Top Gear Live, the action-packed live version of the TV show, launched the first leg of its World Tour at Earls Court London with an audience interactive developed by Inition that allowed the crowds to test drive two of the world’s hottest supercars, in what was the world’s largest mass live audience participation driving game.
Large Audience Interactive Game
The software, written by Inition's team of 3D developers, allowed the audience to compete in a racing car game live on two large screens. Vehicles were controlled by audience members individually holding up red or green cards to collectively steer either left or right. Acceleration was controlled by how much noise each side generates – the louder the audience shouts the faster the cars go. One half of the audience was pitted against the other in what turned out to be a heavily contested (and very noisy) battle for the chequered flag.
The Audience Interface
Each team had dedicated cameras to analyse the ratio of red to green being shown by the participants. Feeds from microphones were fed into custom software which dictated the acceleration and braking of the cars. The Earl's Court game was played by 4,500 per show, with even larger crowds in Sydney at Acer Arena, Sydney Olympic Park, Homebush which held 7,000 capacity per show.
Rowland French, Executive Producer of Top Gear Live said: “I’ve always wanted to get the Top Gear Live audience participating more in the show and developing an interactive lap of the Top Gear test track is about as perfect as it gets. Through working with Inition on yet another ground-breaking project we have easily succeeded in making the most advanced piece of motoring theatre in our history which I hope our audience will enjoy”.
James Gant, Director at Inition commented: “It’s tremendously exciting to produce such a grand interactive game experience for Top Gear Live. It demonstrates the scalability of Inition’s Interactive Technologies and hints at the future of mass live audience entertainment."
Cool Wall
The audience participation engine was also used for a second part of the show, with a 'democratic' version of Top Gear's infamous Cool Wall. Members of the audience could vote on whether cars appearing in the show were 'Cool' or 'Uncool' with a representation of the car moving across the projected Cool Wall to reflect the audience's opinion. As you can images, this wasn't always respected as, thank to a Clarkson-over-ride mode, Jeremy usually over-turned the audience's decision with his own.
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Inition Brings Mass Interaction to the Gadget Show Live
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3D Filming: Tony Hawk on Tour
Working with extreme sports production specialist Boomerang Productions, Inition supplied stereoscopic equipment, crew, consultancy and 3D post services for a half hour 3D programme following Tony Hawk on his European tour in Berlin and Brighton.
Due to a combination of low weight, compact size and high quality image output, Inition chose to shoot everything with Toshiba IK-HD1(1920x1080i) minicams to capture the essence and drama of the competitor's daring skate tricks.
Capturing the Action from all Angles
Inition’s crew established three camera positions during the Berlin shoot.
A Fig Rig gave the cameraman incredible flexibility to capture fast motion shots. A Polecam lightweight jib was positioned at the top of a ramp side which captured stunning sweeping overhead shots including those classic 3D shots when the skater appears to be jumping out the screen. The third stereoscopic rig was mounted on a regular tripod which was used to capture ground level footage and close ups.
Real Time Stereoscopic Monitoring
To monitor the action, each rig was connected to a StereoBrain Processor. Battery powered and highly lightweight, the StereoBrain processor can process a left and right signal and output a variety of 3D modes which can be viewed on a 2D or 3D monitor. During the Tony Hawk shoot, Inition’s crew used StereoBrain processors to output an anaglyph feed to 7” HD-SDI monitors. Media was recorded to Nanoflash solid state recorders.
Using the three camera set up, Inition was able to deliver motion rich, immersive 3D footage for Boomerang Productions. Boomerang Productions delivered a 2D edit to Inition where it was geometrically corrected and mastered into 3D for 3D Blu-ray authoring,
Distant Thunder: Exploring Africa in 3D
World-renowned filmmakers Deeble & Stone partnered with Inition to co-produce a 3D wildlife pilot in Africa called Distant Thunder 3D.
The shoot took place in Kenya and was produced in association with equipment manufacturer P+S TECHNIK. During the production process the team identified and perfected the 3D rigs necessary to shoot wildlife in the field of Africa. Being an environment of widely varying scales, Inition used equally a large variety of interaxial lens distances to capture the extremities of the landscape, from extreme close ups of chameleons eating lunch to the final dramatic time-lapse sequence of the Kenyan night sky where two still cameras were positioned 30 metres apart.
Over the space of a month Inition used a variety of 3D rigs - both commercial models and custom built. These included mirror rigs, 3D time-lapse set ups, side-by-side configurations and gyro stabilized, using SI-2K Minicams and shooting uncompressed RAW, recording to solid state drives so full creativity could be achieved in the post production process.
Every evening, the team reviewed the daily rushes on a large 3D screen to develop what was working and what was not. Over a two week period and in challenging stormy condiitons, we obtained enough spectacular footage to edit together a stunning 10 minute pilot.
The promo premiered at the Dimension 3 S3D expo in Paris in 2010 and was later shown to audiences at the Berlin Film Festival 2010(?) and the Cannes Film Festival where it received a highly postive response.
Gadget Show Live
The producers of the UK’s largest consumer electronics show – The Gadget Show Live, worked closely with Inition to develop ideas and technical solutions to engage the show’s audience in groundbreaking, fun and genuinely new ways.
Inition operates a busy R&D department which always sets out to go beyond the standard brief and for The Gadget Show Live, we developed bespoke software and technical solutions to achieve just that. We developed a unique vote capture system, a mass interactive game and a motion capture showpiece.
Flash Camera Voting
In a signature Gadget Show challenge, two of the presenters went head to head to win over the audience with a singing performance. Rather than asking people to vote for their favourite performer via SMS, Inition created a voting system that could register an individual’s preference via a flash from their camera phone.
Within two seconds, a camera rig on the stage captured each flash of light/vote which was processed by proprietary software developed by Inition Creative Production (? - IS THAT RIGHT). The system was able to register and count each vote and present the results graphically on large LED screens within 15 seconds.
Robust and highly accurate, our reliable system could even detect (and disregard) multiple votes from a single individual up to 80 metres away. It is highly scalable too. With more cameras, we could even increase the field of view of the rig up to 360 degrees and register the votes of tens of thousands of audience members up to 150 metres away and beyond.
Mass Drone Gaming
For the mass drone gaming section, a divided audience competed with the other half in a challenge to steer a mini drone towards a circle on a large LED screen using the motion of their arms and pitch of their voices. The winning team would be the one best able to co-ordinate their arm movements and voices as detected by the Inition sensors. Three standard 720p USB webcams were housed in a single rig angled in multiple directions. Rewritten drivers and settings would achieve the desired framerates. Inition’s own software, based on proprietary and various open source libraries, could accurately translate the motion of people's gesticulations to guide the flying drone towards a target. Further software was able to detect the pitch of vocal noises from the installed microphones - the higher the pitch, the higher the drone would fly.
A Virtual Strip
To get Suzi's avatar to do the strip, Jason entered the marker-less LILA system which is portable enough to be easily rigged up on stage. Jason mimed the start of the strip up until a key moment when an Inition developed animation of a Suzi Perry avatar stripping to a bare wireframe model seamlessy blended into Jason's real time avatar motion.
Conclusion
The Gadget Show Live event was regarded as a huge success receiving exceptional feedback from the audience, producers and even the presenters themselves. The system we used for the Gadget Show Live is part of our growing collection of mass audience interaction software called 'TAP' which features audience movement detection and sound processing for control, driving games with coloured steering wheels and quizzes.
Inition will be running a 'TAP' quiz event in Rome at the end of august which will use coloured voting cards and we are currently in talks with largescale live event organisers which will run up to the end of the year.
Keane 3D Live: A Milestone in 3D Broadcasting
The live 3D transmission of a performance by Keane at Abbey Road Studios to a domestic 3D television marked a major milestone in the history of 3D broadcasting and pioneered many of the 3D transmission techniques to follow.
Inition conceived the idea in 2008 and was the primary technical partner behind the project which was backed by BSkyB, Island Records and Nineteen Fifteen Productions.
Keane 3D was broadcast simultaneously to three very different mediums – The Vue’s flagship Leicester Square RealD cinema; a dedicated website where Keane fans could watch the performance in anaglyph (red/cyan) mode and over the BSkyB transmission infrastructure becoming the first ever live 3D transmission on their network.
Sky Transmission
The Keane broadcast was the first ever 3D transmission to be broadcast over the BSkyB transmission infrastructure to a domestic display. The 3D feed was transmitted as a side-by-side frame compatible signal over a high definition satellite transponder using SENSIO encoding which was linked to two Hyundai 46 inch high definition 3D TV screens. A VIP audience in Abbey Road's world-famous Studio 2 were able to watch the full live Sky transmission nearby.
3D Webcast
A separate 3D webcast was streamed over the Internet in anaglyph (red/cyan) mode. This was the world’s first ever live webcast in 3D which Keane fans around the globe could watch in 3D by wearing a pair of anaglyph glasses. The webcast later went on to become nominated for The Innovation Award at the UK Music Video Awards 2009.
Vue Cinema Showing
A live broadcast via a satellite uplink to the 3D-enabled Vue cinema in Leicester Square, using SENSIO's 3D Cinema Encoder.
The Set Up
Inition supplied five 3D rigs for the historic event – three mirror/beamsplitter rigs and two side-by-side rigs (I thought there was a Toshiba MiniCam set up?) (one SteadiCam and one PoleCam). Each left and right camera recorded the Keane 3D broadcast in full HD for archiving purposes.
On set was a Jib cam, PoleCam, a dolly, a 45 degree angle shot and a wide angle shot. The Inition crew monitored the live and preview feeds via several StereoBrain Processors which can output a left and right signal in a variety of 3D modes.
As access to Abbey Road Studios were very limited, Inition’s production team pre-planned every single shot using stereo pre-viz animations. This allowed the team to determine the best focal lengths, rig positions and stereoscopic effects weeks in advance.
All the planning paid off and each individual transmission was a technical and creative success which was later praised by the national media.
Watch an interview with the band about their 3D performance here
Click here to read an article about the event in TVB Europe Magazine
Live 3D Surgery: Stereoscopic Surgery Training Trial
Brief
MATTU (Minimum Access Therapy Training Unit), the internationally recognised centre of excellence for teaching innovative laparoscopic surgical techniques, invited Inition and other vendors to show how 3D display and motion capture technology could be incorporated into surgical procedures to determine whether 3D training simulation could improve accuracy, safety and performance as well as the quality of surgery training.
Solution
Inition provided consultancy and equipment for the scope of the project including projection equipment, motion capture devices and technical expertise for two implementations – live stereoscopic broadcast of an operation via a stereoscopic endoscopic camera and a motion tracking demo to show how the tracking of a sergeon's hands can be recorded for future analysis.
Live real surgery was performed and filmed in the Royal Surrey County Hospital Theatres and the feed was transmitted to a remote viewing room where other surgeons witnessed the operation in 3D wearing 3D glasses. Two 3D cameras captured the keyhole operation in 3D. Inition’s stereoscopic endoscopic camera provided the stereoscopic perspective from inside the patient’s body and a Panasonic AG-3DA1 camera was deployed externally. Both were integrated with an LG CF3D projector in the viewing room. Inition supplied two 3D monitors for the surgeon too. Wearing passive 3D glasses, he was able to view the output from the endoscopic camera and Panasonic camera just as the other students did whilst talking through his procedure via a wireless microphone.
In order to analyse the differences between stereoscopic laparoscopic surgery and regular surgery, lnition also recommended Ascension’s trakSTAR system which we are a reseller for. The technology was used to measure novice surgeons’ performance on stereo (3D) imaging systems in a simulated environment, providing insight into their exact hand movements.
“We concluded that Ascension Technology would be perfect for MATTU’s application because it is extremely easy to use and offers great quality capture time and again,” said Jeff Ferguson, motion capture and tracking expert at Inition.
Results
The results from the day indicated that, by a considerable margin, the addition of stereo cues improved surgery training and the results are being published as a paper which will be promoted as a new training system.
Live 3D Transmissions : Six Nations Rugby Live in 3D for O2
Six Nations Live to 40 Cinemas
40 cinemas across the country screened England’s home RBS Six Nations games live in 3-D. Archibald Ingall Stretton commissioned 3D specialists Inition to produce the matches which became the largest ever UK sports event to be broadcast live in 3D. Forty Odeon and Cineworld cinemas screened the matches, beginning with England’s official centenary game, against Wales on February 6, as part of a deal with O2, the England sponsor. The match against Ireland on February 27 was also screened live in 3-D.
3D Technology
Using the latest 3D camera technology, the matches were captured from seven camera positions providing a comprehensive view of the game which included replays, match statistics and on-screen graphics. Inition worked with outside broadcast experts SIS Live and used 3D 'Quasar' rigs from Element Technica for the shoot. Broadcast graphics specialists Wurmsers creating bespoke stereoscopic graphics for the game.
Production Team
The BBC is the UK TV rights holder for the 6 Nations – played between England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, France and Italy – and assisted Inition in the broadcast. Inition has worked on a number of 3D productions from football and ice hockey to track and music events. Inition were also the 3D experts behind the 3D transmissions of England’s clash with Scotland at Murrayfield, in 2008, as part of a 3D test for the BBC.
Read TVB Europe's inside story on the project here
