James & The Giant Peach – Giant Screen Broadcasts for The City of the Unexpected
What a challenge — and what an incredible event to be part of. For The City of the Unexpected, staged by National Theatre Wales, Bubble Production delivered a truly giant-scale broadcast: six enormous screens across Cardiff, a live moving procession, three OB trucks, two jib cranes, six static cameras, three roaming cameras, satellite links, dozens of crew, and miles upon miles of fibre and HD-SDI cable.
The production was epic. But the biggest challenge wasn’t scale — it was mobility.
Relaying the Moving Procession Live Across Cardiff
Our main task was to capture the street procession and feed it live to the central OB unit, where it could then be distributed to screens around Cardiff Castle and the wider city centre.
The screens themselves were easy — each received the feed from our server via hard-wired internet connections. The real test was the procession.
Enter ‘The BEAST’ — Our Mobile Vision Mixing Buggy
To keep the live mix moving with the performance, we built a mobile solution affectionately named The BEAST. From the back of our buggy:
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One camera was hard-wired
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Two additional cameras operated via short-range RF links
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Each link normally handles around 600m — but not today
With over 35,000 spectators gathered around the castle alone, RF interference was severe. Our radio-linked cameras, normally reliable over long distances, were restricted to about 30 metres due to the sheer volume of mobile devices in the area.
Bonded 4G Under Pressure
The next challenge: sending the mixed program feed from the buggy back to the castle. Bonded 4G was the only viable option — but with tens of thousands of phones competing for signal, would it work?
Thanks to smart engineering, clever kit, and some carefully developed IP workflows, we found a workaround. Yes, a few minor blips appeared — momentary flash frames — but no worse than what major broadcasters were experiencing using similar systems on the day. In fact, some big names struggled more than we did.
We had to transmit those images back up to the castle. The only cost effective way was going to be bonded 4g. Enter problem number 2… With the huge crowds and just about everyone having a phonein their pocket, was it going to work? Due to some clever bits and bobs of kit, our IP and a lot of research we found a work-around. Yes the picture blipped a few times but these were momentary flash frames, no worse than any other major event. We did see off the competition though, as we were aware that some of the major broadcasters were having problem with their bonded LIVE systems.
A Giant Production for a Giant Story
Despite the challenges, the final result was a massive success — a city-wide live broadcast for a spectacular theatrical event. From giant screens to mobile vision mixing, it was a production of epic scale and a reminder of what’s possible with the right team, technology and planning.
Could we do it again?
Absolutely — if your project demands something ambitious, give us a call.