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Beyonce’s Video Monolith: A Collaborative Achievement

The video monolith is the size of a small apratment building, and it rotates and splits open on Beyonce's Formation tour.

Beyonce’s Video Monolith: A Collaborative Achievement

It takes a lot of planning and coordination to realize the designs of some of todays’ biggest concert tours with their massive structures, complex automation and immense video walls. If you are among the supplying production companies on these tours, success is in the details and all about collaboration. A perfect example of this production reality is the incredible four-sided LED video structure, known as the Monolith, on Beyoncé’s Formation world tour. The centerpiece of Es Devlin’s production design for the tour, it is the result of a collaboration between Stageco, Tait and PRG Nocturne.

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East Coast Lighting and Production Services (ECLPS) provided the video and lighting for the event. Photo by Nelly

The International Portuguese Music Awards Go High Tech

The International Portuguese Music Awards (IPMA) for the past four years has been produced in New Bedford MA, a city that is heavily enriched with the culture of all things Portuguese, especially its rich music. The live-to-air show covers all genres including rock, country, rap, hip-hop and most importantly traditional Portuguese music.

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The setup included a wall of PixelFLEX’s 3.9mm FLEXLite Plus that stretched across the stage deck.

Church of the Highlands Hosts the ARC Conference

Birmingham Church Engages Attendees with LED Video Enhancements

Dedicated to working with house of worship leaders and founders, the Association of Relational Churches provides the support, guidance and resources needed for worship communities to take root and grow. As part of their mission, the association hosts semi-annual ARC Conferences at different locale around the country.

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The company played a big role at the Detroit Auto Show (NAIAS) earlier this year. Pictured here, Ford’s booth.

ROE Visual Expanding in U.S., Europe Under New Ownership

ROE Visual is increasingly creating video products that are grabbing the attention of big concert tour designers among others in the live event world. When preparing for the current Jason Aldean “We Were Here” tour, for example, designer Mike Swinford says he “wanted something a little different.” Part of that puzzle was found in creating four LED tile configurations shaped like diamonds, and to make them he used Roe’s Hybrid-15, equal parts LED video display and spotlight, released just last year. They are wowing audiences everywhere, with four configurations flanking the big center video screen.

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Eric Bernstein of Intelligent Lighting Services steered the club's owners toward Bat M1-391 LED Display Panels from Dicolor/Mega Systems Inc. for the nightclub's main video wall. Photo by Holy Mountain/Demian Becerra.

1015 Folsom’s Video Facelift

San Francisco nightclub 1015 Folsom planned to undergo a massive remodel to commemorate its upcoming 30-year anniversary, which will happen on Oct. 15, 2016. Along with its remarkable staying power, the 20,000-square-foot nightclub is known for hosting big EDM headliners. With so much attention being focused on the San Francisco area during Super Bowl 50 weekend in February, 1015 Folsom Owner Ira Sandler decided to get a jump start on the renovations. He called on Eric Bernstein of Intelligent Lighting Services in Austin, TX to upgrade the club’s lighting and video system with gear from Mega Systems, Inc.

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Baz Halpin and Chris Nyfield are using 62 Strike 4 warm white LED fixtures from Chauvet Professional.

Florida Georgia Line Tours with Chauvet Professional Strike 4 Fixtures

NASHVILLE — For Florida Georgia Line’s Dig Your Roots tour, named for the country duo’s third album, which is due out in Aug. 2016, Baz Halpin and Chris Nyfield are using 62 Strike 4 warm white LED fixtures from Chauvet Professional. The LDs arranged the Strike 4s, which were supplied by PRG, on five light ladders. Positioned on a trolley style track upstage, the ladders can be moved horizontally during the show. Running their rig with a grandMA2, Halpin and Nyfield control each 100-watt LED cell in their Strike 4 fixtures individually.

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Blackmagic Design Duplicator 4K

Blackmagic Design Duplicator 4K and ATEM Switcher 6.8 Update

This year at the NAB show in Las Vegas, Blackmagic Design introduced a new product that no one was really expecting, but that hits an interesting spot in the industry. It’s called the Blackmagic Duplicator 4K, and this product just may have tapped into something pretty hip. It is a recording device that allows you to record SD, HD or Ultra HD content in real time on up to 25 SD cards simultaneously. With live events in mind, you can then distribute or sell the SD cards to customers or audience members right when the event is finished.

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Avolites Arena Console

Avolites Arena Console

Avolites has been in the console game for a long time, but their popularity in the States was never as strong as in Europe. The choice of a console is a very personal matter for any LD, and — full disclosure — for many years, I chose to use consoles other than Avolites because I had a perception that they were difficult to use. The Titan operating system, introduced almost concurrently with an updated line of Avo consoles, however, sought to change all that, and today we’re going to look at their latest offering — the Avolites Arena.


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The grandMA2-controlled rig includes Martin MAC Viper Wash DXs and MAC Aura XB moving lights

LD Dan Tiley Gets Assist for Il Divo’s ‘Amor & Pasión’ Tour from HSL

LONDON – Il Divo, the vocal quartet comprised of male singers from the U.S., France, Spain and Switzerland that got its start in the U.K. back in 2003, has been touring in support of their Nov. 2015 album release, Amor & Pasión” (Love & Passion). HSL is supporting the tour with an expanded array of lighting fixtures in its inventory including Martin MAC Viper Wash DXs and MAC Aura XB moving lights. LD Dan Tiley, who is getting an assist for this tour from HSL project manager Andy Chatburn, is using a grandMA2 console for control.

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Blizzard Lighting Oberon Fresnel Zoom

Blizzard Lighting Oberon Fresnel and Oberon Fresnel Zoom

Blizzard Lighting’s Oberon fixtures, including the Oberon Fresnel and Oberon Fresnel Zoom (pictured here), offer a 3200K-3500K tungsten color while attaining a high CRI of 95 that can be directly compared to natural sunlight. The LED fixture adds to the complete line of conventional light fixtures the company has to offer the lighting marketplace.

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Hubbell Control Solutions' HCS wiSCAPE Gateway is now available with BACnet IP built-in support.

Hubbell Control Solutions Updates HCS wiSCAPE Gateway

Hubbell Control Solutions has updated its wiSCAPE Gateway, which is designed to make it easy to manage, monitor and measure wireless outdoor lighting networks. The wiSCAPE Gateway manages up to 1,000 wiSCAPE fixture modules, controlling dimming, scheduling and motion detection features.  For enhanced network management and security, the device operates on Windows 7 Professional Edition. IT Administrators can easily manage it as they do all the PCs on their network. The wiSCAPE Gateway is now available with BACnet IP built-in support.

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