Buckingham Palace hosts large scale projection event for Not Forgotten Association

The Not Forgotten Association was formed in 1920 to provide entertainment, recreation and leisure to the serving wounded and ex-Service men and women with disabilities.  As part of its 90^th Anniversary celebrations it organised a summer concert for 450 serving personnel and veterans in the Ballroom by kind permission of Her Majesty The Queen.

FOR MORE PICTURES OF THE NOT FORGOTTEN EVENT AT BUCKINGHAM PALACE CLICK HERE

In the early planning stages for the event, the small team within the Charity decided that telling the 90 year story of The Not Forgotten was to be the format and, if possible, wanted projections within the Ballroom to enhance the various acts making up the concert.  Major Sir Michael Parker, who has a long-standing relationship with the Charity and has produced a number of concerts for them in the past, was asked if he would take it on.

The 90 minute show was projected by 8 Christie 18K HD video projectors configured to form a fully immersive ‘wrap around’ projection onto all four walls – with a stage at one end – and the ceiling of the Ballroom.

The majestic space – first completed in 1855 – is 34 metres long by 18 wide and 14 metres high. The projection was required to provide a rolling narrative for the evening plus digital scenery, backdrops and settings for some of the solo pieces. e.g.  a 1930′s style café for male vocal quartet Blake, or a downtown neonesque cityscape for comedian David Copperfield.

The show featured an orchestra and choir, plus live appearances by several leading performers including Rick Wakeman.

Making a fully immersive projection happen in this room was not easy however, with eight enormous chandeliers in the room, all of which cause huge shadowing problems for projectors. In addition to that, there were virtually no flat surfaces around the room, which also features numerous intricate and ornate architectural details.

The images on the two long walls were created from two projectors positioned at each end of each wall, cross focussed and blended back into the centre of the walls. This was the only way to avoid cross shadows from the chandeliers.

The other four projectors were pointing upwards at 50 degrees – almost vertical – and cross shooting onto the ceiling, again positioned and focussed to minimise the chandelier shadows. All machines were fitted with short throw lenses.

The set-up timescale was extremely tight. They had 13 hours the day before the show, and another 13 hours on show day itself before the performance started to rig this very intricate system.