TDC renews the Vivid Sydney festival technologically and focuses on nature

For twenty three days, the specialist Technical Direction Company (TDC) shows in the edition 2023 from the Australian festival the latest in projection equipment, with the models Barco UDM-W30; the TwLite towers where they are installed and the automated LiveView remote monitoring system.

Vivid Sydney (in Spanish Sydney) It is the largest Australian festival celebrating creativity, innovation and technology, and transform this important city into a kaleidoscope of color and events for twenty-three nights.

In your thirteenth edition, that the past began 26 May and will continue until next time 17 June, Vivid Sydney brings together fascinating shows from the world's brightest light artists, live musical performances, debates with opinion leaders and innovative experiences from gastronomic creatives.

As a technology company in the development of the festival in recent years, from TDC (Technical Direction Company) They point out that “it would be easy to offer the same projection technology every year for Vivid Sydney, but it is part of our adn constantly explore the latest technologies to perfect and optimize the offer of video solutions”.

For this reason, the project management team, creative technologists, TDC designers and engineers have participated in the projection redesign to provide more pixels, glow, efficiency y, from a technical point of view, a better result for more than twenty facilities de Vivid Sydney 2023.

These installations take the form of projection design, mapping and lighting on Australia's largest museum ship, on HMAS Vampire for Harbor Life, at the Sydney Opera House Lighting of the Sails: Life Enlivened and in one immersive experience at Vivid House to showcase four stunning works of art about the natural world of Australia.

“Vivid Sydney is Australia's largest festival celebrating creativity, technology and innovation, and this year it does so with the beauty and diversity of our natural world - explains its director, Gill Minervini-. “Collaborating with innovative partners like TDC is essential to bringing the festival to life and creating a truly unforgettable experience for attendees.”.

Regarding the technical advances made in the edition 2023 de Vivid Sydney, Michael Hassett, founder and CEO of TDC, points out that “every year we evolve our technological offer and, in this edition, Our project teams are very excited to achieve a world first in laser projection. The technology of Barco has outstanding features, like high gloss, Low latency processing and robust design; besides, has the only projection system that meets our color uniformity requirements, reduced energy consumption and return on investment”.

As this manager adds, “We always provide manufacturers with some operational and processing suggestions to improve implementation, which this year included low costs and supervision through our platform TDC LiveView to manage equipment from a central location. We are delighted to have that feedback direct included in UDM-4K30 which visitors to Vivid Sydney will be the first to see in action anywhere”.

TwLite Outdoor Projection Boxes

With a new TDC design, las TwLite projection towers They house the equipment outdoors; can be deployed quickly; have improved airflow for efficiency and projector life, and they are more robust and waterproof than the previous ones.

“We are excited about the efficiency that TwLite towers provide during installation on site. Made with sustainability in mind, towers can be reused, which is very important”, states Toby Waley, TDC operations manager.

All installations are controlled from a central point so that projection towers do not interrupt public viewing points. The design of all systems was taken into account during the recent festival Live Enlivened (candle lighting) at the Sydney Opera House, which now has 4K laser projectors to bring Dr.'s work to life. John Olsen y Curiious.

Los new refrigerators of projectors increase efficiency and light output, while improving efficiency with fiber optic outputs of custom media servers.

For installation Inside Out, en Customs House, all laser projectors have been upgraded from Barco UDM-W22 to UDM-W30 model, a compact and lightweight system 30K, WUXGA resolution and 29.000 lumens, to increase light output and performance. Completely redesigned, There is no longer a centralized projection tower and each projector is redundant.

Record laser projection

In total, TDC in distraction 150 of the most modern laser projectors para Vivid Sydney 2023, the largest facility of its kind ever assembled in the southern hemisphere. These laser technology devices emit more light than conventional lamp-based devices., offer superior fidelity, sharper contrast and consume much less energy.

These projectors offer unprecedented lighting levels at the festival to produce a billion pixels every night, more than double that in 2022. At the same time, energy consumption is 150 kilowatts per hour (kWh) lower than last year. “TDC is capable of offering a increase of 25% in projection coverage para Vivid Sydney 2023, while emitting less carbon waste than in 2022”.

In view with TDC LiveView

In line with this year's Vivid Sydney theme, focused on nature, TDC has deployed its LiveView automated remote monitoring system, that controls thousands of computers to solve problems and limit staff travel.

Operators and engineers work from a control center and TDC LiveView provides all the data for each installation, so that if any technical problem arises, specialized personnel are sent to resolve it immediately.

“TDC LiveView is an automated solution that will monitor the thousands of pieces of equipment used at Vivid Sydney across all of our facilities throughout the festival,” he explains. Drew Ferors, director of technical services and training of the company-. Thanks to this system we can collect data in real time, such as the temperature of all equipment located outdoors in projection venues, along with information about the performance of each one”.

All the TDC projector enclosures are air-conditioned to improve equipment performance, and Vivid Sydney facilities are monitored by camera systems which also send information about their status and performance to this company's LiveView application.

In its thirteenth edition, Vivid Sydney transforms the port city into the next 17 June in a luminous fusion of creativity, innovation and technology, with more than three hundred events and activities around light, the music, the ideas and, for the first time, the food.

Project data and achievements

To fully understand the scope of the project and the shift towards best practices in video design and solutions, TDC has provided the following information and achievements of the festival:

• Every night there are more than 3,5 millions of lumens of projected light.
• Unprecedented levels of projection produce a total of 1.000 millions of pixels every night. In contrast, TDC achieved 230.000.000 of pixels in 2022.
• An increase in projection coverage of more than 25% with less energy consumed than in 2022.
• 150 kilowatts per hour (kWh) less than in 2022 (an average australian home, of four people, consumes approximately 1,8 kWh).
• TDC has recently installed a clean energy solar system of 100 kW at its Sydney headquarters, in Alexandria.
• On the eve of Vivid Sydney, TDC has received the world's first delivery of thirty newly developed laser projectors from Barco that are operational at the festival.
• Live View 24/7 is TDC's remote monitoring system that monitors thousands of equipment and environmental factors at more than twenty facilities. Monitoring everything remotely ensures that staff only have to respond to issues in real time, limiting travel.
• Destination NSW, the New South Wales Government's tourism and major events agency, is the owner, manager and producer at Vivid Sydney.