Christie and partners to demonstrate Virtual Projection

LAS VEGAS - CarbonBlack Technology has joined forces with a collective of broadcast industry heavyweights to demonstrate a fully integrated virtual production solution, where CarbonBlack’s screen technology and Christie Virtual Projection™ together enables the first true multi camera projection based broadcast workflow. The industry-first solution combines CarbonBlack’s unique screen technology with Christie projection, Vizrt real-time rendering with Viz Engine 5, Marziani Labs’ innovative speakers, Disguise technology, and WePlay Studios’ cutting-edge virtual production technology stack including the likes of RED Digital, Zeiss, Evertz and StYpe. The result is the first projection-based virtual production setup that enables multi-camera filming for broadcast applications to be publicly demonstrated and will be on show at NAB on booth CL3 in the Las Vegas Convention Center from April 17-22.

The new virtual production solution brings together industry leading technology. CarbonBlack’s nanotechnology-based Hybrid RP surface delivers deep blacks, vibrant color reproduction across the BT.2020 gamut, controlled light behavior, and seamless, pixel-free imagery without moiré artefacts, creating a cinematic and natural visual response that integrates convincingly with live subjects. Christie Virtual Projection is centered around Sapphire^® 4K40-RGBH projectors that enable frame mixing for multi-camera rendering. Viz Engine 5 is a powerful real-time graphics compositor and renderer developed by Vizrt. It is designed to streamline the creation and distribution of high-end live graphics across multiple platforms, including traditional broadcast, corporate, social media, and immersive environments. The system enables seamless, low-latency integration of photorealistic Unreal Engine environments with data-driven Viz Engine graphics within a unified workflow, allowing operators to use the most appropriate tool for each component while maintaining full control over the final composited output. Marziani Labs’ newly launched speakers rely on Artificial Superintelligence to deliver laser-accurate audio dispersion with uniform frequency balance from their planar architecture. 

WePlay Studios is responsible for the full real-time rendering ICVFX system architecture, enabling a theoretically unlimited number of independently tracked camera perspectives to be rendered simultaneously, as well as for the overall system integration and delivery. This includes the assembly of render nodes based on HP Z workstations equipped with NVIDIA GPUs and AJA and Matrox video I/O, and a custom-engineered, fully configured pipeline built on Vizrt technology, tailored specifically for projection-based virtual production workflows. 

This collaboration establishes projection-based virtual production as a viable, scalable, and cost-efficient alternative to LED volumes for multi-camera broadcast workflows. It creates a fully functional multi-camera filming workflow within a projection-based virtual production environment, a capability that has not previously been achieved at broadcast production standards. Overcoming ambient light has always been a challenge for these systems in the past, but CarbonBlack’s breakthrough in ambient light absorption has eliminated this limitation, enabling a new class of projection-based workflows and creating a powerful tool for the broadcast industry.  

The technical capabilities of the workflow make the solution compelling, but the overall result brings more to broadcast facilities. The industry-first solution offers financial and environmental benefits over conventional LED volumes alongside the unique technical advantages.

For production facilities making the comparison with green screen setups, the new virtual production solution offers savings in post-production time and expense. Equally, talent can see their environment in real time and perform to the conditions they are in, helping them to deliver a more believable performance and making this a more practical solution.

“We’re excited to partner with such innovative brands to bring this cutting-edge solution to life,” said CarbonBlack Technology Co-Founder and CEO Alexandra Robinson. “This marks a major step for CarbonBlack as our screens enter the virtual production market and solve challenges that were previously unachievable—particularly around ambient light control and on-camera realism. Together, we’re pushing broadcast technology forward and can’t wait to demonstrate this new workflow at NAB.”

Booth CL3 in the entrance lobby to the North Hall will be home to the solution, providing interactive demos of the projection-based multi-camera virtual production with real time rendering setup during the four exhibit days of NAB. 

To register for your free show floor pass, use the code: NS015660.