Austrian company staged a mega-event in Qatar
For three nights at the end of December 2009 the six kilometer waterfront promenade of Doha was transformed into a continuous 3-D screen by a lighting spectacle ‘made in Austria’. The reason for this event was the celebration of the national day of Qatar on the 18th of December. The history of the country and its vision for the future were shown with 1400 large-frame projections on 40 prominent buildings. The concept was the product of Qatar’s Innovations Unlimited ME as general contractor and VideoMovingSystem (VMS) ‘Kuehne & Kapeller GmbH, a Viennese company that gained its worldwide reputation for their expertise in light-, video- and event technology.
Qatar’s Innovations Unlimited ME as executive general contractor and the Austrian multi-media company VideoMovingSystem, submitted an exceptional concept for Qatar’s National Day 2009 last summer. The IU/VMS concept was the winner of a widely contested competition. It was up to them to create the perfect team of professionals and artists for the event and to plan all of the details meticulously.
VMS associate Udo Kapeller coordinated the mega event and directed the implementation on-site. “Even though we prepared for every possible event, from sandstorm to downpour, problems emerged in the process,” Kapeller said. “For example, we couldn’t use the specially developed communication system during the reconstruction work because it wasn’t allowed to use CB radio in Qatar. Just shortly before the event the special authorization arrived. Nevertheless, everything worked out just fine thanks to the extraordinary team of Innovations Unlimited ME, international and national experts.”
Outstanding production & technology
More than 250 tons of lighting material was shipped to Doha for the event, including 120 sky beamers, 150 Colorado color changers, and 50 large-frame projectors. 100 power units were used for energy supply to secure a steady power output of 1.5 megawatt and the specially developed communication system between the 100 technicians. The to-the-second planed lighting show was carried-out distortion-free.
“This project was an enormous challenge for us, said VMS associate Thomas Kühne, who arranged the necessary logistics and the communication between the partners from Austria” Despite the huge distance everything worked like a charm thanks to our experienced partners.”
The artistic challenge wasn’t less than the technical one, either. For ten months, the 20 participating multimedia artists worked on the translation of the art work, which consisted of some 1400 slides. These were projected onto 40 different locations, including office towers, the Emir’s palace, government buildings, hotels and public monuments.
Drawing competition: Desert and Sea
Udo Kapeller’s key concept was to have 5000 Doha children draw pictures related to the “desert and sea” event theme. Ultimately, 133 of these drawings were chosen and were projected in 100x30 meters dimensions onto the city’s Commercial Bank tower and judged by a jury.
Partners
Innovations Unlimited ME, with the Austrian leader Markus Jordan, Ulf Six, and Amr Bela, headed the project.
Hollywood movie director Peter Webber (Hannibal Rise, Six Feet Under)coordinated four teams of artists – Lichttapete (Austria), Starsky Projections (Austria), Panirama (Germany), and Projektil (Switzerland) in the creative design of the big-frame projections.
Technical equipment and expertise came from Georg Reisch, Markus Sautter and Bernhard Höffert of Pani Projection & Lighting GmbH (Austria), Ingo Rehnert and Matthias Rau of PRG GmbH (Germany) and Martin Seiter of AV-Pro (Austria).
Peter Goretzka of Riedel Funk (Germany) delivered the internal communication system.
The energy supply was organized from Heinz Toplak and Christoph Berger of Power Company Energy GmbH (A).
The LED lighting of 1400 palm trees was organized by French company Blachère.
Context (Austria) applied a specially developed foil onto the 100 meter high and 30 meter wide façade of the Commercial Bank building so that the projection of the drawings was possible.
The Client
The event was organized at the request of Qatarian Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, who appointed a specially-formed committee of high-ranking Doha political figures (SNDCOC) to carry out Qatar’s State National Day Celebrations.
Qatar’s National Day activities began on December 12, while the three-day lighting spectacle started on December 16 with the announcement of the top 133 drawings. The seven-day event celebrated the identity, history and traditions of the country, supported the ideals and foundations of the Qatarian state, which was founded in 1878 by Sheikh Assim Bin Mohammed Bin Thani, and commemorated the men and women who have contributed to building their country.
