Norway’s projectiondesign may not be travelling to the cosmos, but they are an integral part of next-generation space exploration and travel, supplying its F35 wqxga projectors to a mission-critical facility responsible for space launches on behalf of the US government.
Based in Centennial, near Denver, Colorado, the facility is run by the United Launch Alliance (ULA) – a 50-50 joint venture between Lockheed Martin and The Boeing Company. As the nation’s rocket company, ULA designs, builds and launches Atlas and Delta launch vehicles, and provides reliable, cost-efficient launch services for the Department of Defense, NASA, the National Reconnaissance Office and other commercial customers.
“ULA’s Centennial facility is responsible for program management, engineering, test and mission support, with the keystone of the headquarters being the operations and support launch center,” explains Brian Seid, managing director of Centennial-based Xcite Audiovisuals, LLC, the systems integrator on the project. “This is where engineers and executive staff oversee all of the data required to complete successful launches and missions. It is an integral part of ULA’s operations.”
Prior to the new facility being commissioned, the AV design and specification for the room was drawn up by a leading industry consultant, Howard Steele of Technology Plus and fundamental to the project was the requirement for extremely high-resolution projection in the DOSC operation center. “The projectiondesign F35 wqxga is the world’s highest-resolution single-chip DLP projector, so in this kind of application it really gets to show what it can do,” continues Seid.
The finished installation sees six projectiondesign F35 wqxga projectors, each firing at its full WQXGA resolution of 2560 x 1600 pixels, delivering images to a pair of huge 417-inch wide, custom Da-Lite screens via Jupiter Catalyst Fusion video-wall processors.
“This was a real benchmark project that marked the first time so many F35 wqxga projectors’ had been used together at full resolution,” adds Seid, whose company was also responsible for programming the room’s Crestron media control system, as well as testing and verifying signal paths and resolution capabilities throughout. The company is also responsible for maintaining the system in the post-installation phase.
Anders Løkke, Marketing Director, projectiondesign, comments: “All of our projectors are built with complete reliability and technological integrity in mind, and the ULA operations center in Colorado is a perfect example of an application where these qualities come to the fore. There are millions of dollars at stake every time this center plans a mission, so failure is not an option.
“We are delighted that our ultra high-resolution F35 wqxga projector has been chosen for such a ground-breaking project, and also to have worked with an integrator capable of such high levels of support and attention to detail as Xcite Audiovisuals, for whom no challenge has proved too great.”