UK - During PLASA London 2013, AED group organized its second Beer and Boar Night, with the highlight being the price draw of a Road Hog 4 lighting console from High End Systems worth 10.000 EUR end-user price.

"To celebrate our recent master distributorship of High End Systems in the BeNeLux, France and the UK, we organized a party on our booth and were happy to meet and greet with over 150 AV professionals." says Hans Vanderheijden, managing director of AED Distribution.

During the evening, and while invitees were enjoying typical Belgian drinks and food, the prize draw was held. The lucky number belonged to Mr. K?stutis Dulinskas, technical director for the Lithuanian AV company No Noise.

"I was very happy to win the Road Hog 4 lighting console handed over by

UK - Registration is now open for the second annual White Light Open Day, held at White Light in Wimbledon on Sunday, 27 October. The entertainment lighting specialist announced the return of its open day earlier this year, after the success of the event in 2012.

The White Light Open Day, a free event aimed at those working in small theatres, performance venues, schools, and colleges, attracted 200 visitors in 2012 with attendees coming from across London and elsewhere in the UK. All were looking to improve their lighting knowledge, demo the latest kit, or meet with White Light staff.

This year's event aims to provide an even greater variety of content and activities allowing visitors to take part in lighting master classes and technical training sessions, as well as getting a hands-on look at White Light's extensive range of lighting, AV, and effects equipment available for s

UK - Chromlech, manufacturer of the Elidy range of panels and strip fixtures, recently received an Honourable Mention from the judging panel at the PLASA Awards for Innovation ceremony for their latest product - the Elidy Strip with Tap Technology. The technology allows users to automatically set the DMX address of each fixture simply by touching it.

The Awards for Innovation ceremony is an annual event celebrating the most innovative new lighting, sound, and video technology from across the industry. This year, an independent panel of expert judges viewed more than 45 products which were presented from the floor of the PLASA Show 2013 exhibition in London's ExCel Centre. With the awards announcement, the judges said that Chromlech's Tap Technology "represents an impressive advancement in state-of-the-art entertainment lighting," adding that they were "very excite

UAE - ETC is getting ready to exhibit for the first time at the InfoComm MEA tradeshow, which will be held at Dubai's World Trade Centre, 20-24 October. Working closely with representatives from UAE distributor Oasis Enterprises, ETC staff will be on hand on stand TA-G31to talk about projects and demonstrate a range of products.

ETC Selador Desire LED wash fixtures, including the D40XTI outdoor version, will be on display. Desire luminaires are available in seven arrays: Lustr+ for a complete range of colour mixing; Vivid for bold colours; Fire for warm-spectrum hues; Ice for cool spectrum tones; fixed colour temperature white light options Studio Daylight and Studio Tungsten; and Studio HD for variable colour temperature white light. The Desire D40XTI is safe for use outdoors in any weather, with a dust- and weather-resistant IP66-rated design that makes it the perfect tool to

Turkey - Wireless Solution Sweden reports that Elit Light and Sound Technologies, located in Istanbul, has been named distributor for W-DMX products in Turkey.

With the world's leading brands, Elit provides professional solutions for studio, TV applications, conference and concert halls, theaters, shopping malls, etc. The company also offers project design, installation and after-sale support.

Mr. Emre Defne of Elit says, "We are very happy about this new partnership with Wireless Solution. The company has an excellent reputation and a high quality product. We can see countless opportunities in Turkey for W-DMX to be highly successful in all sectors of the industry."

"Elit represents the top brands in the industry and is a very strong company," says Isac Alkstrand, operations manager for Wireless Solution, "They have a broad spectrum of connections a

UK - PLASA London 2013 proved a great success with exhibitors and visitors alike at its new home at ExCeL London. Over 11,000 visitors (subject to ABC audit) attended the show, of whom over 3,000 attended on multiple days. International interest was high, with more than 2,200 visitors from 84 countries. Stand rebookings for next year's show are also up on last year, and several major companies that did not make the move to ExCeL - including Philips Entertainment - have either already signed up for 2014 or are in serious talks to return.

Chris Toulmin, head of events, PLASA London 2013, said, "The response we've received to PLASA London 2013 has been overwhelmingly positive, both from visitors and exhibitors. They have embraced the new venue and also enjoyed the new features such as the AudioLab Arena, Theatre and Interactive. The PLASA team has worked very hard to get to th

UK - Rosco CEO Mark Engel presented Light Relief with its annual benefit cheque from the proceeds of Rosco's 313 Light Relief Yellow colour filter. The cheque was presented to Light Relief co-found Rick Fisher at Rosco's booth at PLASA. During the presentation, Engel had this to say about Rosco's continuing support of Light Relief, an organisation established to support entertainment technicians in times of hardship:

"When we introduced Rosco's Supergel 313 Light Relief Yellow in 2004, you [Rick Fisher] were quoted as saying "I wanted the Light Relief Yellow to be a warm, late afternoon, sunny colour...," which seems to me the perfect sentiment for this colour and this charity - a comforting ray of light when it's needed most. Thank you to every designer who uses Supergel 313 on stage for helping us help our community offstage. We donate the proceeds from this col

UK - Two intense days of evaluation at an event ambitiously billed the "Ultimate Network Shootout" resulted in success for Optocore over five other leading protocols.

The comparative sessions took place on the opening two days of this year's PLASA Show at ExCeL London, and were supervised by Roland Hemming (of RH Consulting) as part of the new AudioLab Interactive experimental concept, which he masterminded.

An impressive number of attendees on each day were given voting buttons in order to register their preference, as six of the most established industry audio protocols - Optocore, MADI, Dante, EtherSound, CobraNet and Analogue - were closely scrutinised. The Optocore solution was voted the best in terms of signal transmission quality by different independent audiences on both days.

The Optocore presentation was made by support engineer, Maciek Janiszewski, and s

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Spain - First started in Sitges, a beautiful city at the south of Barcelona, the Pacha Group has grown into a world-recognized brand with nightclub locations spanning the globe. One of the world's most dominant names in the industry, the Ibiza venue is Pacha Group's crown jewel and driving force behind the brand. Due to the continuous eight-hour days and aggressive club environments, Pacha Ibiza was in need of reliable, high-quality lighting. Pacha turned to Martin Professional lighting for its flagship venue in Ibiza as well as its future franchise locations.

Pacha Group technical director, Toni Prats' lighting design at the Pacha Ibiza venue includes several Martin products, including 14 MAC Viper Profiles, 40 MAC 101 wash lights, 14 MAC 350 Entour fixtures, 10 Atomic 3000 DMX fixtures, four Rush MH 1 Profiles, four MAC 250 wash lights and various Martin Tripix LED strips.

&

UK - CUK Audio has announced the appointment of Rich Soper to the position of brand manager, live sound, with responsibility for sales and support of Cadac, Clair Bros., Cordial, dbTechnologies, Outline, Pivitec and Powersoft.

Soper has a background as a front of house engineer, working on tours, cruise liners and live events. He joins CUK Audio from Yamaha Commercial Audio where he held the position of regional manager and specialised in digital consoles, DSP and loudspeaker systems. Prior to that he worked for dbTechnologies UK and Amber Sound.

"The appointment of Rich is a major step for CUK Audio. It is a key element in the substantial commitment and investment we are making in terms of both sales and support in the 'Live' sector, and the direction the brand portfolio will take moving forward," explains CUK Audio's MD, Stuart Thomson. "We have established a

UK - Prolyte Group and subsidiary Brilliant Stages enjoyed a busy PLASA Show at its new home, ExCeL London, earlier this month. Both companies reported positive feedback following their decision to do something different for PLASA London 2013.

On display for the first time in the UK was the ProLyft AETOS range. Visitors were given the opportunity to see a selection of the new hoists in action on a dedicated demo booth. UK sales director Keith Williams commented, "The reaction to ProLyft AETOS has been amazing. We realise the products have to be seen to be fully appreciated so we had several working units on display, which gave us an opportunity to demonstrate their potential. The hoists were very well received, reinforcing our plans for the future. We had quite a number of enquiries from new contacts and met with many of our existing global distributors. Despite some initia

Italy - Widely regarded as the educational, scientific, financial, and political hub of Northern Italy, Trento is proud to boast of its excellent college - the Opera Universitaria. Ranked as first in the country by the Ministry of Education, Opera's mission is to ensure that a student's full potential can be realised - whether that stems from sport, academic work, or the arts. After enlisting the help of AV integrators A&T Multimedia, and distributors, Adeo Group, the college's new theatre has been equipped with a comprehensive technical installation, enabling complete control over audio, lighting, and video.

Opera's consultant specified that the theatre must be multi-functional, and that the technical system needed to offer standalone use by anyone, trained or not, without the assistance of the college's AV department. As a result, A&T was required to design a system which allo

USA - SES (Special Event Services) of Winston-Salem, NC and Nashville, TN recently provided a Large Format Outline GTO system for the Greenbrier Classic Concert Series. Produced by Gary Bowman of Nashville Live!, in conjunction with the Greenbrier and the PGA, the GCCS offers two days of entertainment on the State Fair Grounds in Fairlea, WV.

This year's headliners, Kenny Chesney (4 July 4th) and Aerosmith (6 July) made the need for an A-Level PA system an absolute necessity. When tasked with designing a system to cover the nearly 1,000ft long field, and crowds in excess of 25,000, SES systems engineer, and director of audio, Jason Farah chose Outline to handle the job. "We chose the GTO system not only for its amazing power, but also the fidelity of the system at the distances it had to reach," Farah states.

Chris Rabold, FOH Engineer for Kenny Chesney adds, "I

Germany - This year's Oktoberfest in Munich was illuminated Leader Light. Approximately 6.4m guests came to Munich to be a part of the event of the year.

"We need to save energy" said the responsible architect of the Hofbr&0228;uhaustent at the Oktoberfest.

For many years on the 16 pylons in the tent featured PAR 56 spots (300Watt each). This year these luminaries have been replaced by Leader Light's energy-saving Stage beams, the same LED fixtures which were used at Eurovision Song Contest 2013 in Malmo.

"We are very happy with the result because we didn't think, that LEDs are able to produce such a effective light and beam," said the architect. "Next year we will definitely use Leader Light's lighting again."

(Jim Evans)

USA - Sound engineer Ben Hammond is on tour with English heavy metal band Saxon, travelling with Allen & Heath GLD and iLive digital systems to manage FOH and Monitors.

The band is currently on a month-long tour of the USA and Canada, supported by American rock band, Fozzy.

A GLD-80 mixer is at FOH, accompanied by an AR2412 rack to manage I/O. The mixer takes inputs via Dante from the iLive monitor system, comprising an iLive-T112 surface and iDR-48 MixRack.

"I'm currently running a 39 input "festival patch" type channel list to fit both Saxon and Fozzy, and GLD has coped fantastically," explains Hammond. "I'm using all eight on board FX engines, which sound stunning - the EMT250 and ADT presets are personal favourites of mine. As well as the FX, so many great iLive features have been included in GLD, one of which that I find incredibly useful is the

UK - Virgin Trains has invested in revolutionary LED lighting technology at Birmingham International Railway Station; this will significantly reduce energy consumption and maintenance costs.

In a bid to create more energy efficient railway stations, Virgin Trains has tasked Lorne Stewarts Facilities Services Division PLC to find innovative ways to reduce energy consumption at stations maintained by Virgin. In the latest phase of this project, Lorne Stewart PLC has used AVA branded LED lighting products to light up parts of Birmingham International Railway Station.

Lighting accounts for a significant amount of energy usage and AVA LED technology was specifically chosen by Lorne Stewart as a cost effective route in achieving 90 percent reductions in power consumption, when compared to outdated lighting technologies.

AVA branded T8 tube lights, lamps and panel lamps were chosen

Brazil - As the first Latin American pontiff, it was unsurprising that Pope Francis chose Brazil as the destination for his first overseas trip since becoming head of the Catholic Church. Generating huge national interest, the visit climaxed with a Mass for World Youth Day on Rio's famous Copacabana beach, dubbed 'Popacabana' for the occasion. DiGiCo SD7 and SD11 consoles played a vital role in relaying the event to 3.5m pilgrims and a global media audience.

The newly-purchased SD7 was supplied by Mac Audio, one of Rio's leading audio production companies. As the audio supplier for event production company SRCOM, the Mac Audio team has considerable experience of large-scale events on Copacabana's 2.5 mile beach, but this was the first time they had used their new DiGiCo consoles.

"We invested in the SD7 because of its sound quality and dual engine redundancy," says t

UK - PLASA London 2013 saw the launch of the new Compulite Vibe lighting console. Vibe is billed as a completely new concept in lighting control integrating conventional buttons and wheels with an innovative and dynamic touch screen based graphical user interface incorporating the latest computer and touch screen technology in an ergonomic and adjustable control surface.

Vibe has the minimum amount physical buttons with the touch screen environment giving the user the flexibility to layout his desktop exactly how he wants it with buttons, display windows and playbacks wherever he wants them. Different desktops can be configured for different parts of the show or for different users. There are no theoretical limits to the number of playbacks of desktop layouts, the user is not constrained by conventional physical hardware, and he can design his own control surface to suit the nee

USA - Harman Professional Division has confirmed the integration of Martin Professional US operations into its organization effective immediately.

The combining of Harman and Martin will result in operational efficiencies, including the closure of Martin's operations in Sunrise, Florida. The company will maintain a strong sales and product support presence in the Fort Lauderdale area and all staff from the facility have been offered positions within the Harman Professional organization, says the company.

"Today, we met with our team in Florida to announce our decision to integrate operations. This move will bring many long-term advantages to our customers and other stakeholders and will help sustain Martin's position as the industry's most innovative, best supported, best integrated lighting manufacturer," Brian Friborg, Harman Professional USA vice president of sale

UK - David Ferraz has joined the White Light sales team as sales product support, further expanding the after sales support available to customers and dealers of White Light Distribution products. Ferraz began working with White Light in July 2013 and is focused on providing support for White Light exclusive product lines. He will respond to technical enquiries, as well as delivering product training sessions and on-site demonstrations.

"We are always happy to expand our offering of services and support for our customers," said Peter Threadgold, director of sales for White Light. "This means customers have a direct line of support from their trusted supplier. They can deal with one company across several brands and products, which will be especially useful for customers in our dealer network. Adding David as dedicated product support means we can continue to deliv

UK - Vaughan Sound Installations (t/a The PAI Group of Companies) has appointed Jeremy Eustace to the role of business development manager.

Eustace will work alongside the sales and business development team and is responsible for developing and nurturing new business across the UK, with a focus on expanding Vaughan Sound's reach across various markets.

A BSc Business Administration graduate, he brings with him a wealth of experience in the AV industry, having spent the previous five years as a BDM/Account Manager at Reflex, Reading.

Earlier in his career, Jeremy was an account manager at Roche Audio Visual of West Yorkshire for almost seven years, and spent a further year in AV/ICT Solutions and Service at Infacom, Newhaven.

(Jim Evans)

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