UK - In the heart of the West-End of London, where the theatre district meets the start of Chinatown, a complex W-DMX system has been installed by Wireless Solution's UK distributor - White Light.

The brief came in by a UK-based lighting consultant. The company was approached by a property management company who is responsible for refurbishing the flats in the Asian district. The request consisted of giving life to Shaftesbury's buildings during night-time, making the district come to life and attract theatre goers and business people in the area.

The project consisted of lighting 11 buildings along 200m, in what is probably one of the most crowded Wi-Fi areas of the city. The use of Wireless was essential to get data across to different blocks of buildings, and to future proof the installation. There will be three phases of this project, the first being lighting the exterior

USA - Philips Entertainment has announced the introduction of two new Showline LED luminaires with the release of the SL Beam 300FX and the SL Punchlite 220. Available through the Philips Vari-Lite and Philips Strand Lighting Dealer Network, the small and lightweight LED luminaires were designed to bolster the breadth of the Philips Entertainment line of lighting solutions, and will be on display at LDI 2015 in Booth 1516.

"We are very excited to be announcing the release of the Showline SL BEAM 300FX and the SL Punchlite 220," said Julie Smith, Philips Entertainment general manager of the Americas. "With the SL Beam 300FX, we have received a tremendously positive response from our dealer network on both its performance capabilities and its acceptance into multiple lighting markets. In the SL Punchlite 220, we now have the IP65 rated LED luminaire that our clients

Republic of the Congo - Robe's BMFL Blade fixture continues to be a popular choice for designers of large scale ceremonies and events needing some serious power and effect - the latest being the opening ceremony of the 2015 All Africa Games in Brazzerville, Republic of the Congo (République du Congo).

French based creative event production designers Concept K were brought on-board by the With Up agency and commissioned to create the event's lighting and visual design - which also included eye-catching projections onto the field-of-play at the 60,000 capacity Stade Municipal de Kintele venue.

The overall event production company was Richard Attias & Associates. Jérome Pasteur was the chief project manager for With Up and the OC show was directed by Fanny Moreau.

As soon as the job was confirmed, Concept K started thinking about the best lights to realize their d

USA - Royal Oak Music Theatre in Royal Oak, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit, is a historic cinema turned performance venue that has stood as a testament to the diversity of entertainment, as well as the resilience of the area, since 1928. After partnering with promotional entertainment company AEG Live in 2007, Royal Oak Music Theatre (ROMT) has become one of the Detroit area's preeminent venues, hosting a steady stream of live performances from Alabama Shakes to Skrillex, the band Perry to Social Distortion, as well as a wide variety of other events.

ROMT recently sought to upgrade its lighting system in order to make it more attractive to a variety of clients and chose to go with Elation LED fixtures for the progressive benefits they provide like greater reliability, less maintenance and increased energy efficiency, all of which translates into a lower cost of ownership.

Brad

USA - Country Music Association Male Vocalist of the Year Jason Aldean has taken an incredible journey in his decade-old career. It's an odyssey that has seen him go from having his pickup truck repossessed (an experience he recounts in his song Crazy Town), to climbing to the top of the Nashville scene with 14 Number One singles and the record for the most first day downloads of a country song on Spotify.

Keith Hoagland, lighting designer and director for Aldean's Burn It Down tour, understands this feeling quite well. Hoagland had his rig all set for the tour when he was introduced to the Rogue RH1 Hybrid from Chauvet Professional.

Hoagland changed his rig and added 90 Rogue RH1 Hybrids supplied by Bandit Lites. He flew the moving fixtures around his entire aerial system, which was made up of diagonally arranged truss over both sides of the stage as well as centre sta

On The Campaign Trail - Aerosmith's Steven Tyler has asked Donald Trump to stop using his band's song Dream On on the campaign trail. The singer's lawyers have sent a cease-and-desist letter, saying the use of the song "gives a false impression" he endorses Mr Trump's presidential bid. The politician has been playing the power ballad all summer, even air-drumming to it at a rally in Las Vegas. Tyler, who is a registered Republican, says it is not a "personal" issue but one of permission and copyright.

It is the third time a musician has confronted Trump about using their songs to promote his presidential bid. When the businessman announced his candidacy, his campaign played Neil Young's Rockin' in the Free World - a song that contains the lyrics "He's just a rich old man / He never cared for anyone". Young, a well-known liberal, demand

UK - Aurora Lighting Hire has returned to the studio with LD Chris Rigby for premier BBC music show, Later... with Jools Holland.

Recorded in front of a live audience at the Maidstone Studios, Later is serious about its music and key consideration is given to the lighting throughout all aspects of the production.

With the studio audience instructed to wear dark clothing so not to detract from the performance, the brief for the show is to allow the music to speak for itself and for the lighting to subtly complement, rather than overpower the musical content.

To achieve the range of looks required to accompany the eclectic mix of artists and musical styles, Aurora has provided LD Chris Rigby with a range of automated heads and a selection of LEDs that allow the versatility to illuminate both the 'floating' set pieces and the stage floor, whether it be large scale

UK - With its glass pyramid structure having welcomed everyone from Muse to Coldplay through the years, the Portsmouth Pyramids has been an regular stop on the UK touring band circuit. Its proud musical pedigree notwithstanding, however, the Pyramids leads something of a double life today. When it isn't rocking as a concert venue on weekends, it's serving as a leisure centre during the week.

This multi-functionality makes the facility more valuable to its community, but it also creates a challenge when lighting concerts. Local company GLS Lighting has met this challenge with some help from Chauvet Professional's Rogue Series of moving fixtures.

"It isn't practical to have a fixed concert house rig here, because the building functions as a leisure centre on weekdays," said Ian Turner of GLS Lighting, who was tasked with providing the venue with a new concert lighting

USA - Czech Republic-based lighting manufacturer Robe Lighting has appointed Adam Camp as regional sales manager of the western United States, effective 28 September, 2015.

Due to customer demand and increased popularity, Robe Lighting continues to expand its reach in the U.S. under CEO Bob Schacherl. This is one of several strategic steps the company has taken to provide Robe's clients excellent sales support and coincides with the opening of a new technical support office in Burbank, CA.

"I am very pleased and honoured to take over Western U.S. Sales alongside such a great team of well-respected industry professionals. In recent years I have watched Robe bring many new and innovative advances to our industry," said Camp.

"In my opinion we have the widest array of professional lighting product and some of the most advanced LED technologies. This is all due to

UK - The versatile new FLX lighting console won a 2015 PLASA Innovation Award to the delight of all at Eaton's performance lighting control business.

The much coveted Innovation Awards were presented at the three day entertainment technology expo staged at London's ExCeL Centre earlier this week.

Zero 88 series general manager David Catterall commented, "A huge amount of work has gone into ensuring that FLX would deliver new standards in lighting control using a touch screen interface and other time-saving features, and winning the Award is great recognition of the effort and ingenuity engaged at all levels by the team who have brought this product to the market.

Launched earlier in the year, FLX has been an instant success for Zero 88 in a number of sectors from rental companies to theatres, churches to multi-purpose venues.

The Innovation Awards were judged by a num

Finland - Lighting and set designer Mikki Kunttu has used an array of Clay Paky Mythos and A.leda B-EYE K20 fixtures to create a truly stunning lighting design for a production of symphonic poem Kullervo at the Finnish National Opera.

Composed by Finnish national composer Jean Sibelius and first performed in Helsinki in 1892, the opera is based on the character of Kullervo in the epic poem Kalevala. A dance element choreographed by Tero Saarinen and performed by the Finnish National Ballet was added to this 2015 production, which celebrated 150 years since the birth of Sibelius. Kunttu specified 52 x Mythos and 48 x B-EYEs from Bright Finland for key lighting in the piece.

"The brightness of the Mythos fixtures was undoubtedly the most important quality in the visual picture of the production," says Kunttu. "They delivered the final incredible punc

The Netherlands - Highlite International BV has extended its distributor network into Asia and the USA over recent months. Graham Eales joins the company from Philips Entertainment to head up Highlite Asia, while Malcolm Burlow moves on, after six years as sales director for Highlite International UK and Ireland, to set up and run Highlite International USA.

Graham and Malcolm share over 40 years of experience within the Sound and Lighting industry. Graham Eales, based in Hong Kong, will be expanding Highlite's Business into New Zealand, Australia and Asia. Graham will oversee product quality control with Highlite's manufacturing suppliers in Asia next to his commercial activities. Patrick Herveille (vice-president of Highlite International) said: "It's very important for us to have a base in Asia, so we can liaise closer and quicker with our Asian suppliers. We also found

UK - WhatsOnStage offers a database of some 5,500 plus performances along with reviews, interviews, gossip, blogs and exclusive video content. Alongside this, each year the organisation hosts the WhatsOnStage Awards - in which the audience are the judges across all categories. With its origins in theatre, complete productions solution specialist White Light is once again sponsoring the event.

WL has previously sponsored the Awards Concert, where the available accolades include Best Actor in a Musical, Best Actress in a Musical, Best New Play and Best Lighting Design, which is sponsored by WL and whose previous recipients include Mark Henderson, Adam Silverman and Hugh Vanstone.

Hannah Longman, commercial manager at WhatsOnStage, comments, "We are extremely fortunate to have companies such as WL sponsor the Awards. It is through their support that such an eve

Spain - One of Barcelona's flagship night time hotspots, Razzmatazz, continues to innovate in order to stay among the region's top entertainment venues. A recent installation of Elation Professional Cuepix Panel LED matrices has added to the venue's visual possibilities, whether for a live music performance or a night of clubbing.

A myriad of artists have stepped onto the Razzmatazz stage over the years, including big names like Coldplay and Kanye West. Razzmatazz uses its 3700m2 of space and five distinct spaces in a variety of ways however. On weekends for example it transforms into a nightclub and its various rooms can be used to host parties, fashion shows, galas or virtually any event. The five separate spaces - Razz Club, the Loft, Pop Bar, Lolita and the Rex Room - can also function as one with the advantage of creating different ambiences at the same event.

The 4,000-c

USA - Syncrolite is pleased to announce the introduction of its newest product family member: the SyncroMITE Beam which offers "a new twist with revolutionary brightness in a compact integrated moving light that offers the advantages of a Xenon source in a traditional moving light sized package".

The SyncroMITE Beam outputs 97 CRI and narrow beams (3° native) in a convenient package ready to tour, install or hire into any application. The SyncroMITE Beam provides an extremely high center beam intensity (CBI) through a massive eleven inch output aperture. Other features include two color wheels designed to produce fully saturated single and mixed colors, a Gobo wheel, flag shutter for dousing and strobe effects, zoom lenses, beam diffusion, on-board auto-sensing power supply and much more.

The SyncroMITE Beam will make its first public appearance at LDI2015 at the

USA - Robe underlines the importance of the American market by announcing a major new product launch at the 2015 LDI expo in Las Vegas - the BMFL Wash and BMFL Wash XF (Extra Features).

There will also be a host of other exciting new products making their US debut at Booth 2521 at the Las Vegas Convention Centre 23 - 25 October.

BMFL Wash and BMFL Wash XF are the latest fixtures to be added to Robe's 'game-changing' BMFL range of luminaires. These are powerful workhorse wash lights, packed with innovative and creative features, says the company.

A large 200mm diameter front fresnel lens provides a high quality traditional wash output ranging from a punchy and tight 4.5° to a super-smooth 55°.

Custom interchangeable frost filters offer three grades - light, medium and heavy - giving an extremely subtle and natural 'soft touch'.

Both CMY and CTO colour mixing filte

USA - Described by Billboard as "trance music's most influential curator," Armin van Buuren has taken this branch of electronic music to new heights. The Dutch-born DJ's State of Trance podcast attracts over 25m listeners a week and is broadcast on 40-plus FM radio stations around the world.

As captivating as these broadcasts are, however, they're only preludes to the truly transformative trance experience of a van Buuren concert. This was clearly evident in late September at the House of Blues in Boston, where the Grammy-nominated artist served up a mesmerizing mix of music wrapped around an immersive lightshow. At the heart of it all was a towering video wall made of MVP Ta8 Curve SMD LED tiles from Chauvet Professional.

Image Production Services used 136 MVP Ta8 tiles, which have an 8.33 mm pixel pitch, to create the striking display. The majority of

USA - Fall Out Boy just wrapped The Boys of Zummer Tour co-headlining with Wiz Khalifa, and once again Clay Paky fixtures were along for the exciting cross-country ride. A.C.T Lighting, Inc. is the exclusive distributor of Clay Paky products in North America.

Robb Jibson of So Midwest, Inc. continued his relationship with the pop punk band, this time as production designer for the US amphitheatre tour. Fall Out Boy released its sixth studio album, American Beauty/American Psycho this year; it swiftly became the band's third #1 album.

An enthusiastic proponent of Clay Paky fixtures, Jibson specified 68 Mythos for the tour. Upstaging was the lighting vendor.

"I'm a fan of Clay Paky; they seem to really do things right," he declares. "I had demo'd Mythos but hadn't had a chance to use them just yet. The light is versatile enough I knew if we spec'd them we

UK - A.C. Special Projects (ACSP) has specified, supplied and installed cutting-edge performance lighting systems for two separate drama studios at Buckinghamshire New University's High Wycombe Campus.

Having previously supplied lighting systems for several other performance areas on the campus, the university approached ACSP to deliver solutions to meet their latest studio technical needs.

For the campus's main Drama Studio 1, which is utilised by a variety of performing arts courses, the brief was to enhance the existing conventional tungsten lighting system with a range of the very latest LED solutions, as well as upgrading the existing lighting console to cope with the new rig.

The university was keen to invest in LED technology, to help improve the campus's overall lighting and heating energy efficiency rating, and thus reduce their carbon footprint. In addition, they w

UK - Technical production expert, Hawthorn's install team has completed the installation of a new house light system for the Hawth Theatre in Crawley.

The specialist permanent installation team was tasked to replace over 200 tungsten fittings with the latest ArcSystem fittings from GDS; a once in a lifetime opportunity to upgrade the quality of the house lights at Hawth Theatre and reduce the ongoing maintenance and lamp replacement costs.

Crucially, the new fittings also deliver a reduction in electrical running costs. A mixture of Arch System MR16, Pro-Fixture 1 cell and Pro Cell 4 were used along with the new 24v Arc Lamps. Kev Sanderson, team leader at Hawthorn, and his expert team had a tight 10 day window to complete the changeover, but completed the task ahead of schedule.

Quentin Whitaker, the Hawth's technical manager, commented, "I am extremely happy with the

UAE - Protec was delighted to support its client, SNAP, with lighting, video and rigging for the Games15 Middle East event, held at Dubai International Marine Club from 10-12 September 2015.

The premier gaming event in the region, hosted by ESL, saw more than 20,000 eager gaming fans brave soaring temperatures to watch global teams from ESL go head-to-head over three days, competing for the US$250,000 prize.

The Main Arena was rigged using Protec's EHD (extra heavy duty) ground support structure which held three LED screens rigged off the 18" sub-truss. The stage was considerably smaller than the arena shows that ESL regularly produces, so Protec took the challenge of making the stage look like an arena show for TV without the space of an arena. Protec's project manager Simon Travis explained: "The main issue was the width of the Main Arena rig. We had to make it sma

UK - Each year, education organisation PiXL holds an awards ceremony that celebrates the significant achievements of students from all across the UK. This year, PiXL's Celebrating Success took place on 23 September at Central Hall Westminster. As production service partner at the historic venue, White Light provided the lighting, audio and video production support to help create what was a spectacular celebration.

PiXL provides over 1,500 schools with access to vibrant, purposeful conferences and networks of people, alongside resources, training schemes and development programmes. The organisation also gives opportunities and support to all young people, regardless of their background or ability, in order for them to achieve their potential - something which was highlighted at this year's Celebrating Success event.

The awards were presented by food-entrepreneur Levi Roots, whi

Chile - Clay Paky Mythos fixtures illuminated the Costanera Tower in Santiago, the highest skyscraper in Latin America, with a light show to celebrate each match in the Copa América 2015 football tournament.

The award-winning Clay Paky fixtures were part of a lighting design by Toni Amoros, who also lit the tournament's opening ceremony. Each time a player scored Amoros employed the Mythos to wash the building with the team's colours and a variety of textures, surprising and delighting onlookers.

The fixtures also projected custom gobos such as the word 'GOOOL' (GOAAAL), supplied by Iluminación Profesional VALOOK, up the entire 300m length of the tower.

"The Mythos was the perfect tool for this ambitious project," says Fabian Cortez Lopez of VALOOK. "Its incredible optics meant it could illuminate the whole building with ease. The custom gobos were pro

The Netherlands - Dutch Rock band Di-Rect from The Hague celebrated their 15th anniversary in great style with a special concert on the beach at Scheveningen in front of 12,500 enthusiastic fans. The beach is one of the most visited public spaces in the Netherlands and is renowned its vibrant ambience.

Lighting designer Nick van Balen ensured that the spectacular lightshow fitted the sense of achievement after 15 years at the sharp end of the music business, and as a confirmed Robe advocate, included 99 x Robe fixtures on his rig - 46 x LEDWash 300s, 44 x Pointes and nine PATT 2013s - a vintage style fixture designed by Tim Routledge, and now being manufactured by Robe.

Nick had an open brief for the show, and the main objective was to make it look awesome - which of course he did with a good deal of finesse, attention to detail and some magic touches to ensure that a great ni

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