CASE STUDY
The Queen's Jubliee
Platinum Party at the Palace
Buckingham Palace • UK
Collaborators + Partners
About
Client
The Queen's Jubliee
Year
2022
Reach
13m+ Viewers
Context and Brief
In January 2022, the BBC commissioned us to form part of the core design team to create the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations at Buckingham Palace. We were commissioned to conceptualise, design and create the visuals for the Platinum Party at the Palace, including the projection-mapped visuals for Buckingham Palace, LED screen visuals and broadcast graphics for the entire celebratory weekend.
We made it our mission to create the most incredible show the Palace had ever seen and pushed the ideas, design and tech in every way possible to create the most incredible experience for thousands of people around the Palace and millions worldwide.
It was an opportunity to let our imaginations go wild, and we’re so grateful to the BBC and the various artists we worked with for giving us this creative freedom to bring the Palace to life.
We wanted to tell our Queen’s story, raise environmental awareness, connect the nation (and world) and throw the biggest party at the Palace.
Services
Projection Mapping
Visual Design
Creative Direction
Project Type
Live Show
Broadcast
Cultural Exhibition
Approach
Creative Vision & Art Direction
Our creative vision and art direction captured the spirit of HM the Queen, her vibrance, strength and positive influence through a balance of classical-meets-contemporary. We took great inspiration from HM’s styling over the decades. We utilised a range of design styles to create many moments throughout the show, combining hand-made and artistic aesthetics with big 3D moments that gave the illusion of depth on the Palace.
There were so many memorable moments within the show:
We created a luscious garden that grew all over the Palace architecture, we poured liquid platinum over the Palace with Alicia keys, we collaborated with Sky Magic on a drone-and-projection-show for Sigala and Ella Eyre, we swung disco balls around the Palace for Diana Ross, we dug into an incredible amount of archive footage for the Prince of Wales’s speech and for Duran Duran we peeled back 70 layers of wallpaper from the Palace inspired by Her Majesty’s amazing styling over the years.
Related
Design for Broadcast
We also designed and created the broadcast graphics for the weekends’ BBC programmes including the Platinum Party, Platinum Pageant and Service of Thanksgiving at St Paul’s Cathedral. We created a sophisticated introductory title sequence which featured a fly through the metallic 3D logo and archive footage telling the story of the Queen’s reign.
Technical
Implementation
From a technical perspective, we utilised a vast range of tools, techniques, software and hardware to create the show, from scanned textiles and hand-drawn illustrations to 2D and 3D motion design and VFX in rendered and real-time software.
We utilised the power of Unreal Engine and Notch to create many of the bigger 3D renders to combat large resolution render times and develop a level of flexibility. Big ideas came with immense technical challenges but through our own pre-visualisation software built with Unreal Engine we were able to see our visuals on the Palace from multiple perspectives, light and weather conditions. Once we arrived at the palace, it was almost a case of pressing go. This also gave us a tool for collaboration with Julia Knowles (camera director), as we could take the positions of the broadcast cameras way in advance of the show and create depth-illusion moments that worked from specific broadcast camera locations.
Lighting
Working with lighting designer Nigel Catmur, we created a beautiful synergy between lighting, projection and LED. We also made many ‘architectural lighting looks’ on the Palace with our projection, rendering virtual lighting within our 3D software to then project onto the Palace.
This was used mostly during the show from 8 PM – 9:30 PM before the full projection show began to give a little life and sparkle to the Palace. Nigel could then control colour and intensity to suit his lighting through these earlier moments of the show.
Outcome
After the success of the Platinum Party at The Palace, we were approached again by BBC Studios to form a big part of their design team and conceptualise, design and create projection and screen visuals for the Coronation Concert at Windsor Castle. We were honoured to be a part of the design team for yet another Royal event that would be seen in over 100 countries around the world, with the event attended by 20,000 members of the public from across the UK. We were so focused on creating an equally spectacular show to the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations the previous year but wanted to find a range of creative approaches that would take the visual identity somewhere new from the Queen’s Jubilee, so we took a lot of inspiration from HRH’s watercolour paintings and formulated a more artistic and illustrative approach where possible. The concert was a celebration for the King and a chance to highlight the patronages and causes close to the King’s heart.
Thanks to
Everyone at BBC Studios for your trust in us and a special thanks to:
Mark Sidaway (Executive Producer)
Cheryl Ko Pearson (Series Producer)
Julia Knowles (Camera Director)
Matt Flint (Creative Director)
Jerry Reeve (Choreographer)
Nigel Catmur (Lighting Director)
Steve Sidwell (Musical Director)
Sky Magic (Drone Show)
Stufish Studio (Stage Design)
Creative Technology (Technical Partner)
And everyone else involved
Team
Tom Bairstow (Executive Producer / Director)
Alice Ryland (Producer)
Lydia Caplan (Lead Designer)
Florian Lecoq (Lead Technical Artist)
Motion Design Team:
Emile Frederick, Sean Bone, Liam Gilheany, Dana Couling, Dan Richards, Dan Wise, Duncan Tune, Jamie Marshall, Arthur Broome, Luca Brenna
Image Credits
NorthHouse
BBC One Footage
Hannah McKay
