News

TORONTO — Tina Turner’s current tour is getting more than a little extra spark with attention-getting visuals engineered by Pyrotek Special Effects. Vice President Lorenzo Cornacchia collaborated with LD Baz Halpin to add everything from Dragons to Gold Flitter Mines, Red Mines with Glitter, Aqua Mines, Blue Mines and an all-fire cue of 20-by-20 Gerbs firing upstage at the conclusion of Turner’s song, “Hero.”

NASHVILLE — The 42nd annual Country Music Association (CMA) Awards, a three-hour telecast on the ABC Television Network with 19 performances, including songs performed by co-hosts Brad Paisley, Carrie Underwood and the Eagles, shown here, was lit by LD Bob Dickinson, who added A&O Technology’s xenon Falcon luminaires to this year’s show.

CHICAGO — U.S. President-Elect Barack Obama gave his election night speech before a hometown crowd of more than 100,000 and a TV audience of millions. C3 Presents, meanwhile, gave its vote to stage lighting rental and production company Christie Lites, which elected to use Martin MAC 2000 Wash XBs to light the historic moments for both the crowd and for TV.

NEW YORK — The ETCP Council has come up with 24-inch-by-36-inch posters that define the eligibility requirements and target audience for each of the ETCP exams. The posters also include full content outlines for the Rigger/Theatre, Rigger/Arena and Entertainment Electrician exams.

BOSTON — Scharff Weisberg helped LD Marc Brickman and assistant LD David Marcucci light two performances held at Symphony Hall Boston by Columbia Records’ jazz artist Chris Botti, performing with Keith Lockhart and The Boston Pops in shows that also featured Sting and Steven Tyler from Aerosmith. The design needed to work for DVD, Blu-ray and a subsequent PBS broadcast as well as for the live audience — with no time to spare.

SYCAMORE, IL — There’s nothing unusual about Upstaging Lighting flying their touring light systems while prepping them. But Upstaging recently flew ACDC’s current touring structure in their warehouse. This required 71 motors to lift five 100-foot-wide arched trusses that formed a curved array of lights using custom hinges and 59 sections of Upstaging’s Hud Truss, each 10 feet long, where most of the moving lights are permanently mounted.

BROOKINGS, SD — Daktronics announced an expansion of the testing facility at its corporate headquarters, which is intended to help provide customers with more reliable products and also to bring new product designs to market more quickly.

LOUISVILLE, KY — Samuel Ryder may have died in 1936, but that didn’t keep his projected 3D likeness from serving as emcee for the recently held Ryder Cup Gala. Using the Musion Eyeliner hologram from Digital Illusions LLC, Ryder was able to walk, talk, and play golf like he did nearly 100 years ago.

DENVER — The crew for Madonna’s Sticky & Sweet tour is hitting the road once again with lighting control by grandMA. It’s “our board of choice,” said lighting programmer Troy Eckerman. Also used on Madonna’s tour last year, the console is being used to control some additions to the touring rig, including Martin’s Stagebar 54 LED luminaires.

HOUSTON — Elation Professional presented the winners of the 2008 Elation Educational Experience (E3) contest with their awards at the 2008 WFx Show. Pictured here are, from left, Elation’s Scott Davies, winners Frank Meyer, Yoshihito Takahashi and Josh Johnston, and Elation’s Eric Loader.

TORRANCE, CA — Citing increasing demand for LED products from the entertainment and hospitality industries, LEDtronics, Inc. named Greg Krymer as product sales manager for architectural lighting.  Krymer had been the company’s southern California district sales manager.