UK - Lighting designer Louisa Smurthwaite has selected Claypaky's super bright hybrid luminaire the Mythos to break through the saturated LED wash on indie rock outfit Glass Animals' latest tour, which was given four stars and described by The Independent as a "brilliant second album show".

Hailing from Oxford, the four-piece have played such venues as London's The Roundhouse and Brighton Dome in support of the critically-acclaimed How to be a Human Being. Smurthwaite specified 10 x Mythos from rental operation SES NC to carve out the playfully geometric set and hold their own against the backlight to provide a strong contrast.

"The creative brief was extremely detailed with a strong focus on colour," explains Smurthwaite. "The goal was to make the band feel like they were within the album cover so I used the same colour palette of sunkissed, pale hues, along

UK - A.C. Special Projects (AC-SP) has specified, supplied and installed a multi-purpose, energy-efficient LED lighting system for Pearson Hall - a historic community hall in the village of Sonning, Berkshire.

Situated at the heart of the village, the much-loved Victorian building has acted as the local community's social hub since 1889. It continues to be used for all variety of functions and productions, including events linked to the bi-annual Sonning Festival in May.

The project brief for Pearson Hall was to provide a low-cost yet high-performance, multi-purpose lighting solution. Flexibility and energy-efficiency were key. The system not only had to work for everyday activities, but also had to be able to provide a range of sophisticated ambiances through the use of colour, for premium social events.

Thanks to a specification tailor-made for the architectural deta

USA - Every day between Thanksgiving and Christmas over 500,000 people (more than the entire population of Kansas City or Atlanta) stop at 611 Fifth Avenue to take in the Saks Fifth Avenue Holiday Display.

It's a safe bet that none of them will leave disappointed this year. Created by American Christmas, the luxury retailer's 2016 Land of 1000 Delights extravaganza dazzles visitors with a magical winter candy land that features 4,678sq.ft of foliage, more than twice that amount of garland and over 2000 jumbo candy ornaments, plus a Chris Werner-designed lightshow that makes the 10-story department store building glow with holiday cheer.

The owner of Los Angeles-based Chris Werner Design, Werner uses an extensive collection of fixtures supplied by 4Wall Entertainment to create over 300,000 individual points of light on the stately building. Playing a key role in this

The Netherlands - André Beekmans from creative lighting design practice The Art of Light based in the Netherlands produced three stunning lighting schemes and supplied programming / operating crews for the three major live venues at the 2016 Amsterdam Music Festival.

AMF is an integral element of the wider Amsterdam Dance Event conference, a five-day EDM extravaganza staged in the spiritual hub of electronic music and culture. It is a collaboration between organisers Alda Events and ID&T showcasing some of the best EDM talent on the planet.

The Art of Light specified over 500 Robe fixtures across the Amsterdam ArenA, the Ziggo Dome and the Heineken Music Hall, most which were deployed in the Amsterdam ArenA. André and his team also looks after the global creative visual requirements of several leading dance artist including Armin van Buuren, Hardwell, Nicky R

USA - Bandit Lites once again participated in the Angel Tree Christmas assistance programme. Started in 1975 in Knoxville, Tennessee, the Angel Tree began with the simple idea that under privileged children also deserve a visit from Santa Claus. Making their wishes on paper angels that adorn trees in local malls, food stores and businesses, patrons are encouraged to choose a child's wish list and make their Christmas dreams come true.

Bandit's director of philanthropy Allison Burchett, controller Shay Simpson and HR coordinator Cori Link combined their efforts to orchestrate the day of giving across multiple Bandit Lites locations. Bandit provided each team member the opportunity to choose an Angel, where gifts ranged from the practical, such as jackets and shoes, to the ever wished for toys and games. Shop Foreman Erich Hudgens graciously spent the day shuttling groups of Ban

UK - Cardiff-based 11th Hour Ice has enjoyed a busy and very productive lead-up to Christmas, supplying and installing ice-rinks at several locations in South Wales. Temporary ice rinks are becoming an increasingly popular feature in the landscape of the festive events season, something with which 11th Hour Ice is well acquainted, having operated in the field for a number of years. The company covers all bases in terms of ice rink provision, offering everything from the ice itself, to any infrastructure and ancillary services that are required.

Essentials such as power generation, distribution and site lighting can be supplemented with everything from project management, ticketing, rink marshalling, decorative lighting, sound systems and even marketing and sponsorship. Effectively, 11th Hour Ice offers a bespoke ice rink service tailored to meet the needs and budgets of a rang

UK - At the world-renowned Tower of London, ice skaters can enjoy a festive experience in what is normally a totally off-limits area, while being immersed in dynamic lighting effects from Elation Professional LED luminaires. One-stop event services provider Figure of Eight Events has provided all power, lighting and sound reinforcement, lighting the ice rink and historic walls at the Tower of London using compact Elation E Spot III LED moving heads with custom fitted snowflake gobos and Elation SixPar 300 IP LED Par colour changers.

Figure of Eight Events was tasked with creating a lighting design to grab people's attention and draw them to the ice rink in the moat along the banks of the River Thames. "The system needed to be powerful, reliable and cost effective," stated Rich Rayner, director at Figure of Eight Events. "We wanted to give the ice rink more life than what you c

UK - Current RMS reports having had a "huge year" in 2016, with major feature releases on display at multiple shows in the UK and US, as well as significant team growth, enabling its team to provide more support to customers worldwide.

To end 2016, the company has revealed a brand new feature, ready for users to have a play with over the Christmas holidays . . .Users can now Clone or Copy & Paste Opportunity Groups across different jobs, which is useful when providing kit for a job with multiple rooms or venues. Rather than having to use the Product Picker to select the same item across multiple jobs, users can now select 'copy' next to the item and paste it onto a different job.

Current RMS will be seeing in 2017 with over 2,100 rental experts onboard, across 1,300 cities worldwide. Major feature releases such as; Simultaneous Scan, Organisation Discounts and a new Costin

UK - A.C. Entertainment Technologies Ltd. (AC-ET) has announced that Mike Docksey has joined the team in a key external UK sales role.

Mike is a well-known face in the industry and brings a wealth of experience to the company. Having spent many years touring with live events around the globe, he joined the HSL Group in 2005 as part of the projects team. Mike enjoyed almost ten years at HSL before moving to Adlib, as head of their lighting and video departments.

Jonathan Walters, AC-ET's sales and purchasing director, said, "Mike's knowledge, enthusiasm and contacts will be a huge asset to us. His background means he'll be able to understand exactly what AC-ET customers are looking for and explain the full range of products we supply, whether that's lighting, rigging, audio, video or cabling and other consumables."

Mike will be based primarily in the North of England, a

UK - Stephen Daldry's multi-award winning production of An Inspector Calls has returned to London's West End. This now famous revival was first performed at the National Theatre in 1992 and has since won 19 major awards across the globe.

Lighting designer Rick Fisher has lit the production since its infancy and returns once again for this latest run at the Playhouse Theatre. He approached White Light to provide the lighting equipment, which included quantities of the GLP impression X4 Bar 20s which the company has recently invested in.

An Inspector Calls is written by JB Priestley and tells the story of a family's dinner party being interrupted by the mysterious Inspector Goole who is investigating the death of a young woman. Rick comments, "What's great about An Inspector Calls is that it's still a brilliant production which resonates with a lot of audiences

Italy - A musical masterpiece returned to the stage at the Teatro Manzoni in Milan. The moving scenery designed by Cristiano Colombi dynamically creates the various different settings. All of them recall the Upper West Side of New York, where the story is set, and Claypaky's light beams shine out.

Federico Bellone was asked to direct the show. "To set the scene, I decided to focus on two elements: the theme of fear, a feeling shared by all the characters in the two rival groups, the Jets and the Puerto Rican Sharks, and red, the colour that has become a trademark of the musical, along with the five iron fire escape staircases which link the various levels of the scenery."

The work of the creative staff involved in producing the musical was focused on these pieces of scenery. Valerio Tiberi was asked to design the show lighting.

Did the presence of the fire escape stair

China - With an early career in lighting design combined with a Masters in ancient Chinese medicine, Daniel Richardson, lighting designer, programmer and operator, credits wysiwyg from CAST Software as an essential tool for designing and programming for the spectacular set of Storm, Now or Never and EDM other festivals in China. Originally from Australia, he is now in London operating tours and designing projects globally.

"I have been lighting designer for Storm since it began in 2013. Each year there's a new brief based on the alien sci-fi theme. This year we worked with Dutch set designers, 250K, working together from the start of the project. In the early design phase I present a preliminary wysiwyg plot to show where the lights, trusses, bars and other technology will be and to give my input on how this works with their set," explained Richardson.

"Outdoor EDM festiva

USA - The Alpha Production team had one thing in mind when they put together the lighting rig for the Pepsi Funk Fest Tour when it stopped at Florida A&M University. The most important thing they focused on was movement. Their goal was to create a show that was constantly moving and changing so it could keep up with the artists on stage.

The Alpha Productions team got the action it was looking for with a dynamic rig that was anchored by Rogue R2 Wash and COLORado 2-Quad Zoom Tour fixtures from Chauvet Professional. They needed it too. The festival's star-studded hip hop, R&B, and soul lineup featured Grammy winners and nominees like Fantasia, T-Pain and Jeremih, as well as legends like Uncle Luke, Jodeci, 69 Boyz and 95 South, who collectively shook the Tallahassee stage to its foundation.

They relied on 12 Rogue R2 Washes to keep up with the performances on stage, noting

Japan - The New National Theatre, Tokyo (NNTT) is one of the world's finest art theatres which opened in October 1997 as a complex of theatres dedicated to the performing arts of opera, ballet, dance and drama. NNTT has three theatres; The Opera House, The Playhouse, and The Pit. Each is equipped with facilities of the latest technologies and designed to accommodate diverse requirements from productions to be performed every night.

The Opera House, also known with a nickname Opera Palace, is Japan's one and only theatre built specifically to stage opera and ballet productions. It is a proscenium arch theatre and has four stage areas: the main stage visible to the audience, a rear stage, and left and right wings, all in the same size. The stage lighting facilities include portable bridges and towers, four-layer galleries, lighting bridges and ladders, with rich variety of conve

UK - Avolites has powered lighting for a one-off star-studded concert at the official switch-on of Oxford Street's Christmas lights, where charity partner for the 2016 display the NSPCC hosted a 'Children's VIP day' to celebrate the launch of its festive fundraising campaign - Little Stars.

Oxford Street was completely closed to traffic between 9:30am and 8:30pm for the well-attended event, produced by London-based production company Wilde Ones. Pop rockers The Vamps and X Factor 2015-winner Louisa Johnson took to the stage, with lighting designer Paul de Villiers choosing an Avolites Titan Mobile and Titan Mobile Wing to control his super bright and twinkly design.

"The Titan Mobile is ideal for this type of pop-up event; it's easy to fit into a tight control area and lightweight enough to able to move it around whenever needed," says de Villiers, who has also worked for

UK - Knight of Illumination Award-winning lighting designer Tom Campbell has used a predominantly Claypaky rig in his recent redesign of Welsh heavy metal band Bullet for my Valentine's (BFMV) latest tour.

Taking over from the band's previous lighting designer in July 2016, Campbell refreshed the rig with a selection of innovative moving head fixtures from the Italian manufacturer.

"I took over after the tour had completed its American leg," says Campbell. "We launched the new design in Germany in front of 6000 people at the Rock am Ring festival on a reduced rig, then expanded it in October when we went into the full production headline shows.

"The new production is a combination of classic rock n' roll stage design with a modern twist. Part of creating this concept is in the stage design itself where we have a collection of old guitar cabinets with PAR Cans wired in.

World - Lighting designer Tom Campbell has selected an Avolites Tiger Touch II and backup Quartz to control his lighting design for metal-core band Bullet for my Valentine (BFMV) on their recent worldwide tour in support of their 2015 album Venom.

Last year the popular quartet returned with a show-stopper of a tour, studiously lit, designed and controlled by Campbell who counts Anna Calvi for which he won a Knight Of Illumination Award in 2015, Katy B, Leon Bridges and John Grant in his resume.

"BFMV knew what they wanted from this tour and more importantly what they didn't want," says Campbell, who cites talks over sushi with the band and international skype as the birthplaces of the show's design zeitgeist. "Through these conversations, it became obvious the feel for the show was a big 'classic' rock gig with a modern twist. We wanted to use cutting-edge fixtures

USA - Electric violinist and member of the original Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Mark Wood began his holiday concert at the Denny Sanford Arena in Sioux Falls, SD with a stirring message for the 12,000 people in attendance.

"We're going to burn up tonight," said the virtuoso musician and Emmy Award-winning composer. "We're here to celebrate the wonderment of music making. We're inspiring these amazing kids and we're inspiring the future."

The "amazing kids" that Wood referred to were local music students who joined him and his band on stage for an exhilarating concert that blended new twists on holiday classics with electrified orchestral versions of rock standards like The Rolling Stones' You Can't Always Get What You Want and Led Zeppelin's Stairway To Heaven. Matching the spirited music note-for-passionate-note was a big, bright and intense lightshow designed

USA - One of Milwaukee's most famous buildings got a face-lift with a new lighting refit and smart control, responsive to the weather conditions - the iconic gas flame, that was added in 1956, indicates the weather forecast by its colour and flicker. This weather beacon was turned off in 1973 because of that year's energy crisis, but turned back on in 1985 - it has now been updated with an LED system that lights up the entire building. MainStage, a US-based theatrical supplier and integrator, was responsible for this project.

The original neon lighting inside the iconic Flame sculpture was replaced with all-new LED new lighting fixtures consisting of 36 - Color Kinetics ColorGraze MX4 fixtures. In addition to the flame centrepiece, over 150 Chauvet Colorado fixtures were used provide coloured accent lighting for the main building structure.

The majority of control distribu

UK -The lighting designers of music superstars Jason Derulo, Dizzee Rascal and Chase and Status requested Claypaky Sharpys and A.leda B-EYE K10s as key fixtures in their touring rigs at UK urban music festival Sundown.

Responsible for the mainstage festival rig was Mick Freer, head of concert touring at award-winning production and hire outfit Hawthorn that provided the lighting, rigging, drapes, FOH control systems and followspots for Sundown's mainstage.

"Jason Derulo's lighting designer, Bobby Bascombe, specified the 24 x Claypaky A.leda B-EYE K10s for the flown rig, and 26 x Claypaky Sharpys in vector mode for the floor package," says Freer. "Claypaky Sharpys were also requested by Steve Bewley, lighting designer for Dizzee Rascal, and Chase and Status' LD, Andy Hurst."

Freer consulted Bascombe, Bewley, Hurst and the other visiting designers in the months leading t

USA - Not much has changed at the Mesa Amphitheatre since it opened in 1979, and music fans in the Phoenix area couldn't be happier. An attractive open air facility where no seat is further than 175ft from the stage, the 4,200 capacity venue offers a cozy environment for enjoying national acts. Yet, while it's a delight for fans, the relatively small and aging facility can create issues for anyone looking to replicate a modern arena light show.

John Garberson and his team from Creative BackStage faced this challenge earlier in December when they were asked to put together a rig at the amphitheatre for a performance by Kings of Leon at a local radio station's Ugly Christmas Sweater Party concert.

Garberson and company were up to the task, providing the band's lighting designer Sam MacLaren with a mix of fixtures that could create a show that remained true to his big venue d

USA - Kramer Electronics has announced the acquisition of iRule, LLC. In 2014, Kramer announced a partnership with iRule to deliver "the ultimate control and automation technology" - Kramer Control. This acquisition will enable Kramer to leverage the award-winning and highly customizable iRule software platform to best address a growing demand for advanced control and automation solutions.

The Kramer Control platform enables integrators to deliver control of lighting, HVAC, communications, A/V and more - along with seamless worldwide connectivity, a critical asset in commercial control and automation markets, such as corporate environments, houses of worship, higher education, bars/restaurants and other

The platform's combination of software, hardware and cloud is the result of years of research and development, an effort that received funding from the prestigious Israel-U

UK - Popular musical Dirty Dancing returned to London's West End in December playing the Phoenix Theatre following a regional UK tour with a lively production that originally premiered in Italy in 2015 where it played Milan and Rome. This production has also toured in Spain and Mexico with additional troupes.

Lighting has been created by leading Italian LD Valerio Tibeiri who seized the opportunity in London to upgrade the original lighting rig and use nearly 70 x Robe moving lights - a combination of BMFL Blades and LEDBeam 1000s - as the primary luminaires.

Written by Eleanor Bergstein the production is directed by Federico Bellone with a set design by Roberto Comotti, both of whom Valerio has worked with on many previous projects. He was delighted to be involved again on this one which is choreographed by Gillian Bruce. Costume design is by Jennifer Irwin, the so

Latest Issue. . .