PLfresnel1s, and PLcyc1s in an upgrade to LED following an extensive shootout comparing results with its existing tungsten rig.

The Chesil Theatre, home of the 150-year-old Winchester Dramatic Society and housed in a medieval building, has installed three PLprofile1s, five PLfresnel1s, and five PLcyc1s to reduce power consumption and simplify colour changing and control.

Peter Vincent, Lighting Manager at the Chesil Theatre, specified the LED Selecon fixtures. "The theatre has a good conventional lighting rig of about 70 lanterns, built up over many years," says Peter. "Selecon's PL range was a logical next step to replace some stock, and complement others. For us, they behave like proper theatrical lanterns with a common RGBW engine, user interface, and dimming curve."<

UK - Lighting designer Will Dart is using the rapid response Avolites Tiger Touch Pro to control his cinematic lighting concept for Indie rock band Bastille on their worldwide Bad Blood tour.

Scaled up from the spring and festival tour, Dart is using the Tiger Touch Pro console in conjunction with the Avolites Titan7 software to control a mix of cue to cue lighting states and moody live effects. Dart uses front projection onto an upstage backdrop screen augmented by wing drapes, which double up as both projection and up-lighting surfaces to give the show design a deep, moody feel.

"The brief we had from the band was to create a mix tungsten effect lighting and video projection," explains Dart. "The original concept was to have something quite theatrical and cinematic going on behind the band. We've used a lot of footage from the band's music videos and th

UK - Devon- based drapes, starcloth, LED and visual effects specialist S+H Technical has supplied products to several high profile TV shows in recent weeks, including the BBC's Strictly Come Dancing special at the Tower Ballroom in Blackpool, The Royal Variety Performance at The London Palladium and the record-breaking 2013 BBC Children In Need telethon's main studio at Elstree.

S+H were commissioned by Patrick Molony, production manager for hit West End musical Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, to produce a custom starcloth for the cast's special performance at the 2013 Royal Variety Performance (RVP), at the London Palladium theatre.

The starcloth backdrop was the idea of Charlie's set designer Mark Thompson who wanted something quick and easy to rig that would bring a unique look and feel to the special medley performed for the RVP, which was attended

Italy - The popular Italian artist Luciano Ligabue recently played six dates in the spectacular Arena of Verona, all of them sold-out and greatly acclaimed. "A rather varied and complex concert," reported Jo Campana, who has been Ligabue's trusted lighting designer for many years. "A defining element is certainly the 70-strong classical orchestra that plays along with the rock band, resulting in an interesting twist on Luciano's style."

The different soundscape required a different approach to lighting, and for lighting control, Campana used two grandMA2 light and one MA NPU (Network Processing Unit).

Campana explains, "We already played 10 gigs in the arena back in 2009, so luckily I knew the location: aesthetically clean, essential, stylistically austere. Let's not forget this is a Roman amphitheatre dating back to the first century AD!

"My ai

UK - Lighting designer / director John Penny Williams worked with Robe moving lights supplied by leading Anglo-Irish rental companies HSL from Blackburn UK and Production Services Ireland (PSI) who are headquartered in Belfast, to create a beguiling lighting design at St Patrick's Cathedral in Armagh, Northern Ireland.

This was for a special Christmas In Ireland performance by the all boy choir super-group Libera, which was recorded earlier in the year and released as their annual Christmas DVD for 2013. Broadcast on PBS American public broadcast network, it has been aired on over 307 stations across 44 US states.

John Penny Williams is a freelance LD with a successful 20 year career specialising in TV lighting and has worked in all areas of the genre from LE to multi-camera drama productions. He originally met Libera's director Robert Prizeman whilst filming a series o

Sweden - LumenRadio reports that SuperNova 3 is now available for download on their website. The release is the culmination of almost a year's worth of development work, field and beta trials.

SuperNova 3 was awarded the PLASA Award for Innovation during the PLASA Show in London in October - the third Innovation Award given to LumenRadio since 2009.

To celebrate all the new functions, and to get the software into the hands of as many customers as possible, LumenRadio are pleased to announce that they will be unlocking two ports of Art-Net RDM functionality for free.

LumenRadio have created a video to demonstrate the new functions - this can be found on online at www.lumenradio.com/supernova and also on the LumenRadio Facebook page.

(Jim Evans)

South Africa - Choirs from 12 African countries competed in the 9th annual One Harmony Choir Festival at the Joburg Theatre. Having supplied the full technical since the show's inception, Showgroup were honoured to be involved once again.

This competition recognises the commitment, sacrifice and hard work of all the choir members, employees of the Barclays Africa Group, who practiced uncompromisingly, outside of normal working hours.

When travelling abroad ten years ago, Robbie Blake, director of Showgroup, was inspired when seeing Clash of the Choir. "Back in the day, Robbie pitched a similar concept to ABSA bank when they wanted to do something for their staff," explained Andries from Showgroup. ABSA - now under the Barclays Africa Group umbrella - have run the event ever since.

For the latest competition, crew moved into the Joburg Theatre as Starlight Express w

UK - London-based moving light specialist Richard Martin Lighting has made a major investment in Showline's SL Nitro 510 LED strobes.

The company - which recently celebrated 30 years of working on projects including Top of the Pops, Children in Need, and Comic Relief - says it purchased the SL Nitro 510 luminaires predominantly to meet demand for a versatile fixture designed to create a striking visual impact for TV and rock and roll.

"The output that the SL Nitro 510 can achieve means they can create dynamic and dramatic lighting for applications such as live music - their punchy and bright strobe effects are perfect for upbeat songs, for instance," says Richard Martin Lighting's Gemma Jaques. "They can also be integrated into set pieces and would be great for game shows. The possibilities are there, and we're sure that our customers are go

Denmark - As John Mayer travels the world on his four-conintent Born and Raised tour, lighting designer Nathan Alves ensures the lavish set is deployed quickly and easily to wow fans beyond Mayer's renowned guitar playing. Supplied by Upstaging, 50 Martin Professional MAC Vipers and 18 MAC III Quadrays light up the stage for the nine-month tour.

"We chose Viper because of its size and weight. It's really the only full-feature light that will stand up to our video backgrounds and the wide variety of other beam-driven graphics on stage. Viper's crisp beam and flat field really impressed me," stated Alves. "I have eight instrumentalists on stage at every venue and I require a light that will hold up to everything from the bright spots to the wear and tear of international travel."

The Quadrays were originally slated as MAC III Arifx fixtures, but after

USA - Elation Professional announced at the recent LDI trade show in Las Vegas a distribution agreement with High End Systems that allows the company to distribute the HES HedgeHog 4 in North and South America, India and Southeast Asia. Developed by High End Systems, the HedgeHog 4 is the newest member of the Hog family of consoles.

Featuring the familiar programming and command line interface and user-friendly ergonomic control surface that have made the Hog series so widely accepted by lighting professionals throughout the world, the HedgeHog 4 is a powerful, self-contained lighting controller with a built-in computer running Hog 4 OS software, the same software as all the other Hogs, and even comes with ArtNet and CITP capabilities.

The new console has a 12.1 touchscreen interface, two onboard DMX and four Art-Net universes, ten Playback Faders and many other outstanding fe

UK - The MOBO (Music Of Black Origin) Awards came of age in October this year when it celebrated its 18th anniversary in style at Glasgow's new 13,000-seater SSE Hydro. Lighting designer Gurdip Mahal, working alongside programmer Ross Williams, bought the M shaped MOBO stage to spectacular life for the BBC3 live broadcast. Not only that, the live audience and VIP guests also enjoyed a dazzling light show that saw the set and stage practically dripping with Clay Paky Alpha Beam 700s.

This year Radio 1 DJs Trevor Nelson and Sarah-Jane Crawford hosted the Awards. Performing on the night, between award presentations, were many of today's top Artists including Tinie Tempah, Naughty Boy, Iggy Azelea, Laura Mvula, Rudimental and So Solid Crew.

Tinie Tempah set the stage alight, backed by a number of flaming, supersized music stands and 16 x high output Clay Paky Alpha Beam 700s place

South Africa - Magnetic Storm, one of the leading event companies in the Eastern Cape, have invested in their first ever LED moving lights. They now have four Robe Robin DLS Profiles and four Robin DLX Spots.

Glenn van Eck and David Limbert from Magnetic Storm required new spots. Wanting to go with LED technology, they had a good look at Mediatech to see what was available. Harry von den Stemmen from Robe was at hand to introduce the equipment to them. The Robin DLS and Robin DLX fixtures have been making waves, well received for their low maintenance and great output.

"They were the best option available t fit our needs at this stage," said van Eck. "We decided to go LED due to the lamp life, lower maintenance and power consumption. It also brings our intel rig up to date and in line with national standards and offers our national client the latest technology n

Germany - TS Veranstaltungstechnik GmbH & Co. KG has recently extended its range of Clay Paky lights by adding 38 A.leda Wash K10s and eight Alpha Spot HPE 700s to the 14 Alpha Spot 300s it already had at its disposal. The firm also purchased a grandMA2 light, a VPU light and a 4Port Node onPC from MA Lighting. In the past, they had already chosen a grandMA2 ultra-light.

"Since we are a benchmark as live music technical support goes in the South of the country, with more than 200 shows a year, and since there is a growing interest in dry hire throughout Germany and Austria, it is vital for us to be able to count on highly reliable and easy to maintain products," said managing director Florian Daniel Tospann when commenting on their purchase. "We chose Lightpower for the same reason. They are an unequalled trustworthy distributor, who has so far joined us as a pres

USA / Australia - Tucson, Arizona based lighting designer Martin Thomas, of Relentless Lighting Design, used Robe's new Pointes for the first time for multi-talented Grammy Award winning singer / songwriter, actress and poet Jill Scott's recent highly successful Australian tour.

Thomas has worked for Jill Scott since 2007, after working with her previous designer, the late Tyrone 'Admiral' Long on the Sugarwater Festival Tour in 2006. For this tour, the start of a live performance campaign that continues into 2014, he took a complete departure from the last one in terms of the lighting aesthetic, putting intimacy, close communication and a sense of timeless elegance right at the heart of the performance.

"The previous tour featured large, dynamic lighting elements while this year's look is more subtle and refined," he comments.

The 24 Pointes were newly purchased f

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