China - ROE Visual has moved its LED production and production-related departments to the Unilumin Daya Bay Technology Park in Huizhou, China. The new location was officially inaugurated on 30 March 2023, with a festive and memorable celebration for the ROE Visual team. This upgraded production hub will enhance efficiency, allowing room for growth as the company expands, says ROE. With the completion of the Daya Bay Technology Park facility, the Unilumin Group now has the world's largest intelligent manufacturing site for LED displays. ROE Visual's independent new factory and office base spans over 16,000sq.m of office and manufacturing space. ROE now has access to various facilities, such as a reception, lobby, production lines, showrooms, conference rooms, and office spaces, all spread over seven spacious floors. ROE Visual's founder Jason Lu, flanked by members of t
USA - Ushio Inc., parent company to Christie, has announced the appointment of Koji Naito as the new chairman and CEO of Christie Digital Systems, globally. Koji currently holds the position of president and chief executive officer for Japan’s Ushio Inc., and will, effective 1 April, oversee both companies. Koji succeeds Hideaki Onishi, who will transition into a new role as Christie’s president and chief operating officer. In addition, Atsushi Kuroda, formerly of Sharp NEC Display Solutions, and currently senior director of Christie’s Strategy Office, has been appointed Christie’s chief technology officer and chief strategy officer, succeeding Zoran Veselic, president and CTO. “Constant innovation and deep core values, while making a difference in the communities we serve, are paramount to Ushio’s vision to a sustainable future for everyone,” says Koji N
UK - Buckinghamshire New University enlisted the help of LED display brand, Absen and global creative studio, Final Pixel to provide an end-to-end virtual production training academy. Working alongside BNU faculty, Final Pixel and Absen provided students studying visual effects and games art courses the opportunity to further develop skills and refine their knowledge of this emerging industry with a live brief, that culminated in facilitating support and expertise across a four-month project which culminated into a 2-week virtual production (VP) shoot. With the use of Absen’s PL2.5 LED screen, Jonathan Dyson, virtual production director for Absen demonstrated the product’s full capacity for virtual production. Regularly providing a range of LED applications for universities and colleges, Absen became involved with the Final Pixel on the project to assist in providi
USA - Kansas City’s new International Airport terminal has opened with a focus on traveller experience, offering a technology-rich terminal with large LED walls driven by tvONE’s Green Hippo Media Servers. The new multimillion-dollar, 39-gate single terminal is billed as the largest single infrastructure project in Kansas City’s history and the natural light-filled, spacious building reflects the city’s aspirations. Local artists have created pieces that are installed throughout, and it is home to more than 126 women and minority-group-owned businesses. The modern, dedicated ticketing area features an LED wall that spans the entire counter space, standing at more than 38,000 pixels wide and 480 pixels tall. The LED wall displays key information and branded airline content. A smaller LED wall is located in the arrivals area at the information desk. Three Green H
Denmark - SGM has updated its Video Pixel Linear product so that it is completely suitable for any temporary production setting or touring environment. The main features that make this possible are: replacement of the proprietary power/data cable and connector with touring Industry standard power and data connectors, a new, low-profile clamp and bracket system which enables creation of shapes as well as flexible, quick attachment to truss, and new firmware which provides individual addressing of each VPL as well as sACN universe priority handling. Because of its proprietary LED design, the Touring VPL can reproduce high visibility pixel content even in high ambient light environments. By expanding the imaging area per pixel in an LED cluster, and pre-mixing the colours inside the quad cluster, SGM considerably improves the impact for direct view applications. Th
USA - Target Centre is one of Minneapolis’ leading indoor venues, and in a city that gets over 50 inches of snow every year and has an average low temperature of 8°F in January, ‘indoor’ is a meaningful word. Opened in 1990, the 20,500-capacity arena is home to the NBA’s Timberwolves and WNBA’s Lynx, but also regularly hosts many other events, including concerts that in the past have included Taylor Swift, Garth Brooks, and, of course, ultimate hometown hero Prince. Target Centre is now also home to a DiGiCo S31 console at front of house, installed there last fall by Windy Shores Sound. Its arrival concludes an extended sound system upgrade that began five years ago with the installation of an L-Acoustics Kara PA system. As is often the case with city-owned facilities, the arena has the usual municipal bureaucratic issues around budgets, and it took some time for
Spain - Alfalite has supplied 964 units of its ModularPix Pro 1.9 ORIM LED panels for RTVE studios, Spain’s national state-owned public television broadcaster. The operation is being carried out by Datos Media Technologies, who won the concession bid to provide the equipment. RTVE has started an ambitious project to revamp all its studios in Spain to provide new features and cutting-edge technology that will improve the experience of its viewers at home, providing flexible, different, and more exciting ways of presenting information. All studios are fitted with versatile AR technology that will allow the production teams to deliver a greater sense of space and creative versatility in a more vibrant, innovative, and impactful way that will make a real difference to its audience. The path to winning the tender to supply the screens for RTVE’s studios was not st
Canada - Martin Tremblay, president and CEO of Solotech, has announced the appointment of Martin Carrier as president of the live productions division in Canada. “I’m pleased to welcome an exceptional leader who will play a key role on our management team thanks to his extensive experience in the entertainment industry. Martin Carrier is a visionary who, along with his team, will drive the live productions business in Canada within a large-scale market,” said Tremblay. Martin Carrier has over 25 years’ experience in senior management roles in a variety of industries, including video games, television and film production, and technology. He joins Solotech from MELS Studios & Postproduction, where he served as president. Previously, he held executive positions at companies such as Frima Studio, Warner Bros. Games and Ubisoft. “I’m honoured to join a
UK - Anna Valley and Garden Studios are partnering to set up a new virtual production studio in central London. The announcement follows the companies’ collaboration on the recent SMPTE Virtual Production Showcase that took place at Garden Studios and featured an LED volume by Anna Valley. Together, the companies are providing a 150sqm+ volume and supporting crew and technology at Garden Studio’s facility in the heart of London’s film community. Anna Valley has an extensive inventory of ROE’s acclaimed Black Pearl BP2V2 ‘film-centric LED panels’ and facilitates a range of pop-up and hosted virtual production studios for television, corporate and film clients. Garden Studios is the largest-scale film studio in central London with a total footprint in excess of 300 000sq.ft and five sound stages totalling over 48 000sq.ft. They’re also no strangers to
UK - disguise has announced the launch of EX 3 - a 4K video playback solution designed specifically for location-based experiences and fixed installations. EX 3 unlocks the scalability of the full disguise platform, which has powered more than 600 immersive experiences in more than 50 countries. The platform - which includes disguise’s Designer software, newly-launched APIs, and the disguise Cloud collaboration toolkit - lets creatives benefit from an end-to-end workflow from concept to delivery, so they can bring their vision to life from one connected platform. “Creative studios increasingly have to deliver a wider variety of projects,” says Raed Al Tikriti, chief product and technology officer at disguise. “With the EX 3, we’ve made doing this easier and more accessible than ever. Even if you only need video playback for an hour, you’ll be able to design, edit
Germany - Film technology company ARRI is elevating ARRI Solutions to become its own business unit and has established two new senior management positions. The business unit is led by Kevin Schwutke, who focuses on the strategic and commercial direction, and David Bermbach, who is responsible for the technological backbone. ARRI Solutions designs, engineers, builds, and operates pioneering virtual production environments of all sizes, along with delivering integrated systems and cutting-edge workflows for corporations, broadcasters, and studios. With experience of leading major studio projects from consultancy through to configuration and turnkey installation, ARRI Solutions offers customers a full end-to-end service with the promise of ARRI brand quality. Dr. Matthias Erb, chairman of the executive board at ARRI, comments: “We are seeing great demand from our
Europe/USA - ALC NetworX, developer of the Ravenna audio-over-IP technology, has welcomed Netgear to the Ravenna community. Under its Netgear AV brand, Netgear is offering scalable AV-over-IP and wireless networking solutions for the commercial market. Netgear's pro AV solutions are engineered specifically for AV-over-IP with out-of-the-box support for most networked AV solutions. Netgear has been developing commercial network equipment for over 25 years and has become a market leading switch manufacturer for AV-over-IP. With the AV Line series of network switches, Netgear has reduced common installation frictions with pre-set profiles for AV-over-IP protocols, from one-room setups to very large AV networks with thousands of endpoints. Netgear’s Laurent Masia, director of product line management for managed switches comments: “We recognise the importance of key a
USA - LED technology specialist LED Studio has opened its first demo space in the US in Dallas, Texas. This will showcase the latest solutions from the company and its manufacturing partner VOD Visual as the brand continues to grow. The facility is co-located with LED Studio partners Elevated Systems in its 8,000 sq.ft. premises that combines offices, a warehouse and now demo space. The media and building services specialists provide a full turnkey solution for digital signage and wallscape installations, including design, engineering, installation and maintenance. This physical space enables visitors to experience the magnitude of LED Studio’s award-winning displays and helps determine the optimal displays for prospective installations. An extensive range of LED Studio displays will be presented to highlight the potential opportunities for end-users in respect to s
Singapore - The latest edition of the world’s largest e-sports championship, Dota 2’s The International 2022, was held in Singapore at the end of last year and attracted 67.74m hours of worldwide viewing. Singapore-based system integration company, Cgangs International Pte, partnered with the game’s developer, Valve, to create a Brompton Technology-powered virtual production set, used during the filming of the opening video and teaser campaign featuring the top four participating teams. Cgangs was introduced to Valve via PGL, a renowned esports tournament organiser, to provide its cutting-edge virtual production services for the event. "Our primary objective was to construct a temporary virtual production setup for Valve's pre-match and opening campaign," says Cgangs' director of strategic partnerships & business development, Alvin Lim. "These were used
India - Founded in 1940, Patna Women’s College was the first higher education facility of its kind to be opened in India’s Bihar state. The college recently invested in audio, video and lighting systems for its newly completed 2,500-seat Veronica Auditorium. Following the successful completion of another project for Patna Women’s College, Punjab-based Soundxperts won the contract to supply a complete turnkey solution for the auditorium, including audio, video, lighting, control, acoustics, seating, and flooring. Soundxperts worked closely with professional audio distributor, Sun Infonet, which was able to supply leading brands for the crucial audio component of this prestigious project. According to Soundxperts owner, Amninder Warraich, “Having the complete audio solution under one roof from renowned brands like Shure, Allen & Heath, Audiofocus, Quest Engi
Europe - The Inside Story has taken steps to reduce its impact on the planet by becoming CoolPartner number 054 with Cloudforests.ie, a social enterprise creating new forests along Ireland’s Wild Atlantic Way. The move will give the full-service marketing agency a verifiable nature-based solution to offset the carbon emissions created by the business. “As a company, we have been talking for a while about the impact that our actions are having on the environment and we wanted to take positive action to reduce this,” explains Barney Jameson, founder and managing director at The Inside Story. “After a period of extensive research, we decided that Cloudforests presented the best solution to help us reduce our carbon footprint.” “Joining Cloudforests is a powerful statement about what we stand for as a company,” adds John Hull, director of video at The Inside
UK - disguise has announced that it has partnered with London’s Lightroom – a new home for spectacular artist-led experiences in King’s Cross – to power its inaugural art experience by David Hockney. Called David Hockney: Bigger & Closer (not smaller & further away), the show was designed by 59 Productions, who used disguise’s end-to-end location-based experience solution for everything from pre-visualisation to show control and delivery. With the venue only open for a month, it has already attracted an average count of over 2,000 visitors a day. David Hockney: Bigger & Closer (not smaller & further away) takes visitors on a journey through 60 years of the artist’s paintings, digital art and set designs through a 50-minute, large-scale projection show powered by seven disguise vx 4 servers. In six themed chapters featuring an original
UK - Pro Media Audio Video Europe, part of the Clair Global Brand Group, has rebranded as Clair Global Integration (CGI), effective immediately. Clair Global entered the European market in 2021, led by industry veteran Eddie Thomas. Keeping the audience experience at the forefront of its delivery in audio systems, network design, AV, network management, and IT comms and infrastructure, CGI in Europe will continue to ‘design and deliver exciting work across spaces that resonate and inspire, in-line with its US operation’. Over the past two years, Thomas and his team have helped to deliver major projects for music venues in London including work at the O2 Arena and Here, the capital’s new flagship live events venue, which is situated within the immersive entertainment district, Outernet. In the professional sports industry, the company has upgraded Burnley’
Taiwan - With offices in Taiwan and Australia, award-winning production house for film and television, Reno Studios, has created Taiwan’s latest pixel pitch virtual production facility. Opened at the end of last year, it is located at the longest-running Taiwanese movie studio, Central Motion Picture Corporation (CMPC). Helping bring clients’ stories to the screen is Brompton Technology LED processing. “In collaboration with partners, Reno Studios provides a one stop service for international shooting projects, with access to essential services such as scenery construction, camera rental, lighting post-production and sound processing,” says Peter Huang, general manager of Reno Studios. Huang knows that image quality is one of the most important elements for virtual production, with LED panels and LED processors fundamentally determining whether image deta
China - Christie has announced that its high-performance 3DLP and 1DLP laser projectors are illuminating a new night-time tourist attraction at the picturesque Jiuge-Shangui scenic area in Zhangjiajie, a prefecture-level city in Hunan Province. Inspired by stories in the Chu Ci poetry anthology by renowned ancient poet Qu Yuan, Jiuge-Shangui integrates the legends of Xiangxi with cultural heritage of the indigenous Tujia and Miao ethnic groups, as well as the natural beauty of Zhangjiajie to deliver a large-scale extravaganza. Live performances staged across the scenic area spanning over 5 square kilometres are lit by close to a dozen Crimson WU31, DWU2022-HS and DWU1612-HS laser projectors supplied and installed by Christie’s trusted partner, Jianye Display. “Jiuge-Shangui night-time spectacular is the first of its kind in the world and
UK - Full-service technical production partner, JLL, has acquired Scruffy Bear Pictures, an independent film company. The acquisition comes hot off the heels of the business’ recent merger announcement. As members of EVCOM, ICE-HUB, Essa, Isla and Albert, the acquisition will enable JLL to further underline commitments to deliver sustainable and by 2030, net zero carbon technical production services to all sectors of the television and events industries. By bringing the Scruffy Bear Pictures team into the JLL fold, their combined skills will ensure the full team can continue to support agencies, studios, and creative teams, as well as innovate and lead the way as the world of corporate events continues to evolve. Phil McMichael, group commercial director at JLL, comments: “The first three months of 2023 have been game-changing for the team here at JLL. The coming
UK - The Christie-sponsored National Film and Television School (NFTS) Most Promising Student Award was recently announced at NFTS’ annual graduate showcase, held at the BFI Southbank. Lisa Kenney, a student in the Directing Animation MA programme, won this year’s award. The showcase screenings took place from 27 February to 2 March, 2023, with Kenney winning the award and trophy for her inspiring work and attitude throughout the year. Robert Bradbrook, head of the Directing Animation MA programme, NFTS commented: “Lisa is a wonderful and caring student who understands that the process of making a film is just as important as the final animation. Not just her journey, but the students that work with her. She always goes out of her way to ensure that the needs of others come first, resulting in a supportive family environment that allows everyone to do their best
Germany – tvONE’s powerful CORIOmaster2 video processor has been installed at the heart of German AV distributor Kern & Stelly Medientechnik’s new showroom in Hamburg, driving a wide variety of displays throughout the space. When Hamburg-based Kern & Stelly moved into its new premises, the team took the opportunity to completely redesign their showroom to showcase AV technical possibilities and configure it for events. The tvONE CORIOmaster2 is now the central video management processor for large and small screens hung around the showroom, including an artwall installation with seven displays. The content ranges from digital signage and demonstration videos to marketing messages and partner information. “The CORIOmaster2 offers endless creative possibilities and helps to present the products of our display partners in an optimal way,” says Mario Mühr
Iceland – The popular Idol TV singing competition burst back onto Icelandic screens recently after a hiatus of more than 10 years, updating its staging and visuals with four LED screen elements which were all driven by Hippotizer Boreal+ MK2 Media Servers. The fifth season’s finale was broadcast live from Reykjavik as contestants battled it out in front of a live audience, judging panel and TV viewers at home. The stage was dominated by an upstage centre Absen PL2.9 LED screen at 2688x1680px, flanked by two LED side walls at 2688x1512px. An additional Absen PL3.9 lite LED floor at 3584x512px completed the video fest, enveloping the set. Icelandic TV technology solutions company Luxor served as production designers for the show, specifying the Boreal+ MK2 Media Servers for video designer Ingi Bekk’s creations. “We used two Boreal+ MK2 servers running as
