PLASA Announces First Nominees for Awards for Innovation

PLASA announces the first of its nominees for the 2015 Awards for Innovation, which recognize and reward new product ideas. Nominated products should meet at least one of the Awards' criteria for "Innovation" -- to offer a new style of thinking, an improvement in existing technical practice, a new or improved aid to safety, a new commercial advantage, use new patents or unique intellectual property, or introduce new technology, materials or manufacturing techniques.

The final assessment of those claims will take place at the PLASA Show, where an independent panel of industry experts will judge the entries, based on the strength of their innovation alone. Respected for their impartiality, the panel will hear a five-minute presentation from each of the nominees, and have the opportunity for questions and answers, before making their final selections.

There are no product categories and the judges will have eight awards of equal standing at their disposal, with the option of a Gold Award for any product or products that demonstrates outstanding innovation above that of its peers.

In addition, the judging panel can choose to give the PLASA Award for Sustainability to any product which offers a significant reduction in power usage, makes effective use of renewable energy sources, or provides a significant reduction in its environmental impact during its lifecycle.

This year's entries will include:

AC-ET's Chroma-Q Studio One 100 LED PAR features a custom optical design and fully homogenized output producing a smooth, uniform, and defined beam -- for above-Par performance from a white source, the company says. Utilizing core LED technology from the Chroma-Q is suited to a wide range of environments. Complementing the Chroma-Q Studio Force range, the fixture provides camera-friendly flicker-free operation and is available in a choice of white color temperatures. Other features include premium build quality, silent convection cooling, theatrical grade dimming, and compatibility with industry-standard 6.25" accessories.

Clay Paky's Scenius is a new, silent moving head spotlight at the top of the Clay Paky range. Its advanced optical unit and new 1,400W - 6,000K OSRAM discharge lamp provide a much higher light output than previous generation 1,500W lamps. Scenius can count on a CRI>95, which is very unusual for a metal halide light source, the company says. Features: 8° - 50° linear zoom, focus tracking system (autofocus), CMY system, 7-color wheel, linear CTO, 12 interchangeable rotating gobos on two wheels, rotating prism, interchangeable graphic wheel, 16-blades iris, soft-edge and flood frost filters, Art-Net/RDM. Energy saving mode: 1,200W.

Clay Paky's Spheriscan's mirror goes on turning endlessly beyond 360°, which creates a swirling effect. Its speed may be adjusted as desired and reach a maximum of 280 rpm. Its spanking new OSRAM lamp works at 1200W. Spheriscan is designed for outdoor use, (IP54). It may be recessed into the stage floor, with only its transparent head visible, to create original gazing projections. Features: 13° - 34° high speed zoom, one 6-rotating gobo wheel, one 8-fixed gobo wheel, rotating prism, fast sixteen-blade iris, linear frost filter, CMY system, 7-colour wheel.

d3 Technologies' 4x4pro sets a new standard for power and flexibility, the company says. The d3 4x4pro plays up to eight layers of 4K video or 32 layers of HD video, and up to eight layers of uncompressed HD video, all with content up to 16K pixels. The d3 4x4pro has two 10Gbit/s Ethernet ports, allowing you to transfer huge quantities of content in minutes. The d3 4x4pro features user replaceable Video Format Conversion cards, allowing you to swap between 16HD outputs (DVI/3G-SDI), or drive up to four 4K via DisplayPort.

Dataton's Watchout 6, the new version of Dataton's multi-display production and playback software, adds a feature-set for advanced projection mapping, fronted by an enhanced user interface. Watchout 6 improves workflow for complex projection scenarios with live edit, virtual projectors, and new marker-based calibration. Common format 3-D models can be brought in and content applied to individual mesh areas. New pre-visualization presents a realistic, multi-camera simulation of the stage environment. Version 6 supports high-end uncompressed video formats, and popular HAP codecs. It also offers frame-rate control and multi-channel audio playback.

ETC's ColorSource Spot out-performs previous RGB, RGB-A, and RGB-W emitter technology, the company says, thanks to its precise combination of red, green, blue, and lime emitters RGB-L). With high output and smooth dimming, the ColorSource Spot is factory calibrated and compensates for thermal droop to keep the color going strong. ColorSource Spot also provide access to the wide selection of lens tubes and adapters as the premium Source Four LED range.

Elation Professional's Platinum FLX is a "FLXible" multi-functional luminaire with a patent-pending dual optical system that gives clear advantages over traditional hybrid systems, the company says. With zoom control in spot, beam, and wash modes, it allows for narrower beam angle and brighter central point in beam mode (1.8° - 18°), a more uniform, clearer, and brighter spot field (2.9° - 25°), and higher-quality, flat field wash effect. The dual optics work independently and switching between beam and spot modes is quick and accurate. It offers seamless CMY+CTO and houses an energy-efficient 470W Platinum 20R lamp for output comparable to 1200W fixtures.

Elation Professional's Emotion is a compact moving head digital luminaire that brings the latest in next generation digital lighting technology to the market. This "digital moving projector" can output static gobos, full color images, animated videos and effects for the creative freedom to project an image anywhere. Easy to use, users don't need an abundance of DMX channels to operate it like other digital lights, the company says. Emotion features an on-board media server w/ 64GB SSHD and extensive royalty-free digital art library. Custom content can be easily and remotely uploaded via CMA software.

Flare Audio's Flare Zero is a loudspeaker aimed at discerning studios, musicians and audiophiles allowing them to hear exactly the sounds that the artist intended them to hear, the company says. This unique system features the company's patent-pending 3-D printed spiraled Vortex exhausts and Space technologies, utilized to the max for minimal distortion, high-power, highest definition sound. Zero stands at 1.8m high and looks to float in mid-air. The 3.5kw of sound it delivers is the equivalent of a club installation, in a studio or private space. There is no excess in the design -- it is minimal and is informed fully by the technology.

Prolights' StudioCOB FC harnesses the advantages of LED in a package that retains the core lighting values of a traditional luminaire. Fusing a "new generation" CREE COB LED source with a single parabolic reflector, the StudioCOB projects a bright, even beam. For flexibility, lenses are quickly placed in the unit to swap between 60°, 30°, and 15° while fully functional barndoors provide proper beam control. With smooth dimming, a massive color palette, and on-board frequency adjustment this perfect fusion of traditional optical system with advanced technology delivers an innovative "workhorse" fixture, the company says.

RC4 Wireless's RC4Magic-DMXpix is a tiny wireless DMX driver for pixel LEDs. It runs two separate pixel strings with customizable multi-channel profiles to create pixel effects utilizing up to 3,000 output channels. Using RC4MagicPC software or RDM, users specify the string type, DMX start channel, and various effects parameters for each driver. Also on-board are a standard DMX data port, and an I2C interface for use with Arduino, and more.

Robe's DL7S Profile is the first DL range fixture to receive a powerful new 800W version of the LED engine with seven colors for smooth, stable, and even color mixing and a very high CRI of 92. From the deepest to the lightest colors, the DL7S provides a rich full color spectrum, and features custom color mixing and dimming and seamless operation especially at the minimum brightness levels. Four fast framing shutters are individually controllable for position and angle and the entire framing module can be rotated. It offers a new series of effects from preprogrammed shutter blade sequences. One rotating gobo wheel with six slot&lock gobos plus a static 8-gobo wheel can be combined with the Animation wheel. Other effects and features include variable frost, rotating prism, and super-fast iris.

Robert Juliat's Dalis cyc light is a new 300W LED Cyclorama / wall wash luminaire designed by Robert Juliat in collaboration with Laser Imagineering. Created for theatrical, TV, and entertainment applications, Dalis blends an extremely wide color gamut. With exclusive asymmetrical reflectors that spread the light more evenly over vertical surfaces, Dalis provides a massive output across the full colour spectrum, the company says. Equipped with an advanced fanless cooling system, Dalis offers silent operation.

Safety Lifting Gear's Duke battery-powered electric chain hoist is a battery-powered, lightweight design, electric chain hoist, of 250kg or 500kg lifting capacity -- useful where mains electricity is not available, or messy electrical infrastructure would get in the way. Up to 10m height of lift. Other features include overload warning buzzer, two batteries that work for 25min continuously "each" at full load, and neat packaging case. Duke was the winner of ABTT's Widget of the Year Award.

TMB's Solaris LED - SoLED W840 strobe provides 92,000 lumen output at one-fourth the power consumption and half the size of conventional strobes. A linear array of Cree LEDs and advanced driver software provides the punch and "feel" of xenon. Multiple units will not stress typical 16A circuits. Flicker-free 2,400Hz solid-on mode is ideal for film and TV, fan-free design is completely silent, plus superior quality of light at low intensity is unrivalled. Familiar control modes and personalities mean fast learning curve, color LCD display is easy to address, and RDM functionality provides continual feedback and remote management. Exclusively distributed by TMB.

Finally, PLASA 2015 will see the presentation of the Gottelier Award, named after Tony Gottelier, the renowned industry innovator who passed away in 2006. This annual award recognizes those product developers who have made a significant long-term contribution to the entertainment, installation technology or presentation industry in the fields of audio, lighting, rigging, or staging.

This year's nominees are co-founder of High End Systems Richard Belliveau; David Cunningham, an early pioneer of computer lighting systems and developer of a number of landmark products for Strand during the 1970s and 80s; and Dr. Christian Heil, founder of loudspeaker manufacturer L-Acoustics.

Previous winners have included Tony Andrews of Funktion One, John Stadius of DiGiCo/SoundTracs, John Meyer of Meyer Sound, Fred Foster of ETC and Jim Bornhorst of Vari-Lite. Last year's winner was Pasquale Quadri, the admired innovator and founder of Clay Paky, who sadly passed away shortly before the 2014 show. His award was presented posthumously, by the unanimous agreement of his fellow nominees.

All the award winners will be announced during PLASA 2015, at a special ceremony on Monday, October 5.