BIT Experience addresses the interactive and creative possibilities of videomapping

Within the workshops held at BIT Experience 2015, Manuel Horischnik, from Ibercover, showed attendees how the videomapping technique has been developing within the audiovisual environment and has been able to take advantage of what other technologies offer such as interactivity, augmented reality or artistic lighting.

Manuel Horischnik, Owner and co-founder de Ibercover Studio, has been in charge of directing the workshop on videomapping that has been held within the framework of BIT Experience 2015. A meeting in which, together with Elena Pizarro, Head of Production, Jorge Alcalá Zamora, CG Artist, and Moises Calderón Bastos, CG Artist, explained what the production process is like for this type of project and what are the different types of applications it has. Some topics that were developed based on different projects that your company has carried out.

Ibercover Studio is a production company of audiovisual events and shows that is responsible for designing and producing commercial and cultural events, as well as creating artistic installations. Its services include the complete production of the montages, starting with the creative part, the contents, the staging, the technical production, the assembly and disassembly.

"We base our work on creative development, on content and what we can generate with images, sensations and emotions. Anyone can rent a projector, the important thing is to express what is going to be communicated," explains Horischnik.

In his speech, Jorge Alcalá made a retrospective of the history of videomapping, "a form of projection that is not new but has a long history that goes back to the time of slides and has evolved as technology has. And, in contrast to what has happened with other techniques, it is not something that has become fashionable but has been developing within the audiovisual framework and, given its versatility, it has been able to recombine with other technologies such as interactivity, reality increases, smoke effects, artistic lighting, LEDs and lasers.”

What is attempted with this type of projection is to deceive the eye and the brain to confuse it and make it not differentiate what is real from what is a projection. “When you manage to play with that doubt, that's when we know that you have done a good job,” says Horischnik.

Videomapping offers many possibilities, since you can texture buildings, statues, mannequins or moving objects, there are even times when the element does not exist, such as when it is done on a stage. This is why "the first thing you have to know is that you want to project and then generate the video using different sets of shapes. It is a technique that offers a great variety of possibilities," says Jorge Alcalá.

These spectacular projects sometimes involve complicated setups, especially if they are carried out on the street or in a central city. A series of protocols must be followed to be able to carry them out since many people and third-party companies are involved in their assembly and "all measures must be guaranteed so that it goes well. For some jobs it has taken up to six months to complete them. We assume the technical and artistic preparation but third parties also intervene and it must be coordinated," adds Alcalá.

One of these works carried out in the center of a city was the one that could be seen in the Cibeles Palace in Madrid at Christmas 2011. A project for which 12 20,000 lumen projectors were used and it took them four months of work. “We had to work at night as it involved a complicated wiring infrastructure and it is a very busy area,” Alcalá continues.

The spectacular nature of the buildings

Proof of the creativity that can be shown with this type of technology are the video mapping carried out by this company in the last three editions of Lux Greco, an event organized by the Toledo City Council, which last year was carried out on the Toledo Cathedral; or the one produced on the occasion of “La noche toledana” in the Monastery of San Juan de los Reyes. Some works where the façade of a historic building was used as a screen. Performing videomapping involves texturing something on video and the facades of buildings is one of the most spectacular projects.

"Lux Greco is a very consolidated show and when we arrived in 2012 we included mapping in the event. Doing this type of project in a building is very spectacular and better the more pieces and relief it has. The difficulty is that being old towns there are problems locating the equipment because they are very small spaces. However, the scenography is magnificent. On the other hand, we must keep in mind that when it comes to historical buildings we must respect the environment so that people are not shocked," says Jorge Alcalá.

Interactivity as a trend

Currently, the market trend is aimed at interacting with the media and this has also reached the world of videomapping as Horischnik indicates. “A television ad that excites you is very good, but if you can interact with it it has a greater impact.”

The first interactive video mapping that was done in Spain was for a promotional campaign for Vodafone and Samsung carried out by Ibercover Studio in 2010. In this one, carried out in the Plaza de España in Madrid, there were two kiosks in which tablets had been placed with a series of games and applications for them to be tested by users.

The videomapping was projected on an area of ​​1,500 square meters in the Hispania building and 4 Christie 25,000 lumen projectors were used to carry it out. Spectators became stars of the show and could play with Samsung tablets using the façade of the building as a screen.

As in the previous case, videomaping is also used for the launch of a product or to promote a brand. Another case explained in this workshop held at Bit Experience 2015 that is along the same lines of brand promotion is the one carried out in London for the launch of a new Nectar Imperdial bottle by Moet Chandon. It was a party in which the projection was displayed above the DJ's head and there were 'video jockeys' (VJ) who were in charge of mixing the videos on a screen so that the mapping changed.

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