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The August 2017 Digital Edition

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August 2017

Photos courtesy Blueshift Design

Alan Jackson ‘Honky Tonk Highway’ Tour

With 16 studio albums and nearly 60 million records sold worldwide, the multi-platinum recording artist Alan Jackson has solidified himself as one of country music’s most iconic talents. In a career that spans three decades, Jackson is still hard at work touring the nation for his dedicated fans. Needing a new production design to support the current “Honky Tonk Highway Tour,” the management team once again enlisted the creativity of Craig Rutherford of Blueshift Design who, in turn, called upon Nashville-based tour provider Elite Multimedia.

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U2 performed at Bonnaroo this year

Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival

The Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival, now in its 16th year on the 700-acre site in Manchester, TN opened on an historical note with U2 as the opening night performer. It marked the first time in their 41-year career playing a festival in America, and only the second time they have ever performed on a festival stage. More than 65,000 people attended the four day event.

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Toucan Productions helped transform a rural Texas ranch into a musical playground. Photos - aLIVE Coverage, courtesy Euphoria Music Festival

From Field to Festival

The Sixth Annual Euphoria Music & Camping Festival

On any other day at Carson Creek Ranch, one might hear crickets chirping in the grove of pecan trees, while cattle grazed and horses neighed under the hot Austin, TX sun. But for four days in April, its 60 acres of fields along the banks of the Colorado River were transformed into an entertainment venue with the Euphoria Music & Camping Festival.

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All photos by Kevin M. Mitchell

Breaking Day with Norah Jones

A Well-Crafted Backdrop, Perfectly Lit, Creates a Palette of Possibilities

Creating textures. Accenting moods. A woman with a beautiful voice at a Yamaha grand piano with a fantastic band behind her. All in a day’s work for lighting designer Steve Baird as he works with a perfect backdrop and just the right amount of lights (not one too many or one too few).

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Roy Bennett's pods flew in fixtures from the Motherland. Photos and text by Steve Jennings.

Rammstein 2017 Tour

For those fans lucky enough to see Rammstein’s tour on their limited 2017 U.S. run, one might ask — was it hotter that day in Las Vegas at temperatures of 110 degrees F. outside, or hotter on stage inside the T-Mobile Arena where the band’s pyro is the biggest of any band in the world? We spoke with the tour’s production and lighting designer Roy Bennett, associate lighting designer and programmer Jason Baeri, production manager and ffp managing director Nicolai Sabottka, pyro/SFX crew chief Nick Thompsett and the tour’s two lighting directors, Faren Matern and Bertil Mark.

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It's not always easy to take a 'bio break.' Photo of Hot 97 Summer Jam courtesy Stageline.

The Unmentionables

The set of skills one must master to work as an automated lighting programmer range from lighting knowledge to console syntax to organization, and much more. Most people are aware of the common abilities that a programmer must become proficient with in order to provide a great programming experience.

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Nook Schoenfeld, Editor, PLSN

Moved by a Show

Have you ever gone to a show, and been totally overwhelmed by your senses to the point that you were actually moved? I mean, seriously touched by a performance?

There are those rare moments in life where you are just overcome by emotions of happiness caused by witnessing something that was just so spectacular it left you posing a question to the patron standing next to you along the lines of “Holy Cow, did you just see what I just saw?” I count five times in my life.

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DTS Brick

DTS Brick

DTS is an Italian company that designs, engineers, manufactures and distributes lighting products and lighting effects for entertainment and architectural uses. This month, they sent me a light that is perfect for any architectural application, but also can be used in any theater, concert or live event as a wonderful source for splashing color.

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CB cabinets were hung in a circular array at Roe’s InfoComm 2017 booth.

ROE Creative Display CB3 Video Tile

ROE Creative Display has been manufacturing quality LED displays for over 10 years. They have six different product lines now, with each one geared towards filling the needs specified by different scenarios. In 2016 ROE Creative Display unveiled their new Carbon line of LED displays, an ultra-light series of tiles that incorporates their own ROE carbon fiber technology in the tiles, making them an ideal product for touring.

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A Look at Vidvox.net’s Open Source Hap Codecs, and How They Work

Hap Video Codecs Grow in Popularity

A Look at Vidvox.net’s Open Source Hap Codecs, and How They Work

I’ve written about codecs in the past, and generally speaking, they more or less do the same job: compress and decompress video frames. And with new ones being created continually to address specific performance-related needs, it is not reasonable to definitively say “this one is best” without taking into account external factors like hardware, application needs, etc.

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