With total album sales topping 12 million and more than 35 million singles sold, Imagine Dragons continue to soar – and the Las Vegas band’s epic live gigs no doubt play a significant part in its swift ascension into ‘arena filler’ status. Last year witnessed the four-piece thunder its way through North America, wowing fans on the first leg of its Evolve World Tour which started in Phoenix, Arizona and is scheduled to conclude in Kiev later this year.
This opening stage of the global outing, in support of the band’s third studio album Evolve, comprised 31 North American dates and SRae Productions – owned and operated by Sooner Routhier and Robert Long – used a trio of Hippotizer Boreal Media Servers to control a stunning array of 30 LED pods. Mounting the pods on a brace of automated Axis the SRae team used four projectors to shoot on to physical roll drop units.
Above: Imagine Dragons:The Evolve World Tour, photo credit: Todd Moffses
The three Boreals – two active, one acting as back-up – received location data via PSN information fed from Raynok Automation software. Here, Green Hippo’s SHAPE proved invaluable. We really enjoy the SHAPE function of Hippotizer, which quickly aligns and builds the show while utilising multi controller to accept and manage different pieces of information coming into the system. The ability to quickly adjust the SHAPE file while the system is online, and then sending the new file into the system is really handy for live implementation. Matt Geasey, Technical Director of SRae
Above: Imagine Dragons:The Evolve World Tour, photo credit: Todd Moffses
SRae’s Green Hippo machines at the Imagine Dragons gigs were running the latest version of Hippotizer V4, and Matt praised not only the award-winning software – including its Colour Blocks function – but also the ‘human support’ provided by Green Hippo itself: One of our favourite features of V4 is the colour block function in the viewports. We were able to successfully build smooth fades and change the layouts of the blocks, fast, when needed to create different dynamic looks, when the automated pods were in different configurations. I choose Hippotizer because of the support it has behind it. The special projects team, who were involved on this project once we confirmed the design, really helped make the system work when changes were happening during the process. Good team right there. Matt Geasey, Technical Director of SRae
Above: Imagine Dragons:The Evolve World Tour, photo credit: Todd Moffses
From the off, the latest Imagine Dragons show struck a chord. Reviewing the Phoenix opening night at the 18,000 capacity Talking Stick Resort Arena, the Arizona Republic newspaper likened the backdrop’s prism of colours to a ‘modern take on Superman’s Fortress of Solitude’ adding that the sight and sounds during the band’s performance of its 2013 smash Radioactive ‘resembled a volcanic eruption’.
The Imagine Dragons Evolve World Tour continues through 2018. To find out more about SRae Productions go to www.sraeproductions.com.