In July of 2019 I was approached by Xite Labs about building a fifty foot wide falcon for their Diriyah – UNESCO World Heritage Site Inauguration project. Having previously built a one hundred foot wide falcon as well as a one hundred and fifty foot wide falcon I accepted the challenge as I knew this would be an extremely easy project to complete. Just kidding…
This was one of the most challenging projects of my life as well as the first time I’ve ever built anything that was going to be ‘puppeted’ by a team of people while being projection mapped in real time as they performed with it. This would also mark my first experience working with carbon fiber as well as my first time traveling to Saudi Arabia to help with a show that the King and Royal Family was going to be attending. No pressure..
Press
Falcon Facts
There were 6 separate pieces ultimately tracked by the D3 Media Server as individual ‘objects’
2 solid pieces for each wing – ‘Inner Wing’ and ‘Wing Tip’
Each of these pieces actually built as 2 ‘parts’ which were bolted together once onsite
8 total parts built for the 2 wings
Each inner wing is 36.82 cubic feet and measures 7’4″ x 8’4″ x 1’2″
Each wing tip is 43.86 cubic feet and measures 15’10” x 7’9″ x 1’2″
Each ‘Wing’ (inner wing + wing tip) once fully assembled is 80.69 cubic feet and measures 23’3″ x 8’4″ x 1’2″
Both wings once fully assembled are 161.38 cubic feet and measure 50′ x 8’4″ x 1’2″
1 solid piece for the ‘Body’ body/head/feet –
The head is 7.01 cubic feet and measures 2’11” x 3’4″ x 2’2″
The body is 62.97 cubic feet and measures 3’11” x 9’8″ x 3’5″
Each foot is 1.7 cubic feet and measures 1’1″ x 6’5″ x 9″
The main body once fully assembled is 73.38 cubic feet and measures 3’11” x 12’9″ x 3’8″
1 solid piece for the tail –
Tail is 4.8 cubic feet and measures 5’1″ x 5’8″ x 11″
The fully assembled Falcon is 239.56 cubic feet and in its resting pose it measures 50′ x 18’3″ x 3’8″
The total weight of the fully assembled Falcon is 420lbs based on weighing the pieces prior to shipping
Each cubic foot the Falcon occupied weighed 1.75lbs
24 people puppetted the Falcon to bring it to life
There were an estimated 80 people who traveled to Saudi Arabia and were onsite specifically for the Falcon
There were many factors that came into play when deciding how I was going to turn the simple, 3d mesh model of a Falcon that I was looking at on my computer screen into an actual, real world object. The most important one in this case was weight.
A lot of the initial design process involved me using Rhino to figure out the total volume of the individual pieces as well as putting together a spreadsheet of various materials that included their corresponding weight per cubic inch/foot. Once I had this information I was able to create a few different designs and figure out pretty quickly whether or not they were viable options based on how much each of the pieces would weigh. Besides factoring in the weight of different materials another main focus of mine was to build the Falcon to match the initial 3d model I was given by the team at Xite as closely as possible. It was my intention for every single facet, edge, and vertice that existed in the 3d mesh to be just as sharp and clearly defined in the finished product.
After researching a few different materials including aluminum and foam someone at the studio randomly mentioned carbon fiber. Three days later I was standing in front of a shop table with some carbon fiber fabric, a quart of epoxy, a piece of foam, and a piece of corrugated plastic. After a few layers of carbon fiber, a couple coats of epoxy, and some curing time I was left with some very promising results. One of which included a ¾” thick piece of EPS foam from Home Depot that a person could now stand on when setup as a bridge between two paint cans.
Everyone was impressed with the results, myself included. 3mm coroplast with 2 layers of carbon fiber applied to each side was not only lightweight and ridiculously strong but the materials were easy to obtain and manufacture which allowed me to have much tighter control over the fabrication process as everything could be constructed in-house at XiteLabs instead of adding additional people and processes to the equation. This solution also allowed me to get the perfect, crisp edges, and facets I was after while also providing plenty of space internally for all of the wiring, batteries, electronics, and hardware that was needed to make this work properly. Another advantage of this method was that it was very forgiving. If something needed to be adjusted or redesigned (which definitely happened..) it was simple. Cutting out piece ‘A’ and replacing it with piece ‘B’ wouldn’t have worked very well if I was dealing with giant pieces of EPS foam that were coated with epoxy.
In addition to handling the design and engineering for this project I was also tasked with speccing, sourcing, and ordering all of the various hardware, parts, and materials that were needed to complete the fabrication process. Some of these parts lists are shared below for those who are interested in learning more.
Once I had most of the wing design figured out I created a 3D model of the warehouse where fabrication was going to take place. This allowed me to get a better idea of how big this Falcon actually was while also figuring out how the pieces would be able to fit during their construction. One of the first issues I ran into that needed to be figured out was what I was going to use as the work surfaces needed for building the frames. I was researching different tables, sawhorses, table leg systems, and even looked into renting stage decking temporarily but all of these options were extremely expensive, especially when you factored in all 21 of the 4’ x 8’ work surfaces that were going to be needed in order to utilize every square inch of warehouse space efficiently.
The solution to this problem became obvious eventually – design and create them myself like everything else. Each table consisted of three 4’ x 8’ sheets of wood. Two sheets of ½” OSB that were CNC cut and used as the legs / base and one sheet of ¾” MDF which was used as the tabletop. The design was similar to the waterbed frame I remember putting together when I was younger which consisted of slotted pieces of OSB that fit together easily without any tools yet was still able to support the weight of a giant bag of water without issue. This solution ended up costing less than half as much as all of the other options I had looked into while at the same time providing the large, sturdy work surfaces that were needed for the actual fabrication of the frames as well as the manufacturing of the carbon fiber coroplast sheets which the individual frame pieces were to be waterjet cut from.
In order to construct all of the carbon fiber frames I ended up adding ‘legs’ to all of my wing ribs (frame pieces that run front to back) that would be chopped off once the part was completed. With all of the legs added to the parts I then arranged them virtually in Rhino on a 4’ x 8’ sheet of ½” MDF and performed a boolean subtraction of the feet from the MDF sheets. Once the CNC shop finished up I was left with simple building jigs which held the parts securely in their precise position. This helped to make the fabrication process as simple and foolproof as possible.
Almost all of the individual pieces needed to construct the skeletal frames were designed with various notches and channels so that they would interlock with one another similar to the OSB table frames. This meant that as long as the pieces were placed in the their correct positions and lined up with one another as shown in the drawings that everything would naturally align itself. This allowed the fabrication team to focus on more important things – like applying epoxy to the joints to ‘glue’ everything together as well as the cutting and installation of the various reinforcements and cross members that were needed to get rid of some of the flex that was occurring early on.
What exactly this ‘glue’ was going to consist of was an unknown at first and took a fair amount of research and testing to figure out. The first idea I had was to order some empty caulking tubes, a tub of epoxy, and some plastic mortar bags (used for squeezing grout between brick or tile). I knew right away when all of it arrived that this was not gonna work. I didn’t even bother trying to fill an empty tube. Bad idea. Moving on. My next stop was Home Depot where I grabbed a tube of two part concrete repair epoxy. This held my two original test pieces together extremely well. The only problem was that this epoxy had a gritty, cement like texture which was obviously not ideal. I was headed in the right direction though “cement epoxy…there must be other kinds of that” and there was. One whose name I was familiar with – Hilti. Their HIT-RE 500 epoxy proved to be the magic formula I had been searching for. ‘Can be applied underwater’ ‘reasonably quick cure time’ ‘smooth texture’ ‘concrete strengths up to 13,000 psi’ ‘holds cement buildings and bridges together’ SOLD. I ordered a couple dozen tubes of epoxy along with a couple of their oversized HDM dispenser guns and we were off to the races. This product ended up being very easy to apply, cured quickly…but not too quickly, and was also stronger than anything I had imagined was possible. Everything about it was perfect for this project.
There were two rehearsals which took place. The first one was at Walt Disney Studios Sound Stage 2 in Burbank, CA and started on 9/27/2019. This was one of the only sound stages in Los Angeles that was large enough to accommodate the Falcon as well as all of the BlackTrax IR cameras which were mounted to truss towers and positioned exactly as they would be once set up onsite for the show. The puppeteer team started out with just the wings at first which ensured that they were dealing with a manageable weight load until they were better acquainted with their new, feathered friend. While the puppeteer team focused on maneuvering the wings for the first time I was focused on making sure that they understood how the pole and pin system actually functioned so they could raise and lower their positions smoothly without damaging the pin assembly that lived on top of their puppet pole. It was an easy system to use properly but just as easy to use improperly if no effort was made to push the pole to the left or right side which ensured that the assembly swiveled back into its correct position before it was raised or lowered. If this didn’t happen you ended up with gimbal lock essentially which resulted in bent parts as well as a lot of extra stress on the pin receptacles.
The easiest way to understand the following is to make sure you have watched at least one of the very short ‘Rotary Latch Testing’ videos which has its own tab near the top of the page (directly above the design drawings) The standard use for these latches is security doors that can be unlocked electronically. Once the open latch receiver (part of rotary latch) is pushed into the striker bolt (part of door frame) it catches it and ‘locks’ by mechanically trapping the striker bolt in place until it is released either electronically or mechanically. In the case of the Falcon these were used originally because the plan was to have the Falcon break apart into its individual pieces at the end of the performance. While this was a cool idea in theory we realized pretty quickly that simply puppeting the Falcon was a big enough challenge on its own. We only had one Falcon and it needed to stay alive long enough to perform at the show. Adding additional complexity and opportunities for failure to something that already contained plenty was not worth the risk we decided.
The Falcon no longer breaking apart didn’t mean that the rotary latches weren’t already a functional part of the design however. In fact they still worked perfectly as a simple way to quickly connect and disconnect all of the pieces that made up the fully assembled Falcon. The center pivot point of each wing as well as the tails pivot point were each created out of two of these latches which functioned as a detachable hinge system – one which could withstand a significant amount of force yet easily be disconnected with the push of a button. I also used two of these latches to attach each of the wings to the body, which was something I would soon figure out wasn’t going to work very well.
‘Tunnel vision’ would be the best way to describe what led me down the path of a decent sized design failure. One which I had the pleasure of being able to share with everyone at the Disney rehearsals when it became time for the Falcons maiden flight. What had happened is that my thinking and design approach had been confined to a box without me even realizing it. One made of carbon fiber, epoxy, and rotary latches. What should have been a precision manufactured assembly made out of aluminum from the very start was instead beginning as mix of various carbon fiber pieces, a 4” OD carbon fiber tube, more rotary latches, and some drawings to make sure that my fabrication team cut and assembled all of it correctly before applying a large amount of epoxy to turn all of it into a single, solid piece.
When the puppeteer team attempted to lift up one of the wings connected to the body for the first time all it took was a very small amount of movement and CRUNCH !
The wing hadn’t even moved more than a few inches. It was an instant failure that was very loud and apparent to everyone at rehearsals. After a few seconds of surprised silence Greg from XiteLabs asked me “what was that?” and I calmly replied “it just broke, this design isn’t gonna work. I have to make a new one”
My response didn’t do much to get rid of the sudden vibe of concern and worry that had filled the room however. What was supposed to be a rehearsal featuring a fully functioning Falcon had just concluded with a loud CRUNCH. The Falcon had to be on a plane to Saudi Arabia exactly 22 days after rehearsals wrapped no matter what. We were running on a tight timeline and fabrication had already fallen behind schedule prior to the rehearsals. The concern was completely understandable which is perhaps why my appearance of calmness and lack of concern over what had just happened seemed to cause additional concern. The thing is I already knew before they lifted up the wing that it wasn’t even going to make it into the air. I had come to this realization rather quickly once fabrication of the original wing rotation shaft was completed (the night before day 1 of rehearsals). It was a bad design and there was nothing I could possibly do to resolve it until rehearsals were over. I knew it needed to be completely redesigned so I chose to stay focused on the many other things I had to get done in the meantime. Besides that I already had the second design pretty much all figured out in my head as it had a lot of similarities to the original only I was using aluminum and welding instead of carbon fiber and epoxy.
Even though my design had failed in spectacular fashion and the fully assembled Falcon wasn’t able to take flight as originally planned, the rehearsals ultimately ended up being a success in every other way possible. We were able to verify that the BlackTrax system, tracking, and projection all worked as intended. The puppeteer team had the chance to become familiar with the handling of the pieces as well as the maneuvering of the puppet pole system, and we were able to figure out all of the other issues that needed to be addressed now that we finally got the chance to see everything in action. By the time rehearsals wrapped I was left with a nice sized to-do list. In addition to the new wing rotation assembly I had to come up with there was a whole laundry list of additional parts and pieces which needed to be fixed, adjusted, reinforced, repositioned, redesigned, and recreated.
To-Do List After Rehearsals
Problem 1:
‘Wing Rotation System’ design failed
⅜” Threaded rod is not an adequate solution
⅜” threaded rod was held in place by carbon fiber assembly which was not suitable for the amount of torque generated by each 23’ wing. This is what failed during rehearsals.
Rotary latches introduced an additional point of possible failure to a critically important connection point.
Solution:
Design and build a new ‘Wing Rotation System’
Create the whole assembly out of precision parts that are cut out aluminum and welded to exact specifications.
Replace ⅜” threaded rod with 2” OD aluminum tube – this is designed as an assembly that will fit in each wing once existing design is cut and removed.
Use heavy duty cheeseborough truss clamps to secure wings to rotating body assembly. Applying silicone paste to the tube and not over tightening clamps will ensure pieces are fastened securely while still having the ability to rotate smoothly.
Problem 2:
⅜” solid rod ends used for puppet pole pin tips are bending.
Solution:
Cut pieces of thick walled pipe to slide over threads. Pipe gets compressed from both ends once the nut is fastened back into place which provides extra rigidity.
Problem 3:
The ⅜” ball pin receptacles available from manufacturers’ catalog are not designed for heavy-duty use. They are bending and will end up failing.
Solution:
Design my own pin receptacles that are heavy duty.
Use small lengths of thick walled pipe with ⅜” ID welded to laser cut ‘steel ring flanges’ with a 4 hole bolt pattern.
Machine out a small amount of the core on top of the pipe to allow ball pins to expand.
Weld extra thick washer on top of pipe as a ‘cap’ which prevents the ball pin from further travel once inserted.
Laser cut a 5” OD ‘aluminum donut’ from ¼” aluminum whose ID matches the ‘steel ring flanges’ (approx 1.5”) and contains the same 4 hole bolt pattern. 5 hole bolt pattern around OD edge. This will be used as the ‘base donut’ for pin receptacles and is seated against the ‘pin support pads’ which are made out of ¾” foam with 4 layers of carbon fiber on each side.
Laser cut a 5” OD ‘aluminum donut’ from ¼” aluminum with a 4” ID. Same 5 hole bolt pattern. These will be used as the ‘top donut’ and will be tightened down which fastens the pin receptacle assembly into place by compressing the ‘pin support pad’ in between each of the aluminum donuts
Problem 4:
Original number of ‘pin support pads’ was based on a predetermined number of puppeteers.
Original placement / position of ‘pin support pads’ was based on the preferred position of puppeteers and the ideal amount of space preferred between one another.
Positions weren’t ideal for equal weight distribution.
Wing tips are a lot of work for the puppeteers and the toughest part to maneuver.
The two ‘pin support pads’ and corresponding pin receptacle locations underneath the front of the main body are too close together and don’t provide enough lateral stability for puppeteers.
The tail needs to have two puppeteers instead of only one in the center.
Solution:
A meeting with the XiteLabs team.
Work together to figure out new positions based on the various problems discussed above as well as the feedback and suggestions made by the puppeteers during Disney rehearsals.
Have the fabrication team create more ¾’ foam carbon fiber blanks to be used for new ‘pin pad receptacle’ locations.
Leave the current pin support pad locations that will work and use again. Remove if in the way.
Have the new ‘pin support pads’ waterjet cut to their required shapes – include the center hole and 5 hole bolt patterns that match the aluminum donuts.
Install the new pin support pads on the underside of the various frame pieces
Problem 5:
The acrylic grommet plates that are mounted to each ball pin receptacle and sit flush against the inside of Lycra projection skin are breaking.
Solution:
Design these pieces out of a single piece of aluminum with 90 degree bends on both sides that form the mounting tabs.
Timeline
07/25/2019 – First carbon fiber test pieces are completed and chosen as the fabrication material for the Falcon
08/15/2019 – CNC Work table design is completed. Wood is ordered and CNC shop begins cutting
08/21/2019 – All of the work tables have been assembled and setup in warehouse
09/12/2019 – Construction of first wing pieces begins using the building jigs
09/28/2019 – First day of Disney rehearsals
10/02/2019 – Disney Rehearsals completed. First day back at the studio. Need to design a new wing rotation system, reinforce puppet pole pin assembly, and reposition/add additional pin receptacles.
10/15/2019 – All of the metal needed to construct the new wing rotation system is ordered
10/21/2019 – XiteLabs full Falcon rehearsals take place. New wing rotation design is a success. The Falcon can fly.
10/24/2019 – All Falcon pieces are loaded into shipping crates, and loaded onto a truck to be shipped to KSA via air freight.
11/04/2019 – Board flight. LAX to RUH
11/06/2019 – First arrival onsite in KSA. Begin unloading crates and setting up the Falcon workshop
11/19/2019 – Originally scheduled show day – postponed because of rain
11/20/2019 – Show Day
Walt Disney Sound Stage 2
Walt Disney Studios – Sound Stage 2 ‘The Julie Andrews Stage’
Burbank, CA
Size: 130′ x 240′ (31,200 sq. feet)
Height: 40′
“Constructed from 1947 and opening in April 1949, Stage 2 is the second oldest soundstage on the Walt Disney Studios lot, and at 31,000 feet (9,400 m), one of the largest in Los Angeles. It was built and financed between a joint agreement between Walt Disney and director Jack Webb, who used the stage for the filming of the television series Dragnet. In October 1955, Stage 2 began production on the first series of The Mickey Mouse Club. From 1954 to 1955 and prior to the opening of the facilities at Glendale California, WED Enterprises (now Walt Disney Imagineering) occupied soundstage 2 to build multiple attractions for Disneyland, including the Mark Twain Riverboat. Since then Stage 2 has been used for filming of multiple attractions for Walt Disney Parks and Resorts.
During the filming of Armageddon the filmmakers discovered the 40 feet high tall stage was not tall enough to hold one of the asteroid scenes in the film. The floor was removed and an additional 20 feet was dug down to accommodate the 360-degree set for the scene. In 2001, soundstage 2 was dedicated to English actress Julie Andrews, because parts of Mary Poppins and parts of the then-current filming of The Princess Diaries took place inside this particular soundstage.”
The second rehearsal for the Falcon took place in the parking lot behind XiteLabs 19 days after the rehearsals at Disney had concluded, and 3 days before the Falcon had to be loaded onto a truck and brought to LAX so it could arrive on time in Saudi Arabia. This one was for all the marbles. There wasn’t any time for additional adjustments or the creation of a new design if something didn’t work properly. Everything had to work exactly as it was supposed to or there would be no Falcon. While I could tell that others were visibly anxious over this big moment I was once again relaxed. What wasn’t relaxing was everything it had taken to get to this point since the rehearsals had finished up at Disney. Instead of being worried about anything at all I was instead feeling a huge sense of relief.
I had made it. The team had made it. We crossed the finish line in time. I knew my design was going to work flawlessly. There was no way it couldn’t as far as I was concerned.
After a few practice lifts of only the Falcons body and inner wings everything was working great.
This was it…
Each of the Falcons 16’ wide wingtips were latched into place. After getting everyone into position with their puppet poles the count began “1……..2………3 ! “ and up it went. No longer content with being stuck in a nest all day our gigantic baby Falcon had successfully completed flight training and was now soaring the skies for its first time ever.
Everything worked.
Perfectly.
The BlackTrax system, which would be responsible for accurately tracking the Falcon as it moved began as a meeting between myself, the team at XiteLabs, and a representative from BlackTrax. One of the animators had placed 3D markers on the 3D Falcon mesh in all of the locations needed to ensure that there would be at least three of the IR LED’s visible to the Sensor Lens IR cameras at all times. Each wing piece for example required 3 in front, 3 in back, 1 on top, and 1 on the underside. There was one small problem however which the BlackTrax rep was quick to address – In order for the tracking points to have the most visibility possible they would need to protrude out from the Falcon like a bunch of little antennas. This was especially important for the front and rear edges of the wings for example as it ensured that the IR LED points would still be visible a majority of the time and not obscured by the wing itself as it rotated and moved.
The only logical design solution for this was to make all of the six inch ‘antennas’ retractable. This was achieved by using small pieces of carbon fiber tube and a cable gland which would serve as one of the guides for the tube as well as a clamp to securely hold it in place. The other guide for the tube, which was positioned about 4” back from the tip internally was created out of a piece of carbon fiber that had a ½” ID plastic grommet inserted into it. All of the holes for the cable glands and grommets were part of the design file which meant that they would be precisely cut and positioned. This was ideal as I had to know the exact position of every tracking point in relation to each object’s 3d mesh if the projection was going to accurately line up with the real world pieces.
Once onsite we used rechargeable 10,000 mAh power banks to plug in the USB charging cables for all of the BlackTrax beacons. Even though the beacons themselves were rechargeable they only lasted around 8 hours. By using the power banks however we could now power the beacons for three days straight if needed. This allowed us to set the Falcon up and know that the beacons would remain powered without any issues until it was time to break the Falcon down and bring it back to the workshop, at which point all of the batteries and beacons were removed and charged.
My business class flight from LAX to RUH had absolutely nothing to do with luxury and everything to do with necessity. The 12 hours of solid sleep I was able to get before landing in Istanbul was the longest nap I had taken in months. Once I combined my rest with a few plates of delicious food I was left feeling shiny and brand new. The dirty car with ‘WASH ME’ scrawled across the side that I had started my trip as was now a beautifully crafted machine that sparkled as it made its way out of the carwash tunnel. After landing in Riyadh around 1am and checking into my hotel I was able to get a few more hours of sleep before the alarm went off and the final phase of the Falcon began.
My first thought after arriving onsite around lunch time was “Wow. This is pretty nice” The production village was quite impressive to say the least. Everything was well organized, clean, and there was an abundance of space. This would include the giant ‘Falcon Workshop’ which was now the Falcons new home as well as mine. The shipping crates with all of the Falcon parts, spare materials, and tools were there waiting for us and so we began the task of unloading everything so that we could get all of it set up and organized in the workshop.
Everything was going smoothly until we started pulling out the finished wing pieces which had been assembled, shrink wrapped, and carefully surrounded by furniture pads prior to leaving Los Angeles. It turns out that the crates had arrived a few days before we did and were left sitting in the same spot once they were dropped off. This spot provided zero shade though and the crates ended up being baked by the hot, desert sun all day at which point they ended up cooling down significantly each night. This caused the corrugated plastic that comprised the core of the carbon fiber parts to heat up so much that some of the front wing caps ended up with significant deformation. This process was aided by the shrink wrap as every time it cooled down it would get even tighter which helped deform the pieces even more. This wasn’t just an aesthetics issue as the front wing caps were also responsible for holding the retractable tracking points in their precise positions, many of which were now anything but precise. This was a problem that would definitely need to be addressed but for now I was relieved to see that no other parts besides the front wing caps were experiencing this issue. The deformed parts were at least small which meant they could be remade easily without requiring a lot of materials to do so. In the meantime with a little heating and warping of our own we were able to make the deformed pieces usable and we got them attached to the front edge of the wings in their correct position using zip ties. The problem was resolved…for now.
After laying everything out and getting the 8 wing pieces all bolted together we were left with the 4 final pieces that would make up the Falcon’s wings. It was time for rehearsals to begin. After some work getting the perch setup and once the rehearsals had started it worked out perfect as it allowed me to spend time on prepping parts for the fabrication of the front wing cap replacements. I was able to have a waterjet and CNC shop in Riyadh cut and deliver the new carbon fiber pieces as well as the MDF building jigs that were needed to begin fabrication. Just because I had gotten to this point though didn’t mean I was actually going to have enough time available to finish all of it.
In my design the front wing caps were able to attach and detach easily using ⅜” threaded Nylon rod and Nylon wing nuts that were used to fasten them in place. All of the batteries as well as the BlackTrax Beacons were going to be mounted and easily accessible behind the wing caps. This was no longer feasible due to all of the ⅜” threaded Nylon rods also bending and warping along with the front wing caps they were holding in place. Fixing all of the bent nylon rod, even if I did get the parts re-made was going to be a lot of additional work. Ultimately Greg and Vello from XiteLabs made the call. We were not going to spend any more time worrying about the front wing caps. We had been able to fix them up well enough to the point that they weren’t even noticeable (especially in hindsight) and it made more sense to get them permanently attached using zip ties and move on. Instead of the BlackTrax Beacons living behind the front wing caps we cut open one of the facets on each piece and created a snap on cover out of a piece of corrugated plastic wrapped in Lycra. This allowed me to reroute all of the stringer connectors to the top of one of the ‘pin support pads’ which was where all of the beacons as well as the power banks we were plugging them into was now being mounted. This ended up working great and was definitely a good call by the XiteLabs team.
This left one last problem that still needed to be addressed however. Since I wasn’t rebuilding the front wing caps I was now left with IR tracking points that were still out of alignment. Somehow I needed to figure out what the new positions of my tracking points were so that I could provide updated positions to the D3 Media Server. They had to be accurate. After spending all night taking various photos which included climbing a ladder to try and get good top down photos I came to the realization that this wasn’t going to cut it. No matter how close I was able to get the pictures and 3D model to line up there were still many discrepancies. It was around 5am or so when the idea of having someone laser scan the Falcon entered my mind. I wasn’t at all familiar with the actual process, hardware, or technology of 3D laser scanning at this point. What I was familiar with though is that fact that 3D scanning was constantly being used to obtain an accurate mesh for projection mapping projects, including the 1000’ x 80’ ancient, stone canvas we were currently in the process of mapping. It had to be able to scan a small Falcon..right? The internet search began. Within five minutes I had found a company that offered 3D scanning and the email was sent. Five minutes later a response. I had found a company in Bahrain which could have one of their 3D scanning technicians on the next flight to Riyadh. After waking up the XiteLabs team with many text messages I was able to convince them pretty quickly that this absolutely needed to happen. This was the last piece of the puzzle and it needed to fit perfectly..
The 3D scanning technician ended up arriving onsite around 11am. Six short hours after I had thought of the idea. Not bad. Within a couple hours he was on his way back to the airport and I was left with a bunch of 3D meshes of my Falcon parts as well as what could only be described as a newfound obsession with 3D laser scanning. One which would lead me to purchase the exact same Faro Focus S150 laser scanner that he had shown up with less than a month after getting back to the states.
It’s easy to look back now and realize that 3D scanning should’ve been the plan all along. Not only to obtain accurate tracking point positions but also as a way to compare the finished pieces to their corresponding meshes so I could adjust them accordingly. Better late than never though. Now that I had everything I needed I was able to head to the hotel and get some rest before I had to be back at midnight for our last night of calibration and fine tuning of the BlackTrax system as well as the projectors. We had 18 hours until the final rehearsals were scheduled to start and everything had to work perfectly as this was the last time our Falcon would be able to fly before it’s final flight at the show. Even more importantly though we only had around 6 hours until the sun came up at which point everything involving projectors would be coming to an end whether we were ready or not. To say that things were ‘running down to the wire’ would be a fair statement. This wasn’t exactly unfamiliar territory though. Not for me or anyone else I was working with which I’m sure played a part in all of us being able to work together to successfully complete everything we needed to before sunrise. We had overcome many different obstacles to arrive at this point, one of the biggest being weather.
I knew it was going to get cold at night in Saudi Arabia but I wasn’t expecting a steady stream of thunderstorms and water to accompany it. “It’s not supposed to rain in the desert!” I thought to myself, all the while it continued to rain…and rain…..and then rain some more. As a matter of fact it rained so much that the original show date ended up being canceled and moved forward one day. Every time it would start to downpour everyone would have to rush to cover up all of the BlackTrax Sensor Lens cameras with plastic bags as they were not waterproof. Even though they wanted to get them covered up as quickly as possible they also had to be careful to make sure they didn’t move the camera or bump it or a time consuming calibration process would have to take place in order to realign the tracking system. Meanwhile over in Falcon land things would have to be quickly disassembled and carried up to the shop at least a couple different times leading up to the show as a sudden downpour would once again start drenching everything.
The problem we ran into with the Falcon was that it was wrapped in Lycra which started to get heavy pretty quickly once it became saturated with water. We ended up purchasing a bunch of space heaters which we would spread out underneath all of the wet pieces each night helping to dry out the lycra skin. Adding to the rainy fun was the long path which needed to be navigated in order to move the Falcons pieces between the Falcon workshop and the stage perch. This path wound its way up a hill, around many obstacles, as well as through thick, slippery mud on a few different occasions. Even with all of these challenges the team managed to carry the Falcon back and forth many, many times as it went through many different rehearsals without incident. This was ideal as there was no backup Falcon we could’ve pulled out of a rack to swap it with. Although we had all of the materials to mend a broken wing or even completely rebuild a part if we needed to it would’ve been unlikely that there would’ve been enough time to completely build, and replace a large part of the bird had something been severely damaged in an accident. Everyone who handled the Falcon was well aware of this fact and thankfully we were able to make it through everything without any issues at all.
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I am text block. Click edit button to change this text. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Ut elit tellus, luctus nec ullamcorper mattis, pulvinar dapibus leo. This is where all of the cool stuff I have to say about my projects is going to go. It is going to go right here – exactly where these words currently are except I am going to come back later on and write new words that actually make more sense than these words. These words that I am talking now are nonsense and I am just jibber jabbering so that I can fill up this empty space and see what my text is going to look like once I come back and write new words that make sense.