Hans Zimmer Live presents the maestro’s majestic film music on the concert stage. The current tour is on hiatus at the moment, with additional dates expected later this year. The difference from Zimmer’s prior tours is the huge influx of original video content as created by designer Peter Nigrini, who collaborated with scenic designer Derek McLane and lighting designer John Featherstone on the aesthetic package and look of the tour—a visual knockout.
“We did not use original film footage, primarily because we wanted the music to stand on its own. But people nonetheless have visual relationships with these films and the music very much calls for a visual environment,” explains Nigrini. Dune. Gladiator. Pirates Of The Caribbean. The Lion King. The Last Samurai. Iconic films with Zimmer's acclaimed scores…
Color became a key aspect of the video, as Nigrini notes: “The question became how to quote the films in our original content for the live concerts. Much of this was about analysing the color gradings used by the original cinematographers. Color charts with swatches of various tones for each film served as the touchstone for the video hues."
When it came the original content, Nigrini worked with many of the animators he uses on his theatrical projects. In every case, he says, “the challenge was to imagine new visual landscapes for the music with touchstones in the original films. The spinning top from Inception, A bird in flight for Dark Pheonix, the original Maurice Binder title sequences for James Bond,” to name a few.
Nigrini also faced the question of I-MAG. “A necessary evil,” he says, asking “how to turn it into an asset, a visual attribute that enhances the design in additional to providing the neccesary access to the performers in these large venues.” The live cameras were processed so that the images were pulled into the same chromatic range as the created content to give the overall look more of a cinematic feel that that of television. “Hans wants the musicians to look like movie stars, as they are usually invisible in the film world. He wanted to bring them to the forefront.”
The video appears on one full-height LED screen upstage, with a second screen at one-third height downstage as a horizontal strip that moves. “The I-Mag was usually seen here, and sometimes presented upstage as well,” notes Nigrini, who pioneered the use of disguise RX Render Node servers for a concert. “These were developed for the film world and generate content in real time to feed to a media server. We sent the 14 cameras to the RX server for color processing and grading, which allows me to bring the live images into the cinematic world I created for each song. A touring camera director does all the switching. Some of the cameras have operators; some are automated. It’s a complicated signal path but allows me to compose what the images look like, yet allows the camera director to choose the best live shots.”
At one point, there was a question as to whether The Lion King should be including in the concert or not: “I am glad it is,” Nigrini admits. “People come to that music with so many images in their heads. So, we commissioned a series of illustrations from Sadi Tekin, a Turksih visual artist, that were then animated to could build a visual world where The Lion King takes place. We were able to show the audience something new but related to the music, both satisfy the desire for the familiar and providing the excitement of the new.”
For Nigirni, the most satisfying part of this project was that “we achieved what we were tasked with in the beginning. Hans wanted to work with Derek and me because of our work in the theatre. It was exciting walking the line between the two worlds—making a concert with a distinctly theatrical sensibility.”
Gear:
2x VX4 with HDMI 4k Outputs
2x RX Rendernode connected via 25Gb fiber for live rendering
1x Rosendahl Nanosync1x Rosendahl MIF41
x Lightware HDMI Matrix1x HP 1810 1G Switch
1x Netgear XS708T 10G Switch (edited)
Servers provided by Pixway
Credits:
Robert Figueira - Lead Animator
C. Andrew Bauer - Animator
Dan Vatsky - Animator
Austin Shapley - Animator
Sadi Tekin - Illustrator
Johnny Moreno - Assistant Video Designer
Emery Martin - NOTCH Programmer
Nevil Jeremias - disguise lead programmer
Edward Hoare - disguise second programmer / disguise tour operator
Viola Weinert - disguise tour operator