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Though the positive vibe about the industry being on the up remained amongst the exhibitors and visitors, the show itself seemed to have gone the other way. Stand sizes had been scaled down, the aisles seemed considerabley wider than last year and some of Hall 1 that was full last year, was sectioned off altogether. There was also a cut back in the signage department, in fact there was no aisles labelling at all, which made things rather difficult, especially for any first time visitors to the show. Despite all of that, the response did seem to be positive, though some said the show may be moving more towards being a national show rather than international. Most agreed that the PLASA Show was still an important exhibiton to be seen at, and said they would be returning next year.

A.C.E.T lighting division displayed the complete line up of Chroma-Q LED products, and alongside the full range of Vista consoles, Jands previewed the Vista 2 Byron, a major upgrade of the revolutionary Vista lighting system. The audio division’s product portfolio featured the Soundcraft Si3 console and Allen & Heath’s iLive-T console. Whilst the rigging division had plenty to offer from Litec and Columbus McKinnon and completing the stand, the video division had the Green Hippo media server range.

This year’s show gave Alcons Audio the opportunity to demonstrate its latest innovations. The main focus was the LR7 and LR7B, the latest additions to the highly successful L-series pro-ribbon line arrays.
Allen & Heath celebrates its 40th anniversary this year and marked the occasion with a party held on the top floor of London’s famous landmark, the Gherkin. “For 40 years, the company has maintained a philosophy of listening to customers and striving to provide the products that will enhance sound quality and user productivity. Allen & Heath’s success is down to the passion, skill, dedication and enthusiasm of its team,” said MD Glenn Rogers.

A key focus on the Clay Paky stand was the launch of the new luminaire series, the ALPHA 1500, which includes Profile, Spot HPE, Wash and Beam versions. PLASA 09 also saw the second Clay Paky Knight of Illumination Awards ceremony, which took place at the Ibis Hotel at Earl Court on 13 September. There were four awards for television, four for theatre, three for rock and a special lifetime recognition award. The winner of the latter, presented by John Watt, was Mark White. Clay Paky Sales and Marketing Manager Pio Nahum said: “The Clay Paky Knight of Illumination Awards have become an authoritative prize desired by the whole sector, for which lighting designers are eager and proud to compete.”

D.A.S. Audio exhibited with its UK distributor Sennheiser and presented the Aero 12A compact line array system, and the Avant Series of portable systems to the UK market.

DiGiCo introduced a console with an even smaller footprint than the SD8. It has no reduction in functionality or number of inputs and outputs, is under a metre in width, and its known as the SD8-24. The console benefits from all the features currently available on the SD8, as well as some additional ones courtesy of the newly developed OverDrive software.

The breakthrough XR Series of moving heads; the FOS 100 Dynamic LED bar; the PIXEL DROP matrix LED system; and the DIVE Series underwater LED projectors were amongst the products on display at the DTS stand. It was also the proud winner of a PLASA 09 Award for Innovation for the new XR300 BEAM.

The ETC Selador Series of LED fixtures made their PLASA debut this year, along with Unison Mosaic and Element, and the Selador fixture was rewarded with a PLASA 09 Award for Innovason, a significant step towards the ultimate goal of energy efficient incandescent replacement lighting.

Funktion One launched three new products. The F101 loudspeaker enclosure comprising one 10-inch bass / mid driver and a 1-inch high frequency device, it is a larger version of the successful F81. The Resolution 3 is an all in one 3-way enclosure comprising a special horn loaded 18-inch bass loudspeaker with 5-inch voice coil, a new Axhead loaded 10-inch loudspeaker for midrange and a 1-inch compression driver for high frequencies. And finally the ASPC1 audio system polarity checker is an invaluable tool for live sound and installation engineers to ensure the optimisation of high performance audio systems.

Goboland’s Vicky Fairall and Wyatt Enever were on the stand answering questions on the Goboland Collection and Custom gobos, alongside their Green Scene and Credit Crunch Gobo initiatives. “People were also very excited by our new iPhone App which allows customers to access our Black Steel Gobo Catalogue, which now holds over 1,250 designs - on the move. It is the first free gobo App ever to be launched and our customers were even downloading it on the stand.” said Fairall.

Hall Stage announced the arrival of IAStage’s new product line, Truss-Mounted Wire Tension Grid systems. This innovative system is a modified, near standard lighting grid consisting of truss and ‘SkyDeck’ TWG panels.

HK Audio debuted the ICON System, a digitally controlled, horn-loaded, active PA that sets new standards for performance and digital signal management capability.

i-Pix launched its BB1 Building Block system, which offers lighting and visual designers the opportunity to configure lightsources exactly as they wish. Building upon the BB4 and BB7, the new BB1 Building Block system creates exciting and innovative new opportunities going far beyond the semi-rigid constraints of normal fixture specification.
JBL introduced the smallest system enclosures in its Vertec product family, the VT4886 passive 3-way high-directivity line array element and its companion VT4883 cardioid-arrayable subwoofer. Incorporating innovative acoustical technologies and purpose-built transducers, they are specifically designed for standalone use or in conjunction with other existing Vertec models.

K-Array introduced the KJ50vb, a variable beam, ultra-slimline loudspeaker designed for horizontal or vertical mounting. Also on show was the KZ10, a remarkable ultra-micro line array, specifically designed for discreet use in a variety of applications.

This year’s Gottelier Award, presented by Rob Lingfield, Chairman of PLASA went to Alex Cooper of Klark Teknik in recognition of his design work on such legendary products as the Midas range of mixing consoles. Klark Teknik also announced several major developments with regard to the AES50 protocol. It has signed agreements with specialist third party developer companies AuviTran and ZP Engineering to make SuperMAC and HyperMAC technology available to the audio industry on a royalty-free basis.

Klein + Hummel expanded the visually appealing CLS Series of slim-line loudspeakers. With special features like a DSP-loaded power amplifier and virtual effects on the FX version, the CLS-2 Series is ideal for such applications as point-of-sale digital displays or multi-media shows.
UK pro lighting sales specialists Lightfactor showcased the core architectural, theatre and live performance orientated products from high profile manufacturers like Novalight from Italy, VXCO from Switzerland, SFAT from France and Cogent and LightProcessor from the Cooper Controls team in the UK.

LITEC presented the new high-performing RF40 truss, the update of EXE-Lodestar chain hoist. It is a new line of trusses characterised by linear and elegant constructional geometries.

Litestructures introduced Litestructures LIVE which was launched earlier this year. It is a unique, one-stop-shop facility, unifying three previously distinct areas of operation, Hire, Stage and Set, and Litestructures Studios, merging them into a single, powerful entity. Add into the mix on-site custom design and manufacture and you have the most capable, flexible, experienced and user-friendly force in the concert, touring and events marketplace.

Clarity by LSC Lighting is truly feature packed and offers seamless integrated control of intelligent lights, LED pixel mapping and Media servers, the likes of which has not been seen before. This was on display for the first time at Earls Court.

The Thump TH-18 powered subwoofer was new at the Mackie stand. It is the perfect companion to the popular Thump TH-15A powered loudspeaker. Demonstrations of new sub took place at the K+K George Hotel close to Earls Court.

On display at the Martin Professional stand were Martin’s first LED moving heads, new LED video solutions, and new LED luminaires for indoor and outdoor use, additions to the MAC family, the MAC 402 Dual and the MAC 301 Wash, as well as updates in the Jem and Magnum line of fog and haze machines. The Milos stand was constructed using its own equipment of MT2 Towers and QuickTruss products. It also presented new products including the C3 crowd barrier system, a stylish, lightweight, modular crowd control system available in a wide range of sizes and angles.

Most Technical India, a fairly new company set up by Dave Parry, visited PLASA 09, as Most Technical India has now officially become sole distributor for Void Acoustic Sound Systems, Pixel Addicts Server, Fibre Optic Systems LED Range and Pixel Range High Tech LEDs, so he and the team, ex Avolites and Event Organiser Isa Sapin, and Indian entrepreneur and promoter Arjun Bahl, were showing their support to the companies.

Celebrating its 30th anniversary this year, NEXO debuted new editions of its best-selling mainstream loudspeakers. The new PS R2 Series is an exciting range of high-output high-versatility compact cabinets, which is ideal for near-field portable and installed PA applications in clubs, theatres and A/V installations.

Outline introduced its newest technology, i-Mode. This unique and innovative platform will ultimately be implemented across a number of self-powered products, and represents a truly ‘intelligent’ platform dedicated to professional audio.  Since September, it has been available in models DVS 115 SW, DVS 118 SW, and LAB 15, with plans to implement it across a number of self-powered Outline products.
PixelRange launched SkyLine at PLASA 09, a family of extremely durable outdoor architectural LED floodlights, capable of high projection, even washes and focused feature lighting. Other new products include the new PixelPar Festival - an outdoor IP65 rated version of the industry standard PixelPar.

Polar Audio proudly exhibited a number of new products including a range from the latest addition to the Polar family, Australian Monitor. Polar Audio conducted live demonstrations of the latest in digital networked audio from across its product portfolio, highlighting products from Aviom, MC2, XTA, Biamp and many others. New products showcased included, beyerdynamic’s Opus 600 system, Biamp’s RED-1 Remote Ethernet Device, Dynacord’s PROMAX 8000 system, ASL’s Digital Intercom system and a host of new products from XTA and MC2 Audio.

PR Lighting launched three new heads, the XPar 348, XLED 390 (both LED FX), and Beam 300, a conventional moving head on the stand of their UK distributor, MilTec (UK) Ltd.

RCF, dBTechnologies and SGM Technology exhibited for the first time together as the RCF Group. RCF presented new additions to the highly acclaimed TT+ Touring and Theatre Series, while dBTechnologies presented the brand new Opera Digital and DVX systems as well as latest additions to the already successful FlexSys and DVA ranges, and SGM were showing the Palco 5 Full Color LED IP55, the Stilo, and the Giotto Spot 700 is the latest evolution in the Giotto range of fixtures.
Robe won a PLASA 09 Award for Innovation for the Robin 300 Series Plasma, while on the stand it exhibited all the products in the new ROBIN range. To complete its flagship AT range, Robe launched the ColorSpot 1200E AT Profile and the ColorBeam 700E AT. And also new were three high-powered LED products - the CitySource 96. CitySkape 48 and CitySkape Xtreme.

Roland Systems Group, makers of popular EDIROL video mixers debuted the new LVS-800 at PLASA 09, a new eight-channel standard definition video mixer, ideal for any live event or presentation that uses cameras, other video sources along with computers as well as multiple screens.
The theme of Sennheiser UK’s PLASA 09 presence was ‘From Input to Output.’ As well as its high profile live production and recording products, the theme highlighted the company’s newest product lines and distributed brands, including Klein + Hummel, Neumann, D.A.S. Audio, Apart Audio, K-Array and Rane, which provide high quality products for the audio installation market and cater for all elements of the signal chain.

The newest addition to the Teclumen team, Igor Cernitori, was on hand at PLASA 09 introducing himself to the UK market. He said: “My position is a new position and is not meant to replace any existing structure within Teclumen or sales network. Our intention is to get closer to our customers, increasing our service and assistance and to strengthen our relationship with our customer base. The level of trust and commitment is as important as the quality and competitiveness of the products we offer.”

Making their UK debuts were the Audinate Dante-MY16-AUD interface card; the IMX644 digital rack-mount mixer; IPA 8200 power amplifier; DME Version 3.5 and the recently-announced updated M7CL V2 mixing console, all introduced by audio manufacturer Yamaha.

A new and advanced hoist motor control system was unveiled at PLASA 09, when XLNT Advanced Technologies launched its new PowerMotion DS8 Pro and Pro Plus Series Solid State Motor Controllers. The DS8 Pro Series provides every essential option for controlling standard electrical entertainment chain hoists, with more advanced options and total multi-unit flexibility.

PLASA 2010 will return to Earls Court on 12-15 September.