CT Plays Key Role in Record-Setting 1.17 Million Lumen Projection on Hoover Dam
Hoover Dam, one of the top engineering miracles in the world, recently became the sight for the reveal of Daimler Trucks North America Freightliners Infinite Inspiration. The event required months of planning, preparation, and set up by a team of individuals steeped in knowledge garnered from long-term experience with the latest in technological innovations.
The statistics were daunting. The challenges were enormous. The 420,000 square feet surface had a number of different angles of curves to it and was an astonishing 2,500 feet away from the projection tower.
Sixty Barco projectors divided evenly between 26,000 and 20,000 lumens each synchronized together to create a single seamless image with a resolution of 4592 x 2048 pixels on the dam half a mile away.
The output of the complex projector setup generated an incredible 1.17 million lumens; equivalent to the output of more than 1,400 60-watt household light bulbs and breaking an official Guinness World record among projections.
An Audacious Idea
Daimler first went to its Public Relations Agency, Oliver Schrott Kommunication (OSK Marketing and Communications). Shrott was a journalist who started a small side business of doing press packages, releases and speeches for Opel and Mazda in 1991. The workload quickly expanded in new directions producing events for the yachting industry, and organizing President Clintons visit to an Opel factory. Hired as the consultants to advise the city of Cologne on organizing the G8 Summit, the company became an international concern. Offices soon opened in China and North America.
In their New York based office, the “big idea” of staging the press event and projecting the presentation onto the Hoover Dam first took shape. The historical fact of the huge role trucking played in the dam’s construction and the immense impact of the dam as a video “screen” tied well into the Freightliner brand, old and new. Further strengthening the message of the autonomous truck being a first in its industry was the knowledge that the scope of this event would be a first of its kind as well.
OSK brought in New York production specialists SIAM to produce the event. The company, founded by Dave Campanile, has been producing events around New York City and the world for 25 years. Siam then sought out a partner who had the creativity to bring this vision to life and a proven record in seamlessly supporting large-scale events.
CT’s experience at video projection mapping and the use of specialized software to warp a projected image onto irregularly shaped screens rendered the curved wall of the Dam a perfect surface for this type of technology.
CT Steps In
Augie Dellapi, general manager at Creative Technology (CT) Atlanta, picks up the story at this point. “I received a call in January of 2015 from Siam asking me to take a look at the feasibility this event they want to stage at Hoover Dam. They were not sure of the dates, but they asked to explore whether it could be done or not, or what we could do. I got some facts from them and started making calls.”
Most of the people on the other end of the line, after laughing for a minute or two, ran off a list of what would prevent pulling the event together. The reasons that echoed down the line were very similar: Too much bureaucracy, too many regulations, too far, too much money. “Oh, everybody thought it was a great idea, would like to be a part of it,” laughs Dellapi, “but….”
This started Dellapi on a second look at feasibility, which brought the idea of Pani’s into the discussion. Pani Projectors, made by an Austrian company of that name that specialized in large-scale projectors, could fill the entire face of the dam and cut a video window out of that, which would help reduce cost. Next step: find a Pani person.
“I talked to Stephen Gray, COO of CT,” says Dellapi,” and ask him if he knew of anybody involved with Pani’s. He tells me of a company in Sun Valley, California with a guy named Max, who has doctored up these Pani projectors that kick out some intense brightness.”
Dellapi finds a company called XL Productions in Sun Valley, CA, owned and operated by a fellow named Jerzy Strzelecki, or “Max,” as he is better known. Max is an artist/designer who refurbished old Pani’s. The company, based in Paris, produced large-scale projections under the name Hold Up. Relocating in America, the company became XL Production. Max received a green card as an “Alien of Extraordinary Abilities.” He is presently 80 years old.
XL Productions (not to be confused with XL Video, which has also been involved in its fair share of impressive large-format projections) builds the most powerful image projectors in the world. These one-of-a-kind image projectors utilize large format lenses designed for Cold War surveillance systems, such as the U2 spy plane, and use other advanced optical systems and techniques to achieve image sizes and brightness levels far beyond that which is capable with commercially available projectors. 18,000W lamps became the standard retrofit. XL Productions has presented imagery for events like the Olympics, the Super Bowl and other special productions.
Let’s Go Camping!
Dellapi laid out all his information to his peer at CT Las Vegas general manager Herb Brandt, saying that he believed the client had the resources to move forward with this event. Brandt replied, “Okay, I don’t care if I ever sleep again… we gotta do this!” Next step would be getting the right people on board, selecting crew, and setting up a demo. Brandt called on project manager Marty Henning right away.
Dellapi knew Henning to be a key component. “He’s very smart, knows how to put an event together. Being a seasoned veteran who operates comfortably across various ages and skill setlines, he can manage a diverse team. We needed Marty to start wrangling the various equipment parts and pieces, the team and the logistics.”
CT assembled a top-flight team to design the technical specs and lay out the execution strategy. A call went out to projectionist Bob Loney. Henning certainly has high regard for him saying,” He’s possibly the finest projectionist that ever was, or will be.”
The projection crew, also known as the lead utility crew, consisted of Loney, Bobby Mireles, Alex Ayers and Andrey Koulikov. Bob Boynton headed up cameras, with Marc Martignetti handling the audio with Chris Wasilauskas, technical director of CT Lighting, rounding out the department heads. CT’s final crew totaled 30, before local labor.
Henning called on Nils Porrmann next to handle d3 server duties. Porrmann has been working with d3 Technologies for a decade.
“The team of people on this project was a mixed bag,” says Dellapi.” We had seasoned veterans, Gen-X-er’s and the millennial group. For a project like this, that type of mix was essential. Early conferences were quite interesting, just learning to communicate with one another. They all are solution-oriented individuals. Their paths just vary a bit from each other.”
The original demo scheduled at the end of March required additional visits to nail down position for the projection tower and servers. Lasers precisely determined distances and angles on site. That data went into update an existing 3D dam model.
“The updated model was then imported into a d3 media server to pre-visualize the projector positions to show what we could expect from rock and canyon shadows,” says Henning. CT’s experience at video projection mapping and the use of specialized software to warp a projected image onto irregularly shaped screens rendered the curved wall of the Dam a perfect surface for this type of technology.
d3 offers the world’s first fully integrated visual production system for video professionals, combining a real-time 3D stage visualizer, timeline, video playback engine, and projection mapping tools into one product. CT deployed five d3 4x4pros to Hoover Dam.
“We ran the system in a fully redundant configuration. To minimize the signal transmission distance, we staged the servers with the projectors, Henning says. “Due to the power of the d3 server, we were able to put all 10 channels on a single server and not worry about performance issues,” he adds. “That made it much easier than having to divide the channels across multiple servers.”
Another challenge to the production was that the team needed a sturdy platform to mount all the projectors. So of course they called on Brown United, with a crew undaunted by 500-foot-high cliffs and 50 m.p.h. winds that barreled through the canyon. They figured out the logistics of the event and utilized tons of scaffold, ferried into the canyon on 24-foot flatbed trucks. Brown United crew members are some of the busiest people in our business. But with a project of this scale, they once again proved why they are in such demand, as they delivered an extremely stable, layered structure and the projectors were able to remain still and precise.
In the end, the Pani projection was used on the canyon walls to highlight the reveal. The Barco projection did all the work on the Dam face. What resulted from the effort was pure desert magic. To complement the stunning visuals, immersive sound enveloped the audience while CT lighting and still imagery painted and danced upon the Black Canyon walls, completing the stunning experience.
“CT’s people, approach, product and passion for the business exceeded both OSK and SIAM’s expectations,” says Dellapi. “The Freightliner Infinite Inspiration is a game-changing technological marvel, and to launch it at the Dam and reveal it to the world like this will resonate like an echo in the canyon for miles and miles.”
Gear
2 GrandMA2 Lite Lighting Consoles
Cameras
- 5 Sony HSC100’s
- 2 Sony P1’s
- 1 Cineflex
Lenses (Creative Technology)
- 1-13x, 3-95x, 2-wide angle, 1-22x,
- Cineflex had a long lens
Fiber (Creative Technology)
Projection Tac-12 = 2@5000’ and
2@1000’ = 12000’
Long Distance Digital Microwave
Links Tac-12 = 2@300m, 3@100m and
2@50m = 3000’
Projectors
- 30 Barco W26
- 30 W20 Flex
- Lens Barco 7.5 – 11.2 zooms
Playback – Graphics
- 4 d3 4×4 Pro’s
- 1 d3 V2.5 Media Server Laptop
- Lightware Routers
Pani (XLProd, Blacksheep Productions)
- 3 custom 18,000w HMI powered units
STATS:
- Image size was 950’ wide
- Film gate was 21” square
- Projection distance was 1500’
Microwave Systems (Aerial Video Systems)
- Link L1500 HD Digital system
Lighting
- 40 Mitronic Superspot 575 on Dam
- 6 Super Trouper II Spotlights
- 10 Source Four Leko
- 40 Expolite Tour LEDs
