Simply Professional, an event staging company led by Sebastian Corkidi, was called upon by the Mexican government to play a key role in planning the $60 million celebration marking 200 years since Mexico declared independence from Spain and 100 years since the Mexican Revolution.
The Roskilde Festival’s Green Footsteps program encouraged fans to act with care for the environment before, during and after the festival. Lighting supplier Comtech also helped house and visiting designers walk the walk at the main Orange stage with energy-efficient GLP impression fixtures featured in the rig.
It's arduous enough directing a massive Broadway musical like The Addams Family, but Julian Crouch tackled three roles at once: co-director, scenic designer and costume designer. "I actually handled some of the puppets as well, but it's like a hidden credit," he adds with a laugh. "I come from a small theatre company, so I often have to do everything. I look back and think, ‘Wow, that was a lot to say that I would do.'" But he pulled it off.
Parnelli Lifetime Achievement Award Winner "Wore Many Hats" for ZZ Top, Waylon Jennings, Randy Travis and Brooks & Dunn
Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn issued a joint statement upon hearing the news: "We can't imagine what we did to be blessed with the likes of Randy ["Baja"] Fletcher. We hate to think about what our career might have been like without him, as so many have been won and lost on the road. The importance of a trail boss like Baja is impossible to put into words. Not a show goes by that someone doesn't talk about the quality of our crew, and it all filters down from him."
Although the exhibition hall didn't open until 10 a.m. on the Sunday morning of Sept. 12, the networking before PLASA started on the streets of Earls Court in London in the days prior to the annual production industry exhibition. That's where the real gathering of the tribe began, where you were more likely to run into your industry friends and neighbors than in your own back yard.
You could say that Joe Branam's story is one about a guy who ran away with the circus and made good. Of course there's more to the man than that, but it starts with the uncommon fact that he began a rigging career on the performance end of the equation.
XL Video UK supplied video equipment and crew for Help for Heroes in Twickenham Stadium, including LED for a scenic H-shaped feature that set the visual scene. The company also provided a full I-Mag/camera/HD PPU package.
Golfers and guests at the Old White Course at The Greenbrier during an official stop on the PGA Tour stayed informed with an LED video display from Upstage Video, a Daktronics rental partner.
With the proliferation of LED video products in the market today, how does a live event production company even begin the daunting task of finding the right product for their applications? After all, distinguishing quality products from those that merely appear to be is no simple proposition.
In the realm of professional video, it's fair to say that the video production switcher is the heart of the show, whether it's a live event, a newscast or even a corporate gig.
Brooks & Dunn's Last Rodeo tour went out on top, with the video support for their last shows as crisp and well-executed as you'd expect from a major tour. At the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in St. Louis, a few weeks before the last tour marked its Sept. 2 farewell at the Bridgestone Arena in downtown Nashville, the crew brought their A game as fans partied, sang, cheered, and even let themselves get misty-eyed a few times.
In the Information Age, the least high-tech items tend to be the most overlooked. The high-flying but low-tech catwalk is chief among them. Both the balm and the bane of riggers worldwide, the catwalk is as cumbersome and expensive as it is necessary, which explains why they are often routed worse than flying commercial out of a small town in northern Wyoming.