HELSINKI, Finland – The 3rd Season Of Light event relied upon W-DMX for one of the major installations. The event, organized by the City of Helsinki, showcased lighting designers Martin Kuhn of Germany, Per Sundin of Sweden and Tulay Schakir and Mikki Kunttu of Finland. Each created lighting installations for some of the main buildings around the city, which included the Esplandi Park Senate Square, Union Street, Kaisaniemi Park, Sanoma House, and Parliament House. Season Of Light draws some 50,000 spectators to walk along the light path from the Senate Square to the Parliament House during its 10-day showcase. CNN International news, other major TV stations and many newspapers covered the project.
W-DMX was used for Martin Kuhn's design on Unioninkatu (Union Street) entitled "100 Years". The installation used 126 pieces of Laser Imagineering Sunbeam 100cm Full Color LED fixtures. Each piece used 60 parameters for a total of 7,560 parameters. The W-DMX system handled a total of 18 Universes at distances up to 450 meters (1,475 feet).
"The whole system was up and running from the evening of Dec. 29. It performed under very harsh weather conditions with snow and temperatures down to -25°C (-13°F)," noted Eero Helle, site technical manager at Noise House Ltd., Finland. "In the same room where we housed the transmitters, Finnish Broadcast Company, YLE, put their Digital Link to broadcast the live show from Senate Square on New Years Eve and there were no interference problems whatsoever. YLE also used two wireless cameras on that show approximately 200 meters away from our transmitters, and there were no interference problems with those either."
"Had we used actual DMX cable, the installation would have required somewhere around 4.5 kilometers plus splitters, repeaters, etc.," noted Jussi Kallioinen, technical production manager. "By using W-DMX we only used 250 meters of cable, and that was only to find a better place for the receivers. It saved us not only loads of cable but loads of time and energy."
"The W-DMX was reliable, that's true," said LD Martin Kuhn. "This was not your ordinary venue either, but I have used it before and it was always rock solid, so I had no worries. I was concerned beforehand about the heavy traffic on 18 lines of 480 channels of DMX controlling LED and potential lag time, but that was totally fine. It was all good."
LD Mikki Kunttu, one of the chief organizers of the event, added, "With all the technical challenges involved with the harsh weather conditions, our technical production was able to overcome every obstacle and literally no major problems occurred. The most important factor in these conditions is the choice of equipment that goes hand in hand with the maintenance and service work required to get the production up and to keep it running. W-DMX was one of these products that stood up to the test and helped make the project a success."
Kunttu also used two grandMA2 light consoles (one in Tracking-Backup-Mode) plus a MA NPU (Network Processing Unit) for the needed processing power. His project was called Grace.
"Grace originated from a religious or spiritual point of view," Kunttu noted. "After creating two works on the Helsinki Cathedral previous years, I wanted to make a piece that completely supports the universal message of the church. We tend to look at this building and appreciate its architecture, but this time I wanted to bring the heart of the church onto the surface."
Together with the grandMA2, more than 100 moving lights had to face harsh weather conditions. "During the event we enjoyed the perfect winter weather with record breaking amount of snow in Helsinki and temperatures as crisp as -25°C," Kunttu said. "With all the technical challenges involved with the harsh weather conditions, our technical production was able to overcome every obstacle and literally no major problems occurred. The most important factor in these conditions is the choice of equipment that goes hand in hand with the maintenance and service work required to get the production up and to keep it running.
"Jussi Kallioinen as the technical production manager for Season of Light put up a dream team and they made it all happen for us designers," Kunttu continued. "Total number of crew working for the event was 85 technicians."
Mikki Kunttu Oy delivered the MA equipment. Other companies involved with the project included Moving Light Oy, West Lighting Oy, Valova, PRG GmbH, Leyendecker GmbH, Nordlite Veranstaltungstechnik GmbH, Pani Projection & Lighting Vertriebs GmbH, Interlite AB / Wireless Solution Sweden AB, Silverzombie Oy, Tragispera Oy/Hokkus Pokkus, Big 1 Oy, Screen Factory Oy, Apache Sales, Eastway Oy, Roudaamo Event Warehouse Oy Ltd, Pekkaniska Oy, K-Light Oy (työvoimaa), Noisehouse Oy and Creativesoul Oy.
For more information, please visit www.wirelessdmx.com and www.malighting.com.
Photos by Ralph Larmann
