TEL AVIV, Israel – Stage Design, with locations in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, recently invested in a 24-way Kinesys Elevation 1+ variable speed motor control system for its rental inventory. The system includes 16 Liftket 500kg 20m/min hoists and eight 2 tonne Yale motorized Beam Trolleys (plus eight ‘slave' beam trolleys) – all converted for use with Kinesys Elevation 1+ variable speed controllers. For control, the Stage Design team chose the latest Kinesys K2 3D graphical automation and motion control software.
Stage Design is part of The Design Group, whose Eyal Lavee explained that they had been checking out the options on the automation front for some two years before the purchase.
"The Israeli market is always keen on new effects," he noted, also crediting Kinesys for "excellent quality and engineering" and products that are "flexible, durable and straightforward to install."
The motion control system has already been put to use for the Festigal 2010 Show, an annual children's extravaganza celebrating Hanukkah. It tours between three venues in Haifa, Tel-Aviv and Jerusalem over a month-long period, with some 500,000 people seeing the 100 live shows.
Festigal uses an in-the-round arena stage set up, with eight LED screens flown around a 15-meter revolving stage. The Kinesys system enabled the screens to make a series of synchronized moves throughout the show – both vertically and horizontally. They could also all be moved together to work as one single surface, or they could be split into eight individual sections. Over 150 different positions were programmed into the K2 for the show, which was operated by Tsah Eliahoo.
The LED screens were flown on special lightweight aluminum I Beams with "smart" connections to any truss, a custom developed and manufactured product from Stage Design. This maximizes headroom and minimizes installation time.
Mark de Gruyter, Kinesys' sales and business development manager, and Andy Hicks, the company's training and technical support specialist, traveled to Israel to coordinate the initial training with the Stage Design crew.
"I could not wish for better support from Kinesys for that first set up," said Tsah Eliahoo who is also head of the Kinesys team for The Design Group.
De Gruyter and Hicks worked with Tsah and his team for seven days of programming as the show was in production rehearsals, giving Eliahoo "a very full understanding very quickly about the system's capabilities."
Lavee called Kinesys founder and managing director Dave Weatherhead "a true partner. When some additional training was needed, he jumped on a plane and came out with exactly the right backup we needed at the time – very impressive.
"Within the Design Group we have huge faith in this system, and believe that creative minds will find many ways to integrate Kinesys into all types of designs for events, tours, exhibitions, theatrical shows and TV productions," Lavee added.
"It has been a real pleasure working with the team of professionals at Stage Design and we're confident they will enjoy putting their newly acquired Kinesys system to good use in lots of bold and exciting future designs," said de Gruyter.
For more information, please visit www.kinesys.co.uk.
