International News

CARDIFF, U.K. – PAI has completed the installation of a lighting and sound design for the new University of Wales Institute Cardiff (UWIC) Student Union building, located at the Cyncoed Campus, north Cardiff. PAI has worked with UWIC and the SU's general manager Mike Davies for many years.

LONDON – The Centre of the Cell learning center offers visitors an immersive AV experience, organized in five different "spaces," or scenes. The AV displays and interactive games help young minds absorb biomedical science and research in an entertaining manner, mirrored in the design of the center as a whole – a large pod suspended over an open-plan research laboratory.

DUBAI – Al Laith Events Services, a new division of Al Laith Scaffolding, a provider of staging and roofing solutions for special events, is headed up by Jo Marshall, who previously served as a technical production director and executive producer during his five years at HQ Creative.

MEXICO CITY – Hermes Music has signed an agreement with Clay Paky to distribute Clay Paky products in Mexico that includes a long-term strategic partnership.

BRATISLAVA, Slovak Republic – Slovakia's Q-99 supplied lighting, video and sound for the 2010 Miss Universe Slovakia pageant, a live telecast on STV 1 staged in front of 5,000 at the SIBAMAC Arena (National Tennis Center) in Bratislava. Martin Kubanka designed the show's lighting, using a rig that included Robe moving lights as the main workhorses.

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad and Tobago – A recent Beyonce performance required the crew to turn Queen's Park Savanna into a concert venue for some 40,000 attendees. Beyonce's lighting team, led by Pat Brannon, LD, relied upon over 60 truss-mounted moving heads from PR Lighting for the show.

FRANKFURT, Germany – Given the economic hardships endured by businesses around the globe, organizers of Musikmesse and ProLight + Sound were bracing for a tough 2010 show. But the event attacted 2,340 exhibitors, 62 percent of them from outside Germany, and almost 110,000 visitors from 128 countries, which was only a modest decline from 2009's 2,388 exhibitors and 112,478 visitor counts.

Held from March 24-27, ProLight + Sound served as a focal point for product innovation in the live event industry. Here's a glimpse of some of the innovations on display.

HONG KONG – Robert Juliat dealer Pacific Lighting Ltd provided 24 RJ 611SX profiles for the City Hall Concert Hall, the largest interior venue within the Hong Kong City Hall complex, which also houses a theatre, an exhibition hall, gallery and numerous restaurants. The fixtures have been installed on the Front-of-House bridges.

LONDON – Now under the management of Blackfriars' newly-created Blackfriars Promotions, the 2,500-plus capacity Victorian Coronet Theatre offers an array of in-house events supported by a lighting system upgrade including GLP's new Impression 120 RZ zoom fixtures.

LONDON – The Really Useful Group, producers of Love Never Dies, the sequel to Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera, worked with Stage Technologies and Delstar Engineering for the automation system for the West End production at the Adelphi Theatre.