Ross Video Assists in Augmented Reality Workflow for Canada Day Celebration

Every Canada Day (July 1), a TV special is produced and transmitted by Canada’s national broadcasters and seen by millions of viewers around the country. This year, Canadians from coast to coast were invited to take part in an array of virtual celebrations to express their national pride, resilience, and unity during this most challenging of periods.

The annual TV extravaganza always features the best Canadian variety acts, both established and up-and-coming, but yesterday’s show also featured a technology first: the first time that the Canada Day show has used Augmented Reality (AR) as part of its workflow. To make this happen, show designers Lűz Studio and production partners Rec4Box turned to Ross Video and, more specifically, the Voyager graphics rendering solution.

“Voyager from Ross is a cutting-edge solution that is being used for the world’s most high-profile awards shows and live productions, and we knew it would be an ideal fit for the Canada Day event,” says Jonathan Fortin, CTO at Rec4Box. “We’re extremely proud to have played our part in bringing this visual feast to TV viewers across the nation on this important holiday.”

Based on the Unreal engine from Epic Games, Voyager enables content creators to produce hyper-realistic animated graphics for virtual studio or augmented reality applications. In terms of the show, the producers used Voyager to bring an additional level of creativity to the presentation of the various acts, with animated graphical elements being integrated into the physical sets to make each performance even more visually impressive.

“With this technology, which is mostly used in sports events, we were able to put on an interactive show and a virtual decor allowing all artists to be brought together, from coast to coast,” says Matthieu Larivée, Creative Producer and Partner at Lűz Studio. “The augmented reality allows us to convey a whole range of emotions and create a unifying event, dealing with the current context.”

The full Canada Day broadcast is available to watch online here.

“Ross may have offices around the world, but our headquarters are here in Ottawa and it’s very gratifying to be able to contribute to a program that is seen by so many Canadians,” says David Ross, CEO of Ross Video. “I’m really happy that our solutions helped make this year’s Canada Day program extra-special, and I hope everyone enjoyed the show as much we did!”

Password must contain the following:

A lowercase letter

A capital (uppercase) letter

A number

Minimum 8 characters

;
SVGLogoHR_NOTAG-200

The Latest in Sports Video Production & Technology
in Your Inbox for FREE

Daily Email Newsletters Monday - Friday