I believe in Father Xmas

fame at last...
Yep, I really did dress up as santa to star in the projections for Hotel Cafe Royal

Bi-Cyclic Existence

My first major gig doing onstage visuals was at the Town & Country club in Kentish Town for the promoter.
Headlining were a band I’d never heard of - Gaye Bykers On Acid
Post show I was quickly asked if I wanted to join them on tour and before I knew it I was on Stewed To The Gills - my first Rock tour. Since then I’ve worked in 56 countries on countless shows - Johnny Cash, Sting, Bowie, Elton John, Duran Duran, The Orb, The Prodigy, Chemical Brothers, Pet Shop Boys, Radiohead, Aphex Twin.
25 years later and I find myself back at the same venue with the same band and still loving it like it was the first time.
In case you were wondering, I used resolume for playback. The old byker vids had their audio replaced with a metronome click which resolume picked up with it's automated beat looper, so I can get it to play video samples that loop to the beat. I then midi mapped the playhead for each clip to a rotator, so i could scroll to any point in the movie then set it all to randomise, which is how I got some of the guitar solos up on screen at the right time.. next time, I'll put in some goto points so I can hit solos and chorus bang on.. it was worth all the effort as I had the time of my life and best of all, I was home by nine… lol

Gaye Bykers On Acid

25 years later and it seems like no time at all.
I turned up at the first show of the tour and had a fantastic evening.. Loved every minute of it.
Hope I don't have to wait another 25 years to see them again.

Not quite home yet

It's planetarium time again. 

This time up in the wilds of Quebec. 

I get to spend a few days winding down from Duran by the St. Laurence Seaway in splendid isolation...

Tempted to just stay here ....

The Ending




Duran USA, 19,485 miles, 50 shows, 96 days.

It's done. 

We all leave the tour fulfilled and with an enormous sense of achievement. It's been a genuine privilege to be a part of such an incredible experience. 

I can almost feel it now, like the first chill of Autumn.
The ache when you say goodbye to people whose lives you have touched, knowing it will be at least years and maybe never until next time.
The moment when you are totally alone in the dark under the stage with the band playing above you and you know that any day now, you’ll be back in the UK and it will all seem like it was a dream. But what a dream! UK, Italy, USA/ Canada 3 times!!! - and they pay me to do it! I get paid to make people happy!!

Fame & the back of my head

Yup you guys can only dream of being as famous as the back of my head..

Just another day at the office

Chas & Dave

First Baby Metal, now the East End's finest as support...
Oh my, what a weekend we have in store.

Bucket list fiasco

Well of course, it all made such perfect sense, having dreamed as a 14 year old of riding a Harley Davidson Electroglide through the vast American Mid-West back in that council house in Nottingham.
So without hesitation I booked a Harley on my day off in Vegas and headed out into the desert.
Now then, what is it that we know about the desert? Ah yes, it never rains.
But it seems that Hail Stones aren't included as you can see from the leopard skin pattern bruises I have as a souvenir of riding into a desert hailstorm at 60mph. Confident it would only last a few seconds I pressed on, only to be pelted with ice cubes the size of grapes for a further very long 3 minutes.
If that wasn't enough, the Electroglide proved to be a dreadful machine to ride. Fine on the highway, a total nightmare around town.

Sod this bucket list nonsense...

Roadie Fridays

Touring - 

I left my hotel room, got in the minibus, checked into the airport, changed planes twice, took another bus to the next hotel and checked into exactly the same room. 1100 miles apart and even the tea bags were the same. Roadie Fridays can be very disorientating.
You finally go out and almost everywhere is closed, or empty.
Never mind, show tomorrow..

Niagra Falls

Rack Building

Once again we are configuring our video devices ready for the coming Duran Duran world tour.

A day at the races

More fulldome - this time at the racecourse in Doha.
The Bobboes were beautiful.

The line up from hell

A relatively simple task.. lining up 8 projectors with blends on a flat screen.  Luckily I dodged the bullet on this one and it was the French projectionist who had to deal with the utter chaos caused by the venue manager turning on the AC halfway through the show, thereby moving the screen 4" out of place and destroying the perfect line-up.

Souq Waqif

Despite the best efforts of the migrant workers and ex-pats, we managed to put together a cracking Fulldome show for the Children's Festival in Qatar..

Duran Live

Gig Review

pic by Ozzie

Duran Duran

Loading in for the UK tour today!

Assassins Creed

3 days at Pinewood Studios on standby as stand in assistant to the assistant Projectionist.

Paris Attacks

Thankfully, good friend and long term Tour Manager for the Orb Steev Toth, escaped unharmed from the tragedy that befell the Eagles of Death Metal gig in Paris last week where he was working.
Glad he's ok, devastated by the events in Paris.

Music Cube

What indeed could be more perfect than a gig where you can't hear the band.
Behold the Sennheiser Music Cube.
Now if only we could figure out a way of keeping them in there forever....

IAS

Yup, it really was 4 days at East Grindstead at the Church of Scientology.
They were having issues with their projection systems, not anymore of course...

I have to say, for all their bad press, these guys were an absolute joy to work with. Wonderful people.

Versus Versace

An interactive sound activated in-store installation, designed and programmed by deepvisual.

New Showreel 2015

deepvisual Showreel 2015 from deepvisual on Vimeo.

More from The ORB

It's Fulldome Time!

While you can buy a fulldome alignment system these days, it's around $60,000 cheaper to ask me to do it for you.

The Orb WXSW tour

Rudimental

Rudimental at the Paaspop festival. PTZ cams by you know who.

One-eyed Jack

Something happened that shouldn't.
I copped a high power laser in the eye at rehearsals and spent the next 5 days looking like a pirate.
Luckily the damage wasn't serious.

Rack Building

One last afternoon of quiet before its off to Production Rehearsals and once more the whole summer will be over before you know it in a blur of loading bays, truck stops and sleepless nights..

Moonbuilding

The Orb are back, with a live preview of their new album Moonbuilding at shows in London and Lisbon.

(photo Tom Wall)

Node @ RCM

Every once in a while the most amazing opportunity comes along and the chance to work with synth supergroup Node at their first live performance for 17 years was just too good to miss.

It was an absolute joy to work with such wonderful people and the next morning I felt as though I had been elevated to the lower pantheon of Projection Deities.. yup, I was that high!  and just on the buzz from the show...

Node

Node Live

Synth supergroup Node are returning after a 17-year hiatus to perform a gig that will see them using "the largest collection of vintage analogue synthesizer equipment ever seen outside a recording studio" at the Royal College of Music in London.

Ultrawide Projection

Two ultrawide panasonics providing a 7m x 3m HD image from 2m away.
Not bad huh?

Xmas season

Just when you thought it was all over until next year... It's party time, for everyone else anyway. For my sins, I got to construct an audio reactive EQ just before the band came on..

A voodoo doll for H&S

Health & Safety Nightmares.

It doesn't have to be this way.

There wasn't even a problem.

We had a truss rated at 4000kgs and a 30kg screen. But the venue insisted on 'paperwork' to show that the truss could 'safely' take the 30kg load.

So the screen lay on the stage for over two hours while we all waited for H&S to be appeased.

The knock-on effect of this was the event being cancelled half way through due to a very simple problem that would have been immediately spotted had not so much time been wasted during the day over nothing.

Xmas @ T5

A comical moment when the Airport's media dept became a little over-protective about their design remit when I asked them what font they used. Maybe they were worried I might open my own counterfeit airport a few miles down the road.
Anyway, it looked great ( of course) and the client was delighted - as usual.

Post Tour-matic stress

yet again, the overwhelming silence and the novelty of being in one place for more than two days at a time. Throw in some unshakeable jet lag and you can easily find yourself up at 3am plotting the next round of visual mayhem. After all, it's just a matter of time...

The Orb - 25th Anniversary Tour

All good things must come to an end ...

and so we finally come to the last few shows and the Grande Finale of the Orb 25th Anniversary tour.

We started in April 2013 and just kept on going right on into Oct 2014

Almost anything can happen during the course of 18 months on the road and this time was no exception. High drama, high jinx and mucho mayhem came to pass, but we came out of the other side with all our fingers and toes and sense of humour still intact.

The band have played some blinding shows and have consistently delivered solid sets to delighted audiences..

.. and the visuals weren't that bad either...

Tomato Factory - Santorini

A perfect venue at a holiday island, but dreadful weather pushed the gig back a day. All the same, deepvisual & long term cohorts Insight Lighting delivered a flawless projection onto the old Tomato Factory at Vlicharda Beach, Santorini..
As you can see below, a good line up slide takes all the hard work out of projection mapping.

I had spent most of my time there wondering where the volcano was, so you can imagine my surprise when the plane finally took off and I saw the 12km wide Caldera of which the whole of Santorini is a small part of.

Product launch - Lagos Nigeria

16 screens amid the chaos of an African TV show. One of the  projectors failed 5 minutes before showtime and we had a replacement up, working and mapped within 15 mins...
My first time working with Arkaos Media servers.. can't see me rushing out to buy one anytime soon, but they work and that's what counts...

Fuji Rock - 2014

Fuji Rock - 2014 and another blinding show by The Orb

Years & Years

The new 'Years & Years' promo required a particularly tricky projection mapping, so who else to call in but deepvisual. A fun day running around a disused pharmaceutical factory in East London was had by all.

Halo - brought to life

deepvisual were asked to bring a video game character to life for a corporate conference in the US.
Needless to say, we handled the tight deadlines and the tricky brief and brought in a first class product.

You won't get a medal for it...

Whenever I see someone being reckless at work, I remind them that crew don't get medals for bravery..
However, that isn't always the case. Here is my medal from The Transit Kings - for their only ever live performance headlining at The Big Chill.

Bombay Sapphire - world's most imaginative bartender

Yup, one of the odder gigs for deepvisual, doing cameras at the world's most imaginative bartender competition. It was a fluid affair and a joy to participate in.

The Orb - Rainbow Serpent Festival - Australia

"If there was a performance that you wanted to catch, it would be ambient house pioneers The Orb, who celebrated their 25th anniversary at Rainbow. With stunning visuals flying out of the LED screen behind the duo, their show was an eclectic, cinematic, and purely captivating journey"

from beat.com.au

Shakespeare's Birthplace

But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?

It's 2 x 20k Christie Roadsters and a Dataton Watchout system, projecting a Xmas montage onto the Bard's birthplace..
Much ado about deepvisual!

In fact, so much ado, we made it into the Guardian - top UK Xmas lights

The Orb - Hebden Bridge

"The visuals are hypnotic and beautiful. The rippling bass lines shift smoothly and almost imperceptibly, pulling you into the music. You are drawn in so far that it’s almost like a rude awakening when a number comes to a close."

from gourmetgigs.com

The Orb - Chicago

The Orb - 25th Anniversary tour of America

The Orb US tour is of to a cracking start with a series of amazing West Coast shows.
Details on The Orb website here: 

Orb vs Lee 'Scratch' Perry at NuMusic Festival Stavangar

First ever live showdown between the Giant of Dub and the Giants of Ambient.
Sat Sept 7th - NuMusic Festival Stavanger

Bad weather results in cancellation of Orb show in Edinburgh

A deeply disappointing cancellation. The Orb tried to get the gig moved to a different stage in the park, but in the end H&S closed the entire site. Luckily no one was hurt, but an unfortunate start to the 25th Anniversary Tour.