USA - Fine Design Associates has been designing exhibit lighting at leading tradeshows for more than 25 years, working closely with creative company to create lighting for exhibition displays. Most recently, Fine Design was responsible for lighting an industry leading brand’s booth at the CES show held in Las Vegas in January. Principal designer, Paul Fine and his team have been working on a global technology leaders’ booth making them stand out at CES for many years. The lighting design has evolved over time to add more lighting fixtures to enhance the desired effects of their client. The booth design for this client had beautifully printed SEG (silicon-edged graphic) fabric walls extending from the four corners of the booth. Large entrances were available on all four sides of the booth. The walls created an intimate space for the exhibitor to display their produ
USA - Brown Note Productions recently deployed a lighting rig designed by Matthew Smith and Brad Salt of Colourblind Production Lighting for Rufus Du Sol’s Solace tour, featuring Martin by Harman lighting solutions. Formerly known as Rufus, Rufus Du Sol is an Australian electronic dance group formed in 2010. After releasing their fourth studio album Solace in 2018, the band embarked on an international tour spanning four continents. The group worked closely with Colourblind to create a dynamic lighting design centred around a striking LED grid backdrop. Tasked with realising the design in a tour-friendly format for the North American legs, tour lighting provider Brown Note Productions put together a lighting package featuring Martin by HarmanVDO Sceptron 10 linear LED video strips and MAC Aura LED wash lighting fixtures. “Colourblind developed a desig
Australia - Since its Broadway premiere in October 1954, the musical Peter Pan has captivated audiences with images of fairies, mermaids, lost boys, pirates, Captain Hook and a tick-tocking crocodile. More than 65 years after its debut, and over 10,000 miles from the Great White Way, the magic of Neverland came to life in a recent production of the J.M. Barrie classic at Parkland High School, outside Burnie, Tasmania. Supporting the production with vivid colours and evocative gobos was a Chris Foster-designed lightshow. Foster’s design drew on the performance features of the school theatre’s new lighting system, featuring Chauvet Professional Maverick MK2 Spot fixtures, supplied by Show Systems Australia. “Parkland High School has a phenomenal new performing arts facility, especially for a small regional public school,” says Mathew Adams of Show Systems
UK - Recreating the velvety evocative sound of the late Luther Vandross, the 100-city Luther UK tour is drawing large enthusiastic crowds throughout the UK. Versatile R&B singer Harry Cambridge takes audiences on a dreamily romantic journey as he emulates the mellifluous vocals of the eight-time Grammy winner legend who touched millions of hearts before his untimely passing in 2005. Supporting Cambridge’s heartfelt musical tribute is an immersive and colourful Ashely Horton-designed lightshow that features Chauvet Professional Rogue R3 Spot fixtures, supplied by Music Mann. Horton’s lighting design is smooth, engaging and versatile. The latter quality was extremely important, given the spectrum of songs in Vandross's back catalogue. Horton's decision to specify the Rogue R3 Spot was influenced by a desire for visual versatility. Thanks to a number of fea
USA - When it was time for Lightwire Theatre - the group behind touring productions The Ugly Duckling, Dino-Light, Moon Mouse and more - to step up its technical game, the venue turned to RC4 Wireless for wireless dimming and DMX needs. “We use RC4Magic Series 3 [2.4GHz] transceivers with four and two channel dimmers; we wire into 12V inverters for EL [electroluminescent] wire. The [RC4] products are as low tech as you want or as high tech. I’m not even scratching the surface of what RC4 products can do, and it’s changed the way we can make shows,” notes Ian Carney, co-founder and performer at Lightwire. The RC4Magic 2.4GHz Series 3 line of products are the firm’s most popular units, and has been a staple in theatres, theme parks and on concert tours. “My objective with RC4Magic, and all our Series 3 wireless dimmers, is power control
Germany - During Prolight + Sound 2019, ACME showcased a series of professional products, including Solar Impulse, Rissa, Thunder Struck, Spartan Hybrid, Energy Spot Pro, Aries and Oxygen. Solar Impulse features beam/wash/spot/framing functions, a framing system, new heat pipe heat dissipation technology, high efficiency and noise reduction, 1000W LED light source, 35000 lumen output, zoom range from 5° to 50°, rotatable and replaceable animation wheel. The fixture is fairly quiet, producing no more than 45dB at 1m in standard mode. (Jim Evans)
USA - Criss Angel’s Mindfreak at Planet Hollywood Resort Casino is a spectacle of sight and sound, featuring “mind-blowing illusions” in “the first immersive Las Vegas show”. As the creator, director and executive producer of the show, Angel spent years working on building a most technologically advanced show. For a production that’s running for at least five years, there can be no surprises when it comes to lighting - it has to be consistent. That’s why lighting designer Josh Selander wanted to incorporate High End Systems’ line of LED automated luminaires and special effects into the more than 2,000 lights in the show. The rig contains 100 SolaHyBeam 1000s, 37 SolaHyBeam 2000s, and for special effects, 22 QUADs and 9 HEX, all supplied through Blue Planet Lighting in Las Vegas. “Having an LED luminaire is important to help keep the show consis
USA - William Succoso readily admits that he has always been “a sucker for Austrian Drapes”. With their fine curvy lines spread evenly across the width of their fabric, these puffy curtains provide, he believes, an ideal surface for light’s intricate patterns to work their magic on. The Long Island-based designer got to showcase the evocative qualities of his favourite backdrop recently, when he lit the popular Americana band I’m With Her on their Winter Tour, which ended in Chicago in early March. “I wanted something that would reflect the warm sound of these artists’ music, yet would also be vibrant, so the drapes seemed like a natural fit,” says Succoso, who became associated with I’m With Her as a result of designing for the Punch Brothers, who are managed by the same team. Using the drapes as the backdrop for the group, Succoso accented them with
USA - Christien Methot, principal lighting designer at Design One in New York City, turned to the scenic design qualities of Elation Professional’s Artiste Picasso colour and graphics moving head for a special snow globe promotion of the all-new 2019 Nissan Altima. Design agency Fake Love worked with Stuart Weissman Productions to display the car in a 36ft geodesic dome dubbed the world’s largest snow globe. Taped around the holidays in lower Manhattan and open to the public, the online and social media campaign was also a photo opportunity for guests that drove people to Nissan’s Instagram page. Methot, who worked closely with Stuart Weissman Productions on the project, explains that the brief was very theatrical and all about experiencing the car amidst a fun winter-wonderland complete with snow and changing scenes. “They wanted to create very specific envi
Israel - Robe moving lights were present during the recent Israeli general elections, particularly during broadcasts from the country’s main news station, Channel 12, which built a special pop-up studio in front of Israel’s Parliament building, the Knesset, which was live for a week. Lighting designer Ofer Jacobi was asked by Channel 12 to design a lighting scheme for the studio and Danor Theatre & Studio Systems was appointed as the rental supplier. Ofer works regularly for Danor and is involved in many Channel 12 productions and Danor’s Erez Hadar is a lighting consultant for the Channel 12 news unit and owners Keshet Media, who turned to the company to deliver the most dynamic lighting solution for this special application. The show’s creative team sent Ofer 3D plans of the studio together with a list of lighting requirements, and Ofer came back wi
Singapore - Professional entertainment solutions company Music & Lights has appointed Lighting & Sound Distribution as its exclusive distributor of Prolights, Tribe and dedicated architectural lighting brand ArchWork, for Singapore. With over 18 years of proven track record, Lighting & Sound Distribution has earned a strong position in the show and entertainment market sector, providing quality European professional sound and lighting, architectural LEDs, trussing, media servers and special effects equipment in the Southeast Asia region. Louis Teo of Lighting & Sound Distribution explains, “Our professional values and commitment towards product quality is what attracted us toward the Prolights, Tribe and ArchWork brands from Music & Lights. We want to ensure that we and our clients share a rewarding relationship and continued product satisfaction
USA - Submissions are now open for the 2019 edition of the Knight of Illumination Awards USA (KOI-USA). The event, which is the USA edition of the UK's respected Knight of Illumination Awards, first took place in 2018 to celebrate the talents and work of lighting and video designers across the sectors of Live for Broadcast, Theatre and Concert Touring & Events in the United States. This year's competition features two new categories – Opera and Corporate Events – and the award ceremony and gala dinner is taking place in Las Vegas on 22 November (Friday) alongside the LDI trade show.
The categories are: Theatre: Plays - large venue Plays - small venue Opera Musicals - large venue Musicals - small venue Live for Broadcast: Awards Shows Digital Content Unscripted Series
UK - Hawthorn has announced the appointment of Alex Bingham who has joined the business as technical production director. Before joining Hawthorn, Bingham held the position of production director at Vibration Group where he was most recently responsible for assisting with the growth and delivery of production at Printworks London. With over 20 years’ experience in the industry, this isn’t the first time that Bingham has been a member of the Hawthorn team, having been employed as their head of London projects from 2005 to 2011. Simon Wood, group director of projects at Hawthorn, says: “We’re delighted to welcome Alex back to the team. He brings a wealth of knowledge to the new position and I believe that he will be a great asset to Hawthorn. With his in-depth experience of the industry, Alex knows how to create truly memorable experiences for his clients a
Germany - Music & Lights’ stand design featured the company’s largest footprint to date and played host to over 400 luminaires in the popular Prolights arena along with the 20 new lighting products in the touring, studio and architectural markets also on display which were launched during the event. The display area featured a new and innovative interactive touchscreen system allowing visitors to test fixtures at their own leisure, interact with the Music & Lights team and the dedicated global distributor network. New fixtures on show during the show included Panoramaispot, a 420W IP-rated moving LED spot delivering stunning brightness levels, all in a compact housing; RA2000, a custom engineered moving profile/spot light with a proprietary LED engine for both touring and broadcast applications; PixiewashXB, which combines cutting-edge LED technology and t
Germany - Claypaky launched Xtylos, the company’s first laser beam moving light. The fixture’s laser source lasts 10,000 hours and uses laser technology with RGB additive colour mixing to ensure the coloured light beams are “as bright as a white light beam”. The beam aperture is less than 2° and it can be decreased further to 0.5°. The range of effects features two gobo wheels - with seven rotating gobos and 12 fixed gobos (including 7 beam diameter reducers) - a wheel with three prisms, and a 16 facet prism on a dedicated channel which can be overlapped with the prism wheel. The Axcor Wash 600 received its world première at the trade show. It is a versatile, enhanced version of the Axcor Profile 600 with the same colour generation technology. In addition, it is fitted with a framing system with four blades and three focal planes. The unit is available with
India - ETC’s ColorSource Spot Pearls lit this year’s Lotus Make-Up India Fashion Week (LMIFW) in Delhi. The ColorSource Spots with Pearl LED array brought an impressive feature set, with bright tuneable white output and simple user interface to the catwalk. The fixtures lit signature autumn and winter fashion collections for 2019 at the event which was organised by the Fashion Design Council of India. Delhi-based rental company Modern Stage Services managed the audio, video and lighting production during the four-day event. Managing director Davinder Wadhwa comments: “A reliable lighting system was crucial for the fashion gala. Twelve ETC ColorSource Spot Pearls were implemented for the first time at the LMIFW. The fixture is a variable white-light LED array which enables users to set the colour temperature anywhere between 2700K and 6500K. The ColorSource Spot Pearls
UK - North Yorkshire-based lighting rental company R&M Productions has acquired a large stock of Martin by Harman’s MAC Viper Profiles. Peter Shorten of R&M Productions says: “The MAC Viper Profile is regarded by many as the industry standard in large format spots. We’ve been supplying them to meet riders for the last couple of years and have had client demand for them, so it seemed like the natural progression to make them our next major investment.” The Vipers were purchased through production equipment sales company A.C. Entertainment Technologies (AC-ET), who delivered them in a matter of days to get them straight onto a run of R&M shows. R&M Productions has a long-standing working relationship with AC-ET. Shorten says of Ben Steppenbeck, northern sales lighting manager for AC-ET: “Ben's a great asset to A.C., we’ve worked with A
Europe - The Cambridge University European Theatre Group toured Shakespeare’s Othello recently and used effects from Elation SixBar 1000 LED battens to enhance the drama. Featuring live jazz, this new take on the famed tragedy, which was set within the world of sixties jazz clubs, played venues in France, Switzerland, Belgium and the UK, before holding an ending run at the ADC Theatre in Cambridge from 15 - 19 January 2019. The Cambridge University European Theatre Group is a self-sufficient theatrical company that tours a Shakespeare play around Europe every December and has been doing so since 1957. The tour is entirely student run, from organising logistics to the technical elements of setting up lighting and sound in each venue. Tour manager Lily Burge oversaw all logistical elements of the latest tour, while production manager Matthew Latham oversaw the techni
Germany - Artistic Licence is enjoying “unprecedented interest” in its newly launched trailing edge mains dimmer, sunDial quad. At the recent Prolight + Sound show in Frankfurt, visitors were impressed by the performance achieved with dimmable LED replacement bulbs, which were dimmed to near-zero with no perceptible flicker. LED replacement bulbs were developed as easy drop-in replacements for older incandescent technology, which is now illegal in many countries. While dimmable versions of LED replacement bulbs are available, the performance with conventional thyristor dimmers is usually poor and highly bulb-dependent. As such, the development of a robust, high-performance trailing edge dimmer at an affordable price has been eagerly awaited. Product designer Wayne Howell comments: "Artistic Licence is known for its abiliity as a technical problem-solver, and withou
Germany - Record numbers visited the Ayrton stand to see the new products and witness the new lightshow populated by Ayrton’s latest fixtures. This year’s releases, the Levante and Diablo wash and profile fixtures, were in action for the first time alongside Khamsin, Bora, Ghibli, Mistral, Merak and NandoBeam, all of which illustrated the versatility, power and feature set of Ayrton’s expanding new Wash, Spot and Profile ranges. Ramping up the excitement, Perseo-S and Huracán-X made debut appearances at the show. Perseo-S is Ayrton’s first compact multi-function IP65 rated fixture developed for intensive outdoor use - think ‘Ghibli’ but weather-proof, and with a 27,000 lumen output from just a 500W source - and weighing in at less than 40kg. Huracán-X also created a storm as the 1000W big sister of Khamsin, in a similarly compact housing but with a 50,000
Germany - Portman Lights, the Polish manufacturer of decorative stage lighting, has just released its newest product at Prolight+Sound 2019. The P1 mini LED is suitable for TV and live events. The fixture exhibits a tungsten look and retro style to match Portman Lights’ existing product line, but is a fully LED product. Arranged in the same configuration and housing as the original P1 Retro Lamp, P1 mini LED combines two layers of light sources: a 1800K linear filament and an RGBW glow that adds colour and enhances the creative possibilities of the new fixture. “We are very excited to bring our new P1 mini to the market at Prolight+Sound,” says Portman Lights’ business development manager, Dominik Zimakowski. “This is a ground-breaking product for us because, for the first time, we have produced a full LED stage lighting fixture whilst retaining the truly v
Germany - MDG celebrated Prolight+Sound 2019 in Frankfurt with the first presentation in the country of its IP55-rated WPE Series of fog and haze generators. The ATMe WPE haze generator and Me1 WPE and Me2 WPE fog generators are rugged, non-stop, variable output, outdoor versions of their successful counterparts. Housed in new black enclosures, the WPE Series has been designed to encase all the benefits of standard MDG haze and fog generators in a sturdy, yet discreet, black housing that can blend unobtrusively into a stage set up, indoors and outdoors. The WPE Series provides the ideal fog and haze solutions for theme parks, outdoor laser shows and the enormous number of outdoor festivals around the world. “The reception to the new WPE units was fantastic,” says Martin Michaud, MDG CEO. “Our European customers were very happy to see that the controllability, ou
UK - SA Events from Maidstone delivered six Infinity Furion S601 fixtures for the latest pantomime show The Jungle Book, a co-production of Wicked Productions and Jordan Productions. During the spring this show is touring the UK. (Jim Evans)
Belgium - Among the earliest and most successful shows in the famous global reality TV franchise, The Voice van Vlaanderen (The Voice of Flanders) routinely generates a lot of buzz in coffee shops and on social media throughout the country. It has also served as a springboard for many of the nation’s most celebrated singers. Supporting the VTM network programme with colourful and dynamic visuals is an Arf & Yes lighting design that this year features over 300 Chauvet Professional fixtures, supplied by Phlippo Productions. “We have been designing for The Voice for some time,” says lighting programmer and operator Jonas Weyn, who works on the show with a whole team of lighting and set designers. “The design is always about balance, making it visually appealing for the live and TV audiences.” Playing a key role in helping the Arf & Yes tea
