Awarded in 2021, these certifications demonstrate the Company’s commitment and proactive attitude to improving business performance and identifying, evaluating and mitigating risks, which provides a safe working environment for everyone.
Sterling Event Group are excited to announce their latest project in collaboration with The University of Chester. Lights, Camera, Action had never boasted such green credentials prior to Sterling Event Group supplying their School of Arts and Media main performance spaces with an energy efficient lighting solution upgrade as part of their exciting wider project to upgrade their lighting, power, control, and data systems.
After several years of working with The University of Chester to supplement their existing inventory of technical production stock, and an opportunity arising for them to proceed with their highly anticipated studio upgrades, Sterling Event Group were called in to provide their support. Their technical expertise and over 20 years’ experience within the industry enabled them to provide extensive guidance on the array of fixture options available to them. From the outset they worked closely with The University of Chester’s Technical Team Leader to devise a solution for the two studios (to be used for dance, drama, live music performances and conferences) that encompassed energy saving and production quality enhancing properties.
“They were able to provide advice on a range of fixture options and also presented a very competitive quote, arranging prompt delivery to meet our limited timescale.” said Colin Blanchard, Technical Team Leader, The University of Chester.
For Sterling Event Group, Chauvet were an obvious manufacturer of choice to execute this install as “with over 400 Chauvet fixtures in our rental stock we were confident to put a Chauvet option forward and could share our experience with their performance, reliability and support.” said Dan Charmer, Director, Sterling Event Group.
The final solution truly exhibited the advances in technology that the industry has seen in recent years and saw the delivery of a full move to LED for the main studio, new install to a second smaller studio, and additional loose kit. Across the two performance studios loads were cut from roughly 39KW to just 10KW (when all lights are set to white); whilst maintenance costs were also reduced, the user experience streamlined, and almost endless colour options provided.
The Chauvet Professional Equipment used included:
Manchester based Sterling Event Group have launched their new Sterling Studio website to showcase their range of solutions for the organisers of virtual events.
In the temporary absence of live events, Manchester based audio-visual production company Sterling Event Group have continued to invest in virtual technologies and have launched a new website dedicated to its virtual event services.
Launching originally in March 2020, Sterling Studio has now been expanded to include a multitude of studio spaces and virtual event services. Proving a popular choice for the organisers of virtual events, the 5 physical studio spaces, along with 3 purpose-built fully remote Virtual Control Centres (whereby events can be managed 100% remotely) are currently in high-demand.
“We’re excited for the year ahead and whilst we hope to see the start of the return of live events in the near future, there will still be a place for virtual events. We are frequently assisting our clients with global communications, in recent months we have live streamed to audiences in 78 countries. For certain types of events there is a huge advantage in virtual, from an efficiency and environmental perspective, that’s why we believe virtual events are here to stay and will feature in the programme of events for many organisations. Furthermore, adding a virtual aspect to a live event could be used to significantly extend the reach.” Richard Bowden, Founder and MD of Sterling Event Group.
Sterling Studios have also expanded from their Manchester Airport HQ and are now operating Hybrid Studios at a number of popular venues within the Greater Manchester area, each with a unique offering.
Further info on the Studios and other services to enhance virtual events, can be found on our new dedicated site – www.sterlingstudio.co.uk.
Technical event production company Sterling Event Group has created Sterling Studio, a Manchester-based studio space designed to boost the production value of webinars and other virtual events, over video conferencing and online meeting platforms such as Zoom, Go To Meeting, Skype and WebEx. The studio, supported by UK distributor PSCo, boasts a digital backdrop from LED display manufacturer Absen.
The idea to create a studio dedicated to virtual events came before the Covid-19 lockdown, just as the need for an events space with the capacity for high production quality was rising – a need that has only increased since.
“The studio space allows us to use our rental equipment and create a space for users to virtually present to their audience using state-of-the-art technologies, without the obvious limitations that come with presenting from home,” said Dan Charmer, director of Sterling Event Group. This facility is also a fantastic tool for companies who don’t want to invest in, or have the required space or equipment to record and broadcast such presentations.
The 230sqm black box space offers features designed not only to provide presenters with creative freedom, but also to maintain current UK social distancing requirements. The space boasts an 11m wide stage, along with a 3.6m circular podium where presenters can easily maintain the appropriate social distance, fully kitted with a professional lighting and audio system, including digital mixing consoles and stage monitor speakers.
Snaking around the back of the stage is a 16 x 3 metre curved LED screen providing a dynamic backdrop to set the scene for any event. The screen is made up of Absen’s Polaris 2.5mm Pro – part of the multi-award-winning Polaris rental series – which has been specifically created for indoor use, offering 1200 nits high brightness, superior contrast and high precision pixel alignment. The screen is well suited for a multitude of uses, such as Sterling Studio, which uses the LED screen to simultaneously display presentations, social media feeds, branding and custom backgrounds in sharp 18bit+ image processing.
“The screen is paramount to the studio: the sharpness and contrast of the image are key elements to the impact we were looking to create,” commented Charmer. “The Polaris series offers what we need for this project mechanically and, more importantly, visually over our existing [Absen] A3 Pro. The compatibility of the hardware across the range was also a big advantage when adding it to the rental fleet.”
The Polaris 2.5mm Pro panels feature an integrated curved locking system, allowing for convex (-7.5˚) or concave (+10˚) shapes to be modelled as needed to further improve the striking visual effect, as well as round, square or triangle panel shapes. The 9.6kg model also boasts simple and quick assembly, something which Charmer and his team used to their advantage.
“A small team of technicians installed the screen without any help or guidance, and found it to be a simple, stress-free installation,” Charmer said.
The screen is driven by Avolites Ai Media servers, which provide large format backdrops for use during virtual events. All signals are routed through a Barco E2 switching system, which is also routing content down to four 65-inch stage monitors within the studio space, made available to the presenters and their team. These are thoroughly cleaned after every use, along with the other equipment available.
“We wanted to create a safe, hygienic space that encompassed the high production value and set design, whilst ensuring the opportunity for engagement with audiences for our clients in a more visually impactful way,” Charmer said. “We do not know what the future holds, but for now we know we have provided the standard our clients have come to expect from us with the assistance of PSCo and Absen.”
Sterling Event Group have announced a new partnership agreement with one of Manchester’s leading event venues, Victoria Warehouse.
As part of the supplier agreement, which commenced on 31st January 2020, Sterling Event Group will be the venue’s preferred technical production supplier and will provide exclusive in-house rigging services for corporate clients across the venue’s wide array of unique spaces.
The technical production company, who celebrated their 20-year anniversary last year, work in partnership with many event venues and clients across the North West & the UK and are thrilled to be supporting Victoria Warehouse and their clients. Victoria Warehouse has numerous event spaces catering for intimate gatherings to large scale conferences and exhibitions all with an authentic industrial vibe.
Richard Bowden, Managing Director of Sterling commented on the partnership “We are really excited to be back working with the team at Victoria Warehouse, a venue with their strap line ‘We are what you make us’, which for our projects team opens up a world of options for creativity.”
James Cohen, Managing Director of Victoria Warehouse commented; “We are thrilled to be partnering again with Sterling Event Group for production and rigging, their team have a genuine passion for exceeding client expectations. This combined with their array of in-house services means we can be sure our clients receive the very best experience.”
This partnership comes at an exciting time at Sterling, with a recent expansion adding a further two warehouses to their Manchester based headquarters creating 8 additional jobs. The company plans to continue this growth throughout 2020 with investment, innovation and development to further improve its offering.
Sterling Event Group will be exhibiting at the upcoming International Confex 2020 exhibition due to be held on the 25th & 26th February 2020 at ExCel London.
The event is set to be one of the largest gathering of event professionals, service providers, thought leaders and buyers in the UK, with the sole purpose of creating an environment of convenience to help support, inspire and drive the events industry forward.
Register to attend by clicking here.
The team look forward to hosting you on our stand! Find us on stand F04C.
Technical production supplier Sterling Event Group, has invested in six Allen & Heath SQ-5 Mixing Consoles.
Sterling Event Group have purchased six Allen & Heath SQ-5 digital mixing consoles to add to our audio fleet. The console features 16 local XLR inputs and 12 XLR outputs. It is an extremely powerful and capable compact mixer. Other features include;
To accompany this investment, Sterling have also purchased four stage boxes – the AB1608. The AB1608 feature 16 inputs and 8 outputs. These units simply connect to the SQ via 1 Cat5/6 cable and can easily be patched to any input or mix bus via the SQ5. Multiple stage boxes can then be daisy chained for higher channel counts up to 48 inputs making this a very efficient easily configurable stage box solution.
Please contact our hire team for competitive quotations and to discuss how this equipment could benefit your next event or production. Alternatively see more info on our equipment hire page.
As part of our expansion tripling our warehouse space, we have a number of new opportunities for talented people to join our team, based full time within our offices & warehouse by Manchester Airport.
Please visit our Careers part of the website for full job descriptions.
If you think you have got what it takes then we would love to hear from you!
As the busy events period is now well and truly underway, the team at Sterling HQ have been hard at work to get our wide range of equipment prepared and ready for our brilliant clients and their events. Take a look for a sneak peek behind the scenes!
The whole Sterling team were invited to a Sterling Family BBQ at the end of August to celebrate 20 years of business, as a celebration and a thank you to the team for all the hard work they put in for Sterling’s fabulous clients and events.
Check out the highlights here!
Here’s to the next 20 years!
