South Africa - Protea Court is the newly opened extension to South Africa's "most desirable and glamorous retail destination" - Sandton City in Johannesburg.

It features the first architectural lighting installation of its kind in South Africa, designed by Paul Pamboukian and senior lighting designer Joao Viegas of Paul Pamboukian Lighting Design (PPLD), with 115 Anolis ArcPad 48 and 12 ArcSource 96 fixtures used to highlight the spectacular 34m high, 42m diameter, 11 degree sloping roof structure and its ETFE inflatable skin.

These were supplied by Anolis' South African distributor DWR, who also undertook the installation and commissioning of the lighting system. DWR's team of three installation technicians all completed full Rope Access and Working at Height safety courses before starting on site, with approximately 70% of the Anolis fixtures needing to be rigged e

UK - London- based Entec Sound & Light supplied lighting, sound and video production and crew for the recent Friends of the Earth's star studded comedy extravaganza at the HMV Hammersmith Apollo, Laugh or the Polar Bear Gets It.

The line up of eight comedians, one singer and one larger than life polar bear's head set-piece featured Tim Minchin, Josie Long, Badly Drawn Boy and Richard Herring and was presented by Greg Davies. The venue was completely sold out as all united in an evening of hilarity and arctic proportions.

Laughing all the way to the lighting desk was Entec's Ryan Brown, who created a production lighting design for the evening - which resembled a festival in style and execution.

His aim was to compliment the main set piece, a giant polystyrene polar bear's head, so to connect this to its immediate environment, he imbibed the stage with an arctic ambienc

UAE - Nicolas Kyvernitis Electronics Enterprises, distributors of Shure microphones and audio electronics in the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar and Oman have supplied Showtech Rentals based in Dubai with 12 channels of the new PSM 1000 In Ear Monitoring system from Shure. The deal includes six units of the brand new P10T and 12 units of the new P10R together with the SE535-CL in-ear earphone.

"Shure have made great improvements in the In Ear Monitoring product segment that include the new PSM 1000 that give users an amazing 40 compatible frequencies per band in tour-ready build quality," commented Shajahan K K, Shure product manager. "The diversity receiver also makes sure that the artist will never experience any kind of audio drops or interference, which is especially crucial in large budget shows."

(Jim Evans)

UAE - Melody House, distributors of DPA microphones in the United Arab Emirates have recently supplied a range of the 4099 instrument microphones to Sharp Eye Productions. The relatively new rental firm decided to invest in the 4099 microphones from DPA as they offered "complete flexibility for their variety of shows, which include small-to-medium concerts to corporate events".

"The 4099s are clearly the industry standard microphones for violins, sax, trumpet and other wind instruments," commented Dino Drimakis, business development manager at Melody House. "With the use of several kind of mounting clips, Sharp Eye will be able to use the microphone on almost every event making it a great investment. Plus with the microdot connector technology, they can use the microphone wirelessly with pretty much every kind of wireless transmitter out there."

(

UK - The nominations for the 12th annual WhatsOnStage.com Awards were announced on Friday 2 December - at a star-studded launch party at London's Café de Paris. As ever, the awards are the only UK theatre awards where nominees and winners are selected entirely by the theatre-going public. The nomination process saw a record 11,000 theatregoers involved in the online nomination process.

Entertainment lighting specialist White Light is ponsoring the Best Lighting Designer award for the fourth year running. The company congratulates the six nominated designers: Neil Austin (for Betty Blue Eyes), Paule Constable (for Luise Miller at the Donmar), Oliver Fenwick (for My City at the Almeida), Mark Henderson (for The Kitchen, 13, and Emperor and Galilean at the National),Bruno Poet (for Frankenstein at the National Theatre)

Russia - As part of a massive five-year renovation project that culminated in a star-studded opening ceremony last month, Moscow's premier playhouse, the Theatre of Nations, has been equipped with an APG loudspeaker system.

Designed, supplied and installed by Russian pro audio and lighting specialists, Doka Center, who also supplied the fully motorised lighting and staging systems, the main audio system is based around APG's versatile DS Series loudspeakers. Phase two of the renovation project, which is scheduled for early in 2012 and will include more APG equipment, will concentrate on the renovation of the theatre's smaller hall.

The Theatre of Nations is housed in the former Korsh theatre that was built in 1885 on land belonging to the millionaire Bakhrushin merchant family. The building was renamed after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. The reopening of the histor

Iceland - ARX Systems, the Australian based designer and manufacturer of digital and analogue interface and signal processing products has announced the appointment of Reykjavík based Northern Lights Audio as their new distributor for Iceland.

ARX managing director Colin Park said, "We're excited to be working with Thor Halldórsson and the NorthernLights Audio team in Iceland, they're enthusiastic about the possibilities for ARX and our products amongst their extensive client base.

"Northern Lights Audio are a growing force within the Icelandic ProAudio Industry and are in close contact with the Installation, live sound and broadcast market sectors.

"After more than 12 years servicing the professional audio industry, Northern Lights Audio now distribute product ranges including BeyerDynamic, LabGruppen, Cerwin Vega and Celestion Audio."

(Jim Evans)

UK - Hosted by Selena Gomez and with a show stopping performance by Lady Gaga, who walked away with multiple awards, 6 November saw the great and the good of the contemporary music industry descend on Belfast's Odyssey Arena for the 2011 MTV European Music Awards. Sennheiser radio equipment was in use by a number of the show's performers.

As in previous years, the live sound design for the show was by Derrick Zieba, with audio equipment for the performances supplied by Britannia Row Productions.

Actress and singer Selena Gomez used a 'custom bling' Sennheiser SKM 5200 mk II with a Neumann KK 105 capsule for her duties as the show's host; further SKM 5200 mk IIs and KK 105 combinations were used by those presenting the awards, including David Hasselhoff, Hayden Panettiere and Jessie J.

All show in-ear monitors were Sennheiser G3, G2 or 2000 series, while some of the highest p

Australia - Described by Australian press as "everything a rock show should be," Australian band Cold Chisel's Light the Nitro tour is playing dates across the country with lighting design by Francesco Calvi.

Because the tour is playing such a variety of venues - from large scale arenas to smaller amphitheatres, even circus tents - Calvi turned to Martin Professional's compact MAC 101 wash light as the base fixture in a versatile lighting design.

"We had serious weight restrictions in many venues, and truck space was also limited," Calvi says. "Because the 101s are so light I was able to go with lots of them and keep the rig the same across all venues."

Calvi uses 150 MAC 101s as the foundation of his design with fixtures on eight towers per side for cross lighting and on five finger trusses that move throughout the show, as well as on th

Super Star - Madonna is to perform during the interval at next year's Super Bowl, it has been confirmed. The singer will take to the stage at the game on Sunday 5 February at the Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. Her performance is expected to coincide with the release of her 12th studio album and she will collaborate with a team from Cirque du Soleil. Broadcast around the world, more than 162m viewers tuned into last year's half-time entertainment which featured Black Eyed Peas.

Parking Protest - Musicians and actors held a protest in London's West End against Westminster City Council's plans to extend parking charges in the borough. The new parking charges will target the area south of Oxford Street, including Theatreland, and will see a rate of £4.40 an hour charged all day on Fridays and Saturdays until midnight, and between 1pm and 6pm on Sundays. It will be t

UK - The UK government has more than doubled the budget available for the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Opening and Closing Ceremonies - from £40m to £81m.

The increase, which was announced in the latest London 2012 quarterly economic report by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), comes from the £9.3bn public purse, which is in theory meant for building, infrastructure and security, while the ceremonies is paid for from the privately-raised funds of the Organising Committee of the Olympic Games - money raised from the IOC, ticket sales and sponsorship.

In the DCMS report, Hugh Robertson MP, Minister for Sport and the Olympics, says: "The ceremonies for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games are a unique opportunity to portray a positive image of the UK to a huge potential global audience - an estimated 1 billion people watched the openi

Sweden / USA - LumenRadio has announced a new OEM partnership with Wizard Connection. The Orlando-based company is a manufacturer and provider of products and services ranging from the latest in green LED lighting systems to elaborate custom ice sculptures. Wizard Connection has integrated LumenRadio's CRMX OEM modules into its portable battery powered LED fixtures.

Suitable for special events, parties, and exhibitions the handy fixtures eliminate troublesome cabling and facilitate placement in difficult locations, says the company. The 9W unit, designed to run for a minimum of 10 hours on a single charge, features integral controls for colour, brightness, fades, and presets. A double yoke system functions as a floor stand or simply add a c-clamp to hang the fixture into the rig.

Richard Painter, director of sales at Wizard Connection says, "Partnering with LumenRadio was

Spain - The domed roof of La Esfera (The Sphere) is a distinctive feature of the city of Alcobendas, north of Madrid, Spain. Hosting a variety of live entertainment, a recent major upgrade of the venue has seen a Yamaha / Nexo digital audio system installed.

Half-funded by the European Regional Development Fund, the €650,000 project included new dressing rooms and public cloakrooms, upgraded entrance facilities, an improved electrical system, a higher stage and all-new stage lighting and sound.

The venue is almost constantly in use by performances which showcase a wide range of local, national and international culture, from rock concerts to folk music. This variety of use was a key factor in specifying a new system, as was the requirement that the front of house multicore be routed around the edge of the auditorium. With these in mind, equipment supplier and installer Milan

Czech Republic - The J.K. Tyl theatre in the Czech Republic city of Plzen (Pilsen) is one of the city's most historic cultural landmarks. Built in 1902, the impressive building honours the city's outstanding theatre tradition, which is second only to that of the capital, Prague. The theatre has recently benefitted from a significant audio system upgrade which has seen the installation of a new Innovason Eclipse GT digital mixing console and a sophisticated EtherSound digital audio network.

Muscdata, exclusive distributor in the Czech Republic for the Innovason brand, selected cable from German cable manufacturer, Sommer Cable as the backbone of the system with an AVM500-ES EtherSound network matrix from Auvitran which enabled star as well as daisy-chain connections. The AVM500 is connected to the control room via optical fibre.

The result is a completely flexible network which

Denmark - In October 2011, Legoland in Billund, Denmark, offered a variety of Halloween-themed activities, competitions and special shows. As part of the spooky fun, Legoland dressed up its King's Castle in Halloween-themed colours and graphics, including animated images from energy-efficient, LED-based Martin Professional Exterior 400 Image Projectors.

Projected onto the King's Castle's turrets were a variety of themed images - ghosts, skeletons, jack-o'-lanterns and bats - up to six images per luminaire with creative options such as image rotation, dynamic focus and dimming. The Exterior 400 Image Projector's interchangeable colour slots allowed each image to change colour up to eight times, adding a further dynamic element to the ghostly atmosphere.

At over 7000 lumens of power, the Exterior 400 Image Projector had no problem handling the 40m projection throws, and the fixt

Egypt - The Ballroom of the luxury Fairmont Towers Heliopolis, Cairo, features four spectacular chandeliers designed to evoke the living corals of the Red Sea. Designed by Maurice Brill Lighting Design and implemented by Artistic Licence Integration, the chandeliers provide highly versatile illumination for this2000-person capacity space.

Each chandelier is rectangular in shape, the largest being over 6m long and 3m wide. Structurally, the illusion of coral is created by a forest of curved glass rods, hanging stalactite-like from the chandelier base. With the addition of dynamic lighting effects, the forest springs into life as synchronised pulses and patterns of light run across all four installations.

Artistic Licence supplied the luminaires and lighting control used to achieve these effects. These comprised some 720 custom RGB LED linear fixtures, each 0.5m in length, and 9

Cyprus - Adamson's exclusive distributor in Cyprus, ProSonic Audio-Lights, recently installed a Point Series system in the Joko Restaurant, located in the city of Nicosia. Its bright and open space promise a pleasant and warm atmosphere. The sounds to compliment the flavour of the establishment, features the full and warm sounding Adamson Point Series cabinets throughout the venue.

he design consists of eight Point 8's and four Point 115 subs for low frequency extension. The Adamson M Series Processor is used for control and the entire rig is powered with Lab Gruppen C Series amplification.

The Joko Restaurant does not close the doors after dinner. The trendy restaurant doubles as a lounge/club into the night. Director of Prosonic Audio-Lights, Christos Chrysnathou, comments, "The Joko installation was really a simple installation. The owner was asking for the best high f

Croatia - The Summer Sea Coast Show takes place annually in Croatia's picturesque seaside towns of Opatija and Rijeka on the Adriatic Sea.

This year, a crowd of around 2,000 turned up to hear Zagreb rock legends Psihomodo Pop and The Beat Fleet (TBF), a rap rock band from Split - with fixtures from PR Lighting, supplied by production company GLS, bringing the scenography to life.

The company purchased eight versatile Pilot 575s from PR Lighting's Croatian distributors, Turbo-X d.o.o, which went straight onto the show.

GLS' purchasing decision was based on the value for money offered by these fixtures, according to Turbo-X d.o.o's Dario Stipic, "They were delighted with the performance," he said. "The Pilot 575's will now go into their rental inventory for use on shows throughout the year."

Meanwhile the company reports growing interest in PR Lighting fi

UK - The Leader Light Stage 6-06 LED fixture - which features a traditional look of six round lenses mounted in a 600mm linear batten, but with each lens powered by a 10W white LED source -recently made dramatic appearances lighting Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds on The Jonathan Ross Show, and on Bowling for Soup's UK tour.

Russ Grubiak, lighting programmer for The Jonathan Ross Show was "very excited about the use of a very special product." He and show lighting director Oli Richards considered various ways of using the 6-06 before deciding on their approach: "We figured that a lot of people would use them in straight lines or as a grid. Oli's preference was for a non-uniform, random focus that filled the ceiling space and looked as edgy as possible. We mounted the fixtures in a ball and socket TV grip, which suited our monopole hanging grid at the stu

USA - Skin care giants, Nu Skin, recently held their global sales meeting when 15,000 sales reps from around the world assembled in Salt Lake City to learn, celebrate and connect over a three day period. The expansive Energy Solutions Arena was dressed for the occasion, and Michael Marto, CEO of event producers Executive Visions Inc., collaborated once again with John Featherstone of Lightswitch for innovative lighting and media design.

Featherstone's brief from Marto and the EVI team was to help bring their vision to life by creating an exciting 'arena scale' design that would be interesting and engaging from the front of the room to the back. A combination of a dynamic lighting system and an LED stage deck made for an inventive palette of creative tools, which included six of GLP's new impression Spot One LED heads.

With three days of meetings and awards - interspersed with

USA - Josh Groban's Straight to You Tour played its first show -fresh from its European leg - at the Bank Atlantic Centrein Sunrise, Fla. Fourteen COLORado Batten 144 Tour linear wash lights illuminated the stage's backdrop adding depth and colour to the faux building - reminiscent of old-word ruins - that doubled as a projection surface for video content.

Flanked by sets of stairs, the open stage allowed Groban to walk straight into the audience. At times, the accompanying band - over a dozen horn players, drummers, violinists, guitarists and more - perched themselves on the edge of the stage or on the stairs as well. This gave the performance a theatrical look overall, lending an intimate touch to the large arena.

At other times, the band plays fairly close to the backdrop where the slim, linear and unobtrusive COLORado Batten 144 Tour wash lights uplight the scene in

USA - High schools and colleges from coast to coast are investing in Robert Juliat followspots, according to Bill Conner and Paul Sanow of Bill Conner Associates LLC, theatre planners and designers in Oak Park, Illinois.

They have specified Robert Juliat Super Korrigan 1200W HMI followspots and Buxie 575W MSD followspots in both newly-constructed and renovated theatres in public and private high schools and colleges across the country.

"Schools typically don't go for high-end lighting, but I like these fixtures and strongly recommend them," says Conner. "There was a perception that the Robert Juliat followspots were more expensive than others on the market. But my conclusion is that they are not: On a dollar-to-dollar performance basis, they rate better. And thanks to their versatility, they're a great pick for educational institutions and the variety of product

UK - The hit of the 2009Durham Festival, Crown of Light -a stunning son-et-lumière that uses the extraordinary architecture of Durham Cathedral as its canvas - returned to the city once again this winter.

Created by Ross Ashton, with a soundtrack by Robert Ziegler and JohnDel'Nero, Crown of Light draws its visual material from inside the cathedral itself and from the Lindisfarne Gospels.

The PIGI projectors were supplied by entertainment lighting specialist White Light, continuing a collaboration with Ashton that has encompassed projects from Edinburgh to New York.

"White Light is a valued partner on my projects," Ashton notes. "They are helpful and accommodating, and work hard to make sure that everything goes well prior to delivery and during the operation of the kit."

"Ross's projects are always something to behold," comments

UK - With effect from Monday 21 November 2011 Independent Studio Services has moved to larger premises at: Low Green, Nowton, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk IP29 5ND (Tel: 01284 765066).

The move has come about to facilitate the increased demand for the company's services of design, supply and installation of complete stage engineering mechanical facilities.

Under the leadership of MD Simon Caldwell, Independent Studio Services brings many years of experience providing mechanical and electrical engineering solutions to the performing arts industry, from initial design and planning, right through to the supply of hardware, and full installation.

Independent Studio Services also provides project management services on full stage equipment installations, interfacing with clients and contractors to ensure the most efficient, timely and safe execution of a project.

"Independent

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