All the show's settings, locations and backdrops are projected onto a 30m wide by 5m high cylindrical projection surface. At certain points, the side sections of the screen track around the stage to form a surface across the front. A section of the screen also splits off from the main structure for several more intimate scenes, and tracks into the central stage revolve, complete with its own set of video projections.
Mesmer was asked onboard after working with Dudley on previous video projects including Coast of Utopia, the award winning Hitchcock Blonde and the controversial David Hare creation Permanent Way. Lloyd Webber had apparently seen Coast of Utopia and wanted to develop a strong video content for this next production. There was no off-the-shelf playback or control system capable of dealing with the geometry and curvature of the Woman In White set. The fact that it also moves made the task of filling the space coherently and evenly with image a huge challenge. The resulting customized playback - dubbed 'The Mesmerist' by its creators - was designed and built specifically for the show, resulting in a tripartite collaboration between commissioners XL Video, Mesmer and Digital Antics.
Digital Antics was contracted by XL Video's Mellows to help develop the system and write the special software needed, enabling Ortel and Straker to up the ante on the image resolution from past productions. The Mesmerist, developed for XL Video by Digital Antics' Quintin Willison, to Mesmer's spec, includes a fully programmable PC interface which controls all playback, serial and DMX devices, as well as 12 digital media servers. It's complete with its own bespoke playback engine capable of dealing with the shape of the screen and soft-edge blending.
Treating the stage as a 3D environment, it also has the mapping capability to move shapes and images across the stage in real time, keeping pace with the screen movements. The computer generated imagery was originated by Bill Dudley and then given to Mesmer to finish and manipulate into a suitable playback format, much of which work was undertaken by Mesmer animator Richard Kenyon. Mesmer also did a video shoot at MR Studios in Wimbledon, filming members of the company for integration into particular animations and sequences.
Feeding the main screen are four over-stage Barco G10 ELMs, housed in special acoustic enclosures designed by XL Video and Mesmer. XL worked closely with Unusual Rigging to get the projectors in precisely the right positions over the stage and out front, and also to ensure that they can be dropped in easily for maintenance. Another two Barco G10 ELMs sit on a newly installed FOH truss, projecting onto the main screen when it closes across the front of the stage.
The tracking section of screen is targeted by two Barco G8 SLMs, also on the FOH truss. For this XL and Mesmer developed a special moving mirror system to allow the images to track the screen movements. The whole projection system is serial and data wired via a massive UTP cable infrastructure, installed by the video team specifically for the production. The UTP Cables are a mixture of Cat 6 and a special video transmission optimized UTP. Physically smaller than the alternative BNC data cables, this is ideal for transmitting high resolution XGA graphics over l
