Inaugurated in 2000 and now in its ninth year, the annual Laureus World Sports Awards was put in place to recognize the achievements of teams and individuals that symbolize the very best in sporting events. This year, the Awards were staged at The Mariinsky Theatre Concert Hall in St Petersburg, Russia, on February 18th and were televised to a worldwide audience. UK-based AV services company Creative Technology (CT) was brought in by production company Done and Dusted to provide the event’s screen requirements, a service it has been providing to the Laureus Awards for the past three years.
In charge of CT’s five man crew was project manager Alex Leinster, who explains what was involved: “We used Barco OLite 612 LED for the main screen in an 8x6 module configuration. This was split into four columns that were tracked backwards and forwards across the stage on a Vertigo system during the show for use as the entrance for winners and presenters to emerge through. We then had a further 1,296 tiles of OLite 612 that were housed in custom metal work on each side of the main screen and divided up as three ‘fingers’ on either side.”
Barco’s lightweight, transparent MiTrix modules were then used to create a 131-foot wide banner around the top of the concert hall’s auditorium comprising a total of 663 tiles, again housed within custom metal work. A further two panels, consisting of 174 tiles of MiTrix each, were positioned on either side of the stage.
“We used another 126 tiles of MiTrix to cover the master truss that supported the tracking OLite screen,” continues Leinster. “That meant we used a grand total of 1,137 tiles of MiTrix, none of which were in a standard configuration.”
Control for the system was via seven Barco D320PL processors, with playback from five Hippotyzer media servers. “These were controlled by video services company Digital Insanity,” adds Leinster. “They ran everything from the Hippotyzers straight through into our system, with the tracking screen going via the OB truck so they could cut VT content as well as live camera footage to that screen as well.”
The art for the screens was supplied to CT by graphics agency Hello Charlie and played back by Digital Insanity. Content for the main screen came from the OB truck. This had already been scaled by CT and sent to the truck for mixing. “This was a complex system, but it all went together quite smoothly,” concludes Leinster.
“It is important for such an event that we provide something that is new and exciting each year,” adds CT’s business development manager, Adrian Offord. “The Laureus Awards is an extremely prestigious event and we used a mixture of standard LED modules and the creative solution that MiTrix brings to provide a visually stunning result.”