Ha Hau, Manager & Field Production Designer for ILLENIUM’s Trilogy:Colorado concert at Denver’s Empower Field (formerly Mile High Stadium), shared some insights on how video and pyro can be used to draw everyone’s attention at stadium-sized concerts into the emotional flow of a stadium-sized show—even for those in the nosebleed section.
“ILLENIUM’s music is very emotional, it provokes a lot of emotions and feelings from being happy, to being angry. I wanted a production that complements his music. I wanted the fans to not only listen to music, but I want them to feel it. The production is built around that,” Hau began.
“These venues are not meant for concerts, they’re meant for football where you watch everything on the field,” he added. “When it comes to a concert, you see everything at one end for the most part. I wanted to take advantage of having the field and make it part of the visual aspect. When you have the nosebleed seats, the seats are so high and watching everything happen at one end of the field of the stage is not as immersive. So, I wanted to create an immersive experience from the field for the people that are up high.
“Nick [DJ Nicholas Daniel Miller, a.k.a. ILLENIUM] really likes flames, pyro, and all those effects. For the safety of the audience on the field you must build a radius around the effect, so we created six flame pods on the field. Then we made these four large pods with LED video on them that are I-Mag screens that show what’s onstage. In addition to those 10 pods, I had a huge pod at center for performances in the first act. So, basically, the field design was built around the flames, and I-Mag video solution for the audience up high to experience.”
From “Production Insight” by Michael S. Eddy, PLSN, August 2023, page 34
