MA Lighting Network Controls Lighting of Mercedes -enz Booth During International Car ShowAs the 62nd International Car Show (IAA) recently opened its doors in Frankfurt, a nine-month preparation and two month setup ended for the planners of the DaimlerChrysler AG booth. The company furnished Frankfurt's Festhalle with state-of-the-art LED technology, as well as more than 500 moving lights and scores of PARs. In all, 10,000 sq. m. and 68 cars were illuminated. For lighting control the planners of the design firm TLD Planungsgruppe GmbH relied on an MA Lighting system consisting of five grandMA full-size consoles, three grandMA lights, seven MA NSPs, 24 MA 2Port Nodes as well as 11 HP ProCurve Switch 2626s. The installed fiber-optic network had a length of 1.4km and connected seven equipment rooms. Thirty-five DMX universes were used for the show. MA NSPs, located in one room, provided the necessary processing power and distributed their signal to the MA 2Port Nodes, which were located throughout the festival hall. They provided DMX to control the entire lighting rig in real time. During the fair, a fully automated show was run. Lighting, video/LEDs, sound,and two turntables were synchronized via Time code. The planners took steps to ensure maximum reliability. Among others, a Spanning Tree Algorithm was used for the network. Furthermore, the system structure was built in a way that even the failure of multiple NSPs would not have affected the show. Also, the main console, controlled via time code and MIDI, was seamlessly backed up by another MA console. All these precautions were undertaken due to the fact that a failure would have caused every light in the booth to go out. During the setup, it was possible to focus the cars and architecture and to view the lighting from every location in the hall, thanks to the connection of the consoles via the fiber-optic network. Replacements weren't necessary because the grandMAs were mobile-integrated into the system at the primary positions. For the fair, 120 tons of equipment were installed into the hall roof. Among others, there were Vari*Lite VL3500 SpotS, VL3000 SpotS, VL5 arcs and VL5 tungsten units, as well as scores of ETC Source Four PARS. Nearly 1,600m of truss and 6,000m of steel and aluminium pipes formed an extensive rig. The strictly structured trusses served as suspension for a half transparent metal ceiling. All spots were symmetrically placed in openings in that ceiling and leaving them nearly invisible. An absolute eye-catcher was the so named "car-walk", a 50m long and 12m wide street which consisted of Barco MiSTRIPs. At the front end, it ran into an Element Labs Stealth curtain, which had a Hibino Cromatec HD LED wall installed above. Furthermore, a stage was implemented into the booth design for the world premiere of the concept car F700 , which was interactively presented by a moderator. TLD Planungsgruppe GmbH was responsible for the planning of the Mercedes-Benz booth, as well as the booth for Maybach, another auto manufacturer. Alexander Orkisch was project manager. Construction management was done by Sebastian Ströher and Christoph Rupieper. Claudia Furrer was responsible for the mounted and emergency lighting. Dietmar Rauh was programmer and Lars Wulff was the operator. Richard Profe developed the concept and the lighting design. Udo Kraemer was technical manager. S+L Leonberg delivered the lighting equipment. During the IAA many more national and international car manufacturers used MA Lighting systems for their booths. 
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