The year 2000 saw Renaissance Cruise Lines add three new ships to its fleet, the R5, R6 and R7. Already distinguished by having the youngest fleet in the industry, Renaissance Cruise Lines will soon be amongst the five largest cruise lines in the world, with the addition of the R8, which will be named in a ceremony on 18 February. Built at the Chantiers de L’Atlantique yard, Saint-Nazaire, France, the R-class ships are almost identical in design, and the Saint-Nazaire division of HMS France has supplied and installed the entertainment systems, TV distribution and the broadcast and editing systems on all of them. For the entertainment areas of the R5, R6, R7 and R8, HMS installed an ETC Sensor delta dimming system plus 48 Source Four PARs and 32 Source Four ellispoidals at the specification of its Miami-based division Harbour Marine Systems.

On March 6th, Stagetec Distribution is holding a Product Day on the Compulite and LSC product ranges.

The full range of products from both companies will be on show, including the new flightcased/touring version of the CompuDIM 2000 digital dimmer and pre-release versions of two completely new consoles from LSC scheduled for launch later this year. Anybody interested in attending should call Stagetec on +44 (0)1753 553522.

International Leisure Industry Week (LIW - 2-4 October 2001, NEC, Birmingham) has appointed Neil Felton as show director. Felton, previously manager for fitness, health and sport at LIW, is now responsible for overseeing the entire exhibition, as well as dealing with the show’s sponsorships and liaising closely with trade associations.

The Unique Flame Light Co, original manufacturer of silk flame effect units, has gone into liquidation. The company, formed in 1997, had won Awards for its flame effects, notably at The Lighting Show at the NEC in Birmingham, and at Entech 2000 in Sydney, and counted among its clients MTV, BBC, Ministry of Sound, Royal Opera House, New York Metropolitan Opera, the Cannes Film Festival and Celebrity Cruises. Crawley-based Baker Tilly is the appointed liquidator.

To meet the demand from television and theatre designers for a lower colour temperature version of the Studio Color, High End Systems has introduced the Indy 575, a patented incandescent lamp that gives designers the ability to match the colour temperature and colour rendering of a conventional lighting rig. At a lower colour temperature of 3200K, the new lamp source allows designers to create deeper reds and warmer ambers with color mixing. These colors are more difficult to achieve with the higher colour temperature of the MSR 575/2 discharge lamp normally used in Studio Color. Users of the Studio Color S or Studio Color 575 unit (with electronic ballast - it does not work with the Studio Color M version with a magnetic ballast) can simply remove the MSR575/2 discharge lamp from the unit and plug in the Indy 575. No adjustments or modifications to the fixture are needed, not even for t

Elissa Getto has joined Theatre Projects Consultants as senior theatre consultant in the Norwalk, Connecticut office. She will be a principal member of the team conducting performing arts feasibility studies and advising on a wide range of administration issues. Currently she is working on major studies for the Lincoln Centers in both New York and Dallas. Prior to joining TPC, Getto served as CEO and President of the Westport Country Playhouse, Connecticut and was also president of the Cincinnati Arts Association and an executive director of PACT Inc.

Police have arrested two more people in connection with allegations of fraud at the Millennium Dome. A man and a woman in their 30s were detained in Liverpool, bringing to six the number of arrests over suspected fraud at the Dome. Property was also seized from two homes and a business in the city's Wavertree area in a joint operation between Merseyside Police and Scotland Yard. The two people were later released on bail, and ordered to return in June. It is believed that the latest arrests are linked to the arrest of four people in autumn last year, related to the investigation of alleged fraud involving a lighting contract at the Millennium Dome. They included a man and a woman, also from Wavertree, a woman in her 60s from West Yorkshire and a man in his 30s from south-east London. There are now four separate enquiries being conducted by the fraud squad involving into Millennium Dome c

White Light’s popular ‘Training Initiative’ training and education programme continues to offer opportunities for those involved with theatre lighting to expand their knowledge of new products and techniques - this week with two seminars on the Great American Market GAM range of products, held in association with the Le Mark Group. Products on show will include the GAM colour range, GamChroics coloured glass, GAM gobos, effects such as the GAM TwinSpin gobo rotators, the GAMCommand DMX controllers and BlackWrap. The seminars will take place at White Light’s Filmer Road, London base on Wednesday 21st February. Anyone wishing to attend should E-mail lemark@WhiteLightGroup.co.uk

Bill Gallinghouse is rejoining ETC in the newly created role of vice-president of business development. In this position, he will be responsible for special projects and will initially be concentrating on the coordination of international sales efforts. Gallinghouse originally joined ETC in 1990 as vice-president of sales and subsequently served as managing director of ETC Europe between 1996 and 1998. For the last three years he was senior vice-president of sales for Fourth Phase (previously PRG), one of ETC’s key clients.

Corporate and industrial event lighting specialists Rainmaker injected drama into the launch of the new BMW engine plant at Hams Hall in Birmingham. Rainmaker’s Paul O’Brien produced a dazzling lighting design for a stage set based on the new BMW engine block. The pistons formed four platforms at different levels, the stage right of which was also a revolve which revealed the new engine. The whole on the interior of the high-tech plant’s parts storage area was also lit by Rainmaker, with electric blue MBI and HQI architectural luminaires. Natural building features like ducting, electricity supplies, pipework, air vents and columns were spectacularly highlighted with ETC Source Four profiles. For stage lighting, O’Brien utilised Studio Spot 250s and a variety of MAC automated lights, Source Four PARs, Source Four 26 degree profiles and cyc floods. The show was prog

Following the announcement of the new administration and management set-up of the PSA, a substantial package of new benefits for members has been unveiled. A new membership pack has been produced which includes a personal membership identity card, pre-paid subscriptions to appropriate magazines, training information and course dates, training booking forms, a diary section, book list and contacts, plus a new, truly interactive web site which is updated daily. Birmingham-based Business Media Services Ltd (BMS) recently took over the role of administrative and membership operations of the PSA office. Bob Fox, the head of BSM, told PLASA Media: "It is our aim to ensure that members of the PSA get the maximum possible from their association with us. We have put together this new package to increase the benefits that membership brings."

Lee Filters is continuing apace with the production of more Designer colours for its 700 Series. Leading lighting designers have been invited by the company to create a colour or colours of their choice. One of the first designers to make the trip to Andover, was David Whitehead, owner of Stage Electrics. He is pictured holding one of his finished creations with Paul Topliss of Lee Filters looking on. Over the coming weeks, several lighting designers will be spending time with the company on the creation of the new range which will officially launched at the PLASA Show in September.

TiLE will be the official European Show of The Themed Entertainment Association (TEA). TiLE is aimed at those who have an interest in the future of location-based leisure attractions, whilst TEA is an international alliance of the world's most talented and experienced professionals in the themed attractions industry. The decision coincides perfectly with the 10th anniversaries of both TiLE and TEA and recognises the close relationship that has built up between the two; the European Chapter of TEA (now TEA Europe) was launched at TiLE 1998 in Strasbourg, France, and has become one of the fastest growing chapters of TEA.

DHA has appointed its first distributors in France - Dimatec, La Boutique du Spectacle and Lighting Technology Durango. In addition to an already extensive range of DHA gobos, Dimatec has expanded its stock of products to include DHA's moving effects range and the Gecko image projector. La Boutique du Spectacle is now a stockist of DHA catalogue gobos, moving effects and the DHA Gecko, a compact, low voltage image projector, which can be used as a framing spot or to project images and textured light. Lighting Technology Durango, meanwhile, is now a stockist of DHA gobos and moving effects.

A cutting-edge club sound and lighting system have been detailed and installed by Marquee Audio into the new 2,300-capacity concert and dance venue, The Academy, in Birmingham. Opened in Dale End by the McKenzie Group - owners of the Brixton Academy and Shepherds Bush Empire - some £600,000 has been spent on converting the former Rank-owned Hummingbird, which had been closed for six years before being sold to the London-based entertainment company, into a premier mid-sized concert venues. The brief was to deliver a quality club system into both the major auditorium and 400-capacity auxiliary room. As a result, Marquee spec’d a computer-controlled Turbosound sound system, driven by a combination of 15 MC2 MC-1259 and three MC-750 amplifiers, and digitally distributed through a pair of BSS 9088LL audio matrix devices, with a Soundweb 9010 ‘Jellyfish’ remote providing loc

The Saint Lambert Cathedral was destroyed during the French Revolution 200 years ago, but in its day was one of the biggest Gothic buildings of its kind in the world, even bigger than Notre Dame in Paris. The city of Liège decided to honor its lost treasure by creating a replica of the church’s ‘heart’. This small piece of what was once an enormous construction is situated in exactly the same location as it was centuries ago. The temporary construction is 30 metres wide, 20 metres deep and 42 metres high. Belgian company Sonoflash was given the task of lighting the cathedral and worked with EVDV (Martin’s Belgian distributor) to spec 10 Martin Exterior 600s with control coming from the Martin ProScenium.

The recently-established Crystal Leisure is all set to launch its first major project. The company will unveil plans for a new multi-million pound superclub within the next few months. Summit, as the club will be known, will hold approximately 1500 clubbers and will be situated on Nene Parade in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire. The company is currently working with leading sound, lighting and design companies to create the look and feel of the club.

Coe-tech, UK distributors for the Coemar range of stage, effects and architectural lighting fixtures, have three new portfolio additions. The Coemar Supercyc 2.4 is the first ever cyc light offering 425 degrees pan and 212 degrees tilt movement. Making the most of Coemar’s patented Twin Lamp Technology (TLT), the Supercyc 2.4 utilises two powerful 1.2K MSR lightsources, giving an incredible 110,000 lumens output and a colour temperature of 5,900ºK. The Coemar Panorama Cyc Power is a highly flexible CYM cyc floodlight designed for exterior use, again taking advantage of Coemar’s Twin Lamp Technology (TLT), an optical system that multiplies the luminous output while minimising power consumption. The latest model of Coemar’s successful award-winning CF7 luminaire is the CF7 HEX. The HEX version features enhanced optics with a 30% brightness increase, 21 channel mode for

Pulsar picked up the ‘Excellence in Training’ award at this year’s LIVE! Awards. The award is recognition of their comprehensive range of both Clay Paky and Pulsar technical seminars hosted at their Cambridge HQ, the joint organisation with DI of both the UK and World Light Jockey Contests, and their latest collaboration with PLASA introducing the Student Lighting Designer Award aimed at colleges.

TMB announced today that Warren Mays, the company’s long-serving technical sales manager, has left the company to join Moodie, Pincu & Associates. Colin Waters, TMB’s CEO told PLASA Media: “Warren has been a great asset to TMB over the years and he will be missed. Because of his understanding of the cooperative relationship between TMB and Moodie-Pincu, we believe this move will lead to many new opportunities for both companies. Moodie-Pincu & Associates is a manufacturer’s representatives in the greater Los Angeles area for Electronic Theatre Controls and other entertainment-based manufacturers of theatrical support equipment.

In 1996 the second edition of British Theatrical Patents 1801-1900 was published in demand to the runaway success of the first edition. Such was the interest and fascination with the subject, the authors Terence Rees and David Wilmore, embarked upon the mammoth task of consulting several million more patents to compile a database of theatrical patents for the first half of the twentieth century. As a result of some five years work the first release of the database is now available covering 1901-1950 and includes many fascinating technological developments relating to moving lights, projection, dimming and control as well as staging, illusions, and a myriad of other technical theatre subjects. The database is now available for purchase (£957+ Vat) and there are currently almost 1,000 patentee entries on the database. Purchasers will receive free updates as new entries are discovered - b

TMB Associates has been appointed as exclusive worldwide stocking distributor for the DMX Data Lynx from Upstaging Inc. TMB is now stocking Data Lynx at all its locations. DMX Data Lynx is an all-in-one DMX router, tester, and disaster recovery unit. It allows instant switching between two lighting consoles with up to four DMX universes per console. It is capable of automatically switching from one console to the other in the event of DMX output failure from the current console. It can also test moving lights and cables, diagnose and display DMX data, plus store backup scenes from any DMX controller. Tommy Stephenson, TMB’s sales manager, said: "This is a very practical product, developed by one of the top rental companies. In addition to its main function of switching between a primary and backup console, it performs a variety of very useful tasks such as DMX diagnosis and fi

PRG company Fourth Phase supplied equipment, design engineering, project management and installation supervision for the entertainment lighting system in the newly constructed Potter’s House worship center, home of one of the fastest growing churches in the United States. This 26,000 member nondenominational church in Dallas, TX, led by Pentecostalist minister, author and entrepreneur T.D. Jakes, set out to build the country’s most technologically innovative church facility yet, dubbed a ‘Smart Church’. The new $32 million, 300 feet x 300 feet, 8,200 seat sanctuary creates a footprint larger than two football fields. Power and data terminals installed at 200 seats allow attendees to download sermon notes and power point presentations onto laptop computers. Altar attendants are equipped with handheld PDAs to allow immediate input of new member data and ‘praye

An institution is coming home, when Crossroads returns to our TV screens in the spring. The soap is planned to fill the gap following the departure of Home and Away. Filmed in Carlton TV’s studio in Nottingham, Crossroads will be the new centrepiece in ITV’s daytime schedule. Second time around, Crossroads has moved up-market, from the original motel to a modern hotel with a beauty salon, bar and restaurant and this time will be lit by a range of . To ensure the perfect lighting, Carlton bought 144 channels of ETC Sensor dimming, supplied by AC Lighting. The returning stars from the Crossroads hall of fame are Jane Rossington (no relation to L&SI’s editor sadly) as Jill Harvey, Kathy Staff, who hangs up the wrinkled stockings of Last of the Summer Wine's Nora Batty and dons the uniform of much-loved laundress Doris Luke and waiting in the wings for a return later in the

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