Germany - Rental companies, Bavaria-based Rain Age and North West Rheinland's Go Audio Rental, have augmented their inventories with Midas PRO6 live audio systems purchased from Midas' German distributor Mega Audio.

"We have been long standing Midas fans since first using the XL200 and XL250," says Rain Age managing director Pascal John. "We still have two H3000s on our books and now we are delighted to invest in Midas digital."

Rain Age head of audio and lighting, Martin Heining, has been eager to acquire a PRO6 since first seeing one at Midas' Kidderminster factory in 2008. "It didn't even have a name then," he says, "but I knew it was the future.

"In our opinion," Heining continues, "the PRO6 will become a worldwide audio standard. Rain Age provides high class audio, and we wanted to be one of the first German rental compa

USA - RTS Intercom Systems (a brand of Bosch Security Systems) reports that it will receive two awards at the upcoming National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS) 62nd Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Awards.

RTS, who received their first Technology & Engineering EmmyAward in 1989, will receive the new awards at a ceremony to be held on Thursday, 6 January at the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

Launched in 1948, The Technology and Engineering Emmy Awards honour development and innovation in broadcast technology and recognise companies, organisations, and individuals for breakthroughs in technology that have a significant effect on television engineering.

"We are absolutely thrilled to be recognised at this highest level by our industry colleagues," says Ralph Strader, business line manager for Telex & RTS Intercom. &q

UK - The Reproduced Sound 2010 conference (or RS26) will take place 18 - 19 November at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff, around 2 hours by train from London and easily reached from Heathrow. The conference will concentrate on design-team challenges and the interdisciplinary approach necessary to successfully integrate highly specialised design services into a fully ambitious project. The design team Principles will be on board, along with a great range of contributors and activities.

Highlights include of the event will include:

- Key note paper from Leo Beranek

- Paper from Jonathan Adams, the Architect of the Wales Millennium Centre

- Paper from Jeremy Newton, the Acoustic Consultant

- Gareth Fry on designing sound for the theatre

- Trevor Cox on "Sonic Wonders of the World"

- An intimate performance of Beethoven's Piano Concert No. 5, played by co

USA - The Touring Company Store is a new retail concept in the SoHo area of Manhattan. It's a retail store selling indie designers products in addition to some conventional fare in an environment that looks and feels like the backstage of a concert area. It is also "an advocate of independent designers, musicians, artists, filmmakers, and all other forms of independent self expression". The store management recently selected a sound reinforcement system from D.A.S. Audio.

Luis Lojo, an independent sound engineer and system designer based in the New York area, was contracted to design and install the store's new loudspeaker setup. After reviewing products from a variety of manufacturers, Lojo and the Touring Company Store management ultimately selected a system drawn primarily from D.A.S. Audio's Variant catalogue.

The new sound reinforcement system consists of six Va

UK - Bandit UK CE Lester Cobrin and the team in Bedford have had their hands full with some major events of late. The 2010 Horse of the Year Show, The 2010 Alternative Hair Show and UFC 120 were all on the schedule.

The Horse of the Year Show is Europe's largest annual celebration of equine events. It has been an annual event since 1949 and in 2002 it moved to the NEC Arena, Birmingham.

Nadia Raibin of The Production Team engaged lighting designer Ben Fox and Bandit to supply this event. The assorted kit chosen by Fox included hundreds of 1K flood fixtures, four light units, MAC 2000 Profiles, MAC 2000 Washes, VL 3000 Spots, Source 4 lekos, Pixel PAR's, Avolites dimming and Whole Hog 2 consoles. The primary console operator was Mark Strange, while crew chief Peter Parchment along with staff Steve "Ruslig, Mez Storrod, Benet Parchment and Vic St

USA / UK - Fans racing to be among the first visitors to the new NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte, North Carolina will discover cutting-edge AV technology supporting the interactive motor sports attraction. Working with an aggressive schedule, Electrosonic provided AV systems for the Belk High Octane Theatre and more than 100 exhibits as well as interior and exterior giant video displays and supporting sound systems.

The 150,000 sq.ft NASCAR Hall of Fame opened in May to commemorate the history and heritage of NASCAR. Designed to educate and entertain race fans and non-fans alike, it features numerous interactive exhibits, artefacts, a Hall of Honour, 278-seat Belk High Octane Theatre and NASCAR Media Group-operated broadcast studio.

The Electrosonic contribution to the NASCAR Hall of Fame helps bring fans closer to the sights and sounds of the sport from the Belk High Octane

Germany - Professional loudspeaker systems manufacturer Fohhn Audio will show its Linea Focus electronically steerable, active line array systems at the 26th Tonmeistertagung in Leipzig's Congress Centre (25-28 November).

Since its launch in 2009, the Linea Focus series has proved popular for both mobile and fixed installation applications, particularly in environments with challenging acoustics. The design of the loudspeakers enables their vertical sound dispersion characteristics to be directed towards specific audience areas and remotely controlled in real time, from a central location, without any need to mechanically alter the speaker's position.

The Linea Focus family currently includes four models ranging from the LFI-120 with 8 high-performance speakers, 8 separate amplifiers and DSP processors, through to its top-of-the-range 4.5 metre LFI-450 featuring 32 speakers, 3

UK - Software provider Stardraw.com has announced a number of new features that have recently been added to the software-based system control platform, Stardraw Control 2010.

Project Templates are a selection of pre-configured, pre-programmed projects that are bundled with the Stardraw Control 2010 authoring tool. Each template represents a typical system type, e.g. boardroom, classroom, automated home, and contains the devices, their functions and a sophisticated user interface that is completely pre-programmed and fully-functional. At the same time, each Project Template is fully customizable, meaning that a system integrator can produce a complete control system front- (and back-) end, specific to a particular project, in minutes.

Critical to this is the addition of the next new feature, Driver Substitution, which enables you quite simply to drag a new driver from Stardraw

Germany - At the 26th Tonmeistertagung in the Congress Center Leipzig, Kling & Freitag is presenting "a complete reproduction chain for the three-dimensional world of sound". The loudspeaker manufacturer will be exhibiting alongside ATec and Sonic Wave.

"We would like to invite all interested parties to our common demo-booth to feel today's possibilities of three-dimensional sound. We think that the applied techniques are very exciting, the proposed solution is highly interesting from the economic point of view, and for this we want to open these technologies to a larger number of users", said Stefan Lenke, head of sales of Kling & Freitag.

(Jim Evans)

Germany - On behalf of technical solution provider Neumann & Müller, LOBO recently staged the presentation of BMW's latest sports car. The vehicle was illuminated with two of LOBO's multi-awarded 'sparks' laser systems - "probably the world's brightest multi-colour laser systems today," says the company.

LOBO president Mr. Bopp comments: "The decisive criteria for applying the new 'sparks' laser technology was its incredible efficiency and eco-friendliness which can indeed match the ecological aspects of the presented product. Thanks to our innovative optical system, we do achieve an extreme brightness at a maximum power consumption of not more than 600 Watts. This corresponds to roughly 1 % of the power consumption of large-frame lasers just two years ago. So, in fact we turned lasers from electricity hogs to one of the most eco-friendly solutions in the enterta

India / UK - Navigator Systems, authors of the award winning rental management software, HireTrack Eclipse reports that they have extended their customer base to India, selling their software to Mumbai based Sound.com.

With nearly 1,000 different companies worldwide using HireTrack Eclipse, Navigator Systems, has been aware of the growing Indian professional production market, seeking a company like sound.com to help open up the market.

Director David Rose comments, "We are is delighted that this leading provider of professional concert sound and audio systems has recognised the reliability, robustness and ease of use of HireTrack Eclipse."

As well as being at the forefront of technology, Navigator Systems maintains its corporate responsibility with its'keep green' policy by regularly demonstrating their software over the internet using remote viewing systems and p

UK - King's Lynn Corn Exchange now offers one of the UK's first installations of the new EVA Series line array cabinets, teamed with EV's Tour Grade power amplifiers running on the IRIS-Net platform, a system designed and installed by Nottingham's OneBigStar in consultation with Shuttlesound.

The Corn Exchange auditorium can house nearly 750 people theatre-style, although its flexible seating clears away to reveal a large open space which can accommodate 1200 standing, Such versatility lends itself to a wide range of events, from classical concerts to conferences and stand-up comedy, so the system spec needed to be equally flexible.

"The EVA cabinet runs down to around 50Hz, so, when the theatre has a comedian on stage, the subs can be left in the stockroom," explains Shuttlesound's Neal Allen, who worked closely on the system design. He also describes the way in whi

Germany - The Nürburgring motor-racing circuit recently added RingWerk, a new indoor visitor centre, to their range of facilities - and turned to White Light to supply and install the complete lighting system for the building's displays and interactive exhibits throughout the 15,000sq.m space.

The lighting for the project was designed by noted concert and event lighting designer Durham Marenghi, whose other work ranges from the opening of London St Pancras Station to the London 2012 Handover at the Beijing Olympics, through his architectural design firm Lumitect. White Light was selected to realise his design by Nürburgring and their project manager Philip Hartley of PHA for its ability to bring an experienced theatrical eye to the project while attending to the practicalities of installing and programming the lighting, dimming, infrastructure and control systems.

"The

USA - London UK based projection and lighting artist Ross Ashton designed artwork and a large format projection system to illuminate the front portals and entrance of the New York Public Library on 5th Avenue to highlight the opening of the Library's new exhibition, Three Faiths: Judaism, Christianity, Islam which runs until February 2011.

Ashton was commissioned to produce the work - which ran for a week - by the Coexist Foundation, a major sponsor of the exhibition, which hopes to inspire greater understanding about what it means to be Jewish, Christian and Muslim today.

It's the first time that Ashton's creative skills have been aired in New York City, and follows on from his recent very successful installations as the main artist for the 2010 Pittsburgh Festival of Light.

The 40m wide by 22m tall projections were beamed onto the building by three 7Kw PIGI p

India - Norwest Productions first came to international attention a decade ago when they supplied the audio requirements for the Sydney Olympic Games Ceremonies. Since then they have earned the reputation as a world leader in successfully tackling the audio requirements of large scale stadium shows racking up successful events such as two of the three Summer Olympics, both Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games in Doha.

This year alone they have done the Vancouver Winter Olympics, Singapore Youth Olympics and now the Commonwealth Games Delhi. "The worldwide event fraternity knows that Norwest are not only easy and fun to work with, they ensure that nothing goes wrong and that nothing is a problem for them," says the company.

For the Commonweath Games, Norwest teamed with a regional, Mumbai-based sound production company Sound.com to supply the entire audio package an

USA - Audio-Technica is celebrating its 17th year of supporting the Country Music Association (CMA) Awards by providing an extensive selection of vocal and instrument microphones for its annual awards show.

The 44th Annual CMA Awards aired live in 5.1-channel surround sound Wednesday, 10 November, on the ABC Television Network from the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, and featured over 200 Audio-Technica microphones, including an impressive array of hard-wired mics and Artist Elite 5000 Series UHF Wireless Systems.

The team responsible for the audio at this year's CMA's again included a who's who of broadcast audio. The audio was supervised by award-winning audio producers Michael Abbott and Tom Davis; ATK/Audiotek provided the sound system with FOH (front-of-house) mixers Patrick Baltzell and Rick Shimer; the broadcast music mix was handled by New Jersey/California-based Music

USA - Comics Come Home, America's longest-running comedy benefit show, returned to Boston's Agannis Arena on 13 November 2010. An annual fundraising event for the Cam Neely Foundation for Cancer Care, Comics Come Home was once again be delivered through an all-Meyer Sound system provided by Rainbow Productions Services / New England Audio Tech of Atkinson, N.H.

This year's edition, hosted as always by Boston-area native Denis Leary, also featured performances by Jim Norton, Pete Correale, Thomas Dale, Lenny Clarke, Joe Yannetty, and other surprise guests.

The primary challenge for Scott Tkachuk, audio designer and touring operations director for Rainbow, was to create the illusion of an intimate comedy club in a reverberant 7,000-seat arena. To accomplish the feat, Tkachuk and Seth Hager, systems tech, deployed dual hangs of 12-each Meyer Sound Milo line array lo

UAE - Nicolas Kyvernitis Electronics Enterprises (NMK), distributors of Roland Systems Group (RSG) in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and the United Arab Emirates have recently hosted a launch event and training workshop over a two-day period.

The occasion was the first official event to mark the presence of Roland Systems Group in the Middle East and allowed attendees to understand the business philosophy of the company, its strategic plans for the region and its current product line-up. Attendees to the event included professionals from various market segments that include install, live and broadcast.

RSG's Middle East business operation is supervised from Barcelona, Spain, where Roland Systems Group EMEA has its headquarters.

"It was good to see both current and new customers at both our launch event and training workshop," commented Richie Hiranandani, marketing m

South Africa - Anolis ArcSource 3 RGB LED fixtures and an Anolis ArcControl 1024 have been supplied by Anolis' South African Distributors DWR to Montecasino in Fourways, Johannesburg. The LED fixtures are set up in the 'pit' area where the gaming tables are situated.

Declan Randall from Congo Blue worked closely with Montecasino's David Butcher to come up with an appropriate lighting design. Montecasino is a popular Tuscan/Italian styled entertainment and casino destination in Johannesburg. Pillars with wooden beams and greenery form part of the décor in the pit area, creating a vineyard feel, and Randall opted to illuminate the pillars with an LED solution.

The brief was to create a lighting scheme to enhance the area around Pit 1 and attract people's attention as they walked past, without simultaneously distracting the players.

Using the existing pillars as the foca

Canada - Corus Entertainment's eight-story LEED Gold-certified Corus Quay building in Toronto consolidates operations from 11 locations, including three radio stations and 24 television services, and brings together 1,100 Toronto-area employees. Touted as North America's most advanced broadcast facility, Corus Quay features a fully integrated digital infrastructure for broadcast and digital content creation. The system integration for the broadcast facility was handled by The Systems Group of Hoboken, NJ, who contracted Bexel to provide its wireless engineering expertise.

With six Telex BTR-80N wireless base stations, each with 24 TR-82N dual-channel belt packs in operation for the new facility working in conjunction with 20 wireless microphones and 16 wireless IFB systems throughout the space, Bexel's Distributed Antenna System allows maximum coverage facility wide.

"Wir

Latin America - Grammy Award winning Spanish pop icon David Bisbal became a household name both in his home country and in South America after he achieved the runner up position in television talent contest Operación Triunfo - the Spanish version of the UK's Pop Idol - in 2001. For the Latin American leg of his latest tour Sin Mar Atras, which took in a number of the summer's festivals along the way, a DiGiCo SD9 digital mixing console, supplied by DiGiCo's Spanish distributor Meyer Sound España, was included in the audio inventory.

Having used DiGiCo D5s and then an SD8 on previous tours, monitor engineer Alberto Liras decided to swap to the SD9, the smallest console currently in DiGiCo's product line, for a variety of reasons.

"The SD9 I am touring with is configured with just one rack of 32 channels and 16 outputs," says Liras. "I am also usin

USA - Country star Jason Aldean has worked with Bandit Lites since he started touring. Bandit VP Michael Golden handles the account, working with manger Clarence Spalding, tour manager Tim McCormick, production manager John Fritz and lighting director Aaron Swetland.

Throughout 2010, the lighting system has grown, as have the crowds. Along the way, Aldean's new album My Kinda Party has outsold every other country album this year.

Swetland works with moving trusses carrying MAC 2000 Washes and Spots, GRN Washes, Atomic Strobes and Jarags. His console is a Grand MA. The system also carries a number of video panels and the trusses perform scissor moves so that there are multiple looks throughout the evening.

(Jim Evans)

UK - A.C. Special Projects has provided a studio lighting ceiling track system for a new photographic studio at the UK headquarters of Martin-Baker, the long established manufacturer of aircraft ejection seats and related safety equipment.

With headquarters in Buckinghamshire and locations in France, Italy and the United States, Martin-Baker hasestablished extensive modern facilities and specialist engineering capabilities to ensure the highest standards of product quality and safety.

Continuing this investment in its facilities, Martin-Baker decided it was time to replace their existing product photography room with a modern studio lighting system.

The company approached A.C. Special Projects to supply and install an IFF Advanced Rigging studio lighting ceiling track system to enable easy manoeuvre and setting of suspended lights above the studio floor when taking 360°

USA - When a band tours with a stage show that routinely features confetti cannons, dozens of people dressed as furry animals, a man-sized plastic bubble and other giant props, it should come as no surprise that some of its audio equipment is a little out of the ordinary. For the band's latest tour, psychedelic rock band the Flaming Lips requested a monitor speaker system that included 10 EAW MicroWedge Series MW15 stage monitors and two MicroSub stage monitors custom-finished in bright orange, allowing them to fit in with the onstage mayhem.

The MicroWedge was co-developed by EAW and Dave Rat, owner of Rat Sound. According to the band's monitor engineer, Sam Cole, "I couldn't be happier about mixing on the MicroWedges; they're loud, punchy and crisp and don't require a ton of EQ to get that way. Plus, they don't break my back when I try and carry two of them across a festi

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