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Projects / University Town Center
Projects / University Town Center

A season of light.

From our shared portfolio: this project was delivered under the Thunder City Pro name. Original project credits are retained here.

Behind the experience.

Written by Larry Beck of Elation Lighting. See full article here.

The Mall at University Town Center in Sarasota, Florida, is a shopping paradise with over 100 stores and 20 dining options that attracts multitudes of patrons year round. This past holiday season, the mall retired its smaller Christmas experience from years past and debuted a spectacular new holiday light show as incentive for customers to forego stay-at-home shopping and visit the mall instead.

Thunder City Pro was contacted to design the lighting spectacular and turned to the ONYX platform from Obsidian Control Systems to control the massive system. “The client called saying they had a vision to do a big light show but had no idea how to achieve it,” Thunder City Pro shares. “I got the call in August and we designed a complete system - advanced pixels, intelligent lighting, control, hardlined and wireless networking, and automation.”

The lighting canvass, spread across a huge area a quarter of a mile square, included 200 palm trees covered in 1000 pixels each, a 50-ft Christmas tree with 800 pixels, and a 34-ft tree also covered in pixels. Four Elation Proteus Hybrid™ luminaires washed the main Christmas tree in color, along with other wash fixtures, and fireworks were added on some finale shows for an extra burst of excitement. Thunder City Pro put together four unique shows, all about 10 minutes long, which ran every half hour between 6:30 - 9:30 pm, seven shows a night. The official launch of the new son et lumiere took place on November 19th and shows ran nightly through January 3rd.

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University Town Center project, installation and production detail 1
University Town Center project, installation and production detail 2
University Town Center project, installation and production detail 3
University Town Center project, installation and production detail 4
University Town Center project, installation and production detail 5
University Town Center project, installation and production detail 6
University Town Center project, installation and production detail 7
University Town Center project, installation and production detail 8

Inside the project

A coordinated outdoor lighting experience

TCP designed a system of pixels, intelligent lighting, networking and automation for the holiday installation at University Town Center in Sarasota. An ONYX control environment connected those elements across the site. The project brought the individual lighting components into a synchronized seasonal experience.

Planning seasonal show control

Translate the creative sequence into playback, lighting and control requirements. Consider the operating schedule, installation environment and the team responsible for daily checks. Define how the show is started and monitored, as well as how future changes or removal will be handled.

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