The 18th Asian Games Jakarta Palembang 2018 opened on Saturday August 18 with a spectacular Ceremony as Indonesia welcomed Asia’s top athletes to Jakarta and Palembang.
At the capital’s Gelora Bung Karno Stadium, 40,000 spectators were entertained by an opening ceremony that featured cultural performances and pyrotechnics on what is understood to be the largest scenic built for an opening ceremony; a 120m-long stage in the shape of a towering mountain with a waterfall and a simulated Volcanic eruption.
Featuring in its second Asian Games, Sydney’s The P. A. People supplied the Communications Systems under the watchful eye of U.S.-based production company, FiveCurrents.
The opening sequence of the Ceremony showed a video of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo on his way to the opening ceremony. The President was seen to be stuck in traffic, but he got out of the car and took a motorcycle to get through the traffic.
On the way to the stadium, the President weaved the motorbike through Jakarta’s small roads. As he reached the stadium he waved to the audience and then moments later appeared in the VIP box.
“We have been in Jakarta since early June, and the opening sequence of the show depicts a scene which is commonplace,” said PAP Head of Department and Project Manager Campbell Waller. “The traffic is something that does take some getting used to,”
Jakarta also has a notoriously busy RF environment, with the stadium being in the heart of 9 million people; RF was very busy and challenging. With The P.A. People’s wealth of experience and RF filter design the company worked with FiveCurrents and the local regulator to provide a high quality solution with very limited frequency separation. The system design included 24 half duplex base radios and 24 simplex base radios interfaced to the matrix intercom frame, along with 600 portables with a wide range of accessories
The P.A. People provided an extensive ClearCom IP-based wired communications system for the Ceremony. The system featured a pair of Eclipse HX Omega matrix frames with both native Dante and MADI connectivity, and around eighty V series lever and rotary Key Stations. The matrix system was supplemented with ClearCom Helixnet digital partyline beltpacs for follow spots and mechanical operators in the mountain, and an integrated ClearCom FreeSpeak II system to support the stage management team. The full duplex FreeSpeak system provides full stadium coverage, including all vomitories and selected back house areas, as well as coverage for an additional 15 packs in the rehearsal venue 500 meters from the stadium
For this project (and for the Venue Intercom Systems at Pyeongchang earlier in this year), the team have been trialling the new V1.5 firmware release for the FreeSpeak II system.
“The coverage in this environment is amazing,” commented Campbell. “It is a great improvement”.
Another aspect of the system was the Cast In Ear Monitor system. Given the RF environment a decision was taken early to use an out of (commercial) FM band solution. The P.A. People supplied 5 channels of transmitter 6000 receivers, and 12,000 earpieces for the cast.
The P.A. People supplied a significant Event IT solution to assist the FiveCurrents team with the delivery of the event. The team supplied and deployed:
- 35 x WiFi Access Points distributed across the site including BOH areas such as Props and Catering
- 40 x Network switches and a High Availability network core
- 5km of Fibre optic cable
- 17 x UPS systems for backup and protection
- 1 x 60 GHz link to Rehearsal venue
The P.A. People’s solution in Jakarta was rounded out with a 10-camera EyeCue CCTV system. Ten Bosch and HikVision full HD cameras, six additional inputs from broadcast, the rehearsal venue and a weather station, as well as Lenovo 21” all-in-one monitors and an Exacq server package provided technical operators and stage management with the vision they needed to provide safe and accurate decisions.
“The team from The P.A. People have again acquitted themselves well on a show that could not support all the bells and whistles. The team and system has been in integral part in assisting FiveCurrents deliver another spectacular Ceremony”, noted Nick Eltis, the show’s Technical Producer. “We look forward to working with them on another project soon.”
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