“I could dive head-first into devising a style and creating content.”

On the 13th of October 2018, the biggest names in Trance performed back to back at Melbourne’s Festival Hall. OUTPUT 001 would be the first event of its kind hosted by renowned Australian events company Output. What better way to introduce OUTPUT 001 than with IKONIX’s spectacular HOLOGAUZE?

IKONIX is a growing design and production studio based in Queensland, Australia. Company founders Zachary Burton and Richard Saunders are industry specialists in projection and holographic design. Zachary Burton and Notch Designer Jason Haggerty describe how they designed for hologram in Notch.

“IKONIX have been using HOLOGAUZE on events for a long time but never in Australia for a Music event like OUTPUT”. Zachary wanted to experiment with what was possible on the HOLOGAUZE for the Festival Hall. Their team would work on designing original content inspired by the weightlessness of space: “Borderless pseudo-3D visual effects were the main goal.”

“We instantly decided on using Notch for this project for its flexibility. The ability to change things on the fly would provide Jason creative freedom onsite.” During a four week pre-production period, IKONIX tested over 100 pieces of content. “Being able to rapidly produce high-quality real-time visuals without touching code meant that I could dive head-first into devising a style and creating content. Removing the complexities of programming shaders afforded us the freedom to focus on the creative aspect of content creation with a robust approach to the aesthetics of the show.”

Jason would import Cinema4D compositions into Notch to light, shade and animate in a matter of minutes “Notch’s native support of 3D scenes allowed for compositions to become very complex with relative ease”.

IKONIX developed their Notch content in tandem with custom TouchDesigner UI, which allowed the team to create some unusual animation controllers: “Everything from procedurals and particles to 3D environments, lighting, and layers were controlled via OSC from TouchDesigner”. Integrating these controls with a live audio feed combined the dynamics of real-time animation with the immediacy of audio reactivity. “This workflow was super efficient to implement across the many layers and allowed for a lot of flexibility when it came to performing live. The most surprising element was how well Notch could bounce between complex layers and handle a multitude of OSC channels, including audio, with zero stutter or frame drops.”

IKONIX hypnotised the audience at Melbourne’s Festival Hall with their celestial designs and contemporised hallmarks of trance culture. The show spoke for itself on social media, post-event there was an overwhelming response from the audience applauding IKONIX design work and the HOLOGAUZE.