The PLASA Show's product awards have been a popular feature of the event for many years, highlighting the significance of the show as a focus for new technological developments. To further underline this role, the awards have undergone an important change for 2004, with a greater emphasis being placed on 'innovation' - hence the first presentation of the PLASA Awards for Innovation.
The previous assessment criteria, which separated the nominations into sectors, was removed, and products were judged on the strength of their innovation alone. The judges, chaired once again by L&SI's technical editor James Eade, consisted of respected consultants, designers and practitioners from various technical disciplines. They were . . .
Jim Beagley - experienced West End production electrician and occasional lighting designer.
Andy Hayles - theatre consultant, formerly of TPC and now a founder of Charcoalblue.
Rowland Hemming - former head of sound at the Millennium Dome; now audio consultant at Live Business International.
Charlie Kail - respected staging and set design consultant.
Blue Leach - leading rock and roll video mixer and engineer.
Durham Marenghi - well-known freelance lighting designer.
Richard Northwood - freelance audio consultant (Coms UK).
Phil Pike - freelance AV systems consultant, formerly head of AV at Madame Tussauds.
This year, the judges were looking specifically for products which 'advance the industry, demonstrate a new style of thinking, represent a key step forward in safety terms or improve technical practices'.
For the first time, each nominated product had to satisfy at least one of these criteria in some way before being admitted to the judging process: this new vetting process resulted in several cases where manufacturers agreed to withdraw their nominations following discussions with the chairman.
Despite the tighter judging criteria, 66 products were nominated, raising over £10,000 for charity and bringing the total amount raised for good causes by the PLASA Awards over the past seven years to £55,000.
