Fanta Fest Fires Up Fans with Green Hippo's Hippotizer

	Caliskan used Hippotizer SHAPE mode to preview the LED screen design in its actual size. Photo: Can Karabulut / Gurkan Caliskan

Turkiye's Gen Z-oriented Fanta Fest returned for 2024 to visit seven of the country's biggest cities, with five large LED screens displaying more than 43 million pixels of performer-specific content, all driven by Green Hippo's Hippotizer Boreal+ MK2 media server.

Video designer and programmer Gurkan Caliskan worked with Fanta Fest's technical director Can Besbelli to deliver strikingly different visual content for the range of artists playing each venue, including prominent Turkish singer Tarkan Tevetoglu and Turkish rapper CEZA. Caliskan was given media content from each performer's production team, designed to the dimensions of the LED screens, which he loaded onto the Boreal+ MK2 media server using Hippotizer's Media Manager feature to organize the show.

The LED screens were rigged stage left and stage right and as a backdrop, with two additional LED screens flanking the stage which were mainly used as IMAG displays. The installation of the festival stage was completed by Staras Technical Production, which supplied all stage equipment. "This project was an immersive, easy, and fun programming adventure for me," says Caliskan. "I synchronized the content with the Timecode signal to make it triggerable, which made running the visuals aspects of the show simple -- it's very easy and safe to do these operations in Hippotizer software. Mapping all the outputs into singles and mathematically converting the total frame into the display area ensures zero errors in the content production part. And even if the project was closed for a short time for any reason, the outputs continued to process which is an impressive and excellent development within Hippotizer."

Caliskan used Hippotizer SHAPE mode to preview the LED screen design in its actual size, to decide on the geometric status of the visual contents, and to instantly control the changes. "Before the festival, we had the opportunity to rehearse for five days in a closed venue giving us the chance to watch it in person in Preview, which is a Hippotizer feature that can make everyone happy and excited," he says. "In addition, I used External Timecode, MIDI control, Timeline Plus, Capture Input, and Notch FX, using this to achieve real-time effects along with animation effects, interactive video content with audio, high-resolution special content, camera effects.

"Overall, I love using Hippotizer because it works perfectly in real-time tasks. It is very compatible in terms of software and hardware and its stabilization is at very high levels. The interface is quite easy and understandable and it's great when used for large-scale shows and concerts like Fanta Fest."

Caliskan worked alongside technical director Can Besbelli, who was also responsible for stage design, Salih Aksu on visuals, lighting designer Ilkay Pirgaip and Fatih Aygun as LED operator. Fanta Fest 2024 visited Baskent Ankara, Samsun, Gaziantep, Adana, Antalya, Izmir, and Istanbul.