Although the Exhibition Room inside the landmark building - situated on the corner of London's Aldwych and The Strand - has been immortalised by Harry Potter (the opulent room took on the role of Gringotts Bank and has also featured in many other movies), production company Eclipse Presentations had other surprises in store.
Down the staircase in the basement they had created an outback theme (with some inspired props and an outback station pub) for pre-drinks and after dinner disco (the DJ operating from a purpose-constructed 'outback' hut), while in the main auditorium they had fielded a g 12 x 5 Christie MicroTiles media display, supplied by dry hire specialists Paragon Projection.
Eclipse have handled the Australia Day event for the past eight years, during which time they have seen technology evolve exponentially. Last year they truss-suspended plasma screens, but according to project manager Bradley Hill, having been impressed with the MicroTiles demo they attended, the company had been looking for a suitable event to let it off the leash for the first time. "This provided the perfect opportunity - and we are delighted that both Paragon's Mark Davies and Christie's technician Ciaran Browne have offered on-site support," said Hill.
Plasma still had a presence - in the form of six 50" relay screens - but the star of the show was the 4.9m x 1.5m MicroTiles landscape canvas, mounted on aluminium ground-support truss.
It also formed a practical and elegant solution as without such a low-profile solution the giant ceiling-suspended chandelier would have intruded on sightlines (the Australian flag could also be shown as PIPs within the display). In fact, with such a grandiose interior (totally devoid of hanging points) the entire technical infrastructure needed to be ground supported.
The MicroTiles display was fed from a digital processor which took playback inputs from DVD and PowerPoint as well as a wired and Camwave wireless cameras.
High Commissioner HE John Dauth LVO, opened this year's Gala with noted Australians John Torode and Tim Minchin respectively providing the culinary and comedic elements.
John Gibson, technical project manager for Eclipse, confirmed, "Technologically, each year has to be better than the last - and we knew MicroTiles, with its high native resolution and seamless display, was the answer."
(Jim Evans)
