Here’s how in an extraordinary location, where every event becomes unique, some technical problems of format and conversion of video signals were solved
The photos and videos of The Sphere have gone around the world: at 157 metres wide, and with a roof of millions of LED modules, it is the largest spherical building in the world and certainly a unique venue for shows and concerts, a place where every event becomes something unique. It was inaugurated with something equally unique, with the return of U2 live in September with a long residency, and hosts and will host extraordinary multimedia artworks (the first by the Italian Marco Brambilla, followed by Darren Aronofsky and Refik Anadol) to mark, even in the arts, a true new direction.
As anyone can imagine, the technical aspects of multimedia are also of prime importance. U2’s production, which was also realised thanks to the contribution of many content creators, stages a hypnotic 16Kx16K immersive video installation reproducing 256,000,000 pixels. The innovative setup of the Las Vegas Sphere uses SMPTE ST 2110 signals, marking a transition from the traditional SDI format. ConvertIP was specifically designed by Matrox to overcome these issues that initially appeared difficult to resolve.
Stefaan “Smasher” Desmedt, U2’s Video Live Director and Technical Production Manager, was in charge of the show’s video shoot, which involved the use of ultra-high resolution DCI (4,096×2,160 pixels) cinema cameras, and thus had to find a way to convert the original video format to SMPTE ST 2110. Here is his story: “After many internal discussions with the technical team at Fuse, we determined that the monitoring and failover should remain at 12G throughout the signal path in SMPTE ST 2110. They provided 26 primary and 26 redundant feeds via Matrox Convert IP. The Matrox support team was excellent…the results were in line with expectations and we were fully operational by August.
Matrox Video will be at ISE to showcase the ConvertIP series at their booth 5D500, along with their complete line-up of solutions for IP-based networked control rooms and video production environments. In particular, the Matrox Extio 3 IP-based KVM extender and KMLync USB switches will be on display, along with the Maevex 6100 and 7100 series of H.264/H.265 streaming decoders/encoders.
https://video.matrox.com/en/media/customer-stories/u2-unleashes-a-visual-spectacle-with-convertip-at-sphere-las-vegas
