Jordan - Tritec AV Amman Jordan, a leading creative technical AV production company in the region, recently embarked on a restructuring programme, which included significant investments in new lighting products from Claypaky. The company purchased 40 Claypaky Xtylos, 42 Mini Xtylos HPE, 12 Skylos and 100 Mini B Aqua fixtures. They were quickly put to use on a number of projects, including a concert by Iraqi superstar Kadim Al Sahir on 13 July in Amman Exhibition Park. Al Sahir is one of the Arab world’s most popular and successful singers; he has also collaborated with western artists Sarah Brightman and Lenny Kravitz. “The event was challenging since the artist is generally considered classical but still comes across as energetic and lively,” says Marwan R. Abujaber, CEO of Tritec AV. “So we focused on depth and dimension using soft washes with an emphasis on
Australia - The first Australian feature film to be entirely shot using Virtual Production premieres internationally this month. Mercy Road is an unrelentingly tense psychological thriller from Tracks director John Curran. Teaming up with Australian filmmaker Alex Proyas’ (The Crow, Dark City) Arclight Films and virtual film production company, Heretic Foundation filmed the in-car and select outdoor scenes for the 85-min drama using the LED Volume stage at the purpose-built TDC Studios in Sydney, Australia. Working from a script by Chris Pelletier and Jesse Heffring and starring Luke Bracey (Point Break, Hacksaw Ridge, Elvis), Mercy Road is a white-knuckle ride about a man who is pushed to the limits of his sanity to protect his beloved daughter. To realise his vision, Curran and cinematographer Ross Giardina (Gold<
Finland - A new brand born in the Nordics, Unity is designed to seamlessly integrate work and life whilst developing a strong sense of community, offering busy professionals everything they need under one roof. Currently boasting seven locations throughout the Nordics, the most recently opened – Helsinki and Tampere – are equipped with high quality Genelec sound systems in the public and function areas, including a Smart IP system in the Helsinki location – all specified and installed by specialist Espoo-based AV integrators, AVconcept Oy. "The brief was to create a welcoming atmosphere with a distinct signature for the Unity brand and bring it to life with high quality audio," explains Tina Kaikkonen, General Manager for Unity Finland. "We collaborated with Tunebutler – a DJ group from Denmark – to curate playlists for the entire Unity group, ensuring a cons
USA - Lighting designer Emmanuelle ‘Gigi’ Pedron has taken Elation Professional’s broadcast market KL Panel XL IP LED soft light and transformed it into a high-impact, aesthetic rock 'n' roll light for Queens of the Stone Age’s The End Is Nero tour. After playing European festivals throughout much of the summer, the band launched their North American leg 3 August in Sterling Heights, Michigan. “I wanted to do a colour field type show in the style of an abstract painting, minimalistic in form with a sense of open space,” Pedron explains of her design. “I want people to see what I see in my head when I hear the music - like chromesthesia - and I needed a light that could express that with colour.” Pedron says the idea behind using the KL Panel XLs on the tour came about during the pandemic when the designer was working in TV and film. “You see special
UK - Enjoying their third year of providing quality sound at the South Facing Festival, Solotech UK found themselves working with a new production team - but the result was just the same. The natural contouring of the 10,000-cap Crystal Palace Bowl amphitheatre, coupled with the power and ultimate control of Martin Audio’s MLA multicellular array, once again provided a winning formula. Method Events were the new incumbents this year, and for the production company’s award-winning co-founder Will Holdoway it was a welcome reunion with Solotech account manager David Preston. “It was a pleasure to be working again with David and the Solotech team for the first time since operating shows together at Drumsheds, North London until February 2022,” he reported. Once again, the programme over the two weeks was top drawer, with - according to Preston - Noel Gallagh
USA - Sphere Entertainment Co has announced that internationally renowned media artist Refik Anadol is the first artist to utilise the Exosphere, the fully programmable LED exterior of Sphere in Las Vegas, as an immersive canvas, debuting an AI Data Sculpture created exclusively for Sphere called Machine Hallucinations: Sphere. Refik Anadol is a media artist, director, and ‘pioneer in the aesthetics of machine intelligence’. He uses large collections of public data and machine learning algorithms to create immersive art installations. Anadol is the founder of Refik Anadol Studio, a technology-driven creative design studio based in Los Angeles. Anadol’s work has been exhibited on six continents, including MoMA, New York; Art Basel, Miami; and the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris. Machine Hallucinations: Sphere, an immersive digital experience, celebrat
Thailand - To provide the The Standard, Bangkok Mahanakhon hotel with an audio system fit for a luxury guest experience, Mahajak Co and Atkrist Co collaborated with Harman Professional Solutions to select and install a range of audio and control solutions. Nestled in the King Power Mahanakhon skyscraper in Bangkok, The Standard’s flagship hotel officially opened on 4 December 2022 and recently clinched the AHEAD Award for best Hotel New Build in Asia. The Standard required a robust background music system for its public areas, restaurants, terraces and meeting rooms. To meet this request Mahajak Co and Atkrist Co deployed a range of solutions from JBL Professional, Crown and BSS. Given the variety of rooms found throughout the hotel, the installation team broke up each floor into multiple zones to assess the unique audio requirements of each space and identif
USA - Today, it seems like just about every show “has to be lit ready for broadcast, I-Mag and or social media at any time,” says Felix Peralta. The noted designer and programmer has worked with many big stars with astronomical followings on Instagram, Facebook, and every other platform. This summer Peralta had the opportunity to create an array of video/photo-worthy visuals with his lighting when he lit Café Tacvba with Gustavo Dudamel and the LA Philharmonic in concert at the Hollywood Bowl. Peralta’s inspired use of contrasting warm and cool colour tones played off against the famed bandshell’s concentric arches, while the warm, radiant glow emanating from the shell-like stage accentuated the natural beauty of the venue’s Hollywood Hills surroundings. Helping him create these looks was a 4Wall Entertainment supplied rig that included 24 STRIKE Array
Poland - Sound rental company Gondek Stage & Events provided the audio infrastructures and other facilities for some of the largest festivals staged in eastern Europe through the spring and summer of 2023. An established Outline client, Bydgoszcz-based Gondek has recently added a substantial stock of Superfly to their existing inventory, which along with many other Outline products, handled a wide range of productions across numerous locations. Starting in May, they delivered a package including sound systems and staging for the Sunrise Festival at the Ergo Arena Upperground in Gdańsk, which was followed in June and early July by supplying two stages at the Open'er Festival at the Gdynia-Kosakowo airport in Gdynia. Right after that they delivered not only the sound but also the main stage and entire backstage infrastructure at the Reggae Festival in Ostró
Canada - Christie reports that its RGB pure laser projectors are illuminating a new immersive venue in Toronto. Illuminarium Experiences, in partnership with Toronto-based Secret Location, has opened its first Canadian location in Toronto’s Distillery Historic District. The 13,500sq.ft space includes almost 30 Christie RGB pure laser projectors and maintenance and support from Christie Professional Services. Illuminarium at The Distillery District places guests in the story and allows them to see, hear, feel, and affect the space around them. The new experience opens with two immersive shows: "Waking Wonderland inspired by Lewis Carroll’s classic novel Through the Looking Glass, takes guests through multiple projection-mapped environments and includes 7.2m real-time frames and over 30 unique interactions. SPACE: A Journey to the Moon and Beyond uses
Singapore - Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is always a delight to light, and Singapore-based lighting designer Gabriel Chan relished this task for the 2023 Shakespeare in The Park (SITP) version of this magical and mischievous work. Gabriel chose 67 Astera NYX Bulbs to get light sources into some of the more inaccessible parts of Richard Kent’s ‘cityscape’ set design, a cocktail of architectural fantasies that reimagined Athens as a stark industrial landscape that transformed into a dynamic hi-tech playground for the magic parts of the narrative. The set needed careful lighting from specific places and NYX Bulbs proved a perfect solution. It was the first SITP event for producers, The Singapore Repertory Theatre (SRT), since 2018. The production was directed by Guy Unsworth and staged at Fort Canning Green within Fort Canning Park.
Portugal - The highlight of the 37th World Youth Day 2023 in Lisbon, saw Pope Francis give the address at the Vigil, when an estimated 1.5m people gathered at the city’s Parque Tejo. Situated between Parque das Nações (Nations Park) and the mouth of the River Trancão, this beautiful setting was perfect for the pilgrims to receive the 86-year-old Pontiff’s core messages of hope and joy. Broadcast for the event was handled by Optocore partner Auditiv, who were responsible for capturing, amplifying and distributing sound on the Parque Tejo stage, and delivering all signals for broadcast distribution from the TV control compound. To give an idea of scale, 109 delay towers were spread across the 3km2 site, along with 69 LED screens. Aside from the address by the Pope, the stage hosted performance by a number of other artistes during the day. According to
USA - With more than 19m monthly listeners on Spotify, plus over 300m streams of his song Last Last alone, Nigeria’s Burna Boy - née Damini Ebunoluwa Ogulu - is by all counts a major international success. In July, the Grammy Award-winning singer, songwriter and record producer became the first African artist to headline a US stadium concert when he drew more than 40,000 fans to New York’s Citi Field to celebrate his 32nd birthday. But that wasn’t an isolated incident; he’s packing massive venues around the world on his latest Stadium Tour, sonically reinforced by Solotech, who are supplying a DiGiCo Quantum338 and two Quantum7 mixing consoles, one of which is loaded with a DMI-KLANG module for immersive in-ear monitor mixing. Burna Boy doesn’t do anything on a small scale, evidenced by the swarm of musicians and singers that surround him onstage.
UK - Bronx-born ‘King of Bachata’ Romeo Santos played a sold-out show at London’s O2 Arena earlier this summer, transforming the venue into a vibrant Latin music club. The show was the only London stop in Santos’ Vol. 3 World Tour. Adding to the dynamic vibe that resonated throughout the arena was a collection of 84 Chauvet Professional fixtures. Bigabox Productions managed (and supplied full) production for the show. “We called upon our friends at Encore Audio London and DMX Productions for audio, lighting and rigging support and solutions,” said Bigabox’s Dean Graves, who served as production manager. “The team of experts was complemented by the services of pyro master extraordinaire, John Wilson. Nyfield designed the original show, which was modified for O2 by assistant PM Tom Cull. It was a very memorable show.” “Everything flowed s
Italy - On 28 May 2023, Magnifying the Beauty, a Cartier show designed and directed by Lulu Helbaek and Simone Ferrari, was held at the Salone dei Cinquecento in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, in front of a select audience of 600 people with entertainment from guest artists Ellie Goulding and Celeste. Lighting designer, Pasquale Mari, assisted by Gianni Bertoli and programmer Mattia Carli, was responsible for lighting the evening’s events, set within the historic confines of the Salone dei Cinquecento (Hall of the Five Hundred) amid the statues and paintings of Italy’s largest public hall. Mari chose to illuminate the statues and highlight the grand architectural elements of the room using 40 award-winning Robert Juliat Dalis 860 cyclorama lights which he floor-mounted just 1m away from the painted walls and sublime statues, transforming them into a beaut
USA - Heart WeHo is a 1,500-capacity venue making it one of the biggest nightclubs along Santa Monica Boulevard in the ‘heart’ of the ‘Rainbow District’. The club is operated by Rocco’s, which is part-owned by Lance Bass, former singer with N Sync. New York based integrator Global AV Group successfully fulfilled the brief for a high energy, high SPL club system boasting definition and clarity. Global AV’s owner Jason Ojeda explains that “Void checked all the boxes as the perfect solution for this venue.” He continues: “With the club’s focus on electronic music and Void Acoustics’ world dominance for sound systems in this genre, it was a self-evident collaboration. We were simply deploying the best of what Void Acoustics offers.” Global AV Group has worked with Void Acoustics for over 15 years and is well-known for their obsessive attention to d
Austria - Situated amid Austria's picturesque wine country, the Mörbisch Lake Festival is a cherished celebration of culture and performing arts. The location has been a regular event for nearly 20 years and each year draws thousands of festival-goers. The festival's centrepiece is a floating stage that appears to levitate above the tranquil waters of Lake Neusiedl. This stage is integral to the festival experience. As dusk falls, and lights shimmer on the water, the stage morphs into an enchanting spectacle that captivates all who witness it. This year, the mesmerising ambiance of Mörbisch has been elevated further through collaboration with L-Acoustics. Over the past 20 years, this venue has evolved from a simple site, into a vibrant centre for performing arts. Transitioning from opera to musicals, it now hosts productions such as this year's Mamma Mia! and
UK - Experienced lighting designer Anthony Hazelden has made the journey from classic theatre to high-octane dance raves effortlessly, his generic stage lighting of yesteryear now replaced by next generation hybrid LED strobes, including GLP’s new JDC Line 1000. For a recent EDM concert within Cardiff Castle he not only provided a cutting-edge floor package for headliner Fisher, for whom he was LD, but the generic house rig for the support acts. This included Luther star Idris Elba and Arielle Free. Hazelden had known most of these artists from working with them on other projects around the world and had known the production manager for the Cardiff Castle show, James Dutton, from High Scream Productions in Ibiza. Mindful of the high-speed approach of Australian dance DJ Fisher within a historic venue, Dutton and Hazelden conceived their design for the sh
UK - Britannia Row Productions supplied L-Acoustics PA systems across four of WOMAD’s stages: Open Air, Saddlespan, Siam and Taste the World, on behalf of Judgeday Productions Director, Dave T. The Open Air Stage is the second festival environment in which Britannia Row has deployed the new L Series L2 system, following exceptional results at Soho House Festival. System engineer Sergiy Zhytnikov worked across the Open Air Stage. It boasted main hangs of L2, K2 stacked on the platform for side coverage, KS28 subs in a cardioid configuration across the stage, and A15s for front-fill. He comments: “As WOMAD is a world music festival, artists perform a variety of different genres including indie rock, nu jazz and downtempo, Indian funk and so on. Both the guest engineers and the production team were very happy with the L2’s results over the weekend, from consis
Denmark - For this year's Smukfest, the Roxx Cluster B2 FC was used on the festival's main stage as a blinder. The mood was high at Smukfest in Skanderborg earlier this month as 40,000 guests flooded the festival grounds to experience five days of performances by international and Danish artists on the five different stages - and the odd rain shower. Nordic Rentals, who supplied lighting for the festival's main stage, Bøgescenen, chose to use 72 Roxx Cluster B2 full colour blinders, which generated a buzz on the main stage because of the endless possibilities the fixture offers lighting designers. The Roxx Cluster blinder made its debut last year directly on three of the biggest festival stages, the Glastonbury Festival, Rock am Ring and Rock im Park and has since found its way to many of the biggest stages in the world. The fixture has become very popular all o
USA - Designer Tyler is a fan of the Chauvet Professional Rogue R1 FX-B with its five individually controlled RGBW moving heads. He particularly likes the fixture’s infinite pan and tilt. When lighting multi-platinum rockers Breaking Benjamin on their North American tour earlier this summer, Veneziano stopped himself from using this feature at points during the band’s 90-minute, 17-song set. “I love the infinite pan and tilt, but I didn’t want to over-use it and become predictable,” he explained. “My plan was to save theses looks for key moments to maximise their impact.” There were plenty of such moments in the band’s performance, as they rocked the crowd with ‘their heart-shaking base, crunchy guitar riffs and thunderous percussion’. When they did, Veneziano was ready with his 12 Rogue R1 FX-B units, which, like the rest of the rig, was supplied
China - In collaboration with event solutions provider Creative Technology (CT) UK and Nordic, Holoplot’s flagship X1 Matrix Array took centre stage at Auto Shanghai - Shanghai International Automobile Industry Exhibition for the launch of Polestar, the Swedish electric performance car brand’s new model, the Polestar 4 electric SUV coupé. By harnessing the power of 3D Audio-Beamforming and Wave Field Synthesis, Holoplot created an inspiring multi-zone audio extravaganza, with show visitors treated to a keynote presentation from Polestar’s CEO, delivered via two dedicated listening zones, one for English, one for Mandarin Chinese - the world’s first-ever live simultaneous translations without the need for wearables. X1 also played a pivotal role in creating a captivating audio experience throughout the show, enveloping visitors in a discoverable sonic journey.
Italy - Prolights products illuminated the Innamorato Tour of Blanco, the young artist riding high in the Italian music scene. Following the success of the Blu Celeste Tour, boasting 35 sold-out dates, Blanco has once again astonished his fans with his inaugural stadium tour, securing his position as the youngest Italian artist to perform on these prestigious stages. The concerts took place at Rome's Olympic Stadium and Milan's San Siro Stadium, where the singer delivered an overwhelming performance, paying attention to every detail and presenting a setlist that encompassed the best of his repertoire, accompanied by a visually stunning scenography. To ensure a captivating visual experience, the rental company Mister X Service employed 106 Astra Wash19PixIP and 138 Sunblast 3000FC Prolights fixtures to illuminate the stage. These fixtures orchestrated a sy
USA - Things never got “routine” for the Beartooth production crew this summer. The Loudwire and Metal Hammer award winners’ 37-city tour has included a wildly mixed bag of shows, as they’ve moved from headlining their own appearances, to supporting bands like Breaking Benjamin and Disturbed, with a healthy sprinkling of festivals thrown in. “It was just kind of all over the place on this run,” said the band’s lighting designer Dan Michie. “This made it critical to have a floor package that was not only very versatile, but could also be set up and torn down fast.” Michie got what he wanted, and more, with a versatile, easy-to-work-with rig from Squeek Lights that featured a collection of compact, but powerful Chauvet Professional fixtures. “The Squeek rig was so great for what we had to do,” he said. “It could be set up and torn down, and offsta
