The special celebrated Bruce Forsyth's long career in show business and featured artists paying tribute to the stars who inspired them. Stars appearing included Jessie Wallace, who recalled music hall legend Marie Lloyd; Jamie Cullum, who performed a Tony Bennett song; and Alfie Boe who was inspired by Dean Martin.
Working with production designer Markus Blee and line producer Charlene Farrell, XL Video supplied two types of LED for the show's set - a 5.4m wide x 3m high LED screen formed of its ROE MC-7T product and a 7m wide x 2.5m high Unilumin 3.9mm LED screen.
The high resolution ROE MC-7T screen was flown and used as both an audience relay screen and backdrop with graphics to match the set.
It was essential that this screen could be rigged and working quickly so that the stage set could be built below the screen. To enable this XL Video's film & TV manager, Jeff Bailey, specified XL's bespoke touring frames, and these enabled a quick and easy build. From unloading the screen to having a working system with pictures took under an hour, allowing precious extra time for the stage and set build.
As part of the stage design Markus Blee required a central screen for VT packages and graphics that could also be used as a sliding door entrance for Bruce Forsyth and the other star performers. This screen needed to be very high resolution to minimize more from tight camera shots, and be lightweight enough for a curtain track.
Jeff Bailey selected XL's high-resolution Unilumin 3.9mm LED as the solution. The tiles were built into two 3.5m wide x 2m high screen doors with a 500mm 3.9mm LED header to cover the curtain truss. Each LED door was independently processed and the two pictures seamlessly stitched back together.
XL Video also supplied the production with a 75" Samsung LCD monitor and two 50" plasma screens for autocue plus a 65" Samsung LCD monitor for the backstage VIP area.
XL's Jeff Bailey comments, "Having previously worked with Markus and Hat Trick I knew that their standards would be exacting and I'm very pleased that our equipment comfortably met the production's requirements. The MC-7T screen was built, flown and working in double-quick time and the Unilumin 3.9mm LED screen looked great with very little moire showing on camera."
(Jim Evans)
