The Championship was the first event ever to be held at the new Spaladium Arena, which opened in Split in December 2008. With a 12,000-seat capacity and a gross surface area of 28,500 m², the Arena, provides Split with its first multi-functional venue in which will be held sporting events, concerts, congresses, fairs, exhibitions and other events that the city has previously been unable to host due to limited capacity.
Lighting Designer for the Opening Ceremony, Boris Popovic, has lit many major live television shows and studio productions in Croatia and recognised the importance of good follow spots on this high profile event.
"Follow spots played an important role in the lighting design for the Opening Ceremony of 21st World Handball Championship," Popovic explains. "so, in such a large venue, finding good follow spots was high on my list of priorities during the preparation stage.
"Rhino Production, the rental company which provided the lighting and sound for the Ceremony, offered me six Robert Juliat followspots. I made some calculations based on the data from the Robert Juliat web site, and decided to take them.
"In the real world they performed even better than I expected, and the performers in the stadium looked great and were brightly lit in such a big venue. From now on I have no doubt which follow spot to use."
The Robert Juliat followspots, two 1200W RJ Korrigans, two 1200W RJ Super Korrigans and two of the latest 1800W RJ Victors, were supplied by Rhino Production of Zagreb.
(Jim Evans)
