UK - Alistage now hires and sells its own all-aluminium Pit / Crowd Control Barrier (Ali Total Barrier) that has been developed with Robbie Wilson of R & R Logistics to complement its Alistage modular stage system.
The Ali Total Barrier was introduced this year and besides such events as the Cambridge Folk Festival, the company has also managed to secure the contract to supply the barrier for Pink's UK and European Funhouse tour.
South Africa - As part of the J&C Joel strategy to always put their customers first and knowing the importance of being on the ground in a certain area, they are happy to announce the opening of J&C Joel South Africa cc.
James Wheelwright CEO comments: "At J&C Joel we've had a long history in Africa and we now feel it is the right time to have a presence in the region in the form of J&C Joel South Africa. Africa is an exciting future market for the Theatre and Entertainment Industry."
James was happy to formalise the opening of J&C Joel South Africa with Declan Randall (one of South Africa's leading lighting designers and theatre consultants), their South African partner at J&C Joel HQ in Halifax England. (see image). For the last ten years, Barry Snow has been J&C Joel's representative in South Africa and he is now becoming their full time general manager.
UK - Summit Steel supplied a Kinesys automation system with K2 control and all associated trussing and rigging to fly and track five projection screens in the main presentation area of the 2009 Sainsbury's Our conference, staged at the NEC, Birmingham, UK.
Summit was working for West Midlands based drpevents, who supplied all other aspects of the event production, including sound, lighting and video, which took place across five halls of the NEC. When it came to the automation elements of the show designed by drpgroup's Dale Parmenter, production manager Steve Pamplin wanted specialists onboard, and chose Summit Steel for whom the job was project managed by Chris Walker.
It was the first time that Summit had worked with drpgroup. "Chris impressed us and made us feel very comfortable," says Pamplin, adding that the time was tight to get the elaborate production instal
Germany - The 2009 Europe Music Awards have taken place in Berlin and for the ninth year running Stage One were on board; on this occasion providing props for both the host Katy Perry and for the artist Shakira.
Working for MTV Networks Italy, Stage One worked to very short timescales, in order to provide several key props: a flown sign, star swing, moon swing and a giant champagne glass, all for Katy Perry, along with a dance platform for Shakira.
"We employ such a variety of skills in-house that we were able to draw on these and turn things around extremely quickly," said Neil Franklin, head of interpretation for Stage One.
Stage One constructed a multi-level chevron shaped dance platform for Shakira, which was designed to complement the overall set. Resembling the inside of a sauna, the dance platform was completed with a tile effect finish and contrasting gold
UK - The millions of shoppers and tourists who flock to London's Covent Garden during the Christmas season can enjoy a special and illuminating treat, courtesy of Litestructures. The area's central plaza has two Palladian-styled buildings, both of which now sport festive chandeliers.
Fulfilling a commission from Jackie Cooper PR, longstanding Litestructures customers United Visual Artists (UVA) specified four large chandeliers, two of them 6m high and another two 8m, one of each to hang in both buildings. The circular bases have 2.5m diameters constructed using LitePro290-3, all clad with black powder coated aluminium sheet.
UVA provided the creative driving force behind the project, with Litestructures interpreting the design into aluminium assemblies, pre-building and pre-wiring all elements off-site at their Wakefield base. Litestructures then coordinated the installation,
UK - The Tour of Britain is one of the highlights in the British cycling calendar. This year's race finished in London and took in some of the city's busiest areas, meaning road closures and stewarding had to be very carefully managed by AP Security.
This year's Tour of Britain covered 746 miles over eight days in September and featured eight stages, covering parts of Scotland, northern England, the south west and finally London. This required closing roads on a busy Saturday afternoon, managing the thousands of people who turned up to watch and keeping an eye on multiple places where people could cross the course.
In all, AP supplied around 200 staff, who were deployed throughout the night with bulk coming in for a 6am start on the Saturday. The route was divided up into six sectors, each having a sector supervisor. Beneath the supervisor, staff were deployed on road closures
UK - Jan Booth, managing director of event branding specialist Sunbaba has been elected as the new vice president of the National Outdoor Event Association (NOEA) in this November's annual general meeting.
NOEA is the trade body for organisers and suppliers in the UK outdoor event industry bringing together local authorities, organisers, promoters, venues and suppliers to share problems, enhance professionalism and create business opportunities.
Booth has had an active role in the NOEA convention for the last five years, is a director on the board of the Tennis Industry Association.
"I am delighted to have been selected for the panel and would like to thank everyone who voted for me. The amount of support that I have received has been tremendous. I am a longstanding supporter of the council and its work and believe that I can bring ideas to the table that will help stan
UK - Alternative rock band Muse, known for their energetic and extravagant live performances, are currently engaged in a world tour of their fifth album, Resistance.
The Muse set has been constructed by Brilliant Stages from Es Devlin's design, under the auspices of production manager, Chris Vaughan.
The set consists of an 18m wide circular stage, flanked by 3m high tech bunkers complete with access stairs and topped by three 'stair towers', each weighing four tons, which carry video screens on all four surfaces.
Brilliant Stages built the stage to conceal three hydraulic performer scissor lifts, a piano lift to the rear, a set of access steps embedded in the stage behind the central drum riser and three star traps from which appear props and performers throughout the show. The central performer lift also supports a riser into which is set a revolve which carries the
UAE - Arising from an initial contact made at the recent PLASA show in London, the Middle East's leading stage and set rental company, IBS Decor, commissioned Litestructures to design a hospitality unit for Mubadala, Ferrari's official race sponsor at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
The IBS design concept called for a structure shaped to read as 'F1' when viewed from one side. This required a complex design as it necessitated the use of reverse angles of up to 70 degrees to achieve the desired profile. Measuring 14m long x 7.5m wide, and with a height of 6m, this was a substantial project, for which LitePro390-4 truss elements were utilised, clad to give the best cosmetic appearance.
Taking just three weeks from concept to completion, Litestructures, no strangers to the world of Formula 1, showed a winning turn of speed. Interestingly, the same structure has since been used for an e
Libya - TAO Group provided safety & risk consultancy services for the main structure build for the 40th Anniversary of Colonel Gaddafi coming to power in Libya this autumn.
Serious Stages and Atlantic Enterprises were contracted by Le Public Systeme to provide a custom structure for the staging of the spectacular production. The largest temporary stage ever erected in the MENA region, Serious Stages and Atlantic utilised numerous Antonov aircraft to fly out the massive amounts of equipment required. The structure consisted of a 38m SPACE roof stage on a 12m high leg with two adjoining 38m wide SPACE buildings, which functioned as the world's largest 'cowsheds'. The build was project managed by Atlantic's Shane McCarthy and David Fletcher with design and engineering support being handled by Serious Stages' team back in the UK.
Both Steven Corfield (Serious) and Shane McCarthy (
USA - The Joint Training Initiative of The ESTA Foundation and USITT has announced Theatre Rigging and Digital Sound Board Training Sessions to be held at Ohio Northern University in Ada, Ohio. The event will be hosted and produced by the Ohio Northern University Freed Centrefor the Performing Arts.
This three-day schedule of courses is designed for entertainment technicians at a basic to intermediate level. The Digital Sound Board session will be held on Friday, 8 January, with the Theatre and Arena Rigging sessions being presented 8-10 January, 2010.
The sound courses will be conducted by Todd J. Mitchell and Cliff Fuller of Great Lakes Sound in Toledo, OH. The rigging courses will be taught by Bill Sapsis of Sapsis Rigging, Inc. in Lansdowne, PA.
USA - Total Structures reports great interest at the recent LDI in its RSC Lightlock which was making its US debut.
The RSC Lightlock now gives designers the ability to dampen the natural tendency for moving lights to twist in reaction to the fixture's pan movement, allowing the light to hit the focus point without swinging back and forth. Live Design awarded the RSC Lightlock the Best Debuting Product Award in the Rigging and Staging category. The award, presented during Saturday evening's festivities on the show floor, recognizes the RSC Lightlock for "increasing the range of uses for moving head lighting fixtures, while reducing the amount of rigging equipment needed to place fixtures within facilities and productions".
For the team at Total Structures, the response from attendees reinforced what they already believed. "When people come back three or f
UK - based flight-case manufacturer 5 Star Cases has recently strengthened its partnership with DJ equipment specialists Pioneer, supplying 3000 cases for the popular Pioneer Pro440 DJ system console.
In the last 18 months, 5 Star has supplied over 3700 Pro440 cases, all finished in a striking red laminate. When Pioneer recently launched a Limited Edition 'piano black' CDJ-400 and DJM-400 featuring cool blue LED illumination, Paul Beardsall of Pioneer Europe NV, once again contacted 5 Star, wanting a new look case to compliment this special equipment release.
An initial order of 1000 blue cases was delivered to Pioneer's Belgian distribution facility in Melsele in early November, followed by a further 2000 units, scheduled for dispatch between December 2009 and January 2010. The option for a final delivery of more units will be made in February, bringing the Limited Edition ca
France - This December, French designer Sonia Rykiel launched her new range with a fashion show in the heart of Paris and Stageco built the specialist structures required to create a Parisian themed set.
The Grand Palais in Paris welcomed 2350 guests when it was transformed into a fairytale village for the launch of one of France's biggest fashion icon's new H&M range.
Stageco was approached to design and build the structures for the show working closely with the show's production manager Piet Winten. Stageco started work on the project a month before the show designing the custom built support structures.
The 26 strong Stageco team worked to a time and venue sensitive brief, building the set in three days ready for the international media, celebrities and special guests to watch the show.
Stageco designed the 400m² base upon which the replica version of the Eiffel Tower
UK - The only entertainment and installation technology show in the North of England, PLASA Focus: Leeds 2010 has launched its website with news of a near sell-out show. The success of the first ever PLASA Focus event this year has already seen next year's event fill two exhibition halls and now you can check out the brands bringing their new technology to Leeds, on Tuesday 27 - Wednesday 28 April 2010 at www.plasafocus.com/leeds
April 2010 will be the second time that venue owners, consultants, show designers, producers and technicians working on the North's leading events, installations and venues have a dedicated event where they can meet and find the new technologies to use in future facilities and productions.
Over 100 manufacturers from all over the world will be on show and the free Education and Learning Programme that runs alongside the exhibition brings
Argentina - The sixth Edition of the Personal Fest took place on 16 and 17 October, with Depeche Mode and Pet Shop Boys as headliners and with many national and international bands including Nile Rodgers & Chic, Zero 7, Cafe Tacuba and Tahiti 80.
More than 60,000 people attended the show which took place in the famous Club Ciudad de Buenos Aires. As in previous editions of the festival the sound and lighting was provided by Buenos Aires Live Show, who chose to use 15" stage wedges from the Proel Edge series.
The monitoring system consisted of Proel Edge15CXPB wedges amplified by Powersoft Q4002 and processed by the Proel DSO26 processors.
All involved were very satisfied with the high power, punch and intelligibility of the Edge monitors throughout the event.
UK - Hoist UK, master distributors for the complete range of Verlinde lifting products for the industrial and entertainment industry has launched a new website (www.verlindespares.co.uk).
Tony Dickson, director of Hoist UK comments, "As part of our ongoing development we are proud to introduce our online spare parts enquiry service available through the new website.
"With direct access to the Verlinde spare parts stock and hoist archive, Hoist UK are proud to offer a quick delivery time on most spare parts. If the part is not available from our UK site, it will be available from the factory in France.
Louise Dickson, sales executive of Hoist UK comments, "The process could not be easier; all you need to do is access our new website and select the hoist you have. This will take you to an exploded view of the hoist, where you will need to note the part numbers r
Royal News - The Queen has been entertained by a host of stars at the first Royal Variety Performance to be held in Blackpool since 1955. The town's illuminations had lit the way as the royal party made its way to the Opera House in the Winter Gardens. The charity event's host, comedian Peter Kay, welcomed the Queen to "the entertainment capital of the world". The show's performers included Lady Gaga, Bette Midler, Whoopi Goldberg and Britain's Got Talent winners Diversity.
Blackpool's Opera House, which seats 2,900 people, was used to host the show in the 1950s era of acts such as Morecambe and Wise, Arthur Askey and George Formby. The annual event was first staged in 1912 and the proceeds go towards the Variety Artistes' Benevolent Fund. The show's staging in Blackpool comes in the wake of BBC One's Strictly Come Dancing being staged at the resort's Tow
Canada - CAST Software of Toronto has announced the arrival of Vivien2010 - Virtual Event Designer, available now for download for members only.
Vivien is an intuitive, 3D event design and sales software designed and built by CAST Software (makers of wysiwyg) for the full spectrum of event professionals who work in the special events and meetings industry.
By making use of its wide array of tools, onboard Wizards, a library of more than 3000 proprietary industry-specific objects and textures, and the ability to import external files in a variety of formats (including Google SketchUp), individual or multiple users from all areas in an organization can become more professional, more productive and more profitable.
Through the use of Vivien's accurate 3D images, event planners, designers, venue sales teams, caterers, furniture rental specialists - can design winning proposals,
Sweden/Germany - Wireless Solution Sweden has announced JB-Lighting of Germany as the latest OEM partner to build W-DMX into its products. The technology will be installed directly at their Blaustein-Wippingen headquarters in the south of Germany.
"We are extremely pleased with this partnership," says Stephanie Walloner, sales and marketing manager for JB-Lighting, "Wireless Solution is the leading manufacturer of wireless DMX tools and the products are widely used in Europe and the USA. We consider ourselves as manufacturers of high quality products and we received nothing but positive comments from our clients on our decision to go with W-DMX."
JB-Lighting will be adding W-DMX to its JBLED product line. The moving-heads feature state-of-the art technology and high light output and are used in TV studios, theatres and live touring.
The Netherlands - It was today announced by liquidator Marcel Willems that Rent-All BV is to take over all the assets of Focus Show Equipment BV, which was declared bankrupt on 17 November.
Rent-All is a versatile rental company headquartered in Bemmel, The Netherlands, with a second branch in Bottrop, Germany. Rent-All offers a wide range of lighting, sound, rigging and video equipment, and the purchase of the assets of Focus Show Equipment contributes to the further development of its rental range.
Focus Advanced Event Technology will continue their activities, with a slightly smaller staff, the company reports.
Focus Show Equipment provides technical and logistics services for numerous events including large theatre productions, conferences, fairs, product launches and corporate events. Focus will now be partnering Rent-All, and will be better able to meet the needs of it
UK - Redburn Transfer, one of the leading players in the specialist market of music transport Logistics, has recently announced a mutual merger with the giant transportation and container firm, Deben Transport. With a family history in haulage dating back nearly 140 years and an enviable reputation within the music industry for the last 28, what motivated the MD Chris Redburn to make this move?
"This summer I was forced to turn down contracts from existing clients embarking on major touring productions,' explained Redburn. "We just couldn't cope with the amount of work being offered to us and I was not prepared to just sub-contract work and risk not delivering the quality of service that I believe is synonymous with our name and reputation. I realised that we needed to expand - and not just by a couple of tractors and trailers but by a significant amount along with an
UK - Arena Seating supplied the temporary theatre which seated over 40,000 people as Clothes Show Live enjoyed six successful days, marking the exhibitions 21st year at the NEC, from 4-9 December 2009.
The temporary theatre had a capacity of 6,200 (larger than the Royal Albert Hall) and was installed over five days by an experienced team led by senior project manager Martin Clark. The Fashion Theatre featured 130 models wearing £5million of the latest high fashion, presented in a high energy one hour spectacular that ran up to seven times per day.
Group operations director Bernard Cottrell who has been at Haymarket Exhibitions for 15 years, said, "I have used a range of suppliers and Arena Seating have shown themselves to be head and shoulders above their competition.
Health & Safety is of paramount importance to us and the Arena Seating teams are very safe
Qatar - Stage One were recently involved in creating a little Christmas spirit in the state of Qatar, when they were asked by marketing and events agency WRG to provide some super-sized Christmas decorations.
Destined for the newly developed area of Porto Arabia, the first phase of a dynamicupmarket shopping, dining and residential district of Doha, the developers of the area wereaiming to provide some festive cheer for Porto Arabia's international clientele.
Stage One were asked to construct: a giant 16m-diameter wreath, which weighed in at two tonnes and was attached to one of Porto Arabia's entrances; 30 scenically wrapped gift boxes, which were placed in various locations around the development and varied in size up to the largest at 4m x 4m; and two enormous scenic Christmas trees, one at 6m high, the other at 12m high.