These are the first of a dozen such events, where Blink is supplying full video production and collaborating with various local radio stations owned by the UK's two biggest radio groups - Capital and GWR. The Southampton event was headlined by boyband-of-the-moment Busted, and featured Blazin' Squad, Mel C, Girls Aloud, Cheeky Girls, DJ Sammy, Mis-teeq and Billy Crawford. The back-to-back performances were punctuated by presentation slots, featuring DJs from the hosting radio station and advertising breaks, during which Blink ran its specially tailored footage.
Blink is responsible for sourcing video screens, cameras and a PPU for all the 2003 Radio events and has contracted Screenco as the supplier. In the past, each individual radio station has sourced video hardware for its specific event, but Blink's project manager, Tomas Llewellyn, pointed out that this year Blink is taking this aspect onboard. The video at each show consists of two 20sq.m LED screens left and right of stage and a delay screen for the larger sites -Southampton, Brighton, Birmingham and Oxford. There's also a three-camera IMAG relay - two in the pit and one hand-held.
New this year is an on-screen text messaging service to further liven up the afternoon, which is being run in conjunction with O² and mobile application specialists Zamano.
(Ruth Rossington)
