Christie, the global visual and audio technology company, recently provided its projection expertise for a major cinematic themed ride installation at Legoland Windsor Resort in the UK.
With nearly 2.5 million annual visitors, Legoland Windsor is the UK’s most visited theme park according to TEA’s annual Theme Index Report in 2020. The park regularly evolves its offering with new rides and themed areas, such as Mythica: World of Mythical Creatures, which opened last summer and features 1.7 million Lego bricks.
The focal point is a colourful large building that features The Flight of the Sky Lion, a new anchor attraction. As the UK’s first “flying theatre” style installation, the installation is the main attraction in Legoland’s Mythica land, part of a major £20 million ($27M USD) investment.
Legoland taking flight
The Flight of the Sky Lion towers over guests at 25 metres (82 feet) tall, comprising a gondola capable of 30-degree swings, a 23-degree pitch and even a few degrees sideways movement. Using flying theatre technology, visitors are transported into Mythica below the Sky Lion’s wing, where Lego creatures such as the two-headed Hydra, and Fire and Ice Bird are discovered.
Inspired by the imagination of children, the titular Sky Lion stands tall at the ride’s entrance, meticulously created from 685,530 Lego bricks.
The ride system is enclosed with a huge 20m x 20m (65×65 foot) globular dome with a cut-out at the peak, used to project content onto its concave screen.
The attraction was created by Brogent Technologies and commissioned by Merlin Entertainments. During the early stages of the project, Brogent was able to draw on the help of Christie Professional Services to model lifetime costs for various projection solutions, during which it calculated the lumen requirement to optimise the dome space, offering the D4K40-RGB projector for an optimum guest experience.
The new experience also incorporates interactive AR elements, with a focus on the principles of creative education.
“We were delighted”
Brogent Technologies’ Stefan Rothaug comments on the choice of D4K40-RGB:
“It was clear from the design of the dome that we needed a single projector solution – it was all we had room for. As such, we needed the best possible unit we could find, and that turned out to be the Christie D4K40-RGB. We were blown away by the vibrant colour reproduction, and the advantages of laser over lamp projection have come into their own in a theme park setting.”
“With rides operating ten plus hours a day, and almost 365 days a year, maintenance costs can be considerable – but with laser, there are no costly lamp changes every two to three months. It was our first time using laser projection and it will not be our last.”
Following the successful project for Merlin, a future collaboration is not being ruled out. Rothaug concludes: “We were delighted with the help we received from Christie Professional Services and we will definitely be drawing on their help in the future.”
Earlier this week, Christie revealed that its Crimson and Griffyn Series 3DLP laser projectors have been used to illuminate the new Statue of Equality in Hyderabad, India.
