This dramatic, one-off spectacle will be created using the world’s biggest water screen projector. The water screen, moored especially for this occasion in the middle of the Thames between the London Eye and The Shell Building, will create an enormous vertical screen of water that will extend to 72 feet in height and 100 feet across. Specially created, never to be seen again Watchmen footage, will be projected onto the screen to showcase Dr Manhattan’s translucent and shimmering form in dramatic and gigantic effect – this really will be an excellent and exciting medium to see Dr Manhattan in all his super human glory; and to watch him hover over the city in true Watchmen style!
IESB
IESB
But oh dear. I kind of figured this bit would happen.
I have some small experience of water and smoke projection, and I've got to say, it only ever looks good at close quarters. Otherwise, it's sort of wobbly and lame. It also appears to have been a static image. BAD IDEA. When projecting on water or smoke, particularly at long-distance viewing, it is so much more impressive to go with a moving image - you're at least giving the brain a chance to make stuff up in what it sees. However, admittedly that tends to fall flat on its arse if its windy at all. Have a look at this lovely link from IESB:
IESB Watchmen Thames coverage
One rather big problem is blue. Not a great colour for this sort of projection, as it fuzzes out an awful lot. Check out the crispness of the smiley badge compared to the Dr Manhattan image.
Everyone I know who saw it, and even those I don't know but have spoken to via the wonders of the interbobby, agree if was something of a damp squib. They waited in the cold. A boat sprayed up some water. Some blue light hit it. It stopped. Oh.
See, a few years ago I was freelancing at a company responsible for one of the big marketing activities for the Fantastic Four: Silver Surfer movie. They took the London Eye, placed a pretty darn big image of the Surfer in the centre, and let it spin. It looked pretty good, though looking at it you wish it was a bit bigger (though if I recall, it couldn't be due to H&S issues).
Silver Surfer
He rather spiffingly span as the wheel rotated. Neat idea. Niceley done. Here are some more shots of it:
Close Further Further away still Gosh
Same bit of town, same bit of river. Acheived with much less disappointment.
What might have been more effective visually for this Watchmen activity would have been to gauze the Eye and use a hugely strong projector on that to show Dr Manhattan's image. Or even guerilla it up the Thames, projecting him appearing, disappearing and reappearing on different sizes and types of buildings. Bigger coverage of area, too. He'd've been nice on a Tate chimney.
I guess the frustrating part is I'm really excited about the film, and this activity really let itself down. I'm a huge fan of the comic, and desperately hope that whilst keeping faithful to the look in spectacularly anal fashion, they will still have retained its soul in the film. This event didn't deliver. However, I'm going to the Future Cinema thing tonight, where there will be live-action events and activities, then a showing of the film followed by a punk band (? I guess it's on theme for the 80s at a stretch..). I'm sure that on a more intimate scale and with a smaller overall budget, this will end up being much more impressive. However, I'm not sure how much fun it will be to see some poor sod painted blue. It's cold out.
Will let you know how it is on both counts. There will be waiting in the cold on this one too, sadly.
EDIT: Forgot to show you this. Best over-hyping by a presenter ever: ITN
And here are the Daily Telegraph guys standing in EXACTLY the right spot for it to look good. Hence everyone else's massive disappointment. Telegraph Incidentally, they mention 'specially created footage' which no photos have shown. Hmm. Also, looks like the guys on the boat gave up and did the honorable thing by projecting on a building so others could see...!
Oh, and this: ha
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