Lighting

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24 June 2024

USA - Lighting designer Tom Kenny utilised Elation lighting for both the indoor and outdoor stages at the 2024 CMT Music Awards earlier this spring. The lighting package, supplied by 4Wall, included Proteus Excalibur, Artiste Mondrian, and Dartz 360 luminaires, among other fixtures.

Broadcast live from the Moody Centre on the University of Texas campus in Austin, performances took place inside and on an outdoor stage in front of the University of Texas Tower. Lighting direction for the indoor show was by Felix Peralta, David ‘Fuji’ Convertino, and Michelle Griesmer, with Han Henze and Matt Piercy handling lighting direction on the outdoor stage. Production design was by Anne Brahic, her 15th year working the awards show.

Kenny was in his 12th year designing for the CMTs and his experience and proven approach are integral to the successful team ef

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24 June 2024

USA - The architectural design of the Insomniac Events Electric Daisy Festival’s bassPOD stage is impressive by any measure. With a 65ft high trim and a width of approximately 250-feet, it is clearly massive. But there is more than size to this impressive metallic structure designed by Stufish Studios. With its shapes and forms extending in every direction, and at multiple levels, it presents a labyrinth of possibilities, inviting all who look at it to let their imaginations run wild along its myriad paths.

Erik Mahowald spent countless hours delving into every nuance of this stage design long before it was ever constructed. He was tasked with making it come alive and accenting all its compelling power with light.

“Once we received the architectural design from Stufish Studios, my team and I closely evaluated the size and material of the structur

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24 June 2024

USA - In 2024, rockers 311 from Omaha, Nebraska, celebrate 34 years as one of America’s most popular indie bands with a massive ‘cult following’. The band celebrates biennially with a ‘311 Day’ concert event - two nights of ‘unapologetic 311-core music’. Since 2018, this has been staged at The Park Theatre at Park MGM, Las Vegas.

Lighting designer Bobby Grey of Notan Creative has been working as their production designer since 2018. But before then, he had completed his first ever 311 tour as a fresh-faced fresh out of school lighting tech, back in the day when Joe Paradise was pushing the buttons.

The 2024 event featured a completely new production design – which will be followed up by a heavy touring schedule – and Bobby took the opportunity to spec nearly 200 Robe moving lights – a mix of Fortes, Esprites, Tetra2s and MegaPoint

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21 June 2024

USA - LD Systems has invested in 26 Ayrton Rivale Profiles. LD Systems has two main divisions, event production services and audio-visual systems integration, and is headquartered in Houston, Texas with a second location operating in San Antonio.  ACT Entertainment is the exclusive distributor of Ayrton lighting in North America.

The purchase marks the first by LD Systems in the current Ayrton product line; the company already has Ayrton WildBeam effects lights. The acquisition, the first IP-rated profile fixture for LD Systems, will be used for its own production work and be available to rental clients.

The IP65-rated Ayrton Rivale Profile is a projector that delivers creativity, subtlety and power – the most versatile fixture created by Ayrton to date. It offers unprecedented performance for its size and weight and features continuous rotation o

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21 June 2024

Norway - The newly launched Grandeur is the sixth luxury ship to come from Regent Seven Seas Cruises. With 10 decks that can host up to 744 guests, the cruise ship promises a deluxe vacation experience with beautiful design throughout. The ship landed on many ETC solutions to outfit its lighting plot.

Filling many roles on the vessel, Travis McHale shared his experience working with ETC. Part of Travis’s responsibilities includes working as a contractor for Norwegian Cruise Lines, designing the light plot, producing paperwork, and creating the layout of all the networking, as well as specifying the equipment. Additionally, for Norwegian Creative Studios, he was the lighting designer and programmer for most of the production shows on board.

This is the third vessel in the class of ship. Prior to Grandeur, Travis worked on the second ship with a Gio

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21 June 2024

USA - Paul Maloof says he’s the kind of person who loves a challenge. He’s also always open to new experiences. He’s getting his share of both with indie icons Say Anything on their 27-city Is A Real Boy 20th Anniversary Tour.

Although they’ve recorded nine albums, in addition to appearing in films and on network TV shows over the past two decades, the popular six-member band has never carried their own LD with them on tour. For his part, Maloof, though admiring their music, was not very familiar with Say Anything’s songs.

“From the get-go, I knew that this was going to be a show of firsts for all of us,” said Maloof. “I started building a show file based on the album track listing and was not very confident it was going to be successful. I decided to take on the challenge of busking the show. It seems to have been the right choice.

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20 June 2024

Sweden - CAST Group of Companies has announced its exclusive partnership with Intersonic AB, taking BlackTrax’s real-time tracking technology to the Swedish market.

Per Anderhagen, sales director at Intersonic, comments, "We are delighted to join forces with BlackTrax, a global leader in real-time tracking technology. As the exclusive distributor in Sweden, Intersonic is dedicated to providing unparalleled support and expertise to our clients, enabling them to leverage the full potential of BlackTrax in their productions."

David Ferraz, international business development manager at CAST, adds, "We are thrilled to welcome Intersonic to our growing network of distributors. With their deep industry knowledge and commitment to customer satisfaction, Intersonic is well-equipped to drive the adoption of BlackTrax technology in Sweden."

"We are ea

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20 June 2024

USA - Elation supported the British Music Embassy (BME) stage at this year’s South by Southwest (SXSW) conference and music festival in Austin, Texas. Partnering with the Academy of Live Technology at Production Park, Elation lighting was used to illuminate the stage and artists while serving as a valuable training ground for the next generation of lighting technicians and operators.

The BME stage is a high-profile platform at the renowned festival and is run on behalf of the UK Government International Department for Business and Trade. It provides a valuable showcase for the UK's best emerging acts and has played host to a number of artists who went on to global fame such as Amy Winehouse, Sam Fender, The 1975, and more.

As an ongoing partner of the Academy of Live Technology, and Production Park, Elation was pleased to supply 18 Proteus Lucius,

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19 June 2024

Europe - Marking the 80th anniversary tour of Holiday On Ice, the 2023-24 No Limits tour was created by AED Studios in Lint, Belgium and played 174 performances in 21 cities across Germany with Claypaky Volero Wave and Scenius Profiles, from tour lighting provider Rentall Europe, lighting the figure skating spectacular.

No Limits and its 40 skaters and artists spanned many imaginative settings, from monster battles to Roman chariot races to the Wild West. The show also pushed the technical standards of live entertainment with an impressive three-dimensional, 200sq.m LED screen, approximately 300 projectors and a customised kinetic lighting installation.

Lighting designer Tim Routledge and lighting programmer James Scott focused on crafting a visually stunning and immersive environment that elevated the performances with inn

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19 June 2024

USA - Songs from Scott McCreery’s new album, Rise & Fall, feature alongside older material on his 16-city tour.

The power of McCreery’s performance is reflected in a richly textured production design by Drew Hornback, which, like the music it supports, features a strong narrative element. At its heart is a three-panelled blow-through video wall displaying captivating content created by filmmaker Jeff Ray, the Austin, Texas creative responsible for many of McCreery’s videos.

Adding visual impact to the video panorama are 18 Chauvet Professional STRKE Array 2 fixtures supplied by Blue Crew Productions of Nashville. Hornback positioned six of the high output warm-white blinders behind each of the blow-through walls. Turned on and off at different points in the show, and run at different levels of brightness, the high-output blinders c

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18 June 2024

Europe - Showlight 2025 is calling for speakers to present papers at the next Showlight, slated for 19-22 May 2025 at Le Parc des Expositions et Congrès de Dijon, France.

The Papers Programme is the heart and soul of Showlight and we want to present our delegates with a wide variety of interesting subjects to educate and entertain. This will be the first in-person Showlight since 2017 and we are looking for exciting new projects from all disciplines of lighting and lighting design to include in the 2025 Papers Programme.

Have you worked on a fabulous new project recently? Have you tried out some new technology and got something to share? Does your design really cut the mustard? We want to hear from you in Dijon! 

The papers committee has already begun the process of selecting papers for the programme. If you have an idea, a story or an expe

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18 June 2024

UK - ETC has announced plans to expand its business with the relocation of its London operations to a new, state-of-the-art eco-building. The move supports ETC’s expanding business and service offerings as well as planning for future growth.

The new space – which is located in west London’s Greenford – is more than double the size of ETC’s existing building and will feature enhanced facilities to accommodate the needs of its customers and workforce.

The design of the new building is being developed by ETC with its own in-house team, in-line with the company’s global design approach. There will be more capacity for training, logistics, meetings, and dedicated areas for ETC’s customers and employees.

The company’s dealers and end-users will benefit from having access to an expanded training program and bigger demo spaces. The ad

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18 June 2024

Europe - Ayrton has announced the appointment of Briony Berning as its new design, training and business development engineer as part of the continuing expansion of its international team. The appointment takes place with immediate effect.

Berning’s multi-faceted role will be to formalise Ayrton’s product training on fixtures, key technologies and developments to the markets and its global network of distributors. Alongside this she will develop the theatre markets on a global scale, paying close attention to the specific needs of these sectors and the relevance of Ayrton products within them. Finally, she will maintain a close relationship with her specialism, the theatre market, to keep abreast of developing trends and technologies and ensure Ayrton product development continues to answer these needs.

UK-born yet spending her formative years in

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18 June 2024

USA - The 11th Annual K-LOVE Fan Awards celebrated the best in contemporary Christian music, showcasing heartfelt performances and uplifting messages at Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry. Fans voted on top honours to award to artists who made significant contributions to the genre of faith-based music including Brandon Lake, for KING + COUNTRY, TobyMac and Anne Wilson.

Go Live Productions partnered with Bandit Lites to provide a lighting system that would dazzle the in-person audience in addition to those watching from home. The awards aired exclusively on Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN).

Lighting designer Mark Carver drew inspiration from the angles of the side LED walls and the forced perspective of the LED header close down.

“Our goal was to create a contemporary linear and forced perspective look utilizing both wash, strip/strobe fixtures

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18 June 2024

USA/Europe - Elation has merged ‘explosive strobe power with design creativity’ in the new Pulse series and has announced that two versatile effects in the line - the Pulse Panel and Pulse Panel FX - are now shipping.

Both fixtures incorporate zone-controllable RGB and cool-white LEDs, 1152 1.5W RGB LEDs establishing the foundation with 288 5W cool-white LEDs at its centre, and 96 1.5W RGB LEDs at its core. Some 144 5W cool-white LEDs line the perimeter. When combined, output is over 100,000 total lumens. 

“We saw what existed in the market with the standard tilting strobe and knew we wanted to create a more visually dynamic effect with higher impact,” comments Bob Mentele, associate product manager at Elation. “We added the CW LEDs on the outer edges to offer more output and visual impact and then capped those with a custom linear prismat

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18 June 2024

UK - Robe UK enjoyed a busy, successful, and positive ABTT (Association of British Theatre Technicians) expo, staged at Alexandra Palace in London, where the company presented two dynamic exhibition areas – a stand upstairs in the main hall, together with a large demo area located downstairs in the venue’s Palace Suite.

Robe also delivered four presentations that were integral to the ABTT’s extended 2024 seminar and discussion programme, which touched on topics related to sustainability and creative lighting.

The main Robe booth occupied a prime position in the main exhibition hall and featured some of Robe’s newest lighting technologies designed for theatre, performance, TV, and broadcast scenarios, together with selected Anolis, Avolites and Artistic Licence products. Atmosphere and haze specialist MDG, which is distributed in the UK by Rob

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17 June 2024

USA - The exterior of Philadelphia’s 21,000-person capacity Wells Fargo Centre has been lit up with rainbow colours installation to mark Pride Month, with ClearLED X-BAR LED bars driven by tvONE's Green Hippo brand of Hippotizer Media Servers.

Lighting and projection designer Rachael Cady was asked by Mark Fink at Green Hippo dealer and integration expert Barbizon Lighting to create the installation in collaboration with the Wells Fargo Center team. It will run throughout global Pride Month.

As part of a recent upgrade of the exterior lighting, Barbizon specified a Green Hippo Hippotizer Amba+ MK2 to run the LED bars, with surround screens that for June are displaying the Progress Pride Flag LGBTQ+ colours. The effect is further augmented by Acclaim Linear One DMX uplighter fixtures reflecting the rainbow theme. The LED bars were supplied by Jones

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17 June 2024

The Netherlands - The 29th edition of the free Mama’s Pride Festival took place in Burgemeester Damenpark in Geleen on Saturday 11 and Sunday 12 May. Reflexion Evenemententechniek supplied the lighting equipment and T.Y.S signed for the design.

Mama's Pride has been known for years as the most convivial pop festival in the Netherlands. The free festival takes place annually in the Burgemeester Damenpark in Geleen, the historic site where the renowned Pinkpop festival once began. At the 2024 edition, 66 acts performed across six different stages. In total, as many as 19,000 visitors enjoyed acts such as Roxy Dekker, STONE and Meltheads.

T.Y.S was responsible for the technical production and Reflexion Evenemententechniek supplied the technology for all stages and the site lighting. An arsenal of fixtures from Infinity and Showtec were used for the en

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17 June 2024

USA - Astera’s new LunaBulb debuted at Cine Gear LA Expo 2024, held at the Warner Bros Studios in Burbank, California last week.

LunaBulb is suitable for cinematographers – for on-camera practicals or to highlight faces with perfect skin tones – and is also handy for events, offering designers, organizers, and décor specialists a myriad of creative possibilities.

The IP44 rated LunaBulb looks like and can emulate the effect of a traditional incandescent light bulb but works like a professional luminaire. The IP44 rating means LunaBulbs can be used outside, even in wet conditions, if the socket they are screwed into is also IP44 rated, making them perfect for statement lighting – such as festoons – or anywhere where lighting might be used to shape moods and atmosphere.

Drawing just 3.5 watts, the LED-based LunaBulb is available with

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14 June 2024

Sweden - At Eurovision 2024, senior technical director Ola Melzig and his team, including designer Florian Wieder, accented the lines of the stage in the Malmö Arena in bright, bold and brilliant colours with 524 COLORado PXL Bar 16 motorized battens from Chauvet Professional.

Acquired through the company’s Swedish distributor Interlite, and supplied by Niclen through Creative Technologies, the IP65 rated, pixel mappable RGBW battens were “pretty much everywhere” according to Melzig. Lighting designer Frederik Stormby used the fixtures to outline the arena on three different levels, in addition to accenting the contours of the set from the ground to the ceiling and providing backlighting for the acts.

“Fredrik’s design was all straight lines, so these fixtures were perfect to outline it with lovely colours and dynamic looks,” continued M

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14 June 2024

USA - Attendees can explore the capabilities of CAST Group’s BlackTrax at two manufacturer stands: Fulcrum Acoustic and d&b audiotechnik.

Fulcrum Acoustic will showcase their immersive audio solutions by integrating BlackTrax's real-time tracking with their Fulcrum One software. Fulcrum One is a complete software environment for designing and modelling sound reinforcement systems, immersive audio installations, and room acoustics. Its user-friendly interface also allows for the tuning, optimization, deployment, and control of conventional and immersive audio systems in one application. This integration will demonstrate the seamless synergy between advanced tracking technology and sophisticated audio design, offering attendees a glimpse into the future of immersive sound experiences.

Meanwhile, d&b audiotechnik will highlight the integration

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14 June 2024

France - The Royal Opera of Versailles, part of the famous Palace of Versailles, was inaugurated in 1770 and is also known as the Théâtre Gabriel. The interior decoration by Augustin Pajou is constructed almost entirely of wood – for enviable acoustics – and painted with a faux marble technique.

After years of neglect, the venue was transformed by two complete restorations – the 1,200-capacity main room was re-gilded in 1957 and the stage and machinery were revamped in 2009. Since then, it has been busy hosting an annual programme of concerts of baroque music, operas, and ballets.

More recently, a major lighting upgrade comprising 40 x Robe T2 Profiles was delivered in two batches by Robe France, an initial purchase of 30, followed by another 10 x T2 Profiles, which they liked so much that they purchased 12 x TX1 PosiProfiles.

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14 June 2024

Belgium - Since its establishment in 1965 as the city theatre of Ghent, NTGent has maintained a prominent role in the Flemish theatre scene. The venue delivers high-quality productions that are both artistically challenging and socially relevant, utilising lighting solutions from ETC.

Operating across two distinct realms, NTGent (also known as Nederlands Toneel Gent) crafts original theatre pieces and hosts external performances at its venues. For their original creations, which frequently tour internationally, NTGent prioritises a versatile lighting setup capable of adapting to diverse venues worldwide. Conversely, visiting performances rely on more traditional equipment, albeit with a preference for cutting-edge technology.

During a recent interview, Dennis Diels, head of lighting at NTGent, shared insights into the theatre's operations and its dec

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13 June 2024

USA - LynTec, a wholly owned subsidiary of Chauvet has announced the acquisition of Juice Goose, a company that manufactures and distributes electric power distribution, conditioning, and control equipment.

“LynTec couldn't be more excited about the reputation and deep customer relationships Juice Goose brings, with solid products that perfectly complement our existing lineup,” said Mark Bishop, president of LynTec. “Now, regardless of how big or small the installation, we have the power solution for the job, whether that’s four circuits for a conference room or 500 circuits for an arena.”

Juice Goose was founded in 1983 and was one of the first companies to provide power conditioning products specifically for the audio industry. Since, the company has developed and maintained a reputation as a reliable supplier of electric power management