DML-1200 w/ Axon Excites Intros for Swedish Ice Hockey League

DML-1200 w/ Axon is a digital luminaire that doubles as a hard-edged moving light source and a high-quality video projector. The internal Axon media server provides full digital lighting capabilities through proven software.

Each arena in the Swedish Ice Hockey League has installed packages of 6 DLM-1200 w/ Axon digital lighting luminaires, controlled with a Road Hog console.

The pre-show Intro kicks off 15 minutes before game time. A Swedish Hockey League intro and the Swedish national anthem rouse the arena, with a few commercials projected through the DML-1200s onto the ice. Now it's time for the DML-1200s to get to work and do what they were hired to do. Lights dim and all eyes focus on the rink.

The white ice hockey arena floor is now a blank canvas for the motivating melange to come. Hands clap to the rhythm of heavy rock music as the rink is “painted” with projections of player’s faces, team logos and other custom content. The DML-1200s capabilities zoom and spread the images across the entire rink, eliciting cheers from the crowds. Some of the projections border on the surreal, such as the sheet of cracking ice or the swimming pool with rippling water fooling the eyes. Fire torches blaze at the player’s entrance, and it all wraps up into one big roar to the rafters. The DML-1200s have done their job. Now it's game time.

Barco’s Abbe Westerlundh was in charge of the ice arena project: from system layout, setup, initial programming and creative content programming for the first event at each arena. Westerlundh trained the local arena operators to run their own system. To customize it to each arena, the local marketing departments created their own specific content, while using a main intro movie created by Access in Linkoping, Sweden.

A big challenge in installing the equipment concerned the different construction layouts of the arenas. There was no standard procedure for installation, as no two arenas were alike in design.

Westerlundh had to figure out the best angles of install and viewing in each of the arenas. All DML-1200s w/Axon were installed on the long side, he says, with a carefully calculated position, individual to each arena because of the differences in the ability to mount truss and motors in the roof.

Mediatec purchased the digital lighting equipment package for the league installations, and handles the gear as a rental for the time the facility needs it during their season. Based in Sweden, Mediatec is one of Europe’s largest corporations working with technical solutions for event and television productions.

Mediatec CEO Kenneth Patterson says, “As all arenas were differently built and equipped at the same time as they were being used nearly every day, it was a challenge to manage the installation in the given time frame. We are pleased and impressed by Abbe´s support and knowledge. He was a great help in implementing the installation in a short time in 12 arenas. The product is impressive and is used for all games, even though the effect differs depending on the arena and team.”