The ancient Roman amphitheatre in Verona was the magnificent setting for Intimissimi on Ice, a sumptuous evening of music and dance on a vast iced stage that covered nearly half the arena floor. Designed in the classical amphitheatre style, the 2000 year old stone structure is elliptical in shape, with the outer walls standing about 17 metres in height. The audience was seated in the remaining half of the arena floor and on seating built into the steeply tiered bleachers of the original structure. Beautiful and atmospheric certainly, yet presenting quite a challenge for sound reinforcement. Davide Carlotti, Education and…
Author: TPi
Showlight is now inviting lighting designers and directors, associates, programmers, scenographers, equipment manufacturers and others to submit their ideas for conference papers for the 2017 programme. The Showlight Quadrennial is one of the few international events organised specifically for lighting professionals by lighting professionals across the performance, television, film, architectural and event worlds. Held every four years, Showlight 2017 takes place in Florence and celebrates the 10th presentation of this eagerly-awaited lighting colloquium. Showlight has made a special name for itself by bringing together many of the most famous names in lighting. Delegates are given the opportunity to be part…
2016 marks the 40th anniversary of the establishment of HHB Communications, which was founded on 1 February 1976 starting as a local live sound company. For 40 years, HHB has occupied a unique position in the professional audio industry. Much more than simply a reseller, HHB offers customers the highest levels of specialist advice and technical support, counting the world’s leading broadcasters, recording studios, post-production facilities and educational establishments as customers, while major manufacturers have appointed HHB in various capacities as an exclusive distributor. HHB has also emerged from a crowded marketplace to become Europe’s largest supplier of Avid audio production…
Gil Teichman is one of the most flamboyant figures on the Israeli lighting design and production scene – innovative, creative, sometimes controversial, uncompromisingly ‘hands-on’ in every design job. He is also a regular investor in Robe products. His eponymously named company, “Gil Teichman”, purchased their first Robes some years ago, and in fact he’s known of Robe right since the start in the 1990s, when they were an OEM manufacturer. The first ever “Gil Teichman” purchases were of the ColorWash and ColorSpot 1200 series, around nine years ago, followed by the 700E AT series, all delivered through Robe’s Israeli distributor,…
WIcreations delivered a custom automation solution for the brand new Holiday on Ice show BELIEVE, as well as fabricating the elaborate set as an efficient touring package. The world premiere of the new ice dance spectacle took place in Grefath, Germany and continued touring in Europe. Hans Willems led the WI team for this project, working directly for producers Netherlands based Stage Entertainment, and closely with set and Scenic Designer Luc Peumans from Painting with Light. Willems and WI have worked on many previous Stage Entertainment productions including ‘Ice Age Live’. In fact, WI’s association with Stage Entertainment started in…
German rock legends KARAT’s recent acoustic tour featured an old school rock and roll floor package lighting design by LD Michael Kiefert programmed on the latest addition to the Philips Strand Lighting line of consoles, the 500ML. The band – who formed in 1975 and celebrated their 40th anniversary in 2015 – played such cities as Cottbus, Magdeburg and Wismarin in venues of varying sizes. Kiefert therefore needed a versatile control solution and so turned to the compact and intuitive 500ML, supplied by Philips Entertainment German distributor Feiner Lichttechnik. “When planning this tour, my main interest was to use a…
Electronic metalcore five-piece Bring Me The Horizon’s tour, That’s The Spirit included a high-impact lighting design by Ben Inskip using Philips Showline SL NITRO 510C LED strobes. Inskip – who has served as lighting designer for the Sheffield-born band for the past five years – employed the strobes to cut through the brightness of the show’s significant video element. “In terms of output the SL NITRO 510C is great,” said Inskip. “It is bright enough to still have impact during the video heavy parts of the set. In addition, the strobes’ great colour mixing meant that they worked well with the…
PreSonus hosted dealer/sales rep and international distributor meetings at the Winter NAMM show in Anaheim, reflecting the company’s excitement over its newest product releases and strong sales. VP of Sales Rick Naqvi presided, as many attendees got their first chance to hear PreSonus’ impressive new ULT-series loudspeakers. As in past years, the company’s annual dealer, rep, and international distributor awards were a highlight of the meetings. The U.S. Rep of the Year award went to Lienau AV Associates, which serves the Mid-Atlantic region (Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, NY Metro, Pennsylvania, and Virginia). Online retailer Sweetwater Sound claimed the Dealer of…
The demand for experiential environments has led architectural lighting design firm and custom lighting fixture manufacturer LIGHTfaktor to open an events design and rental division. To lead this new growth, LIGHTfaktor brought in lighting specialist Amy D. Lux as the Events Division Operations Manager. To enhance both its fixed install and rental services, LIGHTfaktor has just inked a contract as a Robe dealer to offer an array of advanced entertainment technology from the Czech Republic-based manufacturer. Both divisions will operate out of LIGHTfaktor’s headquarters and showroom in Austin, TX. The rising popularity of its experiential, interactive, engaging environments led to…
Jack U, Steve Aoki, Zeds Dead, Flosstradamus, Big Sean and other EDM heavies are headlining the current Life In Color Kingdom Tour, which is selling out venues in the US and UK. As powerful as these artists are, however, none of them is the big cat on stage. That honour belongs to Panthera leo, better known as the lion. A massive replica of the king of the jungle towers over the festival stage, capturing attention through its sheer 56ft wide by 43ft tall size, as well as its artful, intricate design. What really makes this beautiful beast stand out, however, are…
Indoor ‘hardstyle’ festival Knockout Circuz returned to iconic Sydney venue The Hordern Pavilion at the end of 2015, with Lighting Designer Arian Yeganeh creating a spectacular eight-hour light show using Clay Paky Mythos, Stormy and Sharpy fixtures. Promoted by organisers Hard Styles United (HSU) as “one of the most spectacular and intense indoor rave arenas [we] have ever created” with “hours of lasers, spectacular lighting shows and crystal clear audio”, Knockout Circuz saw a line up of such international artists as Technoboy and Bioweapon. Leading event supplier Newtone Entertainment supplied 24 Sharpys, along with 24 Mythos and 13 Stormy CC…
With a wealth of industry knowledge and experience, Palmer will oversee the day-to-day operations of the PixelFLEX sales team. Palmer will also be implementing the sales strategies necessary to keep pace with the increased market demand for the innovative line of PixelFLEX LED video technologies. “We could not be happier about the introduction of Grif Palmer as our new Vice President of Sales for PixelFLEX,” said Monty Rains, President and COO. “He has a very distinguished career in the technology industry, and he’ll be an invaluable addition to our team strengthening and developing relationships with both our current and new…
For more than 25 years, the charity Children on the Edge has helped marginalised and forgotten children living on the edge of their societies. Working in partnership with local communities, they create safe, friendly environments to ensure that those who may possibly be ignored receive the childhood they deserve. The organisation is constantly looking to raise funds to support its work and recently held a fundraising evening as part of Chichester Festival Theatre’s Winter Season. With its strong reputation in theatre, along with its frequent charity work, White Light was asked to provide its support on this occasion. The fundraiser,…
The Classical Ballet Moscow completed an extensive tour of Italy and Sicily featuring a lighting design programmed on a Philips Strand Lighting NEO Lighting Control Console. The company performed The Nutcracker, Swan Lake and Sleeping Beauty in cities including Florence, Milan and Palermo over 36 consecutive days. Lighting Designer and Technical Director Evgeniy Toma utilised the NEO’s intuitive interface and timesaving features to provide him with quick and easy access to all of the fixtures in the rig, which ranged from 60 to 110 over the course of the tour. “I was really impressed by the flexibility of the NEO…
With the release of her first full-length album Goddess, the R&B sensation BANKS recently embarked on The Madness Tour playing alongside The Weeknd and selling-out houses across North America. To create a soulful lighting design that would best accentuate the passionate singer/songwriter, her management team approached Gordon Droitcour and Erik Anderson with Cour Design. Working with Lighting Designer Darien Koop, Droitcour and Anderson eagerly accepted the opportunity to work with the indie artist, and to do so they once again enlisted the assistance of the Nashville-based tour provider Elite Multimedia. “This was actually our first tour with BANKS and our first…
HELi Showequipment operates primarily as a dry hire company for video, lighting and rigging but also undertakes complete installations, show implementation at festivals and works in industrial exhibitions and TV. HELI Showequipment acquired 150 of Elation’s new ACL 360i single-beam moving effects as well as a supply of Elation’s ACL 360 Bar colour-changing bar luminaires with continuous rotation. “Elation is an excellent company and the ACL 360i and the ACL 360 Bar fixtures are reflective of that,” stated Uwe Heinrich, CEO at HELi Showequipment, which also stocks Elation’s Pixel Bar luminaires in its inventory. “The accuracy and precision of the…
Version 2.0.1 of RHAON II (Renkus-Heinz Audio Operations Network) expands control to all current Renkus-Heinz products, including all Iconyx Gen5 systems, IC Live, IC2, VARIAi modular point source arrays, and CF Series loudspeakers. Since its introduction in 2015, RHAON II has been greeted with overwhelming acclaim, with users worldwide praising its unparalleled speed and precision. Joe Orlando, President of Commercial Media Systems in Atwater, CA, remarked, “We used RHAON II for a recent installation at a historic 100-year-old church, and it was simply fantastic. The user interface is well-designed, and it renders so fast, we were literally up and running…
These products enable secure, reliable and constant communications among local or geographically-disperse broadcast production teams. The recently-released HelixNet Version 3.0, a software-only update to the acclaimed HelixNet digital network partyline platform, unlocks the overall capacity of the HelixNet system allowing it a six-fold expansion for supporting more communication channels and more users during live productions. HelixNet delivers tripled its basic channel count, with a new offering of 12 channels per HMS-4X main station. Furthermore, an additional 12 channels can be added simply by purchasing a licence, effectively enabling a single HMS-4X to provide a total of 24 channels. The all-new,…
