Robe Lighting’s RnD department has finished an extensive and comprehensive piece of research and testing in conjunction with lamp manufacturers Osram, relating to the longevity of the Lok-it!® HTI® 1700/PS lightsource used in Robe’s new signature BMFL™ fixture, when run consistently in its brightest 1700 W mode. This confirms that

For the fourth year, MJ Event Gear provided the full technical for Product of the Year 2015 held on the 5th February 2015 in Johannesburg. Product of the Year is the world’s largest consumer-voted award for product innovation and currently operates in 40 countries with the purpose of guiding consumers

Durban based rental company, Black Coffee, have purchased 12 new Clay Paky Mythos fixtures which will go onto the 14th Metro FM Music Awards for lighting designer François van der Merwe and Dream Sets, the official technical and set suppliers . The awards will be hosted at the Inkosi Albert

Operating in the Latin American market, the Venezuelan based PROmontaje needed a solution to host large outdoor events and concerts. PROmontaje owns a large event site, just outside Caracas, which they plan to use for a range of outdoor concerts and sports events. PROmontaje is the main provider of technical

  Performing Art Technology is offered as an extra-mural activity at St Mary’s School in Johannesburg giving students the opportunity to study lighting, stage management, sound, filming, editing and set construction. Girls between grade 8 to 12 train on various control desks including Avolites Titan 1, Philips Strand 200 Plus,

  DWR Distribution takes pleasure in hosting its first Fall Arrest and Basic Training, presented by Jacobus Myburgh from Gravity Training. The three day training kicks off today and ends on 20th February. With a background in the hospitality industry, having managed hotels and venues both locally and internationally, Myburgh

  Russia – London-based creative technology expert Realtime Environment Systems Ltd (RES) has provided the know-how for a spectacular visual event to mark one year since the Sochi Winter Olympics. The ambitious event at Sochi’s beautiful Ice Palace featured a dramatic ice show and was staged by Russian TV company

USA – Clay Paky fixtures dominated the lighting rig for Katy Perry’s glittering halftime show at Super Bowl XLIX in the University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona. Lighting designer Bob Barnhart of LA-based Full Flood chose a large array of Clay Paky Sharpy, Mythos and A.leda B-EYE K20 fixtures

MJ Event Gear has made a bold step as the first South African investor of 24 Robe BMFL Spots. They celebrated by inviting some of country’s top LDs to view the impressive lighting tool, which is making waves across the world.  “It’s a big winner,” said Mike Jones, owner of

Within just six hours of ticket sales opening, the Pretoria leg of ‘Afrikaans is Groot’ was sold out. Just goes to show how Groot Afrikaans is’! The Cape Town leg followed suite with its three performances selling out by the end of that day. With the calibre of such artists

Photos by Set Vexy, article by Louise Stickland Mufti-award winning Dutch rockers BLØF have an enthusiastic and eclectic fanbase as well as earning serious respect for the musical integration of sounds, styles and genres from a diversity of cultures into their work, so the ability to ‘paint’ with light when

The first Robe BMFLs have been in action on a variety of events in South Africa, utilized by some of the country’s leading lighting designers, the new multi-purpose fixtures have certainly been put through their paces on a wide variety of shows. The very first South African based LD to

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia – An array of Showline’s cutting-edge LED luminaires have lit the launch of a national Saudi employment initiative following Riyadh-based event producer Maestro’s investment in Showline stock. The award-winning company purchased Showline SL BAND 300 RGBW, SL STRIP 400 (both RGBW and Tunable White), SL BAR 520

USA – American rock favourite Phish recently played a string of dates at Miami’s American Airlines Arena to ring in the New Year. The prolific band wanted to really make a statement for the shows that tied in with their iconic imagery. Enter DMDS7UDIOS, brought in to projection map the

DWR Distribution will be hosting an Avolites Training Session, Basic to Advanced, presented by Gareth Chambers from 25 to 27 February 2015. “This is always a popular course as there are so many Avolites consoles in South Africa,” said Chambers. “From Titan One all the way to Tiger Touch, it’s

DWR Distribution takes pleasure in inviting you to attend the Vectorworks Training Course presented by Francois van der Merwe. The course, which will take place at the DWR premises in Johannesburg, includes training notes and lunch. To accommodate different needs, there are various training sessions to choose from: A Basic

Liz Berry, experienced international lighting designer, and one of the first moving light technicians in the world, working for Vari-Lite at the time, is coming to South Africa and will be presenting a basic three day lighting training workshop at DWR Distribution from 25 to 27 March 2015. Creative Director

DWR will be hosting MA Training, presented by Nick Britz, at our premises during March and April. Delegates will be able to choose from a Beginners Three Day Course, Intermediate Three Day Course or an Advanced Three Day Course. The Beginners training will be hosted from 16 to 18 March, and covers topics

   A sunken fashion ramp created a striking effect at the annual Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Joburg presented by African Fashion International and held at Melrose Arch in October/November 2014. Dream Sets supplied the technical and built the set, a seamless platform from which cutting edge South African designers could show

UK – US rock band Linkin Park recently stormed into London’s O2 Arena, performing in front of a spectacular backdrop powered by Avolites Ai Infinity servers running version 8. The rockers played two nights in London and one in Manchester as part of the European leg of their ‘The Hunting

DWR Distribution is looking forward to exhibiting at the Lighting Show Africa for the first time. The show will be hosted at the Sandton Convention Centre from 24 – 25 March 2015 from 10am to 5pm, and forms part of Power & Electricity World Africa 2015. Property developers, architects, interior

Photo credit Preston Hoffman Robe made six of its new BMFL Spots available to lighting designer Preston Hoffman for the 2014 Warren Haynes Christmas Jam. The annual event, this year staged at the U.S. Cellular Center in Asheville, North Carolina, featured Billy and the Kids, The Revivalists, Jason Isbell, Vince Gill,

CANADA – On December 6 the night sky over Montreal was pierced by 14 beams of light in a solemn commemoration of the 14 victims of the Ecole Polytechnique massacre 25 years ago. Montreal-based Moment Factory chose Clay Paky Mythos lights for the touching ceremony atop Mount Royal. Residents of

UK – A combination of geometrically and historically inspired projections make for a striking backdrop for Rodrigo y Gabriela’s latest tour, in support of new album ‘9 Dead Alive’. The duo’s Multimedia Designer, Krisjanis Berzins operates the show using Ai Version 8 – Bondi, running from a Software Licence Key.

         Inspired Stages ended off 2014 with a high, as students attended the last three-day school holiday workshop of the year, designed to give insight into the entertainment industry. This successful event was hosted at the GrandWest in Cape Town and was once again presented by the passionate Karen Burt

Photo: © Kupfer Media Austria – The opera “El Juez” (the judge) celebrated its world première in the new Festspielhaus in Erl, Austria. The Festspielhaus was built by STABAG (the general contractor) and designed by Delugan Meissl Associated Architects, Vienna. It seats over 862 people (there are 732 seats in

Join DWR Distribution today, 29th January, any time from 9am for the Avolites Media Ai Open Day. Arran Rothwell-Eyre, Service and Support Engineer from Avolites Media has been in South Africa this week and it has been amazing to be shown the capabilities of this product. “We have been blown

Robert Juliat lighting fixtures have been spotted covering all angles of the stage from front to back at Chichester Festival Theatre in recent months. The new production of Gypsy (see Lighting & Sound International December 2014), which transfers soon to London’s Savoy Theatre, employed four Robert Juliat Le Cin’k Fresnels,

Worldwide – Lighting designer Caio Bertti has become one of the first to specify the new Clay Paky Stormy CC RGB LED strobes for a major tour, choosing them to deliver a plethora of dramatic effects for rock and roll legends Motorhead. Bertti’s simple yet powerful rig includes 17 of

USA – The Austin City Limits Music Festival returned to Zilker Park for two three-day weekends in October to showcase more than 130 rock, pop and hip hop artists on eight stages, including Outkast, Beck, Eminem, Skrillex, Calvin Harris and Pearl Jam. Clay Paky A.leda B-EYE K20 and Sharpy fixtures

Photos courtesy Louise Stickland When Gunther Hecker’s name is on the design credits for a show, you know it’s going to be visually interesting, idiosyncratic and a bit ‘out-of-the-box’ with a few flourishes of the unexpected … and so Gunther has created another epic stage, set, lighting and video design

Avolites Titan One Training will be hosted at DWR Distribution, Johannesburg, on 24th February 2015. The course will be presented by Gareth Chambers. The Titan One has proved to be a cost effective solution for lighting applications. It offers fast and intuitive control of intelligent lighting, dimmers and LED effects

  We would like to take this opportunity of thanking you for making 2014 a good year! May you and your families have a Merry Christmas and may the sun shine on you in 2015. DWR Distribution will be closing from 12 December (at 11h30) and reopen on the 12 January.

This years South African Idols proved to be the biggest, finest and largest to date. Dream Sets for the seventh year supplied the full technical and created the set, while lighting designer Joshua Cutts from Visual Frontier did what he loves best on a grandMA2 full size, using over 7

Lighting Designer Willie Bothma was honoured to once again light the Kings of Chaos on their latest tour to Sun City and at GrandWest’s Grand Arena in Cape Town. The full technical was supplied by Gearhouse Group’s Cape Town branch and supported by Gavin Taylor, Sean Caie and the team

Mark Gaylard, owner of MGG Productions, has forged ahead as the first investor in a VuePix Pix E-Series Pro 12mm LED Mesh Screen in South Africa. The mesh panels went straight into the music production Afrikaans is Groot, which played to full houses in Pretoria and Cape Town during November.

An Avolites Media Ai Open Day will be hosted in the new year at DWR on 29 January 2015. Everyone is welcome to pop at our offices from 9am to 5pm. You will be able to have hands on experience and see what the Ai is capable of. If you

Photo credits: Todd Kaplan USA – Grammy-winning rappers Drake and Lil Wayne may be duking it out onstage this summer but behind the scenes it was no contest choosing Clay Paky Sharpys for their tour’s lighting rig. Lighting designer/show design Guy Pavelo, of GP Design, is using 180 Sharpys provided

Photo credit: Louise Stickland The first of Robe’s new BMFL Spot fixtures to tour in the UK were specified by Boston based lighting designer Jeff Maker for the recent Gaslight Anthem tour … for which they were purchased by Leeds based rental company Zig Zag Lighting. Jeff – whose CV

Photo credit: Andrea Macchia & Matteo Bosonetto Robe’s new Bright Multi-Functional Luminaire (BMFL) Spots made their debut on the vibrant Italian electronic music and arts scene, featuring prominently on the main stage at the 2-day C2C (Club2Club) International Festival of Music & Arts in Turin, where they were specified by

Avolites Tiger Touch 2, powered by an Avolites Power Cube was in control for the R/evolution, the Renault Truck International Annual Roadshow hosted in the beautiful yet industrial feel of Turbine Hall in central Johannesburg. MJ Event gear supplied lighting, audio and rigging for the six workshops, test drives and

  The Market Theatre in Johannesburg was forced to purchase a new grandMA2 Ultra Light desk after the theatre was flooded recently. The unfortunate event was sparked when an intruder broke into the theatre, breaking a drencher pipe in the process. This resulted in the release of 80 000 litres

With a background in electronic engineering and having followed the development of LED lighting for many years, Julian Cohen, owner of Johannesburg based rental company Avstage, had been waiting for LED technology to catch up with discharge lamps. Three decades ago he designed and manufactured large display panels using discrete

ESP Vision Special Promotion With the recent release of Vision 4 Pro on PC and MAC, ESP Vision and DWR Distribution is offering a one week special like no other. These offers will be available from 8th – 12th December 2014 from 9am to 5pm. New and existing customers alike

South African audiences were captivated as War Horse, brought to South Africa by Pieter Toerien and the National Theatre, played at The Teatro, Montecasino in Johannesburg recently. The show then moved to Cape Town at Artscape Opera House from 5 December 2014. Technical support in both venues was from Gearhouse