UK - Siyan, a long-term customer of Clay Paky, has recently increased its investment in Clay Paky products, alongside a brand new purchase of the grandMA2 light, all from Ambersphere Solutions.

Nick Valdez, MD of Siyan, is clear on the reasons for these new investments. "We want to be seen as an approachable rental company with premier equipment. The Clay Paky fixtures we are offering our customers are quality products that can really help provide the professional finish to any of our productions."

"Clay Paky consistently delivers on the quality of their optics. The Alpha 700 family offers a versatile range of fixtures that are bright, lightweight, modular and offer us a great return on investment. This makes them an excellent choice for rental packages, and we can offer the full 700 range, beam, spot and wash as well as the popular Sharpy."

Concludes Val

UK - Lighting, sound and AV hire company Point Source Productions has appointed Amy Parks as general manager. Previously PA to managing director Stephen Capel, Parks will take over all day to day running of the company.

Parks comments, "As the company has grown over the past few years, I have been shadowing Stephen, so it made sense for an official restructuring in order to formalise my role and to allow Stephen to focus on other aspects of the business.

"My strengths lie in client liaison and people management, where Stephen's lie in his extensive lighting industry experience and business development, so it makes good business sense to capitalise on these abilities."

Capel adds, "Point Source has seen different stages of growth from start up in 1997 to the present; now we're about to start a new phase of expansion. I'm looking forward to promoting the Ev

UK - Northern Light Direct has announced the arrival of Gavin Scott, who has taken on the role of sales co-ordinator.

Scott returns to the entertainment technology industry after a brief hiatus during which he worked within the financial services sector. A graduate of Queen Margaret University, he worked within the retail division of Northern Light from 2000 until 2007.

"The launch of Northern Light Direct - and the subsequent expansion of this area of the company's business - provided an ideal opportunity for me to return to the fold," says Scott. " My first love is technical theatre and it's fantastic to be back in this industry. I plan to use my recent experiences gained within the corporate sector to apply specific business expansion techniques to growing Northern Light Direct's market share in the provision of boxed goods to entertainment venues."

Ed

Germany - tarm Showlaser's TSL Yoke is an integrated, single-arm, moving yoke and laser-projector system that allows projecting bright, high-quality, laser effects onto virtually any surface.

This flexible system includes an interchangeable head system that enables users to replace the laser projector with another device - on the same yoke.

With staging and event applications in mind, laser-projector movement and control is managed via DMX protocol - enabling users to integrate and control lighting equipment and laser-projectors easily from the same console. These versatile yokes can be suspended, or rigged and set up at floor level, as your application may require, says the company.

(Jim Evans)

UK - Siyan, a long term customer of Clay Paky has recently increased their investment in Clay Paky products, alongside a brand new purchase of the grandMA2 light, all from Ambersphere Solutions.

Nick Valdez, MD of Siyan comments, "We want to be seen as an approachable rental company with premier equipment. The Clay Paky fixtures we are offering our customers are quality products that can really help provide the professional finish to any of our productions.

"Clay Paky consistently delivers on the quality of their optics. The Alpha 700 family offers a versatile range of fixtures that are bright, lightweight, modular and offer us a great return on investment. This makes them an excellent choice for rental packages, and we can offer the full 700 range, beam, spot and wash as well as the popular Sharpy."

Concludes Valdez, "Our recent addition of a grandMA2 li

Ukraine - Rental company Feyeria is using Showgun 2.5 automated luminaires and the Road Hog Full Boar on all areas of entertainment: concerts, conferences, TV shows, exhibitions, sports, corporate and political events.

Feyeria's Dmytro Andrushchenko, project manager/stage designer, comments, "The Showgun is the first powerful fixture with the LED ring. It combines the functions of spot, wash and an LED Tracking System. We like to use them in big open Air-shows and concert halls, but especially using the LED ring on TV concerts and TV shows where it is most identifiable."

The company owns 24 Showgun 2.5s, and used them for the first time in 2010 on Paul van Dyk's show in Kiev. "These powerful fixtures hadn't been seen in our country before that. It's great for a show at 12,000 people and in such big halls," says Andrushchenko.

Feyeria needed the power of S

UK - Lighting students from across the UK got their first taste of working under pressure - as part of a competition to light a railway carriage in less than two hours.

Six teams were invited to take part in the National Railway Museum's annual Locos in a Different Light event - and ETC was on hand to provide equipment and support.

ETC's associate regional manager for UK and Ireland, Jeremy Roberts, brought a range of Selador Desire LED fixtures and six lighting control desks. He said, "I was really impressed with the imagination and technical ability of the teams. Many of the students had seen ETC SmartFade and Congo jr desks before, but fewer had seen ETC's recent Congo Kid and Element. The programming syntaxes would have been familiar to them, since they're part of the Eos or Congo families, so they were soon up to speed."

The Locos in a Different Ligh

Mexico - Robe lighting has a new Mexican distributor - Mexico City based Vari Internacional - a high profile company established for over 25 years.

The announcement was made during the recent 2012 Soundcheck Expo trade show also in Mexico City, at a special launch party staged at the Polyforum Siqueiros, part of the World Trade Centre complex. The venue is a creative / social facility and art gallery showcasing the work of famous Mexican artist, muralist and political activist, David Siqueiros.

Says Robe's Latin American regional sales manager, Guillermo Traverso, "We planned the Robe party and the announcement very carefully as we wanted to make a huge impact with it and the news of the partnership."

Vari Internacional's CEO Hugo Patiño Cuellar states, "Robe shares our philosophy of offering great products and service, with immediate response and the best te

Korea - Following the signing of a new agreement, C&C Lightway will distribute Coemar products in Korea as an exclusive supplier and dealer.

"I'm delighted with this agreement with C&C," states Salvatore Grillo, director of Coemar S.p.A. "It's the result of a close synergy between the two parties. For Coemar this means being able to set up a stable partnership with a highly qualified company operating in Korea, a rapidly-growing market for applications for entertainment and infrastructures. In the latter sector Coemar is gaining an increasing market share with lines of dedicated products."

"We're very proud to have finalised our partnership with Coemar, a prestigious name that will play a leading role in our already excellent business in Korea," comments H.M. Chung, managing director and president of C&C Lightway.

(Jim Evans)

USA - The nominees for the 2012 Tony Awards have been announced, and the nominees in the lighting, sound, scenic and costume design categories are as follows:

BEST SCENIC DESIGN OF A PLAY

John Lee Beatty - Other Desert Cities

Daniel Ostling - Clybourne Park

Mark Thompson - One Man, Two Guvnors

Donyale Werle - Peter and the Starcatcher

BEST SCENIC DESIGN OF A MUSICAL

Bob Crowley - Once

Rob Howell & Jon Driscoll - Ghost the Musical

Tobin Ost & Sven Ortel - Newsies

George Tsypin - Spider-Man Turn Off the Dark

BEST COSTUME DESIGN OF A PLAY

William Ivey Long - Don't Dress for Dinner

Paul Tazewell - A Streetcar Named Desire

Mark Thompson - One Man, Two Guvnors

Paloma Young - Peter and the Starcatcher

BEST COSTUME DESIGN OF A

Producer Power - Independent theatre producers are combining to launch an association that will represent their interests in negotiations with theatre managements, in the face of worsening trading conditions which they say threaten to put them out of business.

The League of Independent Producers will lobby and negotiate on behalf of its members with other trade bodies or with theatre owners directly, with the stated aim of "improving the lot of the independent producer". The body, which is in the process of being constituted and registered, has grown out of a more informal group - the Society of London Theatre's independent producers forum.

Greg Ripley-Duggan, one of the founding board members of LIP and its acting chair, told The Stage "It was suggested to me that we should revitalise that now defunct body. In response to that, I sent a round-robin email

UK - Optikinetics has announced the launch of its first LED projector. With light output of over 650 lumens from a 40W LED module and a high colour temperature, for truer colour projection and image clarity, the OPTI Solar LED is designed for all gobo and effect projection applications.

The OPTI Solar LED appears brighter and whiter than both the OPTI Solar 100C and Solar 250 - with the same optical sharpness at a higher colour temperature, which means truer colours with better edge to edge clarity, says the company.

The projector is supplied complete with an 85mm lens and a 40 watt LED module with an effective life of over 100,000 hours.

The full range of Solar Accessories can be fitted into the twin gate of the OPTI Solar LED, can be combined with alternative focal length lenses and attachments to enable a vast variety of effects to be created.

(Jim Evans)

South Africa - Experiential agency Tinder-Box, created an elegant farewell dinner for some 60 guests to honour the outgoing president of Volvo South Africa. The full technical for this occasion was professionally catered for by MJ Event Gear and included the new Robe 100 Beams.

Held at the Hilton Ballroom on 21 April 2012, Volvo management along with some of their biggest clients gathered to say good-bye to Anders Lindblad, who plans to relocate back to Sweden. The occasion included performances by Fever Trio, the Volvo Star for Life choir (Star for life is a non-profit Swedish school created in South Africa), and a surprise act by Swedish band Tripple & Touch, who have performed with the Star for Life Choir on several occasions - just in from Sweden that night.

The original spec included 12 LED PARcans, Source Fours, MAC 250 Entours and Prolyte Trussing. However, when MJ's de

UK - Hawthorn, one of the UK's largest suppliers of technical production services, has swelled its projection hire inventory to include six Christie Roadster HD20K-J 3-Chip DLP projectors, from of the newly launched Christie J Series. "This investment is very important, assuring we complete our offering and provide our customers with a greater range of equipment," states Hawthorn's head of video, Oliver Moores.

Moores continues, "We buy Christie because of the people we deal with there. The product is stunning but the relationship we have with them is the most important thing. The Technical support from Christie is very helpful and you can speak to someone in depth. They're always very quick to resolve issues when they do occur and Christie is a very good product. I would say it's one of the best.

"We opted for the J Series as it is packed with features, so

Norway - Olavshallen is a multi-purpose venue situated in the north of the city of Trondheim, Norway, close to the river Nidelva. With a total capacity of 1204 seats on two levels, the venue welcomes a multitude of disciplines including touring theatre, live music, dance and comedy.

GDS distributor for Norway, Elektrik Solutions was approached by the technical team at Olavshallen to supply replacement fittings for the venues ageing auditorium lighting system. The brief was to supply a reliable, sustainable product that could be easily installed between performances, so as not to disrupt its busy performance schedule. The existing fittings were downlights and used standard 100W lamps which were proving inefficient and becoming increasingly hard to source. Petter Nilssen Sales Manager for Elektrik was consulted by the venue and recommended the GDS ArcSystem 1Cell Pro adjustable fi

Bahrain - Festivities are underway as Manama, capital city of Bahrain, celebrates its appointment as Capital of Arab Culture 2012.

As part of the festivities the city produced a spectacular opening ceremony, Path of Pearls, which was packed with magical imagery and effects. Responsible for the stage and lighting concept was Belgian Lighting designer from Painting with Light, Luc Peumans, who employed 170 Clay Paky fixtures to light the vast tiered stage, full sized orchestra, aerialists and dancers.

Long-term Clay Paky stockist, Eclipse Staging Services supplied local Bahrain Company, AVL Concepts, with Clay Paky Alpha HPE 1500, Beam 1500, Wash 1500 and Profile 1500 along with a large number of Sharpy fixtures.

Darren, general manager for Eclipse, comments, "One of the fields in which Luc Peumans and his company Painting with Light excels is in utilising the latest tech

UK - Chauvet DJ LED Shadow blacklight wash panels featured on Coldplay's recent European tour. Supplied by TMB and specified by Lite Alternative, the fixtures will resume their tour when Coldplay returns to Europe in the fall of 2012.

An element of the live tour performances well suited for a blacklight, are the glowing wristbands - called Xylobands - that concertgoers receive before the show. The bands glow once the music begins - due to the imbedded data receivers - making the audience part of the overall visual experience of the show. This sea of glowing lights surrounds the energetic stage design of neon colors complemented by Chauvet DJ LED Shadow.

(Jim Evans)

Australia - The TV Week Logie Awards are the Australian television industry awards, which have been presented annually since 1959.

The 54th Annual TV Week Logie Awards were held at the Crown Entertainment Complex in Melbourne, and was televised Australia wide on the Nine Network.

Performers at the event included British-Irish boy band One Direction, Flo Rida, Tony Bennett and the The Voice mentors, Seal and Delta Goodrem.

Showtech Australia provided all the rigging services for the broadcast and had the opportunity to use its BT280, BT200 winches and Nomad Control Consol that set a new benchmark for scenery mechanics at the Logies.

With six winches in total, four BT280 and two BT200 the set design called for six panels on three tracks to move throughout the evening to create many different looks for different segments of the production. 4 900 Kg LED video wall panels and 2

UK - Established international lighting distributor, MGC Lamps has announced a new name and a new identity. The business which operates in over 90 countries worldwide, has now become MGC Lighting Group.

"MGC Lighting Group better reflects the market areas we operate in and reinforces that we are the lighting distributor of choice for our customers," said managing director James Greig. "We have worked hard over the last 30 years to establish a good reputation. Although the old name has served us well, we needed a facelift to reflect that we are a large, modern company with global coverage, a loyal customer base, and a team that possess technical knowledge that is second to none in our industry."

MGC Lighting Group was conceived after a six-month process that involved the whole team working at its three offices in the UK, Germany and Spain. Workshops were hel

UK - When Nissan's luxury car marque Infiniti set about expanding its presence in Europe, it wanted to engage with potential buyers in a new and unusual way. The result was a digital art competition, the finalists of which have their work featured at the opening of the new European showrooms. Essential to presenting the artwork are BrightSign digital media players, providing each event with a dramatic visual focus.

Distributed in the UK by Pixels, seven BrightSign media players were used at the opening of Infiniti's new showroom in Stockport in late 2011. The event was devised and managed by London-based Oil Productions, with the technical aspects managed by The Big Idea and installed by Entserv Audio Visual.

"We had used the BrightSign players on the Doctor Who Experience. They were extremely reliable, gave fantastic resolution and were able to be synchronised accurately

UK - For the second year running, entertainment lighting specialist White Light supplied the lighting rig to the Olivier Awards Ceremony, which rewards the best of London theatre created during the previous 12 months.

The awards ceremony was held this year at London's Royal Opera House, with the lighting designed once again by Ben Cracknell.

"It actually feels a bit like the perfect gig for us," comments White Light's managing director Bryan Raven. "It celebrates theatre, with which we have a long historic involvement - many of the shows nominated this year use lighting rigs supplied by us - and yet it's staged as a giant event, like the many other corporate and live event productions we are now involved with. It also uses the full range of equipment we offer - everything from LED moving lights to the good old-fashioned PAR can!"

White Light supplied the

UK - Electronic dance group Chicane were back on form last week when they played to a massively 'up for it' crowd at Koko. The much anticipated show was to launch their new album Thousand Mile Stare .

Richard Martin Lighting (RML) supported LD Pip Rhodes in his choice of a simple yet striking rig including Martin LC2140 panels. The vibrant and bold images used with the screen help compliment the psychedelic trance tunes of the Ibiza favourites.

The LED based video screen has a semi transparent design with easily connecting panels that allow for area coverage of up to 14m in height and no restrictions in width. Each panel frame is 1m x 2m with LEDs laid inside an acrylic tube. The pixel pitch of the panel is 40mm which allows for excellent resolution and the design of the panel creates a seamless image. On hand to help out Pip was Hannu the house LD at Koko and Tim the s

UK - The new Canada Water Library in London's southeast Docklands is an impressive and striking building, with artistic ambitions that take it way beyond the standard repository of books, CDs and IT services.

Stage Electrics was brought in by the electrical contractor, Inviron, who in turn worked for the main contractor, ISG Jackson, to create a highly flexible ground floor performance studio space, capable of hosting anything from art exhibitions through to music concerts. Added to that, the massive dock doors, which open out on to a courtyard, act as a proscenium for an audience sitting outside, with the studio forming the stage.

Built from the edge of the former Canada Dock, Southwark Council's £14m investment is an integral part of the local community and popular with commuters who flock to the café for a quick cappuccino or lunchtime sandwich. Its live arts p

Singapore - Wireless Solution Sweden AB Singapore distributor Laservision recently delivered the award-winning creation of Wonder Full - the largest light and water spectacular in South East Asia. This breathtaking multimedia spectacular is currently on display at the doorstep of the Marina Bay Sands, Singapore.

Wonder Full is the story of water and light creating life, told with cutting-edge water and light technology. This free 13-minute show is a water, land and sky based 360-degree experience unlike anything seen before. A three dimensional fantasy showcases the mediums of enormous water screens, vibrant multi-colour high powered lasers, searchlights, spot lights, fountains, surround sound, strobes, bubble factories, flame effects, LED lighting, high definition video projection and other special effects, spanning the 38 acre Marina Bay Sands site. The attractio

Latest Issue. . .