An exciting line up of musicians, performers and brands - in whose success the You Tube platform has been instrumental - celebrated the worldwide reach of the medium and its promotional possibilities.
XL's Project Managers Guy Vellacott and Andy Mayneord oversaw the event's video aspects, and original playback content was designed and supplied by US based companies, Obscura and M-Ocean.
Vellacott and Mayneord worked alongside Flourish Creative Director Guy Tremlett who conceived the event's overall production design. The space was divided into two areas and the stage and set for the main performance space was built by Stage One.
At the back of the stage in the main room, XL supplied a large 11 x 6 metre Absen 6 mm high definition LED screen, built on motorized trucks so it could be opened and closed for entrances and exits. This was flanked by three side panels left and right, two measuring 2 x 6 metres and four at 1.5 x 6 metres.
In the reception areas, more Absen 6 mm LED was used to create two 2.5 x 1.5 metre screens either side of a DJ booth.
Two 85 inch plasmas were flown as prompt screens.
The Absen product was chosen as a robust, cost-efficient and easy-to-rig option that met all the client's needs.
The camera set up was four Sony HXC100s, one fitted with a J-50 long throw lens positioned at FOH, two with J40 lenses on either side of the stage and a hand-held at the front. These were fed into one of XL's compact PPUs and mixed by Nick Fry. The PPU system was engineered by Gerry Corry and included ISO and TX records to Ki-Pro machines.
Two Pandora's Box media servers were supplied to manage all the pre-recorded content being output to screen, run on site by XL's crew, together with a third Pandora's Box that handled all the downloads and content programming.
A week of off-site media server pre-programming took place at XL's HQ and the system's flexibility enabled elements of the content to remain fluid until rehearsals were well underway. The Pandora's Box system combined with XL's programming expertise ensured that this process offered the client plenty of adaptability.
The event's star-studded line up culminated in a hi-energy performance, where the upstage LED screen parted and the band entered on a motorized riser that trucked forward. They were then joined onstage by 100 enthusiastic fans ... closing a very memorable event in great style.
(Jim Evans)
