The May issue of Enttec's newsletter is coming to you chock-full of stuff. We'll have case studies, a story about running into old friends which smack of synchronicity, and so much more. Before we run through the articles you'll get to read, let me just say I really enjoyed my time in New York City this month, and it was great running into all of you who I saw there! You know who you are. As an example, and here's where the world gets really small, an old colleague of mine and I reconnected at one of the manufacturer showcases I attended. Mike is a rare breed of lighting designer who works on Broadway, and then might turn around a month later and work with a rock band going out on an arena tour. He has a marvelous ability to think in vastly different paradigms about light and to be fluent in all of them. I won't reveal his brainchild that he shared with me, but when he saw one of our new products, he totally opened my eyes to other cool ways it can be used, and I really look forward to seeing him take that step on his next project where it's called for.

That's not nice of me to tease you that way, but it's his trick to use, and I don't want to betray any trade secrets. That reminds me, one of the first projects Mike and I worked on together was for a Broadway engagement of the anti-magician duo Penn and Teller. They had interesting ideas about secrecy and their trade craft, which you should get me to tell you about (in person) if you have the chance. Well, I was a junior assistant on that show and didn't have any artistic input, but 2 weeks ago, just after I saw Mike, I got the chance to not light Penn and Teller. They were on a video screen, and my job was to keep the stagelights off it. But, I did light nearly all the other magicians on that stage in Manhattan, and Enttec helped. Read more about that here

What product was it that Mike seemed so entranced by? Well, we announced its impending launch last month, but the news there is that DMXIS is now shipping. I guess that's something to crow about, but it's hardly worth an article unto itself, unless there were videos to share with you.... and there are!

It's true, that's not a lot of new product material, but then we've been popping out new things rather feverishly for some months, and some us felt it was time to shift gears.
Our other flagship control software package, LightFactory, has been getting a lot of notches in its belt this month. I put a few there myself, but thankfully I don't have to tell all the stories; we have one about my experience, and one sent in by a user in Italy, which makes a great story about small and intimate usage, in contrast with my big ballroom show. These articles are quite different but they both showcase what LF can do nicely, albeit for very disparate projects.

Speaking of Italy, we have a neat new 3rd Party app to bring you up to speed about, which uses our DMX USB Pros in a way I'd never heard of before. Fire One Malta is giving DMX a hotfoot!

Sometimes I get to put on a big show, but sometimes it's small and has an audience of one or two at a time. Those are the demonstrations and hands-on training opportunities that come along on occasion, and I really enjoy those too. That's what Vendor Day at 4Wall was like (you know, where I ran into Mike). If you're paying close attention, you'll realize that I was in New York City for a long time in May, between 4Wall, the Live Design Master Classes that we sponsored, the Salute to Magic, and one other project. (I'll be writing about that last one in the next issue because it's just too much for one edition.) The swine flu didn't scare me off, although I did see a few people, possibly tourists, wearing surgical masks on the street. It was a good trip, but I'm glad to be home again.

Jeremy Kumin ,
Editor and Marketing Manager
ENTTEC U.S