EZpro International system for Yangtze attraction
- Details
EZpro International was responsible for the creative design, installation and commissioning of the audio and video systems, which deliver an immersive experience for the performers and the participating audience.
The two-year, RMB 400m project was developed by the Wuhan Tourism Development Investment Group, together with Fan Yue. Determined to find the best audio system for the production, the director's team initially approached several different companies. The EZpro International team was led by vice-president Tao Zhang, who took on the role of chief designer. EZpro designed the first version of the system and rented a warehouse in which they built a 1:1 steel structure to simulate a section of the ship for proving and demonstrating the system. The director, composer and sound engineers were so impressed that EZpro was appointed and the project commenced.
As the show runs every day, reliability is crucial and EZpro designed a system combining Community, Powersoft, Symetrix, Allen & Heath, Apart Audio and Furman equipment, running on a Dante network with fibre optic transmission and full redundancy.
The show has three separate performance areas. Audience members enter the world as it was in Wuhan 100 years ago when they walk down a pier and onto a pontoon. From here they board the ship and become a part of the performance.
The pier and pontoon both have independent control rooms, housing Allen & Heath Qu Chrome consoles, Symetrix processors and Powersoft amplifiers. Thirty-nine Community IP55-rated R.15COAX loudspeakers are installed along the left and right sides of the 220m-long pier. The 140m-long by 20m-wide pontoon is equipped with twelve Community R.5COAX99 loudspeakers and four WX-218SDF subwoofers.
Based on the early 19th-century boat, Jianghua, the ship is 120m long, 22m wide and 15m high. It has four decks with ninety-eight cabins, a bar, entertainment area and a dance hall. The nightly shows involve different stories taking place on each deck. The design team used EASE to simulate sound leakage of the different zones and calculate the acoustic curtains required to achieve isolation between them.
Over 470 loudspeakers are installed around the ship, all powered by Powersoft amplifiers. To create an immersive effect without comb filtering, EZpro opted for stereo configuration throughout, even though this required more complex cabling and high amplification. Four Community D10 loudspeakers are installed on the first deck to cover the dance floor, while two levels of audience seating on the main and first decks are covered by sixteen Community D6 and fourteen C6 loudspeakers respectively. The bar area uses 16 D6 ceiling loudspeakers, with sixteen V2-28 loudspeakers around the main deck for surround effects.
The heart of the system is the main control room in the middle of the first deck. This houses an Allen & Heath dLive S5000 console, together with a dLive DM64 Mixrack of 65 mic/ line inputs. Two Mac Pro computers play multi-channel music and audio can be sent to any of the 114 channels using the Dante controller. Symetrix Edge modular processors are installed in equipment rooms on each deck.
The director required the sound of the pier and the pontoon to be consistent as the ship moves close to the pier. A wireless system is installed on the pontoon to receive the signal from the ship and connect to the Allen & Heath Qu Chrome console in the pier control room, synchronising the sound on the pontoon and ship. Two Community R2-77Z and two R2-94Z loudspeakers, together with four Community R2SUBDF subwoofers, are installed on the ship’s navigation deck to provide reinforcement for the pier as the ship gets close.
(Jim Evans)
