We thank Hall Associates Flying Effects, a long-time member of USITT, for upgrading their support to that of a Contributing member of the Institute.

Hall Associates, headed by Tracy Nunnally, President and Owner, has been a member of USITT for more than 10 years. To find out more about the company and its services, visit www.flyingfx.com.

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Since its debut in 2006, ETC's award-winning Eos control system has taken the entertainment lighting world by storm, with lighting professionals across the globe choosing the console to control conventional and moving lights. Eos is particularly popular in California.

The famed Hollywood Bowl upgraded to an Eos console last year to handle all the conventional lights and some of the moving lights on its rig. Since then, more than 100 shows have been lit by the board, including many tours where guest lighting designers used Eos to control the show.

Eos was used to program the lighting on the American Music Awards show, held in Los Angeles' Nokia Theater in November. The Los Angeles Opera (LAO) is another venue benefiting from Eos. Since summer 2007, Eos has controlled the lighting for LAO's productions at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, including Carmen, as well as a recent presentation of The Nutcracker by the Los Angeles Music Center.

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Creative Stage Lighting held an online seminar about lighting design titled Lighting Design 101 on February 19.

Richard Cadena, editor of Projection, Lights and Staging News and author of books such as Automated Lighting: The Art and Science of Moving Light, presented the seminar. Kevin Loretto of Creative Stage Lighting moderated.

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City Theatrical has released two new LED products utilizing Philips Color Kinetics LED lighting fixtures combined with innovative City Theatrical technology to produce new, never before seen lighting products.

The MasterBlast uses a Philips Color Kinetics ColorBlast 12 TR LED lighting fixture combined with CTI's patented SHoW DMX wireless DMX technology to create a totally wireless, battery powered, LED lighting fixture with up to 10 hours of operating time.

The MasterBlast's built-in stand alone routines and wireless DMX allow events to be run without a lighting console, external wireless DMX gear, or power and data cables saving time, space, and money. The combination of bright RGB LEDs from Philips Color Kinetics with SHoW DMX wireless DMX and control from City Theatrical gives event lighting users a wide range of new options in lighting while saving time and money. Both the MasterBlast and iW Blast TR Lighting Kit are ETL, cETL, and CE listed, are RoHS compliant and are available through City Theatrical distributors worldwide.

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The 2009 United States Figure Skating Championships were held January 18 to 25 at the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio. Held annually since 1914, it is the nation's most prestigious figure skating event, awarding 12 national champions in ladies', men's, pairs' and ice dancing on the senior, junior and novice levels. The event was broadcast live on NBC, with the Ladies Singles events appearing in prime time on Saturday and Sunday nights.

William Brennan, long time lighting designer for NBC Sports, used 50 Clay Paky 1500 Beams specially fitted with frost for this facility and for broadcasting this event.

AG Light and Sound, a dealer for PRG Distribution North America, supplied the lighting package. For more information on PRG Distribution, visit www.prgdistribution.com.

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J. R. Clancy, Inc. was tapped to supply rigging for a new performing arts center near Troy, New York and recently received a patent for its SureGrip rope.

When the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute opened on October 3, its theatre, concert hall, and two studios were ready for action with state-of-the-art, automated rigging from J. R. Clancy, Inc.

Eight years in the making, the 221,000-square-foot Curtis R. Priem EMPAC includes nine levels of studios, a 1,200-seat concert hall, a smaller 400-seat theatre, a studio with seating for 240 people, another that seats 120, a 1,500-square-foot rehearsal studio, and four artist-in-residence studios. J. R. Clancy supplied the rigging and acoustical equipment for the four performance spaces and point hoist systems for the two studio theatres.

The United States Patent Office issued patent 7,461,500 to J. R. Clancy for a "System for Determining Wear to Rigging System Lines," more commonly known as SureGrip™ rope. This is the only theatrical rope with a wear indicator to tell users when the rope should be replaced. It was developed to address the safety concerns of worn hand lines. Excessive wear is indicated by a "telltale" red thread woven into the rope – when red threads are visible, it's time to replace the line.

For additional information, contact J. R. Clancy at 800-836-1885, or visit the company's newly redesigned website at www.jrclancy.com.

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Creative Handbook is celebrating its 20th anniversary and invites all to sign its online card.

Based in Toluca Lake, California, it is a production source book featuring a wide range of information for all aspects of production for commercials, features, television, music videos, and events available in the Southern California region. For more information, visit the Creative Handbook website.

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