News

SAN FRANCISCO — The California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco offers a planetarium, natural history museum and aquarium under one roof, and has embarked on a multi-year project to revamp its facilities in strict compliance with environmentally-friendly LEED standards. Located in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, the Academy is using F10, F20 and F30 projectors from Norway’s projectiondesign for reopened exhibit areas, including the Morrison Planetarium, Hohfeld Hall pre-show area, the Water Planet exhibit and the Visualization Studio used for creating visual and audio content.

JERSEY CITY, NJ — Rumors about a “Coachella East” festival staged in 2008 might have seemed proved false, but only nominally so. The festival, held for three days in August at Liberty State Park, just behind the Statue of Liberty, was called All Points West. The event, organized by Coachella host Goldenvoice and AEG Live, included Radiohead, Jack Johnson and about 40 other well-known indie bands. The festival’s name refers to an old Jersey rail yard, and the three stages were train names from the golden age of rail travel: Blue Comet, Bullet and Queen of the Valley.

LAKE FOREST, CA — Saddleback Church recently purchased two For-A HVS-500HS switchers through CCI Solutions for an HD video system used for The Refinery Project, an auxiliary facility used for youth programs and worship services. The new gear will give the church the ability to switch an HD/SDI 1080 signal on a budget.

AARHUS, Denmark — Martin Professional announced the addition of the MAC III Profile to its line of MAC moving lights. The 1500-watt luminaire is the first product in Martin’s third generation of MAC moving heads, with improvement in optical efficiency and color mixing.

PENDLETON, IN — Tyler Truss Systems, Inc. announced that its True Fold Truss (TFT), designed to save space and money on trucking as well as labor, is now available on a custom order basis. Spigoted for easy assembly and field-tested in 2007 and 2008, TFT comes in sizes ranging from 20.5 inches by 20.5 inches to 36 inches by 42 inches, in lengths of five, eight or 10 feet. All sizes fold to a nine-inch width. With folding internal braces, TFT provides a load capacity of 10,160 pounds for a 36-inch by 42-inch by 80-foot span with double diagonals and snap braces. A total of 400 linear feet of 36-inch-by-42-inch truss fits into a single 22-foot long box truck.

SANTA MONICA, CA — Using a fashion-show runway built into a private airplane hangar, Ferrari revealed its California model at a charity event with an assortment of AV elements supplied by AV Concepts. Arnold Schwarzenegger and about 1,000 other guests attended the event, followed by a charity auction for one of the cars.

LAS VEGAS — The Eyecandy Sound Lounge at the Mandalay Bay Hotel & Casino has a touch-activated dance floor made of LED tiles using an array of 140 pressure sensors that track the dancers’ steps and generate interactive visuals under their feet. The 20-foot-by-14-foot dance floor was integrated by Canadian-based Réalisations.net using a Medialon Show and Media Control system, which uses a database of still images and videos for the underfoot visuals.

BURBANK, CA — Electrosonic has named Leonardo Freitas to the new position of associate vice president of product distribution.  He will be based in Burbank and report to Electrosonic president Jim Bowie. Freitas was formerly regional director for Latin America at Tandberg.

KANSAS CITY, MO — Melissa Etheridge makes no secret about her concern for the environment. She won an Academy Award for her song featured in An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore’s film on global warming. She also posts “Green Tips” on her Web site, www.melissaetheridge.com . So it’s only fitting that for her 2008 Revival Tour, Etheridge’s lighting director David Hamilton helped keep things green with an LED fixture that saves energy, lights the stage with fewer fixtures, and has lamps with a long life, resulting in less waste for landfills.

LAS VEGAS — This year’s LDI Conference & Tradeshow took place at the Las Vegas Convention Center from Oct. 24-26. More than 400 companies put their cards on the table from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, Oct. 24 and 25, and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 26.

When Keith Urban joined Kenny Chesney’s 2008 Poets & Pirates tour, the F LED 11 semi-transparent LED screen chosen by production designer Marc Brickman went along for the ride. Supplied by XL Video, the F LED 11 is one-fifth the weight of comparable LED tiles, simplifying installation in venues with low rigging weight limits, and XL Video can provide an optional lightweight touring frame as well.

L’ASSOMPTION, Quebec — Stageline Group opened a second building here that has been built to comply with LEED certification standards (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) for energy efficiency specified by the Canada Green Building Council. The new building, in fact, runs on hydroelectricity, and the operation of the building does not rely on the use of fuels at all.