UK - AVA Lights - the North West-based LED lighting specialists - has secured a contract to supply energy-efficient lighting to Virgin train stations across the country.

Virgin Trains has invested in AVA's LED lighting technology to help reduce energy consumption and maintenance costs for many of its train sites across the UK. The large-scale refurbishment project, which begins in February, will cover over 13 train stations and car parks nationwide. These include Coventry, Lancaster, Carlisle, Wigan and Penrith, with more locations expected to follow during the year.

Lighting accounts for a significant amount of energy usage across Virgin's properties and AVA LED technology was specifically chosen to offer a cost-effective route in achieving a 90 per cent reduction in power consumption, when compared to out-dated lighting technologies.

The AVA LED products, which will be ins

The Netherlands - MultiTouch has announced the introduction of the largest interactive display wall for research purposes in Europe at Technische Universität Dresden (TU Dresden). At approximately 5m wide and 2.5m high, the turnkey 12x 55" MultiTaction iWall recognises finger touches, complete hands, infrared pens and objects. TU Dresden's goal is to conduct ambitious research in human-computer interaction.

"We expect large interactive displays to be omnipresent in the future," explains Professor Raimund Dachselt, head of the Interactive Media Lab at TU Dresden. "The MultiTaction iWall provides us a 25 megapixel display supporting the widest range of input methods and unlimited touch points. The MultiTaction technology is the only one worldwide to support this variety of interaction modalities at this size. That's why we want to be the first lab with this eq

The Netherlands - Barco reports that one of its customers, the Dutch Railway Museum, will soon receive a prestigious Thea Award. Presented by the Themed Entertainment Association (TEA), this 'Oscar for the entertainment industry', as the award is sometimes called, recognizes compelling educational, historical and entertainment projects. TEA honoured the Dutch Railway Museum for the Fire Test, an exciting new audiovisual storytelling experience. 18 Barco projectors help create the immersive visuals that are bound to wow young and old.

The Fire Test is more than a visitor attraction. It is a truly immersive, audiovisual experience that takes young and old on a unique, storytelling trip. Visitors embark on an interactive adventure through two centuries of railway history, narrated by Dutch-born actor Rutger Hauer and interlaced with razor-sharp visuals.

Nine single-chip DLP F22 W

USA/Russia - RTS has been selected to provide communications equipment and support to NBC Olympics, a division of the NBC Sports Group, during its production of the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, from 6-23 February. The announcement was made by David Mazza, senior vice president, engineering, NBC Olympics, and Harry Klane, director of Sales-RTS.

Klane stated, "As part of our ongoing commitment to NBC Olympics, RTS places one of our engineers on-site for the Games. Should any instances occur that require review, having an extremely knowledgeable RTS person on-site provides NBC Olympics with proven support capabilities. During past years, NBC Olympics is one of the largest RTS users with multiple intercom systems over their vast operations, which are daily trunked in ever-changing configurations. Considering the wider global network formed by trunking our frames

UK - As registration continues to increase ahead of next week's Event Production Show, the latest announcement from organiser, Mash Media is the series of sessions planned for the inaugural Production Area, the dedicated space for discussing practical, 'how to' ideas for staging events.

Set to become the information hub of the Show, the first day's workshops in the Production Area will focus on recent legislative changes and legal compliances. Speakers from NOEA, Browne Jacobson, Reuben Feels and the National Caterers Association (NCASS) will present interactive panel debates on the new Purple Guide (Event Safety Guide), licensing, police costs, best practice in experiential advertising and using storytelling to engage an audience.

On day two, experts from George P Johnson, the Production Services Association and Star Events Group will lead 45 minute 'how to' sessions for even

The Netherlands - Martin Professional, Kollision and Transform Architects have completely refurbished the exterior of the Confederation of Danish Industry building in Copenhagen, which now boasts a beautiful façade, highlighted by an ever-changing LED media surface for a more engaging and emotional presence.

The location of the building was the main reason for a media façade solution, as it sits in Copenhagen at Rådhuspladsen, where outdoor advertising has been an integral part of the area for more than 100 years.

Transform architect Lars Bendrup said, "This LED media façade was the next logical step. It's an entirely new way of communicating through the language of light. Confederation of Danish Industry is showing a new face - one that reflects dynamism and change."

The media façade incorporates 4,000m of Martin Professional's VC-Strip in a customized outdoo

UK - Robe moving lights helped ramp up the drama, excitement and adrenaline for the 2014 Autosports Live Action Arena in Hall 5 at Birmingham UK's National Exhibition Centre as part of the three day 2014 Autosports International exhibition staged by Haymarket Events.

Lighting designer Nathan Wan used over 150 Robe moving lights as an essential part of his rig, which also featured Sunstrips, PARs and other generics. He has lit the Live Action Arena show for the past five years, and is a big advocate of Robe moving lights. Once again he was back in the lighting driving seat for the Live Action Arena's technical production suppliers, Network Productions.

With up to six shows a day, 5000 motorsport fans at a time could enjoy all the thrills and spills of fast cars right there in the Live Action Arena, including high-octane stunt craziness from Terry Grant, wheel-to-wheel racing an

Paraguay - Since 2003, pastors Emilio and Bethany Abreu dreamed about building a church in which to hold services for more than 20,000 people in Asunción, Paraguay ... and in 2009 their dream came true with the Iglesia Centro Familiar de Adoración (CFA).

Since then, the search for excellence and the challenges presented by the building itself, together with the quest to be as sustainable as possible, led them to renew the original lighting equipment and install Robe LEDWash 1200s, MMX Spots and the new Pointe multi-purpose fixtures.

Mr. Jorge Miers, TV and multimedia director at the Iglesia CFA, says, "I conducted some research keeping in mind the requirements of this first purchasing stage of new equipment. Together with Pastor Abreu and the administration board and thanks to technical consultation with Guillermo Traverso - Robe lighting's Regional Sales Manager for La

UK - Creative & Cultural Skills' fifth Annual Conference, taking place on 6 March at The Backstage Centre, will attract 300 leaders from the education sector and the creative industries.

Keynote speakers include Ed Vaizey MP, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries Doug Richard, Founder of the School for Startups, Dragon's Den panellist and author of the Richard Review of Apprenticeships, Wayne Hemingway, Founder of HemingwayDesign, and Stella Mbubaegbu, Principal and Chief Executive, Highbury College, Portsmouth.

The creative industries have been widely celebrated by Government in recent weeks as the fastest growing economic sector following a report by the DCMS. This conference will explore ways to consolidate and build upon this success by making jobs in the sector available to all young people.

The Conference will mark t

The Netherlands - Bazelmans AVR, a Dutch AV rental company, has invested in the Meyer Sound Lyon linear sound reinforcement system and become one of the first suppliers of the new product. The Lyon sale, closed during the ISE 2014 trade show in Amsterdam, includes 40 Lyon linear line array loudspeakers, 22 1100-LFC low-frequency control elements, and a Galileo Callisto loudspeaker management system, in addition to RMServers for loudspeaker monitoring.

Making its tradeshow debut at ISE 2014, Lyon is the newest member of Meyer Sound's Leo family. Lyon comes in a more flexible and compact package than the LEO-M line array loudspeaker, while retaining the same exceptional headroom, accurate sound reproduction at any operating level, and optimized rigging for streamlined set-up. Designed for medium-to-large-scale applications, Lyon is available in two variants: the Lyon-M main line a

Russia - Panasonic has supplied the largest quantity of security cameras in the history of the Olympic Games and the largest amount of LED large screen displays by area ever for the Olympic Winter Games.

Panasonic Corporation, the worldwide TOP1 sponsor in the audio visual (AV) equipment category, has delivered its AV equipment, such as its Full HD visual equipment, to the 22nd Olympic Winter Games to be held in Sochi, Russia from February 7 to 23, 2014.

Panasonic will cooperate with the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Sochi Olympic Organizing Committee and Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS), to provide strong support to the operation of the Sochi Olympic Winter Games.

Panasonic has supplied a large amount of equipment to the competition venues and the Olympic related facilities in a variety of AV product areas, including LED large screen displays, audio systems, bro

UK - The theatrical grade dimming and colour palette of Chroma-Q's Color Force 72premium performance LED battens were utilised by lighting designer Tim Mitchell to provide precise control, dramatic colour changes and subtle intensity for the Royal Shakespeare Company's (RSC) recent production of Richard II, which received rave reviews from UK critics.

The recent run of Shakespeare's Richard II, with David Tennant and directed by RSC's artistic director, Gregory Doran, kicked off at the RSC's main Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon, before moving to London's Barbican last December.

Tim, who serves as associate artist for the RSC as well as the Chichester Festival Theatre, specified seven Color Force 72 RGBA colour-mixing fixtures to light metal chain 'legs' rigged across the stage to a height of 8m. The battens were placed directly above the chains i

Germany - As one of Munich's most popular attractions, BMW World is an extremely important showcase for the premium automaker. Whether visiting BMW World as a tourist or there to pick up a new car, BMW World offers an extraordinary brand experience to customers. Today, BMW World features an eye-catching Martin colour illumination on the outside of the building - a dynamic lighting scheme that has now been extended indoors as a daylight solution.

As one of the world's great luxury automakers, the atmosphere surrounding presentations of the various car models must be perfect, avoiding both shape and colour distortion. Therefore, especially high demands are put on the lighting environment. An extremely even daylight illumination is required - a uniform level of light that must be guaranteed no matter the ambient conditions, time of day or time of year.

"The Martin LED fixtur

Russia - For the Sochi Winter Olympics 2014, Showforce has been working hard behind the scenes to help keep the build programme on schedule.

On behalf of logistics service provider, DB Schenker, Showforce has been working across 10 separate venues in the Russian city, supplying expert crew to fulfil detailed briefs and technical specifications. Five forklift drivers, each fluent in Russian, have been transporting and setting up broadcasting equipment for various broadcasters.

"This has been an extremely prestigious project for us," explains Showforce's COO Mike Smith. "Our work on the 2012 London Olympic Games has resulted in an emerging reputation as a provider of specialist skilled staff so we are proud to strengthen this through our work in Russia. Every member of the team was carefully selected which included obtaining local qualifications in Moscow to prove

USA - Now in its tenth year, the Mosaic Church in Rockland, California, recently completed a renovation of its sanctuary, which included upgrading the existing sound system with an Allen & Heath GLD-80 mixer and an AR2412 remote audio rack. Situated in a strip mall amongst RV and Auto Dealerships along with a Fitness Centre, the Church presented a challenging acoustic environment.

Also added to the existing system is a pair of Tannoy V-12 speakers to complement three V-12's already in use. The church installed a Mi-Pro Microphone set up with a DPA headset for the pastor. Handling DSP chores for the new system is a RANE HAL2 processor.

With four to five Ministries using the Allen & Heath board during the course of a week, a digital mixer was the obvious selection.

"The Allen & Heath GLD-80 has a clear and simple interface that has a lot of flexibility for so many hands t

Germany - Design, programming, and lighting/video direction experts Einstein & Sons has chosen to boost its arsenal of innovative visuals engines by investing in Avolites Media's industry-leading Ai Media Servers.

Einstein & Sons, which was founded in 2013 by lighting designers Roland Greil and Michael Kuehbandner, offers design and consulting, programming, lighting and video direction, media server programming and hire alongside pre-production services, to a wide range of clients.

Recent projects include supplying media server services to the Eurovision Song Contest 2012, design work for Sony and Samsung Booths 2009-2013, design work at the FIS Ski World Cup Munich 2010-2012, as well as associate design work for internationally successful designers like Patrick Woodroffe.

"By investing in Avolites Media's Ai Servers, we feel like we've invested in the future of server

USA - Being in advertising, members of The Ad Club know all about the importance of creating sizzle for a ceremony. So it's not surprising that this Boston-based trade group asked Derek Iorfida (JDI Productions) and Chris Hubbard (EPAV) to do something special for its 53rd annual Hatch Awards, a ceremony honouring the best in New England advertising.

Iorfida and Hubbard gave the advertising group the excitement they were looking for and more with some help from 16 Legend 230 SR Beams and 56 PVP S7 high definition video panels from Chauvet Professional.

"The organizers of the Hatch Awards wanted to create something special on stage to reflect the importance of this event," said Iorfida. "They were seeking a Grammy-style look in terms of the excitement and energy that was generated on stage. We relied on the Legend 230 SR Beams and PVP S7 panels to create this loo

UK - Following discussions with Dylan Mills, technical manager at the Haverhill Arts Centre, Ben Payne, director of Colchester-based Illuminate Design provided a range of desks for the technical team at the arts centre to try to find a replacement for an aging control desk.

The Arts centre caters for a wide variety of shows and events and therefore the desk needed to give the technical team the flexibility to handle both the demands for touring shows as well as one night events.

The venue's staff have a good understanding of Zero 88 control desks so it naturally came down to either a Solution XL or a Orb XF as their upgrade options.

After much discussion about the benefits of both desks, the greater capability of the Zero 88 Orb XF was the overriding factor and the Arts Centre asked Illuminate Design to provide them with the desk and a pair of touch screen monitors.

Keith

Brazil - Japan, Italy and Brazil are located away one from each other but linked together from the same passion for motors and thanks to Gobos Do Brazil , distributor of the Italian brand Luci Della Ribalta - LDR - in Brazil , for the same passion for lighting.

Salaoduasrodas, the largest show for the two wheelers in south America, was the occasion to see them all together in what resulted to be a perfect a mix.

"It was a challenging installation," commented Esteban Risso from Gobos Do Brazil. The customer would like to reduce the total stand power consumption without decreasing the quality of the light."

Ivo Moura, owner of the Brazilian rental lighting company Prisma Eventos was responsible for the installation.

"We came up with solution of using a mix of conventional tungsten halogen light and 200W LED Profile from LDR. The perfect colour matching wi

UK - For the second year in a row, entertainment lighting specialist White Light was chosen to supply lighting equipment and production services for the Prince's Trust Invest in Futures gala dinner, held on 6 February in Central London. The event welcomed about 200 guests including HRH The Prince of Wales, Joanna Lumley OBE, Rob Brydon, Jerry Hall and Tom Hardy to the Savoy Hotel for a dinner reception and performance from Bryan Ferry.

Funds raised from the event will go to support the work of the Prince's Trust, which helps disadvantaged young people get their lives on track. This year, the charity aims to support 58,000 young people gain the skills and confidence they need to find work.

White Light became involved with the project through creative events agency Massive Productions, which managed production elements for the event. To put everything together, White Light proje

Malaysia - Next Integration Engineering, the Next-proaudio distributor in Malaysia, recently designed the sound system for Q-BAR, located in Sibu, an island town in Sarawak, east Malaysia.

The sound system needed to achieve high sound pressure levels, high quality sound to join the concept of Q-BAR, inspired in New York style lounge club with a diverse range of themed nights and with great resident DJs, some international DJs and live acts playing each month in a luxurious nightlife experience, complemented by suitable decor and a comfortable space.

The Next Integration Engineering's team designed the system using the X-line, LA Series and MA series, comprising 4-X15, 2-X12, 2-XS118, 4 -LAS218. The whole system is powered by MA3200 and MA3800. The whole system is controlled by two NSound DP240.

(Jim Evans)

USA - While awards were presented and world premiere video games showcased in an intimate indoor setting at Spike TV's VGX Video Game Awards in downtown LA in December, rain showers stopped just in time for live performances on an outdoor stage that was outfitted with 40 Elation Platinum Beam 5R moving heads.

"We were looking to get some shafts of light coming from the floor and the rig, something that would bring the audience and stage closer together," commented Gus Dominguez, lighting designer for the event. "We needed some serious beams due to the fact that we were in an exterior venue."

Gus had never used the Platinum Beams before but vendor Visions Lighting suggested he try them. "I wanted to try them and agreed to use them on this event," Gus says. "They did an amazing job and were easy to use. I really enjoyed the amount of colours yo

UK - Scotland is well known as the 'home of Hogmanay' and its New Year celebrations are among the most high profile in the world. Underlining its long involvement with these prestigious events, Black Light played a key role the 2013/14 Hogmanay celebrations by providing lighting equipment to locations across the country.

"We have been heavily involved in Scotland's Hogmanay celebrations for many years," says Calder Sibbald, Black Light's head of hire and events. "This year was no different and we were delighted to work alongside Unique Events and other service providers such as Paragon Power Services to help Scotland welcome in the New Year in style."

The theme of the 2013/14 celebrations was Homecoming and Black Light supplied the equipment needed to bring this vision to life to the three key locations: Edinburgh, Stirling and Inverness. Working to

UK - Prominence Production Services has announced it will be showcasing its flagship fabric set solution, LIGHTset at this week's Event Production Show.

Launched in September last year, LIGHTset has been designed and manufactured in the UK to transform the way stage and set backdrops are created, representing substantial savings on crew and transport costs. The 'all in one' solution combines 3D printed images, creative lighting and crisp front or rear projection, and has already been seen at events in The Grove West London, Sandown Park Racecourse and across the UK on two extensive corporate roadshows.

Creative director, Phil Harlow and his team will further highlight LIGHTset's creative capabilities on stand H22 at the Event Production Show, where they plan to showcase a full size LIGHTset performing under "real" show conditions. Demonstrating its unique rear projec

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