Innovation to the fore

This year's PLASA Awards for Innovation attracted 65 product entries from manufacturers based in 10 countries, covering the full spectrum of entertainment technology.

"The degree of technical innovation showcased at PLASA is tribute to the creative talent lurking within our industry," says PLASA CEO Matthew Griffiths. "This talent is what the awards programme recognises and celebrates."

Led by chairman James Eade, this year's judging panel comprised theatre and staging consultants Andy Hayles, Charlie Kail, lighting designers Andy Voller and Mike Le Fevre, UK professional audio industry identities Roland Hemming, Bryan Grant and Richard Northwood, AV experts Blue Leach and John Hooker, and PLASA technical resources manager Ron Bonner.

Eight awards were presented, each recognising a product or technology released over the past 12 months that was deemed to have contributed significantly to the overall development of the entertainment technology industry.

The winners were:

Beyerdynamic - Headzone

Beyerdynamic was recognised for its Headzone headphone monitoring system, which is the first professional 5.1-surround sound headphone technology featuring ultrasonic headtracking and binaural acoustic modelling. The headphones are designed specifically for in-studio monitoring systems.

Electronic Theatre Controls (ETC) - Eos

Eos is ETC's most advanced lighting control system, designed to handle complex, multimedia-filled lighting rigs. It allows multiple programmers to work on the same show file, and is supplied with up to 8,000 outputs, providing an ideal user interface for programmers and designers.

Fuzion - Coemar Infinity Wash XL

Coemar's latest moving-head is an extremely bright, automated washlight with an innovative colour mixing system, impressive zoom range and an integrated effects wheel. Output ranges from 800W to 1400W via DMX.

Litec - EXE-Lodestar 650C1 + Datalogge

The EXE-Lodestar electric chain hoist range, conceived in association with Columbus McKinnon, boasts independent on-board intelligence that governs and controls operation and safety functions. Litec claims the software's inherent capabilities makes control via external console units redundant.

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