Finance lights up Dubai

2,500 people, 600 performers, 24 projectors and 3,000 square metres of screen made this year’s DIFC celebration special. But it took producers and engineers from all over Europe and the Middle East to facilitate the spectacle

Every year, the Dubai International Finance Centre (DIFC) stages an open-air event which includes corporate presentations, speeches and a musical celebration of its achievements. Last November, the event included projection on one of the widest video screens ever used, reveals and live performances from nearly 600 artistes and musicians. The show, which used a 174m wide screen and 24 projectors, was staged for a 2,500-strong audience. It involved the hanging of screens, lighting trusses and audio systems from the DIFC Gate building and two office blocks. The production team, Dubai-based HQ Creative, also had to build the performance area (to accommodate up to 350 choristers) and reveal the performance. 

As the audience arrived, renderings of the two buildings behind the screen were being projected onto them. Then, 10 minutes into the show, the seating stands shook, the ground rumbled and the projected buildings were ‘pushed’ aside dramatically as the music gathered pace.

The show had started with a speech by DIFC governor His Excellency Dr. Omar Bin Sulaiman and it was followed by a 23 minute corporate presentation section with its own specially composed musical score.

Then the set moved, the performers came on and, after the end of the corporate show and its pyrotechnic finale, Syrian soprano Talar Dekrmanjian and Il Divo performed.

Projection and playback

HQ Creative tasked German company Neumann & Mueller (N&M) to handle the video and on site discussions led to the companies deciding to fill in the whole available sight line with a 174m wide x 18m high screen that provided 3,132m2 of projection area.

Twenty-four Digital Projection 30SX machines were triple-stacked on six front of house towers and used to deliver an overall image that was 9,800 pixels wide x 1,050 pixels high. The projectors were run from a Barco Encore system and an eight computer Dataton Watchout edge blending and show control system, with the Encore used to create two large camera inserts on side video screens, into which footage from the IMAG mix was dropped via a feed from the broadcast cameras on site which were also used to provide a live feed of the event to Dubai TV.

Additional image projection on lower left and right stage wings used two sets of three 7Kw Hardware for Xenon slide projectors. Video playback material came from three sources — HQ Creative (where the team worked under the control of artistic director Katie Viera), Atomic Arts in London and Neumann & Mueller’s Munich studio.

Linking audio and video

The crew in charge of the projected show, N&M’s Claus Ostermayer and HQ’s Daz Jamison, used Ventuz interactive software linked to the soloists’ voices for real time animations on the centre screen.

Watchout acted as the timecode master, also used to trigger Cubase machines running 11 playback and pre-programmed audio tracks via a Nuendo audio multitrack system, including orchestra submixes and a ‘dynamic click’ for the show controller, HQ managing director Brad Cohen.

The dynamic click was an idea hatched between Cohen and composer Harry Esctott for the perfect synching of an orchestra with a timecoded show allowing the orchestra to play in real-time with natural variations. Three of the production team went to Armenia before the show to pre-record the 95-piece Armenian Philharmonic Orchestra playing the DIFC soundtrack, which was run using ProTools.

Broadcast video

The performance area had to hold 350 choristers

Chris Saunders from XL Video UK was brought in to coordinate the camera mixes, IMAG screen direction and HD host broadcast facilities, from which Dubai TV took a feed for its live telecast. He also recorded an HD DVD of the whole event project — from the start of the build process to showtime — and produced the electronic press kits for the international media outlets covering the show. The majority of the equipment was freighted by EFM out from XL Video in the UK — and was based around one of XL’s standard HD PPUs plus six cameras.

Saunders brought in ‘name’ touring show directors Blue Leach and Bob Higgins to direct the cameras. The two worked side-by-side, both mixing from the same six cameras. Leach’s mix — cut on the main bus of a master Kayak console — went to Dubai TV, tape and ISO record; while Higgins’ mix produced via a satellite Kayak running off the ME bus of the main one, sent out to the Encore at FOH, and then to the show screens.

The six broadcast cameras (positioned FOH, front of stage and hand-held onstage) were supplemented with an HD camcorder and three time-lapse cameras set up around the site to capture the build process and de-rigging processes.

Saunders also hired a Bell 412 helicopter, complete with Cineflex HD giro-stabilised camera pod, to get all his aerial elements. A Steadycammoved around the space and a Jimmy Jib was stationed at the entrance to catch the arrivals and red carpet activities. Footage was recorded onto five HD camcorder machines and six Digibetas for the press kits cut on their on-site HD edit suite.

For Il Divo’s set XL used two Doremi hard drives storing playback sources.

Audio and lighting

With the 350 person Armenian State Academic Choir, a 95-piece orchestra, a 78 individual ladies’ choir from the Lebanon, 28 members of the local Gems Youth Choir and 10 soloists, the audio for the event was never going to be easy to deal with.

It also required two sound systems, one for the ‘PA’ and one for pre-recorded tracks and effects.

Local company Delta Sound Dubai handled the PA using an L-Acoustics dV-DOSC system consisting of 24 dV-DOSC for the main hangs with 12 Kudos and 12 SP218 subs. It was a four mix surround system with three back positions — left, centre and right — at the rear of the grandstand, consisting of 12 L-Acoustics Kiva and 4 Kilo elements each. The control desks included two Yamaha PM5Ds at front of house for the orchestra mix. The system was processed with a combination of XTA 448s and 226s, powered by L-Acoustics LA48 amps. 

On stage, Delta supplied another PM5D console which was run alongside a Yamaha M7CL doing the choir sub mix. The choir was mic’d with 30 AKG SE300s mounted discreetly on poles, evenly spread across the choir stand. Fifty-four DPA 4060s were used on the strings, and about 38 Schoeps CMC5s were distributed between the orchestra and soloists.

Sound for the speeches and presentations was handled by N&M using Delta speakers and two d&b Q1 effects stacks. Show lighting wads by lighting designer Nick Jevons using three audience trusses, two trusses at the back and front of the stage and further lights hung behind the orchestra and on the top of the buildings. The lights used included a mix of A&O Falcon Beams (3K and 7K) and Martin Professional Mac 2Ks and the show was

programmed on a GrandMA console.

KEY FACTS

The Dubai International Finance Centre event used 24 projectors on a 174m wide screen to display a mix of corporate presentations and performances of live classical music to an invited audience of 2,500 people seated in an open air grandstand. 

Overall production was by HQ Creative, with production and video staging supplied by Neumann & Mueller. 

Broadcast cameras and editing were by XL Video, and audio was supplied by Delta Sound Dubai and Neumann & Mueller. 

Power was by Essential Show Products and the set and drapes, which included a 20m wide Kabuki drop, were by Showtex Middle East.