News

CyberHoist gets Sticky and Sweet for Madonna 09 september 2009

This summer’s Sticky and Sweet tour was a dazzling show even by the usual standards of Madonna’s live productions. A large XLNT CyberHoist intelligent motor system was responsible both for animating the opening seconds of the show and a huge variety of complex screen and lighting movements throughout the evening.
The largest screens were controlled by XLNT’s InMotion3D software running on a CyberHoist FPS Full Production System with dual Apple MacPro’s, in the hands of Senior Programmer and Project Manager Martin Hoop or his deputy Erik Gielen. The action began with a giant video cube that opened the show displaying a replica of the giant ornate ‘M’ symbol flanking Madonna’s stage.
The front part, known as the ‘Venetian’ screen, morphed into surreal video imagery that appeared to be slowly shredded into horizontal strips as the front face of the cube was pulled apart vertically by a pair of CyberHoist 1 ton motors at the top edge. Another pair of 1 ton CyberHoist motors at the base of the piece pulled the lower leaves upwards, revealing the star herself.
The show used 11 one ton CyberHoist and 18 half ton CyberHoist motors, with each of three upstage lighting pods moved by a combination of two half ton and one ton CyberHoists under the command of a separate CyberHoist PS Production System.Forming another key visual element were two concentric circles of Element Lab Stealth screens, which moved in conjunction or separately from each other, each flown from four half ton CyberHoists.
The central Venetian Screen was accompanied by two moving Nocturne 20mm LED screens upstage, lifted and lowered on two one ton CyberHoists per screen. The final element was a pair of rear screens, composed of Nocturne V9 9mm pixel pitch LED walls, each flown from a pair of half ton CyberHoists.
Key production credits are Production and Lighting Designer LeRoy Bennet, Tour Production Director Chris Lamb, Tour Production Manager Benny Collins, Stage Manager Jerry ‘Hodge’ Vierna, Lighting Director Mac Mosier and Show Director Jamie King.

CyberHoist Raises the Curtain for Britney Spears 02 september 2009 Britney Spears’ Circus World Tour, an audacious, ambitious in-the-round touring spectacle, has been wowing fans around the world. Literally at the heart of the giant production is a mammoth circular Stealth LED video curtain, raised and lowered with millimetre precision several times every night by an XLNT Advanced Technologies CyberHoist motion control system.
The complex, three-ring, non-stop show combines aerial action, acrobatics, nine automated lifts, and a central 5.18 metre (17ft) diameter rotating device, all contributing to the Circus theme, and with over 100 lift cues there’s not a moment to draw breath.
The concept is the work of co-lighting designers Nick Whitehouse and Bryan Leitch, with tour director Steve Dixon and show director Jamie King. Whitehouse and Dixon, together with Bryan Leitch and William Baker, make up the recently formed Road Rage production company.
Topping the visuals is a giant carousel-style Stealth screen, four metres high and 18.9 metres in diameter and made up from 990 panels. It’s suspended from 11 CyberHoist CH1000 1 ton intelligent variable speed motors and controlled at stage-side by programmer Arjen Hofma using XLNT’s InMotion3D software running on a CyberHoist FPS Full Production System with dual Apple MacPro’s.
Says Nick Whitehouse: “The complete screen weighs about four tons including the rigging, all picked up on the 11 CyberHoists and the shows starts with it dropped in over the main stage, followed by a big reveal. If it ever broke it would be a showstopper – so CyberHoist was the obvious choice. We had to have a really reliable product up there with a reliable control system that also gives the operator plenty of feedback.
“And now that there’s are CyberHoist systems based in America and Asia, as well as Europe, it’s great because we can just pick up motors locally wherever we go and take the USB key and the show’s there.”Steve Dixon adds: “We’ve got a reliable system that we don’t need to spend a fortune on having back-ups of back-ups: a failsafe system, because stopping a show due to a motor failure would be a nightmare. Likewise, the software’s tried and tested now, and it’s the only moving motor software that gives you so much feedback.” He adds: “As soon as we talked about the screen we knew it had to be on CyberHoist.”
Tour production manager Jason Danter comments: “The CyberHoist system just seems to be a lot more exact than other chain systems; it’s a lot smoother looking and when you’re moving screens, certainly on this show where there’s a lot of Broadway-style automation with winches, the slickness of the screen movement just adds to the whole production. It also kind of lent itself more to what we wanted to do during the show, including bringing it in quicker, taking it out quicker and being able to leave the screen down as long as possible before flying it out – there are various reasons why we used it.“We also get great back-up from the company; they’re good people to talk to, good people to work with. The people that they’ve sent out to run it have all been really good guys. It’s reliable and with the back-up it’s worth the money that you’re paying for it. All good!” read more

Sensation takes CyberHoist to Wonderland 14 july 2009 Sensation, one of Europe’s top mega-dance event brands, celebrated its 10th anniversary this summer by taking the production concept another step further, creating a party atmosphere over two sold-out nights at the Amsterdam Arena.
The event’s famous all-white dress code, originally a tribute by organiser Duncan Sutterheim to his late brother Miles, was reflected in specially commissioned white aerial décor, props and lighting effects.
The aerial pieces were animated, along with video screens and lighting pods, by a 58-motor XLNT CyberHoist motion control system, controlled by a complex four-zoned Ethernet system using XLNT Advanced Technologies DN2 Ethernet/DMX nodes and NS12PF Ethernet / Fiber Optic switches, all provided by Flashlight.
Sensation creative director Sander Vermeulen says, “The whole atmosphere, the lighting and flown pieces, really hits you when you walk in and see 35,000 people all dressed in white!”CyberHoist CH250 250Kg motors opened a central tower of white drapes to reveal a central stage, followed later by unfolding a giant pair of inflatable white butterfly wings. Says Vermeulen: “It was a metaphor for changing the mood of the evening, and it was also the biggest technical challenge.”
12 hanging ‘keys’ pirouetted under CyberHoist control, each internally lit, while lighting circles and a pair of ‘moons’ were also part of the animated aerial action. CyberHoists also raised and lowered eight giant MiTrix LED video panels with two motors per screen, as well as providing the final visual ingredient – four flying ‘butterfly girls’ and another who ‘grew’ like Alice herself in a dress that expanded from human size to a towering 10m high and 6m wide.
The four power and network cable management zones were connected via Ethernet by up to 270 metres of fibre and E-stop to the FOH position, where a total of 14 XLNT Ethernet switches divided the network into the two control systems and XLNT E-stop combiners merged the power distros to three separate E-stop resets for maximum safety and electrical isolation.
The show was triggered by DMX from a Medialon server running timecode, converted by XLNT DMXlink dual channel DMX TriggerBoxes to triggers for the chain hoist manager.
Sander Vermeulen was creative director and Marcel Elbertse production director for Sensation, with lighting designer Gerard Maijenburg. The motion control team consisted of Flashlight’s CyberHoist project manager Arjen Hofma, acts and keys operator Ramon Rijsdijk, screens and butterflies operator Sander Buys, and CyberHoist engineer Mario Reijm. read more

Laura Pausini, Italian Popdiva, on world tour 14 june 2009 Italy - Italian superstar Laura Pausini, whose sell-out World Tour rolled across Europe in the spring and summmer of 2009, toured a massive 10-truck production. XLNT Advanced Technologies CyberHoist motors played a central role in raising and lowering a multitude of video screens and panels.
Production manager Luigi Vallario collaborated with lighting designer Francesco DeCave (www.francescodecave.it) and Pausini’s manager Gabriele Parisi to create the show, in which 100 hoists lifted 30 tonnes of hardware and a large rolling stage.
Supplied by video contractor Event Managements, the multi-screen production dispensed with conventional screen formats, instead deploying a skeleton of eight 2 metre high LED support structures covered with Barcoi MiPix modules.Backing those was a 22 x 8m Technovision NET LED M50 backdrop screen, while four 3 x 2m Barco MiTrix panels performed a wide variety of movements on a semicircular track that curved around to the front of the stage. Content was a blend of specially shot material by video director Gaetano Morbioli and a combination of live i-mag and recorded performance footage.

The rigging system was designed by Luca Tosolini of Italstage, with CyberHoist intelligent chain hoist motors providing the vertical motion control of the LED elements and six DTS custom blinders, and with head rigger Luca Guidolin in charge of the tour rigging team.

Arctic Monkeys for TPi