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Introduced by Pat and Bill Digneit of Double Trouble, the annual New Technology Breakfast for Lighting and Lasers kicked off Day One of the Expo Hall at LDI. This year's event included an adorable but feisty one-inch cube light and a Swiss Army Knife fixture, a visit from Santa Claus, and the annual throwing of the rubber ducks.
Madrix Booth 4019 (Inner Circle Distribution)
Mr LED Pixel Goodness himself, Christien Hertel, is celebrating 20 years of Madrix. Anyone going to LDI After Dark will see some many Madrix products in the nightclubs of Vegas, but today they launched a new product, Stella 8, a DMX controller, booster, or splitter to duplicate data streams. R&D started from the ground up selecting new components, and Stella 8 has a V-O flammability rating (UL94), so safe for sensitive venues like old theatres. Made in Germany; five-year warranty.
Luminex Booth 2329
Anthony Stofflet presented the new GigaCore 16 TF, a multifunction 10Gb network switch for converged AV networks.
It is designed to support the most advanced AV protocols out of the box and is the backbone for a converged network, allowing multiple applications to co-exist on the same network. You can customize after you buy it, and visit it at the A.C. Americas booth.
Jagoteq Booth 1418
Craig Brink from Jagoteq gave an educational product announcement, explaining that Jago is Behoset (an Indonesian language) for superlative or great--who knew? Brink introduced laser illuminated fiber optic cable, "It is not a moving light, there are no diodes to burn out, you can cut it with scissors and fold it giving it unlimited applications." He had some encouragement for audience members who have tried lasers in the past, saying he used to have a Ford Pinto, a dangerous and shi**y car, but he still has a car despite that and so now might be the time to give lasers another chance.
Chroma-Q Booth Booth 2329
Paul Pelletier introduced the latest version of the groundbreaking Color Force and Color Force II, the Color Force III.
Twice the lumens and brightness of Color Force II, with richer colors and ColorSure3 to keep color consistency.
SparQle Pixels is a new feature giving each cell two powerful white LEDs to create shimmering effects and the fixture is IP65 rated.
FlexOptics change the lens from the front (convenient!) and you can also remove the lens completely and use just the reflector.
SilkMotion gives16 bit dimming and flawless low-intensity fades while still managing instant snaps and camera-friendly eye.
Mod Scenes Booth 4035
Mod Scenes, known for having both great products and great booth snacks, has just announced a partnership with Modular Backdrops! 3D panels and you can mix and match with Mod Scenes panels. Sara, the resident Mod Scenes extrovert, thanked all the production interns this year, before announcing its new DMX Hoist and Sabre Tubes.
Mod Scenes is also celebrating its tenth birthday, so swing by the booth for T-shirts and more products.
PixMob Booth 4612
PixMob is the only company presenting that focuses on the fan, not the stage. They've been around for 15 years and some of their highlights include Coldplay's Music of the Spheres tour and Olympic ceremonies. Audiences are the biggest canvas in the room, not the LED screens. To enhance collective joy, the wristbands PixMob produced for Coldplay are now available to everyone else, along with PixMob MVP making it easy to have the audience create, for example, a flying dove or spell out " Believe in Love." The MVP controller can send up to 70,000 beams of wireless DMX so you can choreograph your own video in the stadium or arena, transforming the big dark space and including every ticket holder in the show.
New this year are custom shaped LED badges, including a cowboy boot, shot glass, or camera for the recent Bad Bunny residency. Badges can be your own designs and they still work outside the stadium when you take them home. Swing by the booth to see those and the new light sticks popular in Asia, which can be an add-on merch item. Booth 4612.
Cast Softare Booth 915
BlackTrax
Double Decker and Nicholas Lau Paul Chadwick presented BlackTrax tracking software and new features for WYSIWIG. Today, they are also presenting a case study on Magic Mike tracking at 1.30 in room W316.
Chauvet Professional Booth 2825
Ford Sellers presented the COLOrado Solo Pod E with an updated color engine, higher quality whites and saturated colors and pastels.
A complete single source fixture that goes from 17 to 55 degree beam angles. It works with barn doors and top hats, and everything else you already have. IP65 rated but only 15 lbs. the COLORado Solo Pod E is an 8,000-lumen fixture, and can be used on camera for faces as well as stage washes.
ChamSys Booth 2625
The ChamSys team always rocks the show and this year was no different – Santa Claus, gift giving, and a certain amount of rubber duck and underwear throwing. As ChamSys professionals unwrapped gifts, including a MediaMaster dongle for PC, a compact wing for a console, and a ChamSys Dyn product for the MagicQ DIN, the company unveiled the latest in the MediaMaster series.
Check back for their training video next week.
Behind the Scenes Booth 510/The Wellness Lounge
Jillian Beggs, program director for Behind the Scenes, explained some of the programs available for free at the Wellness Lounge on topics such as the importance of sleep and identifying bullying and substance abuse in the workplace. There is also a local organization handing out Narcan Kits and attendees can swing by for a bit of holiday shopping for a good cause. Cards and ornaments are available for purchase on the shop floor.
Thank you to the Behind the Scenes sponsors!
Wellness Lounge Sponsors:
Pangolin Booth 3200
Freebies from Pangolin! Courtney and Jordan from Pangolin are giving away a laser! Plus a free one-month license to try out software. Definitely worth stopping by the booth for that, and to see the new compact laser system Atom XR which weighs only 33 pounds and is perfect for touring, rentals, and installations. It has a new telemetry system feeding you info from inside the system.
Also at the booth, the 600 Prestige Beam:
And check out the Kvant architect series: Sky Lasers 500 to 1500 Watt, perfect for landmarks and permanent installs.
Only FDA certified body scanning lasers not new but fab.
Lightwright Booth 2113
John McKernon said, "Forty six years ago, I sat down and decided to do something other writing with a pencil and I thank myself every day."
We thank you too, John!
John and Sam Molitoriss introduced the new Lightwright, which comes out in January, rewritten from the ground up so that it works the way that people work, collaboratively. No more passing the show file, everyone can edit the sheets at once. They've tweaked the workflow, instrument counter, error checker, added a brand new set of cable planning tools, and a visual layout for power planning tools for modern power distro.
It is not just for theatre anymore, they invite you to stop by so you can see how the innovations work for you.
Moss LED Booth 2329 (A.C. AmericasJ
Jeffrey Moss from Moss LED introduced the new IllumaDIM and IllumaSync control systems, saying they know how much LED tape sucks because of short circuiting and have problem solved it with Protect-A-Fet. The controller will also tell you what channel the short circuit was on, so you don’t need to try to figure out which strip has the issue, it will tell you what channel the issue is on.
"We soft launched on last year on Stranger Things on Netflix, they bought our entire production run because their controllers were blowing up on set. We shipped a hundred, and they are all still working on other shows."
If you swing by booth 2329 Jeff promises to blow things up for you.
The Black Tank Booth 3402
Robert Kodadek from The Blank Tank introduced a new platform driver system, a modular system for up to 8 channel drivers. It has a patented "Ludicrous" mode for four times the brightness and is the backbone of fixtures for companies like Rosco and Knight Lighting
He also unveiled an ADORABLE one inch cube LED light, TinyLight, which punches above its weight but has theatrical grade dimming and different color engines, a bright light it is easy to hide.
Carbon For Unreal Booth 442
David Perkins did not have any slides but told the story of how he was working in previz and VR and saw a video created with Unreal Engine with a glowing cube in a realistic-looking room. He says, "I thought if we can do that for a game, we can do that for the entertainment industry." The new version of Carbon takes another idea from gaming, it is multi-player, you can create a show collaborating with anyone anywhere in the world. The new features are not the best news from Perkins, last year he was unable to attend LDI because he was diagnosed with cancer, but he has beaten it and is waiting to hear your ideas for building the next version of Carbon so head down to the booth and share your ideas.
Prolights Booth 2329 (A.C. Americas)
Nick D'Angelo, AC Americas North America brand manager for Prolights, introduced these one-of-a-kind fixtures which combine pixel mapping with high power beams.
HaluPix Duo and HaluStrip Duo
- Long throw effects and pixel mapping
- 50cm x 50cm tile great for immersive environments.
- Seamless pixel integration.
Check out the shows every half hour at the booth.
Claypaky Booth 4019 (Inner Circle Distribution)
George Masek from Claypaky considers his job to talk about products, but mostly to listen to lighting professionals about what they want in them.
Claypaky celelbrates 50 years this year, and is introducing the Ultimo Sharpy, building on the successes of it's iconic Sharpy.
The IP 66 is slightly heavier than the original Sharpy, but faster than the original.
You'll also find the improved B-Eye family and Axcor family.
