Nearly 10 years ago, the first ice projections began to appear at major sports venues across North America. Today, the Centre Bell in Montreal, Canada, has pioneered the display of full motion video on the ice rink surface and is entertaining crowds with an enhanced video spectacular thanks to the recent addition of Barco’s HDX-W14 projectors.
AV technology integrator Solotech, working with Barco’s Canadian distributor, SC Media Technologies, configured a system to create the sharpest, most colorful moving images ever seen on a giant sheet of ice. "The Centre Bell’s ice projections are truly the best out there. The WUXGA matrix of Barco’s projectors creates higher-than-HD resolution with no motion blur despite the ice’s highly reflective qualities - a challenge we’ve been trying to overcome for years," commented Solotech’s President François Ménard. "The 360-degree nature of an arena requires minute attention to detail from every angle. The HDX projectors were highly conducive to the meticulous design we needed to ensure the integrity of images from every perspective in the audience."