Creative Technology delivers spectacular projection at UAEFA President’s Cup final
Picture: Done + Dusted
The UAEFA President’s Cup final, which took place at the Hazza bin Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi on 21 October, saw Creative Technology produce an impressive projection which was mapped across the pitch for the opening ceremony and distribute site-wide show communication for the annual tournament.
One of the key highlights from the evening was the projection that covered 1,200sqm. CT supplied four double-stacked Panasonic PT-RQ50K projectors, to achieve 600 lux projection. The projectors were installed in a bespoke purpose-built structure that was fully enclosed and temperature controlled. Projection was integrated on a fully redundant network ring controlled from FOH and utilised CT’s new 1G and 10G fibre networking solutions. Playback was powered by CT’s disguise VX4 Suite and full 4K signal distribution.
Carlos Aguilar, deputy head of video at Creative Technology, commented: “It’s always a challenge to install 50K projectors, but we pre-planned and measured all the routes to the roof of the stadium to ensure everything was installed seamlessly. I had a great team of engineers on site always willing to go above and beyond for the job.”
Communication being one of the key components of the President’s Cup, CT’s delivery and quality of service was crucial in ensuring that every element of site-wide communications coverage was met through Motorola radios, with wired and wireless communications.
The network infrastructure was made up of six Luminex 26i and 12 Luminex 14R switches which provided the backbone for the management and the Riedel network, allowing VLANs to be accessed from anywhere onsite. The Motorola system consisted of four SLR 5500 repeaters and 70 DP4800 radios for talk back, four channels interfaced into the Riedel Artist X128 frame via fibre.
The Riedel Artist frame, which acts as the brain of the system, had 16 Artist panels and 42 Bolero wireless belt packs for production and the stage management teams. Two Helixnet base stations were integrated to support 12 wired Helixnet belt packs for static positions. Four four-wire connections and eight MADI channels were connected between the production event team and the broadcast team for show co-ordination.
Darius Charley, head of integrated networks at CT, said: “The event was great, the support from the production and the technical team was amazing. It allowed us to build a system that worked entirely in the way we envisioned it. The only challenge was ensuring the proper channel groups were assigned to the correct users. This was resolved quickly with our expert team. It was a brilliant project to work on.”
CT also supplied the technical requirements for the team press conference room, which later hosted VIPs for the event. A 4mx2m 1.9mm LED screen was installed to support sponsor content for the pre-match press conference as well as to supply the live relay content during the match for VIP guests. L-Acoustics Syva speakers were used to provide a clean and versatile audio option for the press conference.
Nick Fenton, project manager, CT, commented: “The project went very well thanks to each of the team members taking ownership over their designated areas. Due to the large nature of the project we had to collaborate with other parties to ensure delivery was smooth and the overall goal achieved. The team took this on and stepped in to help overcome any issue and deliver a great show.”