Robe - LEADERBOARD - Feb 2025
PLASA Show 2025 - Banner - June-Aug 2025

Video and AV

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Italy - Sony recording artist Gianni Morandi is a pop phenomenon in Italy: from his days as a gangly 1960s teenager through to the present, he has drawn packed crowds throughout the country. His popularity was confirmed recently when a show to celebrate his 60th birthday, produced in collaboration with Ballandi Entertainment, was staged in Rimini's new indoor sports arena, 105 Stadium.

Although Morandi's best-known songs are his older ones, there's nothing dated about his concerts from a technical point of view. 'Stasera Gianni Morandi' had a huge cutting edge audio and lighting rig supplied by contractor Agorà of L'Aquila, as well as an eye-catching multiple LED screen set-up by Eurovideo.

Sound designer Daniele Tramontani is rightly proud of having set a trend followed by other artists when he designed Morandi's first (1996) concert-style rig in a TV studio in Rome, after t

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UK - Software provider Stardraw.com will formally launch its latest application, Stardraw Control, at NSCA 2005. Previewed at PLASA in London, the application has already generated a huge amount of excitement amongst manufacturers and systems specialists who have welcomed Stardraw's new approach to solving the problem of controlling heterogeneous systems.

Stardraw Control generates standalone, customized control programs that can manage any type of addressable equipment from any manufacturer over any communications infrastructure. Instead of being locked into closed architectures wherever system control, monitoring or signal routing has been required, Stardraw Control offers systems integrators an open, software-based, unified control framework that can manage the entire system with a single application, regardless of system complexity.

Stardraw Control is fast, powerful,

Doughty - Banner - from 6 June 2025

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Belgium - Barco recently announced the introduction of several new LED and projection products, launched to its key European Rental Partners at the company's annual European Rental Partner Meeting, held in Faro, Portugal from 6 - 8 Feb.

Bringing together over 120 key commercial and technical representatives from over 70 Rental Partners throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa, the annual meeting has become the rental and staging industry's official launch pad for Barco's latest products. This year was no exception, Barco launched its OLite 510, a multi-purpose high-resolution indoor/outdoor SMD LED platform, as well as several new projectors, including the RLM R6+ and RLM R5i. The company also anticipated the ever-growing trend of convergence between lighting and video by launching its brand new MiPIX rental structure as well as a first showing of the MiPIX Creativity Pack

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UK - Creating a big impact launch to Cancer Research UK's largest ever integrated fundraising campaign, large format projection specialists, PRG Europe, were used to project huge teaser images on to Battersea Power Station.

Ogilvy's cross media campaign, evocatively titled 'I shouldn't be here', was launched on the 4 February with DRTV advertising across 15 channels, while a second wave of press advertising and direct mail went live on the 14 February.

Working on behalf of event management specialists Event Force, PRG Europe beamed three faces on to Battersea Power Station using a 12K PANI projector. Photographed at an angle and 'key stoned' so that the projected images appeared straight, the event ran for four hours to coincide with rush hour - ensuring the launch teaser got maximum exposure.

Chris Stephens, project manager at Event Force Ltd commented: "Having contact

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UK - XL supplied two of its new DP HD35 projectors and a newly released Barco Folsom Encore SC control system along with a digital three-camera PPU for Pizza Hut's 2005 sales conference in the Monarch Suite of the Hilton Metropole in London. The conference was followed by an awards dinner and dance. The event was produced by Beki Gaskin working for Breeze Marketing; XL's project manager was Greg Rice and Mel Davis handled the event production management.

The two projectors - each displaying 1920 x 1080 pixels - were rigged for rear projection using a soft edge overlap, and giving a full screen display area of 3200 x 1080 pixels across the 12m wide asymmetric surface. Gaskin has produced the show for the last nine years and this year wanted to attempt something radically different. The highly flexible Barco Folsom system enabled her to break the mould not only in live video effe

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UK - Following the release of Stardraw Control Beta 1 last month, software provider Stardraw.com has announced the public availability of Stardraw Control Beta 2 with immediate effect, prior to its formal launch scheduled for NSCA next month. A community of nearly 600 systems specialists was involved in the Beta 1 test phase and further participants in the Beta 2 test phase are similarly invited. Stardraw Control Beta 2 offers enhanced stability and applicability over the first Beta version, which was developed on the Microsoft.net v2 platform, which is itself still in the beta testing stage. As there is no firm release date for MS.net framework v2, Stardraw has released Stardraw Control Beta 2 on MS.net v1.1, the current release version. "It will be very easy to port everything back over to MS.net v2 when it is formally released later this year," commented Stardraw.com

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UK - Blitz, a leading provider of AV equipment and services, combined the expertise from its Manchester and Elstree facilities to supply sound and video solutions for the 2005 ELLE Style Awards held on 15 February at one of East London's newest and most challenging venues, Spitalfields Market. The event was attended by a host of leading celebrities from the fashion, film, television and music world.

Blitz worked with urban productions, a leading events management company, to supply the Awards ceremony with both the equipment and personnel to ensure a flawless service. Blitz first worked with urban productions for the 2004 Whitbread Young Achiever Awards. Monique Smith, project manager at urban productions, commented: "The Whitbread Young Achiever Awards was held at a unique venue in Central London and Blitz's expertise, coupled with their proactive approach and attention t

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USA - A High End Systems (HES) Catalyst Pro media server is kickstarting the heart of Motley Crue's Red, White & Crue: Better Live Than Dead 2005 world tour. The two-hour show, featuring classics and new numbers, reunites after six years all four original members of the band Nikki Sixx, Vince Neil, Mick Mars and Tommy Lee.

The lighting team includes LD Justin Collie of Artfag, lighting director Kevin Cauley and programmer Nathan Wilson, with extra pre-tour assistance from HES programmers Brad Schiller and Nicholas Militello. XL Touring Video is supplying the Catalyst system, while the lighting contractor is Ed & Ted's Excellent Lighting.

The tour started in February in North American arenas, then heads to Latin America, Europe and UK, and returns to US amphitheatres in August and September. November and December will see the group in Southeast Asia.

(Lee Baldock)

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UK - Corporate Audio Visual Plc - one of the UK's largest audiovisual companies - has announced the acquisition of the Aztec Communications Group Ltd, a specialist hire, events and exhibitions company, in a move which further strengthens the Company's portfolio of services.

The completion of this acquisition, together with the relocation of the Manchester head office to purpose-built premises and the expansion of the company's Birmingham operation "underpins the Company's commitment to technical excellence" says the company. Aztec Communications will relocate from its existing Waterloo offices to Corporate AV's expanded Vauxhall site in central London.

Over the past 15 years, Aztec Communications has built a reputation for technical competence and quality of service within the event and exhibitions market. Corporate AV says its national presence will provide a platf

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UK - MCL Birmingham has been appointed as the preferred AV supplier to the ICC Birmingham. The company has supplied to the venue for a number of years, but will now take main responsibility for the provision any additional AV requirements. MCL Birmingham secured the appointment against intense competition: one of the reasons for MCL's success has been the excellent working relationship that exists between hire desk manager Chris Cheatle and the ICC Birmingham's technical manager, Paul Dipple, say the company.

Chris commented: "We have always worked very hard to ensure we provide what our clients want, when they want it. However we took this a step further for the ICC Birmingham. We met with the ICC Birmingham team and noted the areas in which they saw the greatest need for additional support in the coming years. For example there was an increasing requirement for moving lig

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Germany - Agilent has announced a breakthrough colour management system for backlighting LCD flat-panel TVs, which the company claims delivers 25% more brilliant colours than current fluorescent backlighting. The colour management controller IC and colour sensor module combine to produce a complete hue (colour) and intensity (brightness) control system, say the company. The system works with high-power Luxeon red, green and blue LEDs from Lumileds Lighting - a joint venture between Agilent and Philips Electronics.

The Agilent solution solves past problems LCD television display manufacturers have had with RGB LEDs by providing a closed-loop optical feedback system. The system enables plug and play for OEMs and maintains a set color point over the life of the TV display. Initially, the primary application for this technology is to control RGB LED backlighting for LCD flat-panel

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UK - XL Video supplied two Barco R12 projectors to Red Priest's Red Hot Baroque Show which launched at Hackney Empire last week, before embarking on an international tour scheduled to last most of the year. The show's visuals - lighting and projection - have been designed and produced by Ben Rogers, who started work on the project last autumn. He was approached early by the music act, who was already engaged in constant touring worldwide. They wanted to 'up' the production values of their show and develop it into a creative collage of Baroque recital and modern performance.

Projection was on the cards from an early stage. Rogers wanted something that would give a unique look and was easily travelled. He approached XL Video's arts and theatre specialist Malcolm Mellows and together they explored the different options. They came up with the two projectors which can be front

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Hong Kong - Lighthouse Technologies broke new ground with the introduction of the P12-Enhanced Resolution (ER) indoor/outdoor light emitting diode (LED) panels, which use advanced digital processing to enhance resolution to include more detailed information on a smaller screen. With a 12.5mm dot pitch resolution, the P12-ER allows more images, graphics and text to be displayed on 25mm panels.

The P12-ER is the first LED panels to combine the benefits of Lighthouse's M4 colour uniformity, 14-bit grayscale and resolution-enhancing technology. The P12-ER is best suited for advertising and stadium applications that require mid-size screens with high-resolution for longer viewing distances. Recognizing the demand for a wider variety of LED signage, P12-ER is the first in a line of enhanced resolution products Lighthouse plans to introduce in 2005. The internal architecture of the onb

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UK - XL Video is supplying 304 panels of new Barco I-12 SMD (surface mounted diode) screen and one of its new Grass Valley Zodiac mixer/switchers for the current Westlife 'No 1s' European arena tour. On this, the fifth Westlife tour for XL Video, the company is also supplying a full three-camera IMAG/PPU system and crew via Blink TV. Live video director is Billy Robinson.

The Barco I-12 is configured into four screens. Unusually, the two side screens, which are always used for IMAG, are also constructed from the same LED source - in a 10-wide/8-deep combination. Onstage there's a 10-wide by 12-deep curved portrait screen downstage right, and a smaller 24-tile portrait screen upstage left.

This video unites the two side screens with the onstage screens in a wide-vision stage setting. The video design and stage set was conceived by Production North's Steve Levitt and the band.

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UK -The Association of Investment Trust Companies was set up 73 years ago in the City of London as non-profit making trade body of the investment trust industry. In the past few months it relocated its HQ a few doors along Chiswell Street, and up to the ninth floor of new purpose offices.

One of the advantages of the new facility was the ability to incorporate a long 24-seat rectangular conference room, divisible into two separate spaces. It was important that high resolution images could be placed easily onto a sufficiently large screen from the lectern position.

With a large membership, AITC's convention room already enjoys high utilization and while the bulk of the projected content is Powerpoint presentation, AITC also need access to finance satellite channels, with overall ease of operation. The AITC had already received a quotation for the multimedia infrastructure when

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Germany - AV retail entertainment creators and provider, Cube Music, has been specifying BSS Soundwebs as the digital hub of its distribution systems into high-end retail sites on a regular basis. When Ed Manwaring of EM Communications was asked to put a BSS-driven network onto the Cube Group's stand at the recent EuroShop retail trade fair in Germany - using a pair of SW9016 video/audio matrix switchers and an SW9010 'Jellyfish' remote - it was not only to enable salesmen to stream different content to potential clients via the remote panel, as Cube CEO Fiona Ryder explained: "Soundweb has become an absolutely key element of our retail installations," she said. "The first time we used it was for a client at the Bull Ring and we love the whole flexibility and the way it works. From that point on it became standard for us, and so it was critical we had one to show on

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UK - Stage Electrics London has complete the move into its new shop, after more than 12 months at its Long Lane premises. "We wanted to give our customers easier access to the facilities at Stage Electrics," says Linda Moore, head of sales and marketing for the company. "We have the added value of parking at the rear of the building where we now have customer access to the shop and hire warehouse."

There have also been some additions to the team at Long Lane. Stephen Bray has joined as sales manager for the branch. Bray has come to Stage Electrics from a background in sound, most recently at Media Tools. Also, James Morris has joined as a customer service representative after working at Vodafone. Bray and his team will shortly be holding a series of open evenings to introduce products and services now available from London.

Pictured left to right are: Ed

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UK - It's been a case of in with the new at Scottish lighting specialist black light, with two new faces on the team. Hire manager Alan Jackson has decided to return to his native England, so managing director Gavin Stewart has taken the opportunity to reorganize the company's hire department.

Richard Hogg was already doing a fine job running the day-to-day business of the department and Seonaid "Shonny" Aitkenhead has now joined him, having worked with black light as a freelancer at the end of 2004.

This has allowed Jackson's successor to fulfil an expanded role. Phil Haldane has now joined the black light team as events manager to actively develop the company's specialist events work.

"We are seeing our events business develop with an increasing amount of themed weddings, presentations and corporate projects running alongside events like the Edinburgh Fringe

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UK - XL Video UK has purchased 625sqm of Main Light Industries' Soft-LED drape. This is the first Soft-LED product to be purchased in the UK. 300sqm of it has gone straight out on the Kylie Minogue Showgirl world tour, which kicks off next week in Glasgow - for which XL is supplying full video production. The Soft-LED was specified by LD Vince Foster.

The remaining 325sqm is designated for other up-coming XL projects - including Maroon 5 and Destiny's Child. The company is also about to invest in a further 1000sqm of Soft-LED. XL's Lee Spencer said: "When I saw it in action at the Kylie rehearsals I was well impressed. The product's incredible impact has achieved exactly what the designers where looking for". XL Celebrates its fifth birthday this month. "Five years on, and XL is still at the forefront of video display technology" continues Spencer &quo

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UK - Panorama Led RGB and Panorama Led White are two Led-technology professional projectors suitable to perform in most applications such as outdoor: architectural and urban applications, amusement parks and circuses, exhibitions, theatres, convention centres, cruise ships, tourist and resorts precincts, orchestras, musicals and touring, fashion catwalks.

Panorama Led RGB is recommended for TV studios, disco and entertainment venues, concerts and events; Panorama LED White is a solution for halls, shopping malls, schools, churches, hotels and restaurants as well as interior decoration.

The technical specification is of 36 luxeon LEDs (1W each; declared lamp life 100.000 hours) luminous source with step zoom, dimmer, strobe, built-in automated functions, remote control, DMX 512, DR1 compatibility and an IP66 protection rating.

(Sarah Rushton-Read)

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France - Proving that some people will go to any lengths to procure their mixing console of choice, French sound, lighting and video company ETF-Procon recently hired a JCB to install a Midas Heritage 2000 at front of house for the Festival International des Pyrénées, Olorons Ste Marie, France.

The concerts during the festival took place at various outdoor venues, including the town square, where the front of house position was in a control room constructed above the performance area. As 800 temporary seats for the public had already been installed in the town square, access for the 56-channel console into the control room was restricted. Heads were put together, and it was decided that the easiest way of delivering the console was through the rear window of the control room.

The remainder of the equipment, which included a Midas XL250 for monitors, was delivered to the squa

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The Netherlands - Dynamic signage systems are becoming increasingly popular in international airports, where they provide an ideal platform for both passenger information and advertising. One of the latest locations to benefit from such an installation is Lounge 1 departure hall at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam.

Installed by systems integrator, Hecla Professional Audio & Video Specialists, two Lighthouse 10mm LED screens, one measuring 2.56m (w) x 6.72m (h), the other 2.56m (w) x 1.92m (h) are flown above a pool of water in the centre of the lounge. "We chose these screens because of their perfect pixel pitch for this application, reliability, and their IP-65 water resistant front rating, as they are above water and need to meet with stringent safety regulations," explains Peter Slütter of Hecla. "M4 Technology [Lighthouse's proprietary uniformity control system

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Germany - The 35th 'Ball des Sports', organized by the foundation Deutsche Sporthilfe, and under the patronage of the German Federal President Prof. Dr. Horst Koehler, took place on 5 February in the Festhalle Frankfurt under this year's slogan Nacht der Sterne. More than 2,000 guests, including celebrities and Olympic champions, enjoyed a spectacular show equipped with latest technology.

As the show's media technology partner, CT Germany provided the LED specials, projections and peripheral equipment for the Ball des Sports. On behalf of event producer Kogag, the CT team offered full service including installation, support and dismantling with the technical project management of the CT Düsseldorf sales office.

The highlight of the stage set was CT's new Soft-LED: a dynamic LED curtain, it showed video and graphic content which was created specifically for this show.

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UK - Digital media specialist Projected Image Digital has moved to larger premises in West London. Meanwhile, its sister company, gobo manufacturer Projected Image, remains in East London at its purpose-built laboratory and office space on Three Mills Island. "It was always intended to move PID when we outgrew the space," explains David March, "And that's happened much quicker than expected in just two years since the launch of 'Digital'".

The new PID building features a vast workshop facility with more storage, increased office space and a full-scale demo and training area. It means PID can offer comprehensive demos for its entire range including Catalyst and Element Labs products. The move also enhances PID's ability to provide thorough product training on all products, they say.

The Grade II listed building at 53 Northfield Road is a slice of productio

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