Hawthorn returns to Adobe Summit EMEA 2017
- Details
Focused on the future of digital marketing, delegates from Europe, the Middle East and Africa gathered to soak up tips and insights from the Adobe Marketing Cloud and its partners. Led by group creative director Pete Harding, Hawthorn was tasked to bring Taylor Bennett’s impressive vision to life, delivering the technical production for the main conference plenary, exhibition space, break-out rooms and the muchly-anticipated Summit Celebration.
In the Community Pavilion, a six-metre long, five-metre wide and three-metre high tunnel constructed from 3.9mm LED panels guided attendees from registration through to the Social Area.
Realising an idea by Russell Bennett, Partner at Taylor Bennett Partners, Hawthorn and 80-Six created an interactive LED ceiling that stretched throughout the Community Pavilion. Made up of 1017 panels of Roe MC7 LED, the team devised a custom rigging solution to allow the panels to be flown face down.
This year’s plenary stage played host to a number of big names, including actor Colin Firth and former Premier League and England footballer Frank Lampard. With major brands including T-Mobile, BMW Group and The Coca-Cola Company sharing how they are firmly at the forefront of digital marketing, Hawthorn created three vast screens to display the stunning video content. using three triple stacked Christie 4k30 Boxers. To mask any gaps between the screens, Hawthorn used concertina style 18mm LED.
Two two-projector stacks of Christie 4K boxers were also used for the rear relays along with three 20’ camera relay screens running from Christie 14Ks. In total, the plenary screens delivered a mammoth 534,000 lumens and 23,716,800 pixels.
Lighting in the Plenary was designed by renowned luminary designer Russell Grubiak who created a layered design that was sympathetic to the core graphics on screen whilst also providing a hidden layer of ‘rock-star shenanigans’ to reinforce the talent walk ups and opening video sequences.
Clay Paky Sharpies were used to create a web above the screen and were choreographed with organic movement in sync with the graphics and unique to each section of the content. Four truss mounted Lycian Followspots were used to light the people and to keep the onstage ambient light levels down. An array of beauty lights hidden in the stage fascia helped facials. Viper Performance fixtures added some shaped lighting where fill or specials were needed and a barrage of Colour-force 72 batten and GLP Bar 20 brought some dazzle.
Audio in the Plenary was delivered using a d&b audiotechnik V Series line array. Hawthorn also ran a full Dante redundant system over fibre, meaning they could run Dante Virtual Soundcard on the d3 servers. This resulted in a fully digital system from source to amps. Also, with the addition of the d&b DS10, they could run Dante to the d&b amps.
Billed as the biggest and best Summit Celebration yet, the ‘Digital Landscape’ themed party featured entertainment from alt-pop band Two Door Cinema Club. Partygoers were enchanted by a futuristic landscape of digital trees, virtual reality experiences and a spectacular interactive projection mapped waterfall.
Hawthorn collaborated with renowned media technology studio BAJT to create the interactive waterfall installation and bring Taylor Bennett’s vision to life. Together they crafted a solution in which the waterfall was run with four 30K projectors fed directly from a two d3 4x4pro media servers using Notch integration, meaning every pixel was created in real-time.
A BlackTrax system was then used to pick up movements of two sticks which each featured a concealed BlackTrax stringer emitter in the end. The stringers read the stick position and place effectors into Notch to create the effect of the water running around the stick, altering the path of waterfall in absolute real-time.
Pete Harding, creative director of projects at Hawthorn, commented: ‘Taylor Bennett are renowned for delivering brand experiences that immerse consumers and captivate audiences. Russell and his team always present us with unique technical challenges, from creating an interactive virtual waterfall to building a fragmented LED ceiling.
“The Summit also gives us the opportunity to work collaboratively with other industry experts, combining our expertise to create something truly special. We’re always striving to push the boundaries, getting creative with technology to bring our client’s incredible vision to life.”
(Jim Evans)
