WDS 2022
While poor weather conditions including dust storms and high wind speeds forced the cancellation of the grand opening ceremony and some of the planned aerobatic displays, some unique attractions generated high levels of interest at the recent World Defense Show (WDS) held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia from the 6th till the 9th of March.
Protec was entrusted by its client, WDS, with the full theatrical & stage management along with complete scenic, staging and technical production of the opening ceremony and a ‘command & control centre’ experience for this inaugural edition of the expo.
Eddie Andradé who project managed the opening ceremony and the ‘Command & Control Center’ explained, “We ploughed through various challenges and had everything set up and ready, including four mobile 12m x 7m mobile LED screens, scenic elements, audio, seating stands, live cameras, pre-filmed and edited video content and of course days of rehearsals to get the opening ceremony together but the weather gods just weren’t interested. It was a real shame we couldn’t go ahead with this show,” he said. Eddie added, “We did, however, proudly deliver all the shows for the command & control centre experience which was well-received by all the stakeholders of WDS and the visitors to the expo. This was a unique theatrical production with an intense intermingling of technical content and live performances. The conceptual design and AV solutions were designed by our technical director, Nick Groves, who topped his own incredible creative talent and technical expertise. Talent like his, along with the dedication and hard work of the entire Protec team both, on and off-site, constantly fending off various challenges, made this production the success it was and quite memorable.”
Spanning across an 800,000 sqm site, the World Defense Show featured three large exhibition halls, outdoor exhibit spaces, dedicated demonstration and display areas, a purpose-built 3km-long runway and space for static aircraft displays. Some 600 defence and security exhibitors from 42 countries, took part in the expo, which was set up by the Kingdom’s General Authority for Military Industries, and 80 military delegations from 85 countries also took part.
Standing out from the displays, and one of the shows unaffected by the weather, was the first-of-its-kind ‘Command and Control Center’, a dedicated interoperability demonstration area that Eddie mentioned earlier. With shows that ran up to five times per day, this interactive, immersive, and real-world C5ISR Command & Control Centre experience featured a theatricalised 30-minute audio-visual spectacle, combining live actors with highly engaging advanced virtual environments and constructive simulations. The theme for the world defence show was ‘interoperability’ between the major defence services in any given location – air, maritime, land, cyber and space. The ‘command-and-control centre’ concept was the perfect avenue to bring these services together in one place and highlight how they work together in dealing with a given scenario.
Housed in Protec’s SUPAdome, the ultra-realistic future all-domains Command and Control concept, where Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) algorithms employing super-computers operated alongside more traditional operational data manipulation technologies, captured a ‘12-hour period of a national response’ when confronted with an imminent ‘strategic crisis’, simulating the future of interoperability at the highest levels. The show itself involved 31 actors and 3 stage management crew along with a director and producer and 9 tech crew, led by Nick Groves.1 test
While poor weather conditions including dust storms and high wind speeds forced the cancellation of the grand opening ceremony and some of the planned aerobatic displays, some unique attractions generated high levels of interest at the recent World Defense Show (WDS) held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia from the 6th till the 9th of March.
Protec was entrusted by its client, WDS, with the full theatrical & stage management along with complete scenic, staging and technical production of the opening ceremony and a ‘command & control centre’ experience for this inaugural edition of the expo.
