ET Live, adjacent to the Sands Expo, was the site for the 2004 ETS-LDI award ceremonies in Las Vegas Saturday night, a far cry from a traditional hotel ballroom. ET Live debuted at ETS-LDI with great success and featured a variety of musical acts on five different stages and proved to be an ideal venue for an awards program that honors the leaders in the entertainment technology field.
The first award of the evening was the Wally Russell Award given to legendary lighting designer and inventor George C. Izenour. Larry Kellermann of the Wally Russell board accepted the award on Izenour’s behalf.
The SRO Technical Achievement Award, designed to honor TDs in the staging and rental community who have shown tremendous skill and poise beyond the call of duty, went to Jim McClellan, Director of Production with AEG Live Events in St. Louis. McClellan faced many challenges this year as TD on a major Grammy Awards party at the Staples Center as well as back-to-back gigs managing multiple shows and performers at Mega Fest in Atlanta and The International Barbershop Competition in Louisville.
Data Snake with AC circuit by Lex Products Corp. was given the Widget of the Year Award.
Marc Rosenthal received the Projection Designer of the Year Award based on his work creating images for theatre, opera, dance, ballet, theme parks, special events, spectacles, concert touring, art, corporate production, and trade shows. Recent projects range from Like Jazz and Talking Cure at the Mark Taper Forum, a complete digital projection and UV black light installation in a dome for Burningman 2004.
Paul Garrity of Auerbach, Pollock, Friedlander was named Sound Designer of the Year for his work in supporting and enhancing the field of sound design, as well as for his work on Cirque du Soleil's Zumanity theatre that has a unique and adjustable sound environment.
A new award--Technician of the Year—was presented to Jeanette Farmer for her many years of supporting the work of lighting designers and solving some of the toughest technical problems ever encountered in a theatre facility, even when the stage is a swimming pool, or whatever else the Cirque du Soleil throws in her direction.
Another new category is the Lighting Director of the Year, which was given to The Blue Man Group’s lighting director Marc Janowitz, who has spent many years creating a lighting scheme to support the Blue Men in the various surreal shows.
Marc Brickman was named Lighting Designer of the Year, not only for his legendary work with Pink Floyd that inspired a generation, but also for making the Blue Man Group’s German debut as sensational as possible.
Winners of the ETS-LDI 2004 Booth Awards are:
Small Booth Winner: N & N Productions/Gobo Xpress won for their display that was set in a backyard barbecue. Anne Norris and Chris Davis designed the booth.
Big Booth Winner: ETC for its sly tribute to its new corporate headquarters in Middleton, WI, and for bringing theatre onto the Sands Expo show floor. Design duties went to Fred Foster and Sue McLaney.
Best Laser Display: Laser Net for its exciting use of its product not just within the booth but on top of it as well. The booth was designed by Christine Jenkins, Tom Harmon, Horacio Pugliese, Tim Ziegenbein, Steve Heminover, and Michael Solinger.
Most Creative Use of Lighting: XL Video for unique use of its products as the booth itself as well as much of the furnishings within. Marcel DeKeyser designed the booth.
Honorable Mentions for Small Booth: Global Truss, James Thomas Engineering, Barco. A special honorable mention for the “Best use of Barbie Pink” went to Rud-Chain and Lightspace, who both found very interesting uses for this unique shade.
Honorable Mentions for Large Booth: Robe.
In the product categories, the winners are:
The Sound Product of the Year: A joint award, going to two companies in the Harman Group, BSS Audio for Soundweb London and Crown for the I-Tech series of amps. There was also an honorable mention to Gepco’s Heavy Duty Cat 5E Cable.
Rigging and Hardware Product of the Year: Ballast Truss by Total Structures. Honorable mention went to ProCommander PRO 5 with Varistar Hoists by CM Entertainment, an integrated programmable hoist control system. This year’s Promising Prototype of the Year in rigging in hardware was the JR Powerlift by JR Clancy.
Special Effects Product of the Year: Delta 6000 Fog Machine by Roscolab. It uses a new dual-path heat exchanger to produce very high volumes of fog. Consuming more than nine liters of fog fluid per hour, this machine was developed for large stages, theme parks, and industrial applications. It uses the same basic electronics as the Delta 3000, including built-in DMX as standard equipment.
Projection Product of the Year: MAXEDIA by Martin Professional. Blending 3D effects and mapping, real-time layer manipulation and transition effects in up to 20 layers simultaneously, the Martin Maxedia Media server allows programming onboard, with or without a DMX console present for playback. The Debuting Product/Promising Prototype of the Year went to Brash by Lucid 3D, Inc. Brash, distributed by Sound Distribution, Inc, is an integrated 3D composer that creates and renders objects and video in real-time.
Lighting Product of the Year/Lighting Tools and Software: ESP Studios’ ESP Vision, for taking the pre-visualization concept to new standards. It provides lighting designers and production teams with a very powerful tool for realistic and real-time lighting simulation, shadow casting, color mixing, moving set pieces, special effects, and more.
Lighting Accessory of the Year: Rosco Power Supplies by Roscolab. An exceptionally useful power supply to reduce the growing number of black boxes required to drive the accessories every designer loves to use, from gobo rotators to scrollers and beyond.
Lighting /Architecture Product of the Year: SGM’s Palco 3 and 5, a compact, super bright color-changing floodlight for outdoor use. The Palco 3 and 5 offer all the advantages of LED’s, combined with a high flux of 2,800 lumen and stand alone operation.
Lighting/Entertainment Product of the Year: Pacific 45 degree – 75 degree ZOOM by Selecon. The latest in a unique and innovative series of stage ellipsoidals, Selecon’s Pacific 45 – 75 degree provides the beam width of a Fresnel with unmatched pattern projection capabilities. Available in both tungsten and metal halide versions, this fixture is an excellent addition to what is already an internationally recognized product line. An honorable mention goes to the CS4 Spotline by Studio Due.
The final award of the evening was presented to Ellen Lampert-Greaux, ETS-LDI conference director and consulting editor of ED/LD. Lampert-Greaux was given the Starlight Award, for her contributions to not only the ETS-LDI show, but also to Entertainment Design and Lighting Dimensions magazines. She has been a tireless source of support, guidance, and inspiration from the very first year of the show. Lampert-Greaux is the first ever recipient of the Starlight Award.
The ceremony was sponsored by Strong Entertainment Lighting, Stageline, QSC, Sound Image, Robe, and Yamaha, with special services provided by Matt Dillingham of Advanced Entertainment Services and Adrian Segeren of Le Maitre Special Effects, lighting designer Patrick Dierson and programmer Rodd McLaughlin.