What’s in a name? In the case of The Venue at Thunder Valley, the answer is “everything you need to know about its vision for the future.” By calling their facility The Venue, the United Auburn Indian Community and Thunder Valley Casino Resort left no doubt about the goal they set for this 4,500 seat indoor theatre located outside Sacramento. Their new attraction was designed to stand out from the pack and define its own category. This would not be “a” venue, but “The Venue,” the one people went to for an entertainment experience like no other.
As anyone who’s visited the $100 million theatre would agree, its founders achieved this lofty goal in spectacular fashion. Featuring shows by artists like The Eagles (Hotel California 2023 tour), Bruno Mars, Santana with Bryan Adams, The Black Crowes, and Ringo Starr, The Venue, which was built to replace the casino’s outdoor amphitheater, offers top-flight entertainment in an engaging and supportive setting.
Contributing to the fan experience at the facility are three massive video walls made with over 550 CHAUVET Professional F3X LED panels supplied and installed by CTM Sound of Sacramento, which has worked with the casino since 2010.
CTM used 255 of the 3.9mm high-res panels to create an impressive 50-foot wide center stage video wall. The remainder of the panels (302) went in to building stage left and stage right I-Mag walls, each measuring 35-feet wide aby 20-feet tall. Together, the trio of walls, which are located 50-feet (center wall) and 25-feet (I-Mag side walls) from the audience create a striking impression that fills the entire venue with excitement, bringing fans closed to the performances on stage and reflecting the mood of the music. The images shown on the walls are driven by two 10-5 Nova processors in a send/receive setup over fiber.
Thanks to their high resolution and 14-bit grayscale images, the walls display vibrant clear content that comes off well live and on video. Drawing on the intense output of the walls, designers working shows at The Venue can also use the walls to create immersive washes over the stage and audience.
Their imposing presence notwithstanding, the large walls posed no special challenges for the installation team. “The tiles are built with a great feature set,” said Chris Miller, owner of CTM Sound. “The magnets that assist in the clamping together of tiles were great. The rigging latches are extremely easy to use. The IMAG walls were a direct mount; and the mounting holes through the panel frames were very simple and easy to attach with wall anchors.”
Miller recalls that when the casino’s project managers contacted him, they had a clear idea in mind. “We’ve worked very well with Thunder Valley for years,” he said. “They had a vision, and we knew how to help them achieve it.”
Of course, that vision involved more than just three spectacular video walls. It was one of making The Venue live up to the promise of its name… It has been a promise kept.
Further information from CHAUVET Professional: www.chauvetprofessional.com
