BASHIBA IMMERSIVE ENTERTAINMENT .:. INTERACTIVE LIGHT SHOW.

www.splashespa.ch
www.bashiba.com

When BASHIBA was asked to design the lighting and sound effects for Europe's newest WaterPark, "Splash e Spa", we wanted to respect the unique properties of the dome, permeable to light and resonant to sound. Rather than fighting against the natural light entering the dome’s membranes or the reflections of the pool illuminations on the dome, we worked with them transforming for example the latter into the magic of northern lights, or developing them into a storm with flashes and heavy rain.

"This domed building impressed with its design and construction quality, and in particular with the clever lighting of the three domes which in the early morning and evening creates a magical atmosphere inside and out."
At night, the artificially lit membrane shining in darkness, reminded us of a living organism, a structure that breathes. By activating the "wave pool", the light reflections on water added the dynamic lighting effects that we wanted. Similarly, we used the existing sound of the water being pumped away from the sides of the pools (pink noise) as a relaxing sonic backdrop and natural base, and we then added on top the intriguing sounds of whales, so that the people in the pools could imagine to be swimming with the gentle giants of the deep. For our solution, it was important that such effects should support the activities and wellbeing of the guests of the waterpark. This also meant that the different areas of a same space, used in part for excitement (e.g. the wave pool), in part for relaxation (e.g. the pool bar), needed to be shaped in parallel, creating specific immersive zones in which people could enter, also emotionally, into different worlds.




The way we can best intervene in such spaces that are not a white canvas, but have specific characteristics and which are animated by the people using them, was to design the lights in real-time. We wrote custom code in vvvv, a real-time programming environment, and we picked two Enttec cards (ODE and MK2) to connect our computer to the Stageline DMX512 Mergers, so that we could control the lights of the dome and the two pools without interfering with the preset scenes that were programmed using a Compulite Vector and controlled via a Crestron touch screen. With our setup, we could rapidly test multiple immersive spaces, create interactive scenes so that we could experience dynamic changes, and then immediately select what felt right for the waterpark.