Hive, a company specialising in media control systems and software, has shared details of its project to power the iconic Dragonfly installation at the 2025 Glastonbury Festival, UK.
The 13-metre-wide audiovisual creature in the Arcadia field is constructed around a repurposed military helicopter, and brought to life with perfectly synchronised projection mapping, LED playback, and lighting.
The Dragonfly is a collaboration between Arcadia, Cucumber Productions, Video Illusions and content creators Astral Projekt, and this year included its first full deployment from Hive. The installation was driven by the company’s new Beeblade Nexus media engines and supporting range of sophisticated software tools, designed for projects that combine both creativity and intricacy.
Energy efficient system
The decommissioned Sea King helicopter that forms the body of the Dragonfly offered an extremely unusual projection surface, with irregular curves, protruding features, and a small footprint which made standard video mapping techniques challenging.
Additionally, the sculputre’s LED ‘eyes’ and face illumination demanded perfect synchronisation between projection, lighting and real-time visuals.
Hive supplied six Beeblade Nexus units housed in three robust Nucleus enclosures, arranged across projection towers on each side of the structure and inside the Dragonfly’s head. This solution provided a lightweight, energy-efficient and cost-effective alternative to the former rack-based system.
Dave Green, Hive’s CTO, says: “With Hive, we were able to replace an energy-hungry server stack with compact players that delivered the same, if not more, capability – but using far less power and at around a fifth of the cost.”
This approach reflects Arcadia’s sustainability ethos. The Dragonfly is fully powered using renewable energy provided by Grid Faeries, and Hive’s low-power architecture aligns with the large-scale show, which is a leader in green festival production.
Making high-end tools accessible
The Dragonfly’s complex video layering and transparency effects were powered by the Nexus boards, which each supported dual 4K60 NDI inputs with alpha layers. This was crucial to manage the real-time feeds created in Unity and TouchDesigner by Astral Projekt, flawlessly blended with a pre-rendered, time-coded 10-minute show sequence known as the ‘Arcadia Dragonfly Show’.
Hive’s software, notably the Obj Map and sophisticated mapping capabilities, made this installation stand out.
Several techniques were combined to meet the needs of the design, including:
- Obj Map tool. This mapped content onto the hexagonal LED ‘eyes’ with spherical accuracy, importing UV-mapped geometry files created in Blender.
- Pixel Map Page. This new feature was used to control Art-Net LED components for the Dragonfly’s facial illumination.
- Timecode support. Hive’s reliable timecode function connected Dragonfly’s 10-minute programmed sequence, and provided elegant playback for pre-rendered animation to the LED ‘eyes’ and all projection surfaces.
- Warp Grid tool. This tool delivered real-time warping and projection mapping onto the fuselage and tail.
More than 200 individual LED panels were mapped across the Dragonfly’s spherical ‘eyes’ using Hive’s sophisticated Obj Map tool. This provided pixel-perfect alignment on this extremely complex curved surface.
This combination of tools is usually only available for high-end media systems, and is now far more accessible thanks to Hive’s streamlined, easy-to-use platform.
‘Rock-solid media server setup’
Hive collaborated closely with Arcadia’s technical production team and long-term partners Cucumber Productions and Video Illusions from the outset to ensure the technology reflected Arcadia’s creative vision. Its solution seamlessly managed both the pre-programmed show and real-time content throughout the festival weekend, powered entirely with renewable energy from Grid Faeries and using minimal equipment.
“It was a real showcase of what Hive can do – as a platform, as a product and as a
team. I’m proud of the result and grateful to our partners for trusting us with such an
ambitious piece,” says Green. “It’s still probably one of my favourite visual installations of all time. It just looks otherworldly – like something from an alien planet.”
Ben Vaughan, director at Cucumber Productions, says: “I couldn’t have been happier with how things have gone. As well as making the eyes on the Dragonfly, I was lucky enough to fill the role of Head of Video on the Arcadia stage.
“This year, I specced Hive media players and I couldn’t be happier with how things have gone – in no small part thanks to the team there. Huge respect to Mark Calvert [Hive CEO], Dave Green and Nigel Sadler [Hive chief pollinator] for making everything run so smoothly.”
“It was great to have a rock-solid media server setup at FOH, running dual 4K NDI feeds with alpha, delivering content smoothly and consistently every night,” says Cyrus Bozorgmehr, head of creative comms at Arcadia.
“The lightweight equipment meant it was installed quickly with a minimal footprint, avoiding the usual load-out and truck logistics you’d expect with traditional server stacks.
“The Hive system ran content seamlessly to our eight double-stacked projectors, keeping everything precisely mapped and aligned in a busy 360-degree environment. It also powered our custom transparent LED video screen – made of over 200 tessellating hexagon panels – which formed the head of the Dragonfly and the DJ booth. Dave Green and Nigel Sadler from Hive were great to work with, and it was a pleasure to have them on board.”
Hive looks forward to contributing to further editions of the Dragonfly, and working together once again for Glastonbury 2027.
Recently, Hive announced the expansion of its workforce with five new positions. The company welcomed Rory Jervis as sales director, Ciaran Abrams as lead developer, Danielle Hastings as customer service executive, Alex Couzins as marketing specialist, and Nigel Sadler as chief pollinator, a newly established role focused on enhancing partnerships and promoting Hive’s vision.
