The opening ceremony in Doha
Qatar - Painting with Light (PWL)’s creative director Luc Peumans was asked to design an eye-catching lighting scheme for the opening ceremony (OC) of the first Qatar eSports WEGA Global Games. The OC event was staged in the Khalifa Stadium in Doha and attended by 14,000 eSports fans.
Show artistic director Steven Martin from The Cintamani Stone: ArchitectofEMOTION (TCS-AOE) asked Luc onboard for their pitch, and they were awarded the project by Doha-based event company The Planners LLC.
Working together for several years now, the experienced team at The Planners combined with TCS and Trimex has become a major player in the Qatar market for these types of shows and events.
Luc was excited to be part of an all-Belgium technical design and imagineering team including OC technical director Ludo Vanstreels from Trimex with whom PWL has also worked on several previous projects.
Challenges for Luc’s lighting design included the positioning of the stage in one section down the long end of the stadium, which meant that the whole lighting rig - and all other technical elements - had to be ground supported.
Integral to the winning pitch were elaborate projections mapped onto the stage floor and holographic images beamed on a special 30-metre-wide by 12-metre-high scrim - currently a trending aesthetic in the world of eSport tournament OCs. These had to be carefully ‘lit around’, combined with several flying and ground-based cast members and performers.
Large amounts of video and LED screens to generally contend with were additional challenges for lighting.
Luc’s design was based around seven 16m-high towers, three upstage and four downstage to the sides to provide a sense of depth and a basic structural framework around the 80m-wide oval-shaped performance space. These towers also served as useful lighting positions.
Upstage was the impressive 1000sq.m, 12m-high back video wall. The stage surface was mapped for projections and the holographic images were beamed onto massive special holo-scrims. Luc chose 100 Robe MegaPointes as his main effects lighting fixtures.
Lighting was supplied - along with audio, LED screen, ground support trussing, vari-speed motors for performer flying, general rigging and trussing - by the Doha branch of mediaPro International who also built the stage. The stage was built by The Planners’ in-house decor team.
In addition to the MegaPointes, there were 60 Robe Spiider LED wash beams, 36 Cyclops LED washes, 50 Claypaky Mythos and 42 CP Scenius Unicos which were used to highlight cast positions from the sides and for illuminating specific parts of the projection areas.
The ticketed OC event was completely sold out and launched this first edition of The Global Games, hosted by Aspire Zone Foundation and organised by Truxtun Capital.
(Jim Evans)

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