Projects

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10 May 2024

The Netherlands - When Easter is approaching, many people are busy trying to decide how they want to spend their long weekend off, but for the employees at Stagelight, they are already busy working on one of first major music festivals in the Dutch calendar. Paaspop is a three-day festival that takes place in Schijndel on Easter weekend each year, but the build-up starts much earlier.

Each stage at the festival not only has to be built from scratch, but also equipped with sound and lighting equipment worthy of some of the biggest national and international acts. This year’s event saw names like Anouk, Editors and Tiësto among the headliners.

Stagelight has been providing Paaspop with lighting equipment for a long time and this year was no exception. In total, project manager Hermen Klerks selected a grand total of 1,310 light fixtures from Infinit

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09 May 2024

South Africa - Cape Town’s nightscape has been enriched with the recent addition of Halo; a premium nightclub experience that combines opulent design with cutting edge technology, including a Funktion-One sound system from the loudspeaker manufacturer’s distributor for South Africa, Phuture Sound.

Completed at the end of 2023 and opened shortly after, Halo is Cape Town’s newly envisioned nightclub that combines world-class sound, custom acoustic treatment (by Supersonic), and opulent interior design (by Conduit Interior). Stepping into the space offers partygoers sensory immersion and removal from the everyday, with leading domestic and international DJs providing the soundtrack.

“There is typically a tug-of-war in setting up a new venue between what sounds good and what looks good,” says Phuture Sound’s Anton Sinovich. “But Halo is pro

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09 May 2024

Kenya - Located near the centre of the city, the new five-star Kwetu Nairobi is a Curio Collection by Hilton hotel. Opened this spring, the hotel offers wide-ranging facilities which cater for guests and businesses alike. Kwetu boasts more 100 guest rooms and 10 meeting rooms, complemented by a fitness centre, bars, restaurants, and entertainment spaces.

To fully meet the demands of its broad range of users, an investment in high-quality technology was essential. The audio element covered an extensive remit, and was entirely supplied by UK-based specialist Audio Feed, who worked closely with integrators Frontier Audio Africa to deliver the systems.

The project deployed a range of MC² Delta amplification, with and without DSP, throughout.

Oz Jefferies of Audio Feed comments: “We have a longstanding relationship with MC² Audio and have used

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09 May 2024

UK - When Belfast Distillery Company set out to preserve the legacy of McConnell’s Irish Whisky - a brand that dates back to 1776 - they decided to take over the A-Wing of Crumlin Road Gaol, and convert it into a visitor attraction to run alongside its production activities.

Built in 1845, the Gaol was renowned for housing a number of key figures during The Troubles, but this listed building has now been carefully restored and converted, with a modern AV installation - including end-to-end Martin Audio loudspeakers, designed and specified by the manufacturer’s partner for over 40 years, Rea Sound.

Martin Audio had in fact been requested by the clients themselves - notably their master distiller & head of supply & operations, Graeme Millar. According to Rea Sound director, Roger McMullan, as a gigging musician, Millar had fallen in love wi

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08 May 2024

Europe - Berlin-based Kontra K, the rapper who tops the German hip-hop scene, has toured arenas across Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Luxembourg throughout February and March.

Lighting designer, Marcus Herzog, specified 112 Ayrton Eurus Profile fixtures for his lighting design on a stage designed by Kriss Hinrichsen for this tour. The Eurus Profiles were provided by the tour’s lighting supplier, BBM Clair.

Herzog explain why they chose the Eurus Profile for his very unusual design which involved a number of automated overhead lighting pods and video walls, as well as more conventional lighting positions: “We decided on the Eurus because of the exceptionally high light output and the flexibility of the lamp,” he explains.

“The majority of the fixtures are installed in six pods, which are arranged in a semi-circular arch above the st

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08 May 2024

USA - Three lighting design students from the University of California San Diego (UCSD) recently had the opportunity to work with Elation Proteus Lucius and Fuze Wash Z350 moving head luminaires on Winter Works, a dance production featuring three original works by three professional choreographers from the UCSD dance faculty.

Produced yearly by the school’s Theatre & Dance Department, Winter Works specialises in dance repertory production. This year, Taylor Olson, Elba Emicente, and Vida Huang collaborated with choreographers Kara Mack, Ana María Álvarez, and Dr. Grace Shinhae Jun, respectively, on the performances. The productions, which involved a large cast of student performers, were showcased from 15-17 March at the 400-seat Mandell Weiss Forum on the UCSD campus.

Taylor Olson, an MFA lighting designer at UCSD, who lit

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08 May 2024

USA - A Void Acoustics audio system has been installed by i.e. Smart Systems at Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s new Texas headquarters. Constructed over the span of two years, the new campus spans two five-story buildings and boasts a sprawling 440,000sq.ft rentable space.

Designed and constructed during COVID, HPE wanted an empowering space that enables its people to do their best work. Located in Spring, Texas, HPE’s new campus has become a high-tech haven for visitors and over 2,200 HPE team members. i.e. Smart Systems was tasked with crafting an interactive and immersive space, spotlighting HPE’s industry-leading capabilities while delivering a memorable experience.

i.e. Smart Systems recommended Void to HPE. The seamless installation of Void's speakers by Smart Systems' installation team resulted in a vibrant audio landscape that has exceeded

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08 May 2024

Canada - The Big Air Show ski/snowboarding event at the Blue Mountain Resort in Collingwood, Ontario, featured a fast moving and colourful lighting design created with Chauvet Professional fixtures supplied by Production Service Industries (PSI).

Lighting designer Andrew Dawson and production manager/co-designer Matt Chambers lined each side of the 200ft landing with five towers, separated by about 50ft. Each tower had three Color STRIKE M motorized wash-strobes and a single Rogue Outcast 2X Wash on top.

Drawing on the intense output and colour rendering prowess of these fixtures, the designers created a series of distinct and colourful looks for the 20-to-30 skier and snowboarder jumpers who participated every night.

“We broke our colour combinations down into a few segments,” said Dawson. “This year's show featured a ‘competition mo

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08 May 2024

Germany - The Hannover State Opera selected Prolights Astra Hybrid330 to light up the 2024 Opera Ball, held under the theme Let the Sunshine In. The event drew over 3,330 guests and showcased a range of musical performances, from classical to modern, necessitating a flexible and adaptable lighting system.

The Astra Hybrid330 proved to be up to the challenge with their hybrid design, which includes both beam and spot capabilities, a wide zoom range, and CMY colour mixing, enabling seamless transitions between different styles of performance.

Positioned 12m above the main stage, these spotlights provided an exceptional performance under the direction of lighting designer Fabian Grohmann who shared his enthusiasm for the Astra Hybrid330: "I was truly amazed by their capability. Despite their compact size, the Astra Hybrid330 spotlights are incr

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07 May 2024

Australia - Leonardo da Vinci – 500 Years of Genius at The Lume Melbourne, located in the Melbourne Convention Centre, is an immersive exhibition created and produced by Grande Experiences with Biblioteca Ambrosiana, the custodians of Leonardo’s original manuscripts, the Codex Atlanticus, housed in Milan. The gateway to Leonardo's life and legacy is a colossal 3,000 sqm/ four-story high multisensory gallery that envelops visitors in an immersive journey, engaging all the senses with sights, sounds, scents, touch and taste that recreate the ambiance of the Renaissance.

Craig Smith, Grande Experiences' head of production, operations & technology comments, “Several years ago, when looking for a spatial audio solution for The Lume Melbourne, aFX Global and Encircled were among the first companies we spoke to. IOSONO quickly became the

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07 May 2024

USA - Rat Sound Systems continues its tradition of delivering quality audio experiences at Coachella and Stagecoach festivals. With the Outline Newton FPGA-based processing platform powering the festival’s audio systems for another successful year, Rat Sound Systems reaffirms its commitment maintaining standards in live sound reinforcement.

Since its debut at Coachella in 2019, the Outline Newton processor has been a cornerstone of Rat Sound Systems’ audio setup. Dave Rat, sound system designer, sound engineer and president of Rat Sound Systems, highlights the critical role of the Newton processor in their audio distribution: “We use Newton in our master distribution racks. I do believe all of our stages have it as we use the Newton to tie into the event security override system with the GPIO.

“The racks they’re in are our master drive rack

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07 May 2024

Italy – The Laugh-Out-Loud funny LOL Talent Show returned this spring with audiences entertained by comedians who performed in theatres in Milan, Naples, and Rome. On stage, an eight-metre-high backdrop displayed pixel dot imagery, with LED strip ‘LOL’ lettering all driven by a Green Hippo Hippotizer Boreal+ MK2 V4 from tvONE.

The upstage screen in designer Francesco Mari’s colourful set was created entirely from RGB programmable light chains - pixel dots - with a 20cm pitch, which was customized by E-Kube Srl with help of Modena-based real-time LED expert DigiLight. This created a ‘curtain’ that acted as a background ‘matrix’ screen. The three wooden LOL letters were rigged with Philips iColorFlex LEDs, covered with opal plastic cabochons. The outline of the letters was illuminated by a programmable RGBW LED strip, while the letter

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07 May 2024

USA - Light Action of Wilmington, Delaware, acknowledges that they have one of the best gigs in the industry. Each year for more than a decade, they’ve provided full-service production for a string of legacy acts on Rock Legends Cruise, a floating rock festival with a cause that sails the Caribbean every February. For years they have relied on Elation lighting to illuminate multiple stages and this year turned to newly acquired Proteus Lucius LED profile fixtures to raise the production even further.

“Gigs don’t get much better than this one,” stated Brian Market, COO at Light Action. “We have a great client in the Native American Heritage Association, it’s a great cause, and there is literally a boatload of rock talent on board. People love it so much they come year after year, and we help keep it exciting for them with top level production on t

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07 May 2024

Poland - Robe supported the 2024 Scena Jutra (Stage of Tomorrow) two-day symposium in Warsaw, which this year changed up to a new venue inside the city’s Palace of Culture & Science in downtown, one of Europe’s tallest buildings.

The sixth edition of this growing two-day event featured over 120 speakers, both international and from across Poland, who gave a series of presentations or joined lively panel discussions. These embraced an eclectic variety of topics all related to production design, visual and sonic art also embracing architecture and built spaces, plus several more esoteric but related subjects.

While the designated exhibition area provided a backdrop for Robe to showcase some of its latest tech, the vibe was more about stimulating ideas and exploring the adventure of possibilities that might be achieved now and in the future thro

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03 May 2024

USA - The promoters of the 27th Arizona Bike week billed their event as a ‘five-day celebration of motorcycles and music’. Half a million visitors attended the event at Westworld of Scottsdale in early April.

John Garberson and his team at Creative Backstage designed the stage using fixtures from their own inventory as well as gear supplied by LIT Lighting. The production team’s effort provided a vast and supportive canvas for LDs from Godsmack, Yelawolf, Brantley Gilber, Everclear, and George Thorogood & The Destroyers.

As part of their plan to create a larger impression during the festival, Arizona Bike Week organisers asked Garberson to have larger IMAG Side screens. At the same time the bands had their own requests. As Garberson recalls it: “Our client wanted to beef up the side screens from last year, while the production teams from

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03 May 2024

Denmark - Østre Gasværk is a theatrical venue in Copenhagen. It opened in 1979 on the site of a redundant gas works and the theatre is housed within the old gas tank. Its giant cylindrical shape makes it a dramatic place to stage the musicals and theatrical events that Østre Gasværk is known for.

The addition of a new DiGiCo Quantum 7T has revolutionized the programming and rehearsal process. Morten Frank, head of sound and board operator for its latest musical, UrineTown, explains what it means to have the DiGiCo Quantum 7T at the front-of-house position.

“Having the Theatre software for our Quantum 7T has really helped,” he says. “It gives us a great overview of the cues in the show, and quickly being able to change members of Control Groups during rehearsals has been a massive improvement to our workflow.”

The DiGiCo Theatre so

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03 May 2024

The Netherlands - On 23 March 2024, the Grand Hotel Amrâth Kurhaus in Scheveningen, echoed with the beats of music and the excitement of the crowd as the sold-out Must x Kurhaus took centre stage. The event not only showcased an impressive line-up of artists, but also underlined the rich history and allure of the venue.

The Grand Hotel Amrâth Kurhaus stands as a monument to elegance and grandeur, with roots dating back to 1818. Over the centuries it has served as a beacon of luxury and sophistication, hosting dignitaries, celebrities and now events like Must x Kurhaus.

Headlining the event was internationally acclaimed Spanish DJ David Penn. Joining him were Mr Belt & Wezol, DJ Roog, Divine and MC Roga, each contributing to an electrifying atmosphere that captivated attendees from start to finish.

Enhancing the sensory experience was th

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03 May 2024

Italy - On 3 March, pop-rock band The Kolors played the Forum d'Assago in Milan before announcing their new international tour which, in addition to Italy, will visit Switzerland, Poland, Germany, Lithuania, Slovenia, and Belgium.

The lighting for the concert was designed by lighting designer Francesco De Cave who chose 120 Ayrton Cobra laser-sourced fixtures for the event, supplied by Italian service company, Agorà.

Cobra features a native contrast never before achieved by a digital light source, 0.6° beam angle, and extreme focus range that allows the shape of the beam to be adjusted to suit operation at any distance XT -Focus.

“I have already used Ayrton fixtures for many tours and programmes: Eurus, Domino, Perseo, Cobra,” states lighting designer, De Cave. “This time I chose Cobra as the special feature in the lighting design pre

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03 May 2024

South Korea - With 4,000 seats, Noksan Church in Gangbuk, Seoul is one of the largest worship spaces in the country. It’s also the first to install an immersive sound system, placing the congregation at the centre of the celebration made through words, music and praise.

With cooperation from Nexo distributor A-Works and using Yamaha AFC for ambience control and object-based mixing, the system was designed and installed by CTO Kim Do-seok and the team at immersive media technology specialists Sound Korea ENG.

Five arrays of nine Nexo Geo M10 are hung above and across the stage at the front of the chapel, with two lines of six Nexo MSUB 18 hung centrally. Amplification and processing are provided by Dante-networked Nexo NXAMP4X2Mk2 Powered TD Controllers.

“The installation at Noksan Church is the latest immersive sound project by Sound Kore

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03 May 2024

USA – Pop band LANY recently wrapped up the North American leg of its 2024 tour, A Beautiful Blur, named after their fifth album released in 2023. Bandit Lites provided the lighting for duo Paul Klein and Jake Goss who named their act in honour of Los Angeles and New York.

Lighting designer Ben Gilbert sought to streamline the design with LED fixtures, offering both a cohesive design and easier time programming. He drew inspiration from the cylindrical halo video element and curved the lighting trusses around it.

Bandit Lites supplied Ayrton Khamsin S, Chauvet Strike Array 4, Chauvet Color Strike M, Chauvet COLORado PXL Bar 16 and Bar 8, VL 3600 and ROBE Pointes as well as two grandMA 3 Full consoles and a Follow Me System.

“The Khamsin is the workhorse of this design and is a fantastic LED fixture,” said Gilbert. “With its f

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03 May 2024

Belgium - The Flanders Technology and Innovation Festival (FTI) is a six-day celebration of technology and innovation hosted across different cities in Belgium. The entertainment event takes place at the Buda Island in Kortrijk and is organised by Hangar K. Split into five distinct areas, the festival aims to bring people together to experiment, strengthen bonds, innovate and tackle the technological challenges of the future.

Leyard Europe’s LN Series LED screens delivered for the Unwrap Arena at FTI. The space celebrates new technology with an educational bias. During the festival children, educators and interested adults are invited to test out new equipment and immerse themselves in gaming to find out more about this booming Flemish industry.

Chief catalyst, Vincent Vanderbeck, is the power behind Hangar K. The company has a passionate ambition

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02 May 2024

USA - For the March world premiere of One of the Good Ones at the Pasadena Playhouse in Southern California, lighting designer Jaymi Lee Smith turned to Elation’s new Proteus Odeon LED profile fixture to fulfil a number of lighting roles.

The Odeon, a full-featured 30,000-lumen moving head that houses a variable CRI LED engine, allowed the designer to find the best blend of intensity and colour accuracy to accurately form the onstage lighting while energising the theatre with full-on effects after the final curtain. 

Founded in 1917, Pasadena Playhouse, distinguished as the official State Theatre of California and honoured with the 2023 Regional Theatre Tony Award, stands as one of the nation’s most prolific theatres, having staged thousands of original productions. One of those original plays, One of the Good Ones, which ran f

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02 May 2024

USA - Supporting Shaindy Plotzker’s performance at The New Jersey Performing Arts Centre on 6 April was a deeply immersive, multi-level set design on a substantial (18ft deep and 13.5ft trim) stage.

At times, this expansive set evoked images of an ancient courtyard, at others it inspired with majestic mountain-like imagery. Lighting designer Moshe Baskin and programmer-operator Max Blackman brought this spectacular panorama to life with help from 170 Chauvet Professional fixtures supplied by Shaya Alder’s Eagle Production.

Baskin described how the design came together. “This concept came from an Israeli designer, Ronen Najar. Eli Gersner of EG Productions, who produced the concert, reached out to have us create something with it. I took it into Vectorworks and worked on it until I was happy. I substituted the original fixtures with Chauvet Prof

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02 May 2024

Romania - When WJB Media was looking to build the first certified Dolby Atmos Music Studio in Bucharest, together with Ines Sound, they turned to LEA Professional to amplify the space.

The team’s end goal in creating the studio was to ensure more engineers and artists could experience the immersive effects of Dolby Atmos first-hand. The studio, which runs a 7.1.4 Dolby Atmos system with Lipinski speakers and four LEA Professional amplifiers, is already attracting musical talent from far and wide.

The visionary behind the studio is legendary sound engineer Joe Hellow, who has worked with some of the top artists and labels before using the pandemic experience to redefine what was next in music production. This was Hellow’s second experience working with LEA Professional amps, having already created a similar studio in Nashville, TN.

“What