Entec, Avolites and James Thomas's Pixel range team joined forces to make Air's recent show at the Eden Project in Cornwall a memorable one. It was the first time that the attraction's famous Biomes had been illuminated with Pixel fixtures. Integrated into the live performance, they formed a beguiling multi-coloured backdrop to the stage.

With Dave Byars in the creative visuals hot seat, piloting an Avolites Diamond 4 console, Air's lighting had its own touches of imaginative magic and visual invention. The 'specials' element of the lighting rig - which toured everywhere including all the festival appearances throughout Europe - consisted of 14 Studio Spots, eight James Thomas Pixelline LED battens and four Manfrotto stands on risers. It was designed with festival practicality to the fore - quick and simple to rig and wheel onstage - whilst also providing Air with their own unique set of visuals.

Byars ran his touring Pixellines via PixelDrive Lite PC based software, giving two graphics layers, one mask layer and the PixelDrive front end, making programming straightforward and quick. After the first site visit to the Eden Project, Byars was on a mission to light the Biomes - the opportunity of having a backdrop of several giant translucent spheres directly behind the stage was just too good to miss!

Twenty-four PixelPAR 90 (A) architectural firings were positioned around the Tropical Biome, chosen for this location because of their solid wash type of light output, and their sturdy weatherisation - not flinching in the 98% humidity environment. The Temperate Biome featured less extreme weather, so the Pixelline 1044 battens were a good option for lightsources here.

Entec supplied consoles, FOH racks, multicores, monitor control, specialist monitors and all mics, plus a full d&b PA for the Air tour. FOH engineer Paul Ramsay's DiGiCo D5 Live console accompanied him to every show, tied in to any locally provided racks and stacks where applicable.

Monitor world was looked after by Gerry Colclough who carried his own Midas XL3 board, also supplied by Entec. The band all use Neumann KN105 mics. The only monitor enclosures carried on the tour were two pairs of Entec's d&b E3s, used for keyboards and drums, with the other five pairs of wedges on the PA spec sourced locally.