UK - Llanelli-based Vaughan Sound Installations (VSI) in conjunction with loudspeaker manufacturer Community UK and the Welsh Rugby Union (WRU) has recently completed a major refurbishment of the audio system at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff.

The new system vastly improves the audio quality, intelligibility and coverage and integrates with the stadium's life safety systems in the eventuality of an emergency evacuation.

VSI has completed a number of stadium audio installations. Specifically in Wales, audio systems have been installed at Llanelli RFC's Parc y Scarlets stadium and the Cardiff SWALEC stadium.

Along with the new audio system, the Millennium Stadium has undergone major technological improvements over the summer carried out by the technology services company CAE. This includes the installation of two 90sq.m LED big screens for each end of the pitch and over 400 h

China - Wireless Solution Sweden helped celebrate the 16th Asian Games, which took place in Guangzhou, China, 12-27 November. The lavish, multi-media Grand Opening (complete with a fireworks spectacle) was held outside Guangzhou's main stadium for the first time at Haixinsha Island on the Pearl River and drew more than a reported 3m spectators.

The Asian Games, held every four years, are the second largest sports event in the world after the Summer Olympic Games. Guangzhou is the second Chinese city to host an Asian Games following Beijing in 1990. A record number of nearly 14,000 athletes from 45 countries and regions participated in 476 gold medal events in 42 sports.

The organizer and director of the opening ceremony, Chen Weiya explained that the ceremony was designed to include a conventional light show, a pyrotechnics display, plus a show that Chen described as a "k

Ireland - EQ Lighting were the main Lighting provider for the Dublin and Cork Studio venues at this year's Arthur's Day. The studios designed by Eugene O'Connor DOP and project managed for EQ Lighting by Rob Jones and Garrett Hanley, were the first outing for their newly purchased Clay Paky Alpha Spot 700, Alpha Wash 700 and Alpha Beam 700. Units were in use at four Dublin venues including Vicar St and The Academy and in The Savoy, Cork.

Alpha Beam 700s were also supplied to the Hop House at St James Gate Brewery for the main show. Arthur's day is a global televised event, seen by a worldwide audience and featured such acts as Snow Patrol and Paolo Nutini.

The various studio venue lighting directors had great praise for the Alpha 700 range and the units worked flawlessly throughout the week. Production for the studio venues was handled by EQ Audio and Events.

Garrett Hanley,

USA - Tomcat reports that registration is now open for the 2011 Hoist & Rigging workshops on 16-19 February in Midland, Texas. A team of instructors has been assembled to deliver the Hoist & Truss workshop and the Rigging & Truss workshop. This ETCP recognized training programme will provide a hands-on-learning experience for participants interested in receiving both basic and advanced training in their area of specialisation - hoist or rigging.

"With the Hoist & Rigging workshops, Tomcat has established a reputation as a worldwide leader in safety training. The curriculum is regularly enriched in response to the changing needs of the industry as well as the feedback provided by participants," stated Tomcat's instructor Will Todd.

The hoist segment of the Hoist and Truss workshop features complete teardown and rebuild of a one ton Lodestar and a quarter-ton Prostar.

UK - As part of a scheme to upgrade and expand its existing campus facilities, which began in 2000, the University of York has recently opened the new Theatre, Film & Television Building for students planning to enter the world of modern media.

According to the University's website, the Department of Theatre, Film and Television "offers a unique multi-disciplinary environment in which stage and screen are explored from artistic, scientific, theoretical and historical perspectives".

The Department's new building, which was completed in October 2010, provides electronic, media and performance facilities, including a scenic stage theatre, black box theatre, screening room, research and training areas, TV studios with audio and editing suites and ancillary teaching accommodation.

Bam Construction approached Delstar Engineering to manufacture and install a 10-axis hoist

China - During November, Haixinsa Island, Guangzhou, played host to two spectacular events - the opening and closing ceremonies for the 16th Asian Games.

PR Lighting was entrusted with the responsibility of presenting the festival of lighting which illuminated the event.

During the preparation of the Asian Games, General Director Weiya Chen stated that, "The ceremonies should not only be elegant, creative and unique, but also be multi-dimensional, and provide an all-encompassing festival of artistry and culture." And professional lighting effects were the critical factor in realising this ambition.

"Light is the soul of the stage. Without lighting, the stage will have no vitality or vigour. The PR Lighting moving heads contributed enormously to the high impact," said Xiaolan Sha, general lighting designer for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, who was also i

Japan - Audio-Technica has opened the doors on a new facility, Technica Fukui. Located in Echizen City, Fukuoka Prefecture, Technica Fukui integrates the three pre-existing A-T Fukuoka branches into one location, consolidating and streamlining design efforts with increased collaboration among A-T's global design teams, says the company.

The new facility is equipped with a dedicated acoustic lab and an advanced-design anechoic chamber specially designed for audio testing. An emphasis has been placed on further advancing wireless technologies with research and product development.

Technica Fukui is designed to streamline Audio-Technica's product development process with emphasis on innovation, accuracy and efficiency. Investments in the latest wireless communication measurement tools will allow A-T to create wireless products for both professional and consumer markets that will

Switzerland - TiMax Tracker and TiMax2 SoundHub audio showcontrol systems from UK developer, Out Board, have been in constant demand for the outdoor theatrical events becoming ever more popular across Europe. Two such events in the 2010 season were Anna's Carnifex - the story of Switzerland's last witchhunt of Anna Goldi the witch by Carnifex the witchhunter - and Dallebach Kari, a musical of the classic film which signalled the beginning of German-speaking new Swiss cinema.

Tom Strebel and his Basel-based sound design and consulting company audiopool were behind both events.

The Dallebach Kari opus was staged at Thunersee, where every year a large stage is built upon the beautiful lake of this, one of Switzerland's largest cities. Strebel employed the TiMax SoundHub not only to apply its delay-matrix localisation capabilities to the radio mics, but also f

UK - PASMA and the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) are warning users of low level access products such as podium steps and folding room scaffolds to make sure that the equipment they have bought, or hired, meets at least the minimum standards of fall protection.

The warning follows increased concern about cheap, inferior products now flooding the UK market, especially in the construction sector, which offer limited protection to users by not having an adequate guardrail system fitted as standard.

Since 2004, industry estimates suggest that some 50,000 of these work at height tools have been sold in the UK and Ireland and are most widely used in the construction industry by a multitude of finishing trades.

Comments PASMA's managing director, Peter Bennett, "In theory, these products provide a compact, lightweight and protected work platform that represents a safe metho

UK - December sees the opening of a new Covent Garden venue, the fourth in central London owned and operated by the growing cocktail chain - Adventure Bar & Lounge. Light Bureau have provided architectural lighting design to the 160sq.m subterranean basement bar in Bedford Street close to the piazza.

Working closely with interior designer, Sophie Hibberd, Light Bureau produced a dramatic solution relying on some simple theatrical techniques whilst producing comfortable lighting to booths for customers to relax and drink.

This is quite an achievement as Light Bureau director Paul Nulty explains: "The key to the success of the bar lighting has been to keep it simple, the budget for lighting was very tight, the total expenditure on lighting, including controls is just £4,000.00 so we had to be very creative with some of the details and resourceful with regards specific

UK - Currently on an extensive tour to promote her debut, eponymously-titled album, Eliza Doolittle is playing a range of territories including Europe, the USA and Australia. A recent UK headline tour, followed by a prestigious support slot to Paloma Faith, has also helped to raise her profile in her home country.

Tour manager and Front of House engineer Jim Carmichael is a long-term Sennheiser user and a self-confessed fan of the 900 series. Currently, Eliza is using an e965 wireless microphone and G3 IEMs, with her band using wired e935 mics.

Touring takes its toll on equipment, especially when you're on a tight budget. "As well as providing good audio quality and signal strength, the Sennheiser equipment is extremely rugged and reliable," says Carmichael. "The company's backup is also excellent - I've never had a single problem that hasn't been solved with a

Europe - As Deep Purple continue their tour through Germany and France, their long-serving FOH engineer Gert Sanner has transferred his show mix from his Soundcraft Vi6 digital console to the smaller footprint of the new Vi1.

An early adopter of the Vi6 (since when he has regularly provided technical support to sales and rental company, SSE Group), Sanner was keen to move his show files to the Vi1 and prove the process in a real-world environment.

"The purpose was to create show files that would work on any Vi console," he stated, with the end goal of purchasing a Vi1 for the band.

Having now completed his rigorous trials, the FOH engineer declares that he has been able to tick every box. "It was important to be sure that the Vi1 would work on the road and to discover whether there were any compatibility issues or areas for improvement. I did this by demoing i

UK - The annual Prince's Trust Concert at London's Royal Albert Hall and lighting designer Simon Tutchener called on Bandit Lites and CE Lester Cobrin to supply the illumination needs for the 2010 event. Since 1976, this event is one of the premier happenings in the music world, raising money to assist the young jobless people in the UK. The show has long been an attraction to the best of the best and this year was no exception.

Brian May and Roger Taylor of Queen, Eric Clapton, Status Quo, Phil Collins, Mike and the Mechanics, Jamie Cullum, Tom Jones, Alison Moyet, Midge Ure, Tom Chaplin and others served up an evening of memorable performances to the royal couple, Prince Charles and Camilla. The evening has hosted by Dame Edna Everage and Rob Brydon. The event was run by production manager Kevin Hopgood.

Tutchener used Martin MAC 2000 Washes, MAC 2000 Profiles, ETC Source 4

USA - NAMM has announced the education session schedule for this year's Hands-On Training (H.O.T) Zone at the 2011 NAMM Show, offering the broadest educational experience for professionals in the recording, live sound, DJ, house of worship, commercial systems integrators, and stage and lighting industries in the history of the show.

The H.O.T. Zone will offer attendees free one-hour classes on more than 75 educational topics over four days, including topics such as Introduction to Live Mixing New Techniques for DJs, Lead Worshipers Arise The Future of Music, and Pro Tools 101". On 13 January, 2011, the opening day of the NAMM Show, the H.O.T. Zone will be offering Boot Camp Day with an array of basic courses designed to provide foundation-level instruction in music technology and business.

USA - ESTA has started work on a new project to write an American National Standard: BSR E1.42 - 201x, Entertainment Technology - Installed Stage Lift Safety Standard.

Stage lifts, such as orchestra pit or theatre forestage lifts, are not the subject of any current national standard. As a result, safety requirements and inspections of them are inconsistent. This project is to develop a standard for stage lifts that can be referenced by the International Code Council and the National Fire Protection Association.

The scope is limited to safety and to lifts that are installed as a part of the building and that are not for a single theatrical production. Any person involved in the design, manufacture, use, or inspection of stage lifts and who is willing to actively work on the project is invited to join the new working group.

A working group application form is available on the

USA - Usher's current OMG Tour, his first big-budget spectacle since 2004, is lit by lighting designer Peter Morris and associate lighting designer Eric Wade. "We had to design around a lot of fly gags and moving set pieces," notes Wade who heads FOHShow, a lighting- services company. "The rig is designed to look big but not be completely massive; it's large but not over the top. It fills two trucks and features between 160-200 fixtures."

Wade is using a grandMA2 and comments, "I love the grandMA2 because you can pretty much programme it however you're comfortable programming: Nothing is set in stone. It does everything the way I'm used to working but with lots more bells and whistles. And the networking is amazing; I had Benny Kirkham come out and help me programme, and we worked simultaneously with him setting up his desk exactly the way he wanted whil

UK - Lighting rental company HSL is supplying lighting kit and crew for the Foals Total Life Forever tour which covers the UK and Europe.

Lighting designer Davy Sherwin has put together a show based around a design that makes the rig appear vastly bigger than it actually is.

The project is being handled by Mike Oates for HSL, who says, "It's always great working with Davy - he is one of the most talented of the UK's current new wave of LDs."

The full rig contains a front and back truss plus a substantial floor package, the latter of which will travel to Europe with them where they will hook in to house rigs overhead.

Four different length tank traps come down as drop arms from the back truss, and another five come up from the stage underneath, with one GLP Impression LED wash light on the down pipes and two on each of the up pipes. Another two Impressions

UK - Ateis UK has appointed York-based Tukans as sole distributor to handle its ECS-Teleconference range.

ECS (Echo Cancellation System) was launched at the beginning of 2010 and is designed to produce clear audio for teleconference work, with no delays or doubletalk. The product is based on a digital signal processor using Dynamic Automatic Echo Cancellation, which uses a wideband acoustic echo cancelling algorithm developed by Ateis engineers.

While ECS is aimed at the conference market in general Ateis is also looking to move into the boardroom and specialised commerce sectors. The ECS range has a modular configuration and comprehensive signal processing replacing the function of many ancillary products, making it cost effective and easy to maintain.

Tukans director Yvonne Womersley comments: "The financial sector has embraced conferencing technology and we are sure

UK - LMC Audio has sold the very first Midas PRO3 live audio system to Rambert Dance Company. Rambert's front of house engineer, Tomás O'Connor, who made the decision to purchase the desk alongside sound designer David Tinson, was keen to invest in a desk that "combines quality and flexibility".

O'Connor comments: "Rambert wanted to spend wisely on a desk that could fulfil the demands of the company's increasingly complex show pieces. Our main goal was to find a desk that had all the flexibility and features of a digital desk, but with the usability and great sound quality of an analogue desk. After a lot of research, the Midas Pro series was the only desk that met our requirements."

JP Cavaco, sales manager at LMC London, made the sale to Rambert.

O'Connor notes: "When I joined Rambert, I was aware of a long history between the sound department her

UK - Showsec's London Office successfully implemented a complex event security operation at Earls Court for the British Military Tournament.

VIP Royal guests and senior military officials were among 56,000 visitors attending the return of Britain's oldest military tattoo, on 4 and 5 December. Over 500 troops and 145 horses appeared in two performances per day, featuring the ever-popular field gun run, massed bands and battle re-enactments.

IMG's operations director Nick Mattingley who managed the event production, states, "Showsec were seamless from beginning to end. Their venue knowledge and experience was second to none, particularly for directing crowds and performers around Earls Court, we were reliant on them to deliver - and they did very well.

"There is a momentum for us to capitalise on this years' success and come back next year, so we will open discussion

UK - Production Light and Sound, a leading UK live events production company, has announced the acquisition of 14 Robe Robin 600 spotlights, making them one of the first businesses in the UK to stock and deploy this new technology. This investment is just part of a major overhaul of Production Light and Sound's inventory, as they scale up operations to meet the increased demands of larger projects.

Jason Salvin, director of Production Light and Sound explained why credit provided by Azule Finance was so vital: "Having pitched and won a series of large scale events contracts we needed to rapidly grow our business. In the fast paced events production industry, it's critical that we remain at the cutting edge of new technology developments, to ensure that are services are the best in the industry. Thankfully, Azule Finance, who came highly recommended by Robe, was able to prov

UK - The current Kings of Leon world tour features an innovative design by LD Paul Normandale with all lighting controlled by a grandMA full-size console. The lighting is being operated and looked after on the road by director Ali Bale - using a grandMA for the first time. Another grandMA light is being supplied by XL Video to run the Catalyst media server playing back video content.

Normandale has worked with the band since 2004. The conceptual look of the latest show features a large and battered, messed-up looking back wall made up of 640 PAR, nook and raylite fixtures, an idea that came to Normandale because the band like fast cars, so the wall of lights resembles a giant metallic wall of retro headlights in a tribute to American muscle car culture. He also wanted to have a complete departure from a large or dominant video screen or wall at the back.

The 640 'headlights' a

Germany - The new EAW KF740 Three-Way Full-Range Line Array module recently made its German debut at a historic concert in Berlin that featured one of the best-known oratory works by Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis. Berlin-based Hacksound Veranstaltungstechnik provided the multi-zone PA system, comprising all EAW speakers powered by Lab.gruppen amplification, for the performance of Canto General at the Max Schmeling Hall.

Hacksound supplied a main left/right flown system composed of nine KF740 speakers plus two KF730 Compact Line Array Modules, for down-fill, per side. A dozen additional KF730 speakers, in two hangs of six, provided out-fill to the audience on either side of the stage. Five more KF730s were positioned to provide front-fill. Three hangs each of six KF730 speakers, plus a pair of SB730 Compact Line Array Subwoofers, were employed for left, centre and right

UK - The very first batch of the new Robe Robin LEDWash 600 LED Wash fixtures off the production line in the Czech Republic were delivered to UK lighting rental company HSL, with 40 of them going straight out on JLS's UK arena tour, specified by lighting designer Dave Lee.

JLS' career kicking off after being runners up on the 2008 X-Factor talent show. Since then they have sold 1.3m albums worldwide - including their new and second studio release Outta This World.

The show for this, their second major tour, has been created by artistic director Beth Honan with a set and stage design by Peter Barnes, with all the technical production co-ordinated by Production North, overseen on the road by production manager Karen Ringland.

When Dave Lee was choosing his fixtures, he specifically needed some very bright and lightweight units to do certain jobs. When HSL's proje

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