News Blog

This section contains field reports, case studies, whitepapers, reports from tradeshows, backgrounders, and other articles we consider interesting. When you sign up for our newsletter, we will email you articles that match your interests.

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22/08/2018

PRG and VER emerge as one integrated company in Europe & The Middle East

PRG announced today that VER has merged into Production Resource Group in Europe and the Middle East.

The entities will be commonly controlled by The Jordan Company, GSO Capital Partners and PRG Management. Jere Harris will serve as Chairman and CEO of PRG and VER, and Stephan Paridaen will be President and COO. Both companies will offer the ability to share equipment, knowledge and personnel wherever doing so will benefit its customers and meet evolving client needs, offer solutions, resources and expertise in ways neither company could achieve independently.

“For more than 20 years PRG has been diligent in offering its clients the best production service and equipment in the entertainment industry. Growth across disciplines, markets and geographies has always been a key part of our strategy,” said Jere Harris, PRG’s chairman and CEO. “Now, our ability to support all types of entertainment productions globally will take on new meaning, raising an already high bar to an unprecedented level.”

PRG and VER are both well established in concert touring in lighting, video, media servers, and staging innovations. Combining PRG and VER’s strength will now offer a complete suite of services for tours, festivals, and events. Further, PRG can enhance its long history in television production and expand its work in the film industry as VER brings world-class expertise in the video camera market, lighting, display and a robust suite of cameras. VER customers will benefit from PRG’s staging and automation expertise, vast lighting inventory and its position as the exclusive rental house for PRG’s patented proprietary lighting and video products.

“We believe that this approach will bring about innovation, an exciting level of service, and even more transformative collaboration with our partners. It feels historic, not only for PRG and VER, but for entertainment industry,” said Harris.

Globally, VER and PRG will have approximately 70 locations across six continents. Clients will have improved access to an extraordinary array of equipment from all major manufacturers as well as specialized and proprietary equipment.

17/08/2018 eSport / Special Events

Taking on PUBG's eSports Battlegrounds! – Event Technology for eSports

PUBG’s e-sports Battlegrounds are conquering Berlin: the world’s 20 best PUBG teams were competing for 2M dollar prize money at the Global Invitational Meeting 2018 in Mercedes-Benz-Arena Berlin from July 25th-29th. Despite only having been published in December 2017, the game has already gained a huge fan base: the tournament was commented live in four different languages and streamed online which attracted up to 60M spectators at the same time. PRG provided all the event technology (rigging, static calculation, sound, video and lighting technology), including related video processing components.

See our video:

”At this event, the spectators expect to become part of the game”, says Ingo Rehnert, Head of Sales & Account Management – Sport & Special Events at PRG. Players and fans want to experience what happens on the stage ”as emotionally and directly as possible”. To facilitate this, a cube-shaped LED screen was installed above the stage in the arena’s center where the teams were competing. More than 1,300 lights and 680m² LED screens were installed in only three days.

2.600m² projection screen fabric cylindrically veiled the circular stage construction with the gamer zone for the barnstorming opening ceremony. PRG provided the kinetics that enabled the movement of the projection cylinder. 48 Panasonic PT-RZ31K laser projectors displayed the video content onto the cylinder (360°) as well as onto parts of the stage floor. For the mind-blowing finale of the opening ceremony, the projection cylinder was pulled up as part of the show revealing the team boxes.

“This is one of the points why we do shows with PRG: the lights, the audio, the video and everything else is going to behave and look exactly the same as visualized and planned in the studio beforehand”, says Michael Thuney, Producer at Production Associates. “We do shows all around the world and PRG has been working with us all along.”

Just like Michael, we are happy about the fantastic success and thank him and his team for the great cooperation at this amazing event!

In total, about 300MT material were used. The event was realized using the following technical items:

Rigging Services

331 x Chain-hoists
20 x BGV C1 hoists
82m Catwalk-truss
1,226m Truss

Lighting Services

144 x LED Strobelights
1204 x Moving Lights:
– 610 x Moving Light Beam
– 90 x Moving Light Spot
– 20 x Moving Light Wash
– 484 x Moving Light LED

Video Services

580qm² 5mm LED Wall
100qm² 2mm LED Wall
50 x Laser Projectors

Audio Services

60 x Line Array Speaker
20 x Subs

Logistics

30 x 40t Trailers

15/07/2018 Automotive Event

Best of Belron - Best Technology for the World Cup of the Car Glass Repairs 2018

Focused jurors, finalists competing for the title and an expert audience following the competition closely: This was the ‚Best of Belron‘ at the ‘Festhalle’ in Frankfurt. The event aimed to find the best fitter and glass repairing professional of Belron International (CARGLASS®).

PRG was in charge of the lighting, audio, video and rigging and staged this event according to an ingenious concept by Uniplan – watch our behind the scenes video:

Felix Börner (Uniplan – Director Hamburg Office): “Our and PRG’s biggest challenge was the immense size of the venue (almost 20,000 m²). Furthermore, the time frame for the set-up and the dismantling were both extremely short and an alteration had to be conducted on the last day. We needed an experienced partner striving for perfection, just like we do at Uniplan, to put everything into balance and are thrilled to have succeeded together with PRG.”

The participants of the competition were welcomed frenetically by about 1,000 guests from all over the world at the opening event.

The LED tubes above the competition workshops creating the typical workshop neon-atmosphere were a special highlight and were customized for Uniplan by PRG Projects. The LED tubes, of a length of 3m were controllable down to the pixel via media server and therefore offered a variety of effects that blended in seamlessly into the different scenarios during the event.

A conference took place simultaneously in an adjacent exhibition hall, during which the audience could learn about interesting topics, e.g. the latest developments in the industry. The complete conference technology was provided by PRG as well. Fohhn Audio A provided a new sound system which, due to an elaborated technology, resulted in a wide spread broadcast and therefore sparing the utilization of delay lines.

The event went over two days and ended up with the honors of the new world champion, followed by a gala dinner and a party with live music.

Robert Sterke (Global Sales Development Director at Belron):: The way people worked together was just fabulous, like clockworks! Since we have to consider so many elements during the event ourselves, we are happy to work with partners that give us the insurance of having everything under control and that everything works perfectly. One worry less for us!“

We thank Uniplan and Belron for their trust in PRG and our fantastic collaboration!

#BestOfBelron

05/07/2018

PRG Announces New Concert Touring Innovations

Updated PRG SPACEFRAME™ and new Ingest product on Beyonce and Jay-Z’s “On the Run II” Tour

LONDON and LOS ANGELES – July 9, 2018 - Production Resource Group LLC, (PRG), the world’s leading provider of entertainment and event technology solutions, announces two product innovations – Infinity SPACEFRAME™ and Ingest – which are supporting Beyonce and Jay-Z's "On the Run II" Tour. The new Infinity SPACEFRAME™ which serves as a kinetic backdrop on stage and Ingest, a new technology that archives camera images created on tour, are industry firsts.

PRG SPACEFRAME™
PRG SPACEFRAME™ is an innovative carbon fiber touring frame created by PRG Projects, a division of PRG which specializes in developing and integrating proprietary solutions to the rigors of the production and entertainment industry. It was launched on 2017’s U2’s “Joshua Tree” Tour and “On the Run II” is the second concert tour to feature the product. For this tour, Stufish (the designers of both “Joshua” Tree and “On the Run II” tours) wanted to have a clean look, visually eliminating all support structures and rigging. To do that, PRG Projects came up with a solution called “Infinity SPACEFRAME™” where the rigging and support structure are integrated on the back of the SPACEFRAME™, invisible from audience view. Video content on the screen is now edge-to-edge without visual barriers as a classic screen would have. It gives it a monumental look and creates a new type of immersive viewing experience. The Infinity SPACEFRAME™ makes the most of the PRG SPACEFRAME™ concept by utilizing the structural capabilities of the video screen as part of the automated tracking support. It ultimately saves truckloads of additional support structure.
“Designing custom LED and video solutions for live events is a core part of what PRG Projects does. Beyond what we develop for PRG, we work directly with designers to create unique staging solutions that allow them and performers to be as creative as possible,” said Frederic Opsomer, managing director, PRG Projects. “We are constantly thinking of what is next, how do we improve on what we’ve already done. The new Infinity SPACEFRAME™ allows for moveable LED screens in an operational effective set up which aids the dynamic energy Beyonce, Jay-Z and other performers create during the show.”

The stage design for “On the Run II” Tour includes two LED screens with SPACEFRAME™. The secondary – or upstage – screen is a 16,8-meter-wide and 10,8-meter-high screen (55 feet x 35.4 feet) with ROE’s CB8 LED. The bottom section of the upstage screen is automated with three SPACEFRAME™ panels that open like garage doors, enabling the musicians’ rolling risers to enter and exit the main stage. The upstage screen stands behind a four-tiered opera box style performer platform. The main - or downstage - screen is divided into 12 automated sections. This allows for different dramatic scenes and settings and provides Beyonce and Jay-Z different entry and exit scenarios. The new Infinity SPACEFRAME™ screen, with GALAXIA’s WV9 air transparent LED, measures 52,8-meter-wide and 13,2-meter-high (173.2 feet x 43.3 feet) when closed and hangs on motorized carts that move left and right on a track. The carbon fiber fabrication and built-in wind bracing provides the stability that structural engineers demand in order to have a screen of this size move around on a track.
“There is currently no other framing system that can do this, it’s a perfect example of designers really pushing the product to the limits and having free reign for their ideas. A symbiosis rarely seen in our industry,” said Opsomer.

INGEST
“On the Run II” Tour is also implementing PRG Ingest. Ingest is a new technology that allows the capture of concert footage in real time from up to 24 isolated camera feeds. Each camera feed - or channel – will be ingested in the server, processed, and via the network pushed to an external storage drive.

Traditionally, footage from a single camera is captured on a single recorder, then after a show, each file on the drive is copied over to a separate hard drive. This is an intensive process that can take many hours as the transfer can take up to one hour per camera.

“With the Ingest system, we can create a show record on an external drive of all channels in nearly real-time and still have a back-up copy on the server should anything go wrong,” said Wolfgang Schram, director of video engineering, PRG. “The servers also get time coded, so all recordings have real time and can be used in an edit right away.”

In order to handle the 6.2 TB of data that “On the Run II” Tour generates per night, PRG uses six media servers which make copies of what is recorded, transcode it to a pro res 422 file and push it over a 10GigE network on an external NAS drive.

14/05/2018

PRG’s New Concert Touring Products on U2’s eXPERIENCE + iNNOCENCE Tour

PRG’s New Concert Touring Products on U2’s eXPERIENCE + iNNOCENCE Tour

Pure10 and Rolling Video Floor Risers elevate the touring industry

LOS ANGELES – May 14, 2018 – Production Resource Group LLC, (PRG), the world’s leading provider of entertainment and event technology solutions, announces two product innovations - Pure10 and Rolling Video Floor Risers - which have been integrated into the design, production and operations for the U2 eXPERIENCE + iNNOCENCE Tour. Both solutions demonstrate PRG’s dedication to innovating products that respond to the needs of artists, tour designers and managers seeking to push boundaries and deliver a more immersive concert experience.

“PRG has supported every U2 tour since 1992, and they always challenge us to be innovative with available technology or to create something new,” said Jeroen Hallaert, director of PRG Projects North America.

U2 eXPERIENCE + iNNOCENCE Tour is a follow up to the 2015 Songs for Innocence Tour for which PRG provided the video cage on the moving catwalk between the video screens. However, for the 2018 tour, U2’s creative team required high-resolution, super transparent LED video screens and an independent automated kinetic catwalk between the video screens. The purpose of the transparent LED video screens is to allow band members to perform amidst the LED walls (as during the 2015 tour) without creating a visual divide in the arena. It also provided the ability to integrate Augmented Reality into the show.

Further, the design team wanted the catwalk to be accessible by a moving staircase, and therefore the catwalk should move independently from the video screens. This added automated catwalk required more motors and equipment, thus adding weight. This meant PRG Projects had to find a solution to make not only high-resolution, super transparent LED video screens but also make it super light-weight.

PURE10

In response to U2’s challenge to create a transparent LED wall, PRG Projects revolutionized the way LED screens are built and created the patent-pending Pure10. Rather than mounting the printed circuit boards (PCB) holding the LED in standard clunky frames, PRG Projects sliced the PCB in strips and turned them 90 degrees with the LED mounted on the side. This resulted in 75 percent transparency.

The added specially curated Augmented Reality scene-setter - triggered by the LED screen – required a transparent, high-resolution screen. The way PRG Projects chose to build the screen allowed for a 10mm pixel pitch. A pitch far superior than what PRG Projects initially imagined.

“The creative team and the band were looking for a LED screen that allowed them to use AR in the way they envisioned. Pure10 works so well thanks to the magic combination of the pixel pitch, the high transparency and the brightness,” said Hallaert. “The band now calls the screens and catwalk the barricage.”

Additionally, rather than metal fabrication to house or frame the Pure10, PRG Projects used knowledge gained from developing the SPACEFRAME® and engineered a fast-building system in carbon fiber. This resulted in the weight savings that the tour’s production team was looking for. It also gave free reign to the designers and the band to further use the automated catwalk creatively.

As with the innovative transport design for the SPACEFRAME, PRG Projects has advanced the way concert touring is taken on the road with Pure10 by maximizing space and volume in trucks, airplanes and sea containers. The number of trucks needed is cut in half compared to the 2015 tour. Further, when the equipment is used during the show, empty transport dollies fold, stack and roll away in the tiniest spaces. This allows for other departments to move around the venue more freely and makes for ergonomic and superior logistics for load-ins and load-outs.

Rolling Video Floor Riser

The Rolling Video Floor Riser is a revolutionary system in how it’s built and disassembled. Initially revealed last year, PRG Projects updated and upgraded it for U2 to be used as the round stage. Each riser is fitted with 2 LED modules offering a high resolution 4mm pixel pitch during performances. Each riser has integrated magnets to enable a speedy assembly - an LED Floor of up to 1,076 square feet can be set up in less than 20 minutes.

“The Rolling Video Floor Risers were developed to meet the short set-up and change-over times of LED flooring which is perfect for the concert touring and festival segment,” said Mark O’Herlihy, vice president of PRG Global Entertainment.

Not only do the Rolling Video Floor Risers dramatically reduce the set-up time for an LED floor on stage, they also are transported in especially fitted dollies, which contain six risers each. The dollies are 1.6 m in height, allowing shipment via airfreight on the lower deck, which drastically reduces the shipping costs.

Credits Pictures © Steve Jennings

18/01/2018

Holiday on Ice - The Anniversary Tour

A technical symbiosis of light and video

It is the most visited ice show in the world - Holiday on Ice! This year, the production celebrates its 75th anniversary. "Atlantis" is one of two shows currently touring Germany and France, exciting its audiences with spectacular costumes, great choreography and impressive scenography.

Once again this year, PRG will return to Holiday on Ice’s frozen world and support the show in terms of event technology. In addition to rigging and audio technology, PRG also provides lighting and video technology.

Adam Bassett of Woodroffe Bassett Design is the lighting designer of the show. Among other things, he and his team have worked on the lighting for the Rolling Stones, Lady Gaga and the Olympic Games. Adam Bassett explains what aspects played a role in the implementation of the current tour:
"Whenever we develop projects, it's the interplay between the design and what we have available in terms of budget, equipment and technology to meet the specific design challenges. It was very helpful to work closely together with PRG from the start, trying to find technical solutions to the complexities, within our budget."

One of the technical highlights of this year’s tour are the ten automated Roll-up screens in the middle of the ice rink. For this, PRG uses six Panasonic PT-DZ21K projectors. The Roll-ups are controlled via DMX by the GrandMA2 console. The GrandMa2 console also controls the WO media server to track the different positions during the show. A completely redundant WO system is used as an output.
As a backdrop of the ice rink, we installed a large video projection. Two Barco HD projectors W f 26K project in different depths so that with the help of the WO system, the data is mapped and a 3D effect is created. The projections also emphasize the costumes of the figure skaters and thus create the magical atmosphere of the lost city of Atlantis.

Kjell Peersman, Technical Manager of Holiday on Ice, is delighted with the successful video-technical implementation of the show content:
"We had to find a tailor-made solution to deliver video content on the automated roll-ups. PRG developed a great solution for this, making all boards and media servers communicate with each other. The result is just great! "

In addition to video technology, the lighting has been carefully adapted to the scenario of the show. A total of 40 Icon Edges were used. This moving head is a fast beam, spot and wash luminaire; it contains a wide range of gobos and offers a lot of lighting effects, which benefits the tour.

Bob Walpot, Director of Operations and Asset Strategy PRG, is satisfied with the technical solutions the team has created for the show:
"The combination of these video and lighting elements in synergy with the sumptuous costumes creates a wonderful and immersive show."

Holiday on Ice's Anniversary Tour is also a great success! In total, over 90 shows are performed. Till the end of February, the ice skaters will still enchant the audiences before Atlantis sinks back into the sea.