Voting in the Gottelier Awards is only open to PLASA Members, registered readers of LSi magazine and pre-registered visitors to PLASA 2016. All will receive an email with a unique code inviting them to place their individual vote via the PLASA Show website. Voting closes on Friday 9 September 2016 and the winner will be announced at the PLASA Show at Olympia, West London, on Monday 19 September.
The nominees for 2016 are:
Chris Cronin
During a career of almost four decades, Chris Cronin has had a hand in pushing forward many of the developments in staging technology that we take for granted. From the days of PAR cans and Raylights to the T2 safety truss, and from the Medium Duty truss to Take That's 'Big Man', Chris has applied his enthusiasm and ingenuity to products which have benefited thousands of projects all over the world. Having started his career with James Thomas Engineering in 1978, Chris left to start Tomcat Ltd in 1985, before founding Total Fabrications Ltd (TFL) in 1989, later expanding to become Total Solutions Group (TSG). In all that time, Chris has been at the forefront of the entertainment staging industry, developing flexible, safe trussing structures.
Dr. Christian Heil
Dr. Christian Heil founded L-Acoustics in 1984, and the introduction of the V-DOSC line array system in the mid-1990s led to a fundamental shift in the live sound market, and line array systems proliferated for the next decade and a half. Still, Heil and L-Acoustics continue to refine the line array concept: the KIVA ultra-compact system came to market in 2008; the K1 system - seen as the long-awaited successor to the ground-breaking V-DOSC - debuted in 2009; the KARA modular line source system followed in 2010; and the K2 system in 2014. His latest technology venture, L-ISA, is a comprehensive multichannel audio architecture, designed to bring immersive audio to live performances in venues with capacities of 100 to 10,000 or more.
Wayne Howell
Wayne Howell began his career in the mid-80s at Avolites, where he first learned computer programming and contributed to the development of the QM500 and Rolacue desks. In 1988 he founded Artistic Licence, a specialist lighting control solutions provider. His innovative product designs, including Micro-Scope DMX tester, the Lamp Tramp, the DMX-Dongle, DMX-Split, Pixi-Web and Visual Patch have won many industry accolades. He contributed to the development of ESTA standards DMX512 and RDM, created Art-Net - the royalty-free DMX-over-Ethernet protocol - and initiated the Zero Carbon Project. He is also the author of Control Freak and Rock Solid Ethernet and is currently working on a third book.
Masaaki 'Mick' Okabayashi
During almost three decades with Yamaha, Mick Okabayashi has played a major role in the development of digital mixing consoles. He joined in 1987, the year that Yamaha developed its first digital mixing console, the DMP7, and spent 12 years as a software engineer on the console development team, before becoming team leader and heading up the PM5D's development. This was followed by the M7CL and the LS9 - both of which played significant roles in the live music industry's transition from analogue to digital mixing. Since then Mick and his team created the CL and QL series of consoles, introducing Dante audio networking to live mixing systems. He is now overseeing the continued development of the flagship mixing system RIVAGE PM10.
Yvan Péard
Co-founder of lighting manufacturer Ayrton in 2001, Yvan Peard has developed a reputation for creating innovative lighting products combined with the highest quality engineering. The visual tools Péard has created are characterised by the use of cutting-edge LED and optical technology, and a determination not to follow the crowd. Over the years, products such as the Moduled 318, the first modular fixture designed specifically to create an LED matrix - to the DreamPanel, and more recently the Wildsun, IntelliPix, MagicBlade, VersaPix, MagicPanel, NandoBeam, MagicDot, MagicBurst, CosmoPix and AlienPix, have kept the Ayrton name at the forefront of LDs' minds.
The Strand Lighting R&D team, 1960s-1980s
The team at Strand Lighting, led by Marin Moore and later by David Bertenshaw, worked to develop a series of landmark lighting control systems. These included IDM, DDM, MMS, Lightboard, Galaxy - all of which pushed the boundaries of technical possibility of the times to deliver the dream of memory lighting control, including some functionality that has sadly been lost from control systems of today.
Anne Valentino
Anne Valentino has spent most of her working life in contributing to the creation of lighting control consoles. Starting as a technical director at a Houston performing arts centre, she worked for lighting manufacturer Kliegl before moving on to Strand Lighting. Here she began her work with lighting control products which would define the industry, from later versions of the Strand Light Palette, through ETC's Obsession and Expression consoles, to Vari-Lite's iconic Virtuoso and back again to ETC where she developed the hugely successful Eos, Ion and Gio consoles.
(LSi Online)
