X-Fighters turns to eclipse
Published: MEA
UAE: eclipse Staging Services supplied the audio, video and rigging equipment for the first Red Bull X-Fighters event to take place in Abu Dhabi. The event was the final leg of the freestyle motocross competition’s world tour.
Constructing the rigging without blocking the view of the crowd and the international live broadcasting cameras was the first challenge eclipse needed to overcome. ‘The sport itself had the first and final say,’ said senior audio engineer, Wissam Shaheen. ‘Most of our time during setup was focused on the aesthetic side of things while trying to maintain a flawless sonic coverage. We aimed our design to compliment the extremely talented riders’ energy, and deliver the soundtrack smoothly to the audience without taking from their performance.’
The audio side of the project saw eclipse put its d&b audiotechnik inventory to use. The VIP platform and main grandstand were covered using eight d&b J series stacks. These were a combination of four J-Tops and a single J-Sub per stack. The two smaller grandstands required four d&b V Series ground-stacks, consisting of four V-Tops and one V-Sub per stack. The various stacks were all controlled by the d&b R1 remote control software.
Away from the speakers, a DiGiCo SD9 mixing console was paired with a MADI-Rack and a pair of D-Racks. As the DJ booth was located 100m away from the audio control, the new Neutrik Xirium digital wireless audio system was put to use.
The visual side of the project saw more than 15m of roe 9mm LED screens to broadcast the live feed from the Red Bull X-Fighters camera team. Hundreds of metres of cable were laid throughout the arena for the audio and data networking needs of the event.
‘It was a pleasure doing such an adrenaline infused event, mainly because I had a wonderful team and enough time to setup properly and as always, with d&b, the results were simply amazing,’ concluded Mr Shaheen.