The brief was to create the impression of a planet above the heads of the audience in the main room of the venue which is a warehouse with high ceilings.
The idea was to suspend a weather balloon in the air and project onto all sides.
Resolume Arena 5 couldn’t handle spherical mapping so Syphon was used to send the output to MadMapper where a 3D sphere object file had been imported to warp/map to the balloon.
A USB microphone was used as a sound input to modulate settings and effects in Arena. This way the textures and visuals on the balloon would respond to various audio frequency ranges.
The result was satisfactory.
The installation took about 8 hours to set up and survived 9 hours of the event at which point it somehow exploded like a supernova! It only missed the last few hours so this wasn’t such a disaster- thankfully it didn’t happen earlier!
Equipment
- 1 x 1.8m white diameter inflatable weather balloon
- String to suspend balloon
- 2 x Projectors (one positioned on each side of the balloon, positioned slightly lower than the mid point so that the seam on the bottom was less visible)
- Ethernet HDMI extender
- Long ethernet cable
- Macbook Pro
- Software: Resolume Arena + MadMapper
Location: UFO Sound Studio Berlin
If you have any questions about this installation you can use the comments section below to ask and I’ll be happy to respond.
TONY
I want to replicate what you have done but with one projector to one side of balloon.
Is it possible to use Resolume – Advanced output – circle?
Where would I find a 3d sphere file?
thanks
Ewan
Hi Tony,
If you just use output circle in Resolume the image will be stretched/distorted towards the edges of the sphere.
In order to achieve the correct warping of the image I sent the video from Resolume to MadMapper where I loaded the 3d sphere (.obj) file which I found online by searching ‘free 3d object files’. Here is the sphere object file I used.
I also did another event but this tine using a PVC blimp which was much easier to work with than the weather balloon (but about 5 times more expensive).
Let me know how you get on as I’d be keen to see!
And if you have any more questions, just ask.
Thanks
Ewan
Robert
I am looking to project from the inside of a 8ft round sphere using one projector with a fisheye lens. Do you think this will work with the software you used? Would you be interested in helping or sending me to someone who would be interested?
Ewan
Hi Robert,
That sounds interesting. Do you want the image to cover the whole sphere or, if not, how much?
I would be interested in helping with this. I’ll send you an email.
Thomas Hunt
Hi Robert,
I hope you’re well?
I’m looking at doing this exact same thing and wondering what your outcome was? Ideally looking to rear project from inside the sphere too.
Thomas Hunt
Hi Robert,,
I’m looking to do something similar with rear projection from inside the cube. Just wondering what your experience was as how many lumens would be essential for this
Jamie
Hey, your project looks really cool!
I’m trying to do something similar. I have a video of the earth which scrolls by on a loop and I want to map it onto a half-sphere (where only the half of the sphere that I’m projecting onto is the visible part of the video).
I’ve got MadMapper setup, imported my video and the sphere object you linked above and for 1 projector it works great, but I’m trying to use two with blending in the middle.
There’s little to no MadMapper documentation and few tutorials that do sphere-like maps.
How did you add multiple projectors all showing a different angle of your sphere? I can’t work it out.
Cheers!
Ewan
Hi Jamie,
Glad you like the project 🙂
I’m wondering why you are trying to use 2 projectors? Do you want to cover the other side of a full sphere?
In my experience 1 projector should cover almost all of one side. So to get full coverage I positioned a second projector directly opposite on the other side of the sphere, and simply projected the same video/footage onto both sides. For a spinning animation it will kinda look like its all one projection spinning in the same direction.
I mostly used abstract visuals so the blend at the edges didn’t need to be super accurate.
I’m happy to help you with your project if you can explain further or have any more questions.
Thanks
Robert
I run a wedding entertainment business and my thoughts were to show picture montages/video from the center of the dancefloor so guest have a 360 view instead of a flat screen. I have had this idea for some time but assume I dont have the know how to do it. i have been looking at projectors and to put a fish eye lens on it but hard to make that investment if I dont know if it would work. I originally thought one projector with a fish eye shooting inside the sphere due to the portability. Then I wasnt sure if I needed special software to make it round for if the lens would do that? As you can see I have a lot of maybes but you understand the concept?
Jamie
Ah! That’s how you managed to do two projectors.
What I’m after is essentially how to do full sphere mapping with MadMapper, using multiple projectors and blending. Then I can just cut that down to 2 projectors covering half my sphere with mapping.
I need to use 2 instead of just 1 as I can’t actually place a projector squarely in front of my sphere as that’s where the audience are. I need to use one off to each side where I have the space. Also the semi-sphere I’m projecting on to is utterly huge so I need each projector turned 90deg (vertical) on each half of the half-sphere to make the image brighter.
Jin
Hey! I’m also interested in something like this but I don’t know how does one do the edge blending(with 2-3 projectors) and calibration for the image to fit the sphere. Would be great if anyone can share some tips 😀