UK - The new Vista 3 by Chroma-Q lighting & media control range is adding a touch of visual magic to Sounds and Sorcery celebrating Disney Fantasia, a new immersive theatre experience at The Vaults. Visitors put on headphones and then embark on a multi-sensory interactive journey which reveals a fantastical environment using a combination of cutting edge binaural sound, elaborate set designs and dazzling lighting. Lighting designer Jake Wiltshire selected the Vista by Chroma-Q control system to bring his creative vision to life for the different lighting needs of each set design. For The Rite of Spring, LED strip effects are smoothly blended together to create a natural 'churning' look for the smooth-flowing volcanic hot magma; for The Sorcerer's Apprentice, moving lights are precision controlled to create an organic feel in sync with the
UK - Event specialists, Light Fantastic Production Services Limited partnered with L'Atelier Five agency on the recent Hublot FIFA World Cup installation and product launch event at Harrods, Knightsbridge. L’Atelier Five turned to LFPS to handle rigging and technical installation on their installation for Hublot watches in the store’s Hans Crescent entrance atrium. At its centre, the 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia themed project featured three large open frame ‘footballs’ constructed from aluminium with integrated LED lighting and video displays. Finished in red, white and blue to reflect the Russian national colours, the trio of footballs needed to appear to float effortlessly within the atrium. Limited by extreme load restrictions on the rigging points and severe weight limitations on the sloping floor below which precluded the use of traditional lifting methods
Europe - BlackTrax real-time motion tracking system was instrumental in bringing the thrills of the Fast & Furious movie to live events in the UK and Switzerland, with further shows planned for the Czech Republic, Denmark, France and Germany. Fast & Furious Live uses the most advanced technology and fans’ favourite cars from the series to faithfully evoke the most outrageous moments and stunts from the series. Recreating the underground streets of Los Angeles to locations that criss-cross the globe, Fast & Furious Live lets fans relive the most extreme action as precision performance drivers execute pulse-pounding stunts surrounded by blockbuster set design, authentic digital projections and state-of-the-art physical obstacles. Kate Dawkins, already with a pedigree for creating content for spectacular live shows, was responsible for
Germany - The Ehrlich Brothers have become among the best-known magicians and illusionists in the world. Their trademarks include trucks weighing several tons emerging from nowhere, trees growing in a matter of seconds, and almost everything disappearing from the stage during the course of a show - and then reappearing, as if by magic. In mid-July, the two brothers added further superlatives when they guested for three days in the Stuttgart Porsche Arena. First of all, there was the Showdown of the World's Best Magicians, with selected guests appearing on the first two evenings, presented by RTL. Finally, on the third evening, the Ehrlich Brothers presented their new show Magic Worlds. Working alongside Ehrlich Entertainment GmbH, were the Production Resource Group (PRG), who provided rigging, lighting, video and media technology, Schiffer & Faber for
USA - John Colligan is lighting designer for jam band Gov’t Mule. Punting his way through the band’s two-three hour shows, which are marked by extended improvisational riffs, he “follows every expressive note to accent its emotional force with light”. Helping him in this spontaneous adventure are 12 Chauvet Professional Rogue R1 FX-B fixtures, supplied by BML-Blackbird, which has been supplying the touring system for the last 10 years. “Songs have a way of expressing emotions and have a powerful effect on the psyche,” says Colligan. “Lighting can bring out emotions on its own, too. There’s a certain sense of harmony that happens when lighting works with music. Combined, the two arts create a new, deeply moving experience.” Delivering this experience requires lighting that is constantly changing with the music. Creating new looks that keep pace with
USA - Last year’s 40th Anniversary Tour was by no means a farewell tour for 70’s/80’s rock band Foreigner. It’s now been 41 years since their debut album and the band behind some of rock’s most classic songs hit the road again in June, kicking off a 30-show Juke Box Heroes U.S. tour that has proved to be one of the hottest outings of the summer. Lighting designer/director Dan Lastovka has kept the old-school look design from last year’s anniversary tour but with significant updates such as Elation Rayzor 360Z LED beam moving effects replacing Arena Par Zoom LED wash lights and a redesigned truss layout. New York rental house See Factor has again collaborated with Foreigner on lighting supply. Foreigner production manager is Steve Croxford. “This year’s design is an evolution from last year’s design,” explains Lastovka, who has been wit
USA - Jeremy Lechterman and Jackson Gallagher of creative visual design firm FragmentNine are the imaginative wizardry behind the production design for Keith Urban’s Graffiti U tour which has just commenced in the US. The album of the same name is enjoying critical and commercial success, and the architecture of the stage design brings a modern visual twist for Urban’s diverse fanbase. Various Robe products are incorporated into the lighting rig including BMFL Spots, BMFL WashBeams, and Cyc FX 8s. It is the first time that FragmentNine – known for their flair and imagination – are working with Urban and his team. Talks started about a year ago with reference to the upcoming 2018 tour, and they chatted to the artist extensively about how he envisions his music and how he likes to be presented live. Known for his genre-defying compositions, and true
Estonia - Estonia’s oldest theatre - Vanemuine in Tartu - received new audio, lighting, video, and communication equipment supplied by Amptown System Company (ASC) as part of a major conversion project. Berlin-based Ingenieur Gesellschaft Wibbeke & Penders was commissioned with planning and implementing the structural conversion work while Dr. Reiner Chemnitius was responsible for working out the fundamentals for media equipment selection and installation. Working together with ASC project manager Jan Vandrei and his team, theatre planner Dr. Chemnitius developed and customized the complex redundant audio/video fibre optic system based on Optocore and BroaMan components exclusively for the Vanemuine theatre. Two management consoles with the real-time capable media control system by adunas were eventually selected. The larger main console to the right of th
USA - ADJ has announced the release of its new myDMX-RM lighting control interface. The tool offers internal storage with 16 programmable trigger buttons in addition to its function as a hardware dongle for the myDMX 3.0 software. The myDMX-RM is a 19” rack mountable interface that connects a computer running the myDMX 3.0 software via USB to a DMX-controllable lighting rig through a standard XLR connection. Out of the box, the unit allows use of myDMX 3.0 Express Mode, which includes all of the standard features needed to setup, programme and control a lightshow. It is then possible to upgrade the software (via store.dmxsoft.com) to unlock advanced features such as a 3D Visualizer, MIDI control and ‘Easy Remote’ smartphone / tablet control app). Through the software it is also possible to assign lighting programmes to each of the myDMX-RM’s 16 trigger buttons
Canada - CAST Software has released a new version of its wysiwyg lighting design and previsualisation tool. Release 41 brings a broad range of new features, including scaling objects, section sets, NDITM support, enhanced rigging points and realistic smoke and light effects. CAST has also announced it’s working on a cloud and student licencing option and support for 64-bit architecture. Scaling Objects: users are now able to easily scale up, down or stretch any 3D object within wysiwyg. The Scale tool can be applied to a primitive shape, an object from wysiwyg’s library (except truss and fixtures) or objects imported from other applications.
The new features
Selection Sets: these are designed to save time by reducing the need for repetitive selection tasks. Selection Sets will save the selection information such as which objects are selected
UK - The Knight of Illumination Awards (KOI), which celebrate international video and lighting designers for their creative work in the UK, has revealed the Theatre shortlist for 2018. An expert panel of judges, all of whom have years of experience reviewing theatre, opera and dance, have watched countless productions over the last year and distilled the best of the best into the shortlist. The panel is made up of The Dancing Times critic, Zoë Anderson; The Guardian's leading theatre critic, Michael Billington; opera critic for The Stage and Opera Magazine George Hall; chief dance critic for The Stage, Neil Norman; co-founder of Exeunt, Natasha Tripney; and opera editor for Whatsonstage, Mark Valencia; led by broadcaster David Benedict, chair of the Theatre judging panel.
UK - The Association of Lighting Designers’ annual Michael Northen Awards launched this week. The awards are an opportunity for students just leaving their college or university course to gain practical skills and experience in creating a portfolio which sells their design ideas. Entry is now open, and all submissions must be received before midnight on the closing date: Wednesday 31 October. Johanna Town, chair of the ALD, comments: “What better accolade with which to enter the industry than with a lighting design award? The Michael Northen Bursary scheme (MNB) is a great aide to developing a lighting designer’s abilities in communication. To be able to sell your ideas and passions for a design to other industry leaders, is as important a skill, maybe even more so, as the design itself. For this reason, this particular award entry is so important to a designer
UK - Rich Rowley has joined Adlib as general manager (lighting and video). Rowley has enjoyed a long relationship with the Liverpool-based full production and rental specialist over the years and brings more than a decade of senior management experience from working at XL Video and PRG. Rowley will be concentrating on the already substantial lighting and video / AV aspects of Adlib as the company completes the transition from its original audio roots into one of the premier full service technical solutions providers in Europe. The appointment comes at a pivotal time for Adlib, which is poised to move into a new warehouse and office facility. Adlib owner and founder Andy Dockerty comments: “I am delighted to welcome Rich into the Adlib family. I believe it is testament to the growth of Adlib and the development of our lighting and video departments that we hav
Europe - Lightact, a Slovenian media server manufacturer, now features a two-way sharing of textures and variables between Lightact and Unreal Engine. Version 3.0.5 also introduces LightNet and LightSync which enable multi-server syncing. Mitja Prelovšek, CEO of Lightact, comments: "We are extremely thrilled to be able to release v3.0.5 as it further strengthens Unreal Engine workflow as well as expanding Lightact's core media server functionalities.” Lightact is an integrated suite combining standard media server functionalities such as projection mapping, multi-screen video output and DMX lighting control with unique real-time rendering capabilities and reliability features aimed at permanent installations. The suite includes Lightact Cloud installation monitoring solution and Lightact WebUIs client user interfaces. Lightact v3.0.5 is available on Lig
UK - CPL, working as technical partners for event producers Bright, returned to the Mojo Active Almondsbury site near Bristol for the annual OVO Energy summer party, an action-packed day of fun and entertainment for OVO employees, their friends and family, now in its fourth year. The project included CPL’s delivery of audio, lighting, rigging and crew for two music stages - Main and Bar - featuring live bands and a DJ line-up respectively, and there were also a few ‘specials’ around the site, including flying a 1m diameter glitter ball flown from the apex of one the conjoined tipis making up the Bar area. The CPL team was led by Mike Radford, and they worked closely on site with Bright’s production manager Nick Diacre and their project leader, Annabel Harrison. For the main stage, a d&b Y8 line array sound system was specified, with three flown Y8s a
UK - Over 180 years after its creator’s passing, Georg Büchner’s Woyzeck continues to resonate with theatre audiences. This is very evident in the Birmingham Repertory Theatre’s recent production of the drama, which features intense imagery made more evocative by Lee Curran’s lighting created with Chauvet Professional Ovation, Maverick and COLORado fixtures. In keeping with the open-ended spirit of Woyzeck, the Birmingham Repertory’s production of the play grew out of a change of plans on the part of the theatrical company. Initially, the company had planned to run a different show with a different director in its Spring-Summer 2018 season. When that director had to withdraw due to another commitment, Roxana Silbert, AD of the company, took over as director and decided to do Leo Butler’s adaptation of Woyzeck rather than the original show.
USA - Rap artist Logic is touring North America with a visually ambitious show using two Avolites Ai servers to drive immersive content to multiple LED surfaces. Logic’s Bobby Tarantino vs Everybody tour takes in performances at some of North America’s most famous venues, including NYC’s Madison Square Garden, the LA Forum and Las Vegas’s Park Theatre. Production design, programming and Notch content for the tour has been masterminded by Visual Endeavors’ creative director Aron Altmark. He comments: “We have a number of custom servers that we’ve built up for interactive and media server duties over the past year, and our Ai servers for the Logic tour are based around this robust build - namely, Intel i7 8th-gen hexacore processors coupled with Nvidia GTX 1080Ti GPUs and lots of PCIe solid-state memory. There are two servers on the tour for fu
Europe - Claypaky has added two more luminaires to its new Axcor series - the Axcor Profile 600 and Axcor Profile 400. Each fixture is available in two versions - with either 6500K colour temperature and high light output, or with 5600K colour temperature and a CRI of around 90. The Axcor 600 is designed for tours and large events. It features a wide zoom range from 5° to 45° (1:9 ratio) and can be used in a variety of situations, including those for which a narrow angle is most suitable. The Axcor Profile 400 is targeted to the medium power market by offering a light that packs the company’s advanced lighting, mechanical and electronic features into a compact body (less than 65 cm high). Among the features this compact LED light offers are a framing system that works on four focal planes, an effects section with an animation wheel, a complete colour s
USA - The Dave Matthews Band is digging deep in their catalogue to serve up some old school favourites while mixing in new songs from their latest release on their current 2018 tour, which kicked off 18 May in Houston, Texas. The popular jam band is known as a must-see summer touring act and this year are selling out amphitheatres across the US beneath a rig that includes effects from Elation Chorus Line LED battens. The band’s first tour since 2016 runs through 10 September, with the final show at the Hollywood Bowl in LA. The tour is in support of the band's new album Come Tomorrow that debuted at #1 on the Billboard charts. Lighting design is by Fenton Williams together with Aaron Stinebrink of tour lighting vendor TMS of Omaha, Nebraska. Both Williams and TMS have been associated with the Dave Matthews Band for over two decades. The designers use 30 Chor
UK - Luminex GigaCore network switches provided a dual redundancy network for The Great Exhibition of the North's opening ceremony along the Tyne River, which featured spectacular live music, fireworks, and an 80m-long fountain and drone display. More than 18,000 people lined the Newcastle and Gateshead Quayside for the opening ceremony to launch the festival, which celebrates the scientific and artistic achievements of the North of England. Equipment hire and events company, SLX provided the complete audio and lighting production package and crew for the event. Audio hire manager Rob Collett, who oversaw the event's hugely ambitious audio & lighting production requirements, had been looking to invest in a high quality, easy to use network switch with Ethercon and rugged fibre connectors. After being impressed with SLX's stock of Luminex's Mk1 nodes, he decided to
China - Stage Electrics and Pacific Lighting have started work on Hong Kong’s new Freespace Theatre. The joint venture between Stage Electrics and Pacific Lighting has proved successful in winning the contact to deliver production lighting, sound & video infrastructure, communication systems and rigging for the Freespace Theatre, one of the new performance venues located in Hong Kong’s new Cultural District. Since signing the £1.7m contract in early 2017 the team have undertaken detailed off-site design work, liaising regularly with the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority. Activity on-site has now commenced, including installation, termination and testing of the specialist works ahead of the planned official opening in 2019. Pacific Lighting’s Hugh Chinnick and Virginia Kam have been key in providing local coordination, advice and guidance to t
USA - New Found Glory followed up their 2017 20 Years of Pop Punk Tour by hitting the road earlier this summer in support of their ninth studio LP, Makes Me Sick. Blow-your-head-back colours were part of the experience. The band eschewed video walls and projections, and instead relied on a backdrop of hand-painted psychedelic scenic elements designed to glow when hit by light. Providing that light was a design by Megan Alksninis of JDI Productions that added to the colourful panorama, with help from the COLORdash Par-Quad 7 LED wash from Chauvet Professional. “The look of the Sick Tour is extremely colourful; it’s bright and loud to reflect the band’s music,” says Alksninis. “Their heavy energy pop punk show does not slow down - and our lights keep pace. I took inspiration off the backdrop and other scenic pieces to create my looks. Neon
Iceland - Located in the Hali region of Suðursveit in South-East Iceland, Thorbergssetur is a culture centre and heritage museum dedicated to the region’s history and the life and works of writer Thorbergur Thordarson. With a theatrical-style exhibition which includes glimpses into the life of the Icelandic author, the museum recently decided it was time to update their lighting design. Wanting to install a completely new LED system, Luxor lighting designer Alfreð Sturla Böðvarsson created an elegant, story-telling design using Gallery LED and PHX 150W LED profile luminaires from Altman Lighting. “A director who I´ve worked with a few times was working in the museum this summer, and he asked me to give them advice on how to replace the outdated 12-year old system with a modern LED lighting scheme,” opens Böðvarsson. “They wanted to emphasize the many sce
World - Guns N' RosesNot In This Lifetime tour continues to steam its way around the world two years after kicking off with an appropriately impressive classic rock lighting and visual design using totally contemporary technology created by Phil Ealy. Phil’s work with the American hard rockers dates back over 30 years - since they first hit stardom with their debut Appetite for Destruction album released in 1987. Ron Schilling is out on the road as lighting director for this one which is the first time that three original members Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan have performed together since 1993. Phil chose Robe moving lights to play a major role in the lighting scheme with the stadium version of the rig featuring 74 x BMFL WashBeams – five used as truss follow spots, 32 x BMFL Spots, three BMFL Blades and ten Pointes. The BMFLs are rigged in
