Transformations and Dramatic Statements 
The Fray at Villanova University
April 26, 2010
On Friday, April 23rd, Eventions provided sound, lighting and staging for the spring concert at Villanova University with headliner, The Fray. The concert was attended by close to 3000 students and featured Steel Train as the opening act.
The Fray’s most famous song is “How To Save A life” which is the theme song from the hit TV show, Grays Anatomy.
The concert featured a 40X40 Stage, a 26 speaker line array sound system, 100 feet of lighting truss with 126 stage lights. Complementing the conventional lights were 16 Martin moving head intelligent lights and a host of special effect lights.
While we have worked with many nationally touring artists, it is always fun to see the requests the bands make as well as the logistics that nationally touring acts have to deal with. The Fray traveled with two 52’ tractor trailers loaded with their equipment, merchandise for sale and supplies. They actually had a Yamaha baby grand piano that they lug around with them. I thought it was amusing that at least 6 different crew members asked me what state they were in!
The band travels in the lap of luxury in three tour buses with High Definition satellite TV, full kitchens and luxurious sleeping accommodations rivaling most hotels. But life on the road is tough. The Fray was in Boston the night before and was traveling overnight back into upstate New York. When they woke up, they had a 1.5 hour yoga session right in the back of the gym and then went on a quick tour of Philadelphia seeking out vintage record shops to satisfy one of the members obsession with rare vintage LPs
Special thanks to our friend Kevin York for some of these great images.
The great sounding D&B line array system.
The Fray timelapse - Eventions from Brian Toner on Vimeo.
CATEGORY: Behind the Scenes, Our Stage This Weekend, What We're Up To
Award Winning Multi-Media Bar Mitzvah
April 19, 2010
In November of 2007, Eventions Productions collaborated up with the highly creative team from Table Art to produce this incredible bar mitzvah. The Philadelphia Chapter of ISES (The International Special Events Society) honored us with the Liberty Award for “Best Event Decor” for our use of lighting and video for this celebration.
The client came to the design team with the dream of a “zen like” party and showed us a picture of a blue room with these floating candles. Our lighting and video designers along with Kathy Warden and the team at TableArt worked for months planning an all-enveloping multi-media experience using floor to ceiling high definition video images to be one of the primary decor pieces. Video images of water, fire, flowers and other nature elements were projected onto the walls of the room and were synchronized to change through the night as the party progressed.
Another use of the video walls was for the montage presentation. The client had video footage of the guest of honor from the day he was born allowing Dave Williams from Cinema Cake to create a truly multimedia montage. There were 6 simultaneous video images being projected at the same time. The effect was AWESOME
We also fabricated this 10’ square floating bento box for the cocktail hour food displays.
Photo Credit - Susan Beard
One of the main features of the event was the 600 individual taper candles that we hung from the ceiling throughout the entire space. The installation of the candles took a four man team two solid days to install. As you can see, the result was breathtaking.
Here is the recap video from Cinema Cake.
CATEGORY:
Rebecca Druckenmiller: (04.21.10 - 8:13 am) Brian,
The blog looks amazing!
Pilot - The Finished Product
April 07, 2010
Here are some shots of the finished set. We are ready for the client to come tomorrow morning to checkout all of our hard work.
CATEGORY: Behind the Scenes, Corporate, Our Stage This Weekend, Pilot
Pilot - Load in Day
April 06, 2010
We arrived on-site at the Gaylord National Hotel today to begin the load-in of the set, audio, video and lighting. Below are some pictures of the set-up. There were a ton of pre-production CAD drawings and very specific measurements made to ensure that the lighting truss was going to fit in front of the chandeliers. We were working off of blue prints that the hotel provided of the ballroom. When we got there and began installation, it was discovered that the drawings were WRONG. The Chandeliers were not where they were supposed to be. It took about a half hour of on the site engineering to come up with a solution. As the truss was being raised into position, we had to attach ropes to both the truss and the chandelier and pull them apart from each other to make everything fit. As you can see from some of the pictures, the three chandeliers, while magnificent looking, were constantly in the way of our production.
Thank goodness the hotel had plenty of hallways we could use for storage… 45 road cases take up a lot of space
CATEGORY: Behind the Scenes, Corporate, Our Stage This Weekend, Pilot , What We're Up To
Fun with Cinema Cake.
April 02, 2010
When our good friend, Dave Williams from Cinema Cake started planning his daughter’s Bat Mitzvah, one of his first calls was to Eventions to help him produce an amazing party. Dave assembled an all-star team of some of the area’s best event professionals including Melissa Brannon from Uncommon Events, Sarah DiCicco, Jelly Roll, and some craziness from Creative Juice Group.
For Danielle’s concept video Dave and his creative staff recreated the SNL video “I’m on a Boat” to “I’m on a Bus”. Dave’s staff rewrote the lyrics and music to fit the new concept. Next up was a new one for us… “can you fit a 52 foot bus into your warehouse?” Our answer was “of course… and I’m afraid to ask, but why? One cold day in January, at 8 AM the bus arrived at our facility and the transformation began to make it “cool”
Check out the video that was shown the night of the party. - Keep an eye out for a cameo from dave and his wife Sheryl as the bus drivers.
Also, take a look at the “Out Take” video that shows some of the “behind the scenes action”
For the actual party, We supplied a huge truss design with 12 intelligent lights, LED lights and diffusion fog. We also debuted our Chroma Blast LED dance floor and custom fabricated some floating lucite tables utilizing our Chroma Towers as bases. The great thing about our Chroma series of dance floor and Chroma Towers is that they all coordinate with the intelligent lighting used on the dance floor.
And here is the “sneak preview” of the party. Congratulations to Dave, Danielle and the entire Williams Family.
CATEGORY: Behind the Scenes, Business Partners, For Fun, Mitzvahs
Pilot Week 3
April 01, 2010
Construction:
The set construction is well under way and is currently being painted. We can’t wait to see it finished and installed in the space. Everyone is looking forward to the Easter Holiday weekend since it is the last time we will have to breathe for a few weeks.
Check out the different pieces as they come together.
This was the “inspiration” for the TV surrounds
These are the “Channel Dials” for the TV screen surrounds
CATEGORY: Behind the Scenes, Corporate, Pilot , What We're Up To
Renee Grande: (04.20.10 - 1:27 pm) Brian,
The blog looks great, and this Bar Mitzvah looks amazing. I especially like the suspended candles and the multiple screen video montage. Very cool effect. I can't wait to see your next post.