The festival provides a series of programmes for new creatives, offering them inspiration, learning and insight on how to best break into the industry.
The use of projection and projection mapping, a technique that uses specialist software to warp and blend projected images on to any surface including buildings and interior walls, is becoming increasingly popular at events due to its high visual impact and immersive experience. Proving that this technology can be used effectively in any type of event, no matter what the budget or setting, Hawthorn put their own creativity to the test, working on the D&AD New Blood Award ceremony and Adobe's muchly-anticipated fringe event, their Creative Meet Up London.
D&AD revealed the winners of the 2016 New Blood Awards at a special ceremony at Village Underground, in Shoreditch. This is the third year Hawthorn has provided technical production for the intimate occasion, that see's 300 of the best young creative minds come together.
Having used video strips created from LED panels the year before, Hawthorn wanted to take a different direction for the 2016 ceremony, enhancing a key feature of the venue, it's stunning bare brick walls. Using two of their new-to-stock Panasonic 6500lm laser projectors, Hawthorn projected D&AD and sponsor logos on to the archway wall before setting the party mood with stunning visuals created in-house by the company. Powered by an Avolites AI media server, the result was a stunning visual display and immersive experience.
In addition, Two Christie 10K Projectors were used to create the main screen, displaying content from the evening's winners.
Lighting for the ceremony was designed to enhance the industrial atmosphere of the building, once a Victorian viaduct, and used Robe Patt 2013s, a retro designed light that perfectly captures the current trend for tungsten fixtures. The set up was completed with the addition of Martin MAC AuraXB fixtures, creating a simple yet artistic lighting design that perfectly captured the atmosphere of the evening.
Tom Ring, project manager at Hawthorn, said, "It's always great fun to work on the D&AD New Blood Awards. The use of projection throughout the evening allowed us to get really creative with our production, perfect for an awards ceremony recognising the best in young, artistic talent. We have a great relationship with the events team at D&AD so it's wonderful to deliver another stand out event with them."
This year, joining forces with D&AD, Adobe brought their Creative Meet Up London to Shoreditch Studios with Hawthorn tasked by agency Taylor Bennett Partners to deliver full technical production for the event.
Hawthorn used three 14K-M Christie projectors along with a D3 Media Server to provide projection mapping to the existing curved venue wall behind the lecturn, with the custom-made content created by in-house Hawthorn experts using Adobe's After Effects program.
Lighting used LED fixtures in the main, with Clay Paky glow-up strips, battery uplighters and ETC Source 4's Lustr Series 2 to light the set floor. Audio used a variety of d&b boxes driven from a Yamaha QL5 digital mixing console.
(Jim Evans)
